# Dear Tivo, I want my IR Blaster back!



## fonewiz (Jul 20, 2011)

Long time Tivo user since first Series 1 Tivo came out. The last Tivo model I bought was a series 2, actually I own about 4 of them but not all on and in use at the moment.

I have watched all the new Tivo models come out over the last several years and always wanted to upgrade but kept hold off.

Finally, I bought a shiny new Tivo Premier a few days ago.

I am VERY disappointed at this point mostly due to all the cable card and tuning adapter issues.

Can someone tell me what the point of a cable card is instead of the original IR blaster setup?

If the benefit is suppose to be eliminating the external cable box then I don't think that was a success, I now have a Tuning Adapter from Time Warner that takes up as much space as the cable box I have in my bedroom.

The installs and problems with this card and adapter so far are horrible and I just fail to see why the IR Blaster method is no longer available.

IR blaster just works and always has. There is no compatibility or install issues with the cable card, no special setup required from the cable company and so on. Tivo just simply changes the channel like a remote would. Arrg...

Just don't get it.

Give me my IR Blaster back Tivo, so far cable card and tuning adapter sucks!

What happens when there is a power outage and I am not home? Do I miss shows because the tuning adapter flakes out or Tivo doesn't see it and something needs to be rebooted? I ask because I noticed when the tuning adapter it power cycled, the Tivo doesn't really see it every time until the Tivo is then rebooted.

So if I am out of town for a week and there is a storm with a power outage, then I miss a weeks worth of recordings because of this garbage setup.

Maybe I just don't understand it all at this point???

Finally, am I suppose to get ALL channels through the Tivo as I do through the Time Warner provided Digital Cable box in the bedroom? At the moment, I am not sure. I saw a brochure that showed almost half the channels from Time Warner as "Not available with Cable Card".

Rant Over..


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## SullyND (Dec 30, 2004)

Would you be happy recording only one channel at a time, and likely not in HD?


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## fonewiz (Jul 20, 2011)

SullyND said:


> Would you be happy recording only one channel at a time, and likely not in HD?


I want the HD but is Cable Card the only way to accomplish that? My TV receives HD from the cable box, why couldn't the Tivo?

Same issue with dual tuner, pretty sure there is a way to accomplish that without cable cards.

But, with that being said, I am truly curious as to what options are gained by using a cable card.

It seems there are a lot of complications but I just may have had some bad luck so far.


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## L David Matheny (Jan 29, 2011)

fonewiz said:


> Can someone tell me what the point of a cable card is instead of the original IR blaster setup?
> 
> If the benefit is suppose to be eliminating the external cable box then I don't think that was a success, I now have a Tuning Adapter from Time Warner that takes up as much space as the cable box I have in my bedroom.
> 
> ...


The cable card was indeed supposed to neatly eliminate the need for an external cable box. Interestingly, many cable company boxes now contain cable cards, and they manage to program those correctly, yet they struggle to get them working in TiVos. Instead of embracing an easier way to do things, they invented the Tuning Adapter as a new stumbling block. So, yes, given the adversarial relationship that cable companies have with their customers, it might be smart of TiVo to again allow use of an IR blaster. I suppose the cable companies could then try to come up with new, incompatible remote codes.


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## rainwater (Sep 21, 2004)

L David Matheny said:


> So, yes, given the adversarial relationship that cable companies have with their customers, it might be smart of TiVo to again allow use of an IR blaster. I suppose the cable companies could then try to come up with new, incompatible remote codes.


IR blasters aren't coming back. No way TiVo is going to advertise a HD TiVo that can't record but on one tuner and not in HD.


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## LoREvanescence (Jun 19, 2007)

L David Matheny said:


> The cable card was indeed supposed to neatly eliminate the need for an external cable box. Interestingly, many cable company boxes now contain cable cards, and they manage to program those correctly, yet they struggle to get them working in TiVos. Instead of embracing an easier way to do things, they invented the Tuning Adapter as a new stumbling block. So, yes, given the adversarial relationship that cable companies have with their customers, it might be smart of TiVo to again allow use of an IR blaster. I suppose the cable companies could then try to come up with new, incompatible remote codes.


I bet their are more likely to go blue tooth, which would render an ir blaster usless. Tivo would need to come up with some thing newer.

But even with that, you could never record over hdmi due to hdcp (high definition content protection). A couple years ago recording hd over component was not possible, it is now. But you would see a loss in quallity since it's analog and the recordings will likely be larger then what's in the cable company's stream. Also, having to have the tivo change the channel on the cable box leaves more room for for possible failed recordings.


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## rainwater (Sep 21, 2004)

LoREvanescence said:


> A couple years ago recording hd over component was not possible, it is now.


It would also mean TiVo wouldn't get cablelabs certification if they wanted to support cablecards. So, basically, they can do it, but TiVo can not longer record HD and only support one tuner. It will never happen.


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## seattlewendell (Jan 11, 2006)

*The primary purpose of cable cards is not to save space. It is to allow boxes like Tivo to record HD. Without it all Tivo can do is record SD.*
That's it, that's the list. Everything else is secondary

When I first saw your post, I thought clearly Tivo community should implement some sort of drug testing. But you came here in earnest so let met try to help.

I remember about 2001 everyone I knew was talking about this great piece of advanced technology called a Tivo. Well I bought one and the IR blaster nightmare began.

Let me say that 25-30% of my recording were botched on a weekly basis. My cable box required 3 numbers to change a channel. Example CBS was 002. Tivo was almost never get the numbers correct. I tried everything; New blasters, the aluminum foil shield. Everything.

I eventually gave up and came back to Tivo once the series 2 came along. I switched to Directv because you could connect the Tivo the Directv box via a serial cable to change channels. Finally the Tivo started to feel like advanced technology and not some piece of junk cobbled together in someone's garage.

Once HD started to explode I spent the money on the DirecTivo box. Great box. Then the series 3 came along, and I switched back to cable, and incountered cable cards. I don't know if they always did this but since 2007 (when I got my Series 3) in Seattle Comcast has given you the option of a truck roll or pick up the cards at their office, and self install. They don't volunteer this info you have to say "I don't want a truck roll". After you pick up the cards, you need to call in to give them the host id, and other numbers and they send the signal.

Since then I have installed 2 premieres. I have never had a problem with my Tivo installs. Period. They have all take about 5 minutes on the phone.

Now I realize that I am lucky that Comcast in Seattle does not use tuning adapters, please do not lump tuning adapters in with cable cards. Tuning adapters are intended to save the cable company money. They don't have to send all the signals to your area. Only the signals currently being used. They are completely unrelated to cable cards.

So if you want HD you need one of two things:
1-A Tivo and Cable company box in one
2-Cable Cards.

Feel free to go back to SD and enjoy your IR blasters. 2001 called they're waiting for you.


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## fonewiz (Jul 20, 2011)

Thanks for the responses so far.. 

I was not aware the dual tuner and HD required the use of the cable card. I guess this is why..

Still my experience so far versus my Series 1 and 2 experience sucks.

I mean, HD and dual tuner is great but not getting half the channels I am paying for, Tivo/Tuning Adapter not happy after power hit etc is not.

I have used the IR blasters with various companies cable and satellite boxes and NEVER had an issue. So, I guess it's all about the luck you have.

I could give a s**t if it's IR Blaster or cable card, I just want it to work.

So far, IR Blaster works and cable card doesn't.

The cable installer that came out didn't have a clue how to install the card or tuning adapter. He called someone else over which sort of had a clue but barely.

They were here on the phone with their tech support and trying to get it all working for about 2 1/2 hours. When they left they said "Well, it can take up to a few days to get all your channels working, call us if it doesn't work by then".

I called Tivo first today and they conferenced Time Warner in, the call lasted almost 2 hours.

In the end, Time Warner dude says I have a bad Tuning Adapter and they will send another dude with a different one. I am not convinced this is the issue.

I started this post because I didn't really get what improvements cable cards brought to the table, while they bring so many problems.

Now I know, thanks for the education.

I don't belong in 2001, I just want my shiny new Tivo and $100 plus per month cable service to work. Is this wrong?

Call me old school, old man whatever but all of my experiences with Tivo prior to this one was just good. I have had many conversations with many friends and family over the years that have resulted in at least 20 Tivos. After this experience, regardless who's fault it is, a new Tivo is not something I will recommend at least not at the moment.


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## aristoBrat (Dec 30, 2002)

fonewiz said:


> I want the HD but is Cable Card the only way to accomplish that?


No. It can also record over-the-air (OTA) high-def from your local stations.



> But, with that being said, I am truly curious as to what options are gained by using a cable card.


For me, cost is probably the #1 advantage.

I have 4 TiVos (two Series 3, two Premiers). That's 8 tuners. Requires 6 cable cards (because the Series 3 needs two cards per unit).

At $1.99/month to lease each cable card, 6 cable cards cost me $11.94/month.
4 tuning adapters cost me $0/month -- they're free.

Your IR blaster solution would require a separate digital cable box per TUNER.
At $7.99/month to lease each digital cable box, and 8 tuners, that'd be $63.92/month for the same capability that costs $11.94/month with cable cards.

I also don't have to pay for electricity to run 8 digital cable boxes in addition to my TiVo, or have to deal with the fact that each cable box will need its own coax feed (vs. 4 coax feeds for the TiVo). Talk about a mess of wiring!

I'm sorry you're having problems with Time Warner getting yours setup and working properly. Once it's figured out and you've used it for a week, I don't think there's really much to complain about.


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## scandia101 (Oct 20, 2007)

rainwater said:


> IR blasters aren't coming back. No way TiVo is going to advertise a HD TiVo that can't record but on one tuner and not in HD.


Why not in HD?
If a cable box can output an HD signal to a TV, it can do so to a Tivo, and if that Tivo can receive an HD signal, it can record and output that signal.


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## dianebrat (Jul 6, 2002)

seattlewendell said:


> *The primary purpose of cable cards is not to save space. It is to allow boxes like Tivo to record HD. Without it all Tivo can do is record SD.*
> That's it, that's the list. Everything else is secondary


I disagree, IMNSHO what CableCARD brought to the table was to eliminate HD encoding needing to be done by the Tivo, you record the digital stream as is and store it without any processing.

The CableCARD when it wasn't being screwed over by TWC, installed by inexperienced techs, and banished to second-class status by the MSOs was a solid technical solution to a ton of problems that Tivo had needed to engineer workarounds for in the analog world previously.

The CableCARD from a functional standpoint works, and once set up properly works surprisingly well. I can only imagine the different world we would have out there if the CableCARD hadn't been waived for satellite, and all but made as difficult to get installed as the MSOs could make it. We'd have a decent encryption key that let us, the consumers make the determination as to what device we wanted to use.


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## danjw1 (Sep 13, 2005)

In the Series 3 forum, there is a dedicated Time Warner thread. You can get useful tips on how to deal with them in that thread. It is a good resource you may not be aware of.


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## rahnbo (Sep 12, 2010)

fonewiz said:


> IR blaster just works and always has. There is no compatibility or install issues with the cable card, no special setup required from the cable company and so on. Tivo just simply changes the channel like a remote would. Arrg...
> 
> Give me my IR Blaster back Tivo, so far cable card and tuning adapter sucks!
> 
> ...


I'm not entirely thrilled with the CableCARDS and especially tuning adapters either but they've been much better than the IR blasters in my experience. A while back Brighthouse did something that made it impossible to change channels with IR blasters on the hour and 1/2 hour. That meant doing lots of work to get everything to record a minute later or earlier than start time. If you loose power to the STB does it turn itself back on? No STB I have owned can do this. I'm not saying none can, but none that I have leased did. Perhaps the cable company DVR's self-power can but I don't know. At least when the power is restored everything should resume to normal with a CC and TA. That's assuming it is even out long enough to totally drain the UPS. I've never seen the Premiere/CC/TA combo not come back up properly after a total power failure. In fact every time I reboot a Premiere I'm causing a total power failure by simply resetting the UPS. 10-20 minutes later all is well. The blasters also ran the risk of becoming dislodged by cats and things like that. Blasters don't work well when they're strewn across the room. Haven't seen a cat remove a CC yet. I don't know what brochure you're talking about but the only channels not available with the CC is PPV and for that I have my one free HD STB which remains powered off almost all of the time.


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## Worf (Sep 15, 2000)

I would appreciate a TiVo with component inputs. Sure it only does one channel, but it's better than using the cablebox.

If you got CableCARD, great, everything is peachy. If you don't, like us, the cable provider's pretty much dictated "use our crappy boxes for everything". Right now I use an HTPC with a HD capture card (over component). It works, but it ain't TiVo.


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## davezatz (Apr 18, 2002)

seattlewendell said:


> *The primary purpose of cable cards is not to save space. It is to allow boxes like Tivo to record HD.*


No. There are plenty of devices that can record in HD. As poorly as it may seem implemented, CableCARD is an industry standard and designed to simplify integration. As Diane mentions, it also allows for a pure digital transmission, tuning, and capture of the protected content.

Now I will agree with OP that Tuning Adapters are awful in so many ways. That's what I'd like to get rid of. Actually, *I* did get rid of them when I dumped Cox for FiOS.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

dianebrat said:


> I disagree, IMNSHO what CableCARD brought to the table was to eliminate HD encoding needing to be done by the Tivo, you record the digital stream as is and store it without any processing.


The Cablecard maps, authorizes and provides for decryption of channels, it has nothing to do with the transmission method (i.e., mpeg2 over QAM) or how they are captured to disk. Any HD tuner can capture clear QAM or ATSC OTA to disk without a card.

The card is there because of protected content, in other words, not to enable HD recording in general. We're splitting hairs, but some folks might not understand the purpose of the cards.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

While I do not believe TiVo will every build an HD DVR with IR Blasters, it isn't because of technical reasons, it is because I do not believe at this point the market would be big enough for it.

That doesn't mean lots of people wouldn't find a HD DVR without cable cards and dual OTA tuners that could also record HD from a STB via component inputs very useful.

Without cable cards TiVo would not have to pay any attention to cable labs rules or pay the cable labs fees for the DVR. And Tivo could still build other cable card compliant DVRs
It would be able to record 3 things at once 2 from OTA and one from a STB
It would work with everything including cable, satellite, & AT&T uverse. Meaning you could switch providers and keep your DVR
The HD recordings from the STB could be in MGEG4 thus still being very high quality but taking up less space.
Frankly if they are release such a DVR a year or 2 ago I think they would have sold more than many people on this forum believe.


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## rainwater (Sep 21, 2004)

scandia101 said:


> Why not in HD?
> If a cable box can output an HD signal to a TV, it can do so to a Tivo, and if that Tivo can receive an HD signal, it can record and output that signal.


Like I said earlier, I don't believe TiVo would ever get Cablelabs approval for a cablecard device that supports IR blasters and outputs over component.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Component is not going to be around forever. Once they stop putting any analog outputs on BD players in Jan 2013, they will probably start to remove them from other devices. They've already stopped putting Svideo inputs on most Tvs. What will be the next analog format to disappear?

Plus any new BD players made since Jan.2011 have stopped outputting anything higher than 540P over component. I have no idea how soon other devices will start to change, but there is no question that the days of component outputs is numbered.


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## LI-SVT (Sep 28, 2006)

There is no technical reason why any Series 3 and up can't support dual IR blasters and dual analog capture. Even if it were just SD you would be able to use a newer TiVo with Directv and take advantage of the newer broadband features. I would do this in a heartbeat if it were made available.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

rainwater said:


> Like I said earlier, I don't believe TiVo would ever get Cablelabs approval for a cablecard device that supports IR blasters and outputs over component.


And Like I said why would they need it? Just make a DVR without cable cards.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

LI-SVT said:


> There is no technical reason why any Series 3 and up can't support dual IR blasters and dual analog capture. Even if it were just SD you would be able to use a newer TiVo with Directv and take advantage of the newer broadband features. I would do this in a heartbeat if it were made available.


Of course currently there is no technical reason. But it would certainly increase the cost for a feature that's use is waning. Personally I've never used the IR blaster thing with TiVo. Although if I had owned one in 1999/2000 I probably would have used it. But my first TiVos were in late 2001 from DirecTV so I had no need for any of that. But by then I was already watching HD for 50% of my viewing so the prospect of recording analog from something like that would not have even appealed to me back in 2001.


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## rainwater (Sep 21, 2004)

atmuscarella said:


> And Like I said why would they need it? Just make a DVR without cable cards.


Because there is no market for it. TiVo has been marketing their box replacing a cablebox for several years now. They aren't going back to the old method. Plus, they have been unifying their platform to sell to MSOs. They would drop standalone boxes altogether before they went back to IR blasters for SA boxes.


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## atmuscarella (Oct 11, 2005)

rainwater said:


> Because there is no market for it. TiVo has been marketing their box replacing a cablebox for several years now. They aren't going back to the old method. Plus, they have been unifying their platform to sell to MSOs. They would drop standalone boxes altogether before they went back to IR blasters for SA boxes.


I agree they will not go back to a DVR using IR blasters. However it has nothing to do with cable labs approve/disapproval. If TiVo felt there was a market for DVRs that used IR blasters they would just build one without cable cards. The only reason for TiVo not to build such a DVR is simple because their market data shows there would not be enough demand for it to be profitable. No technical issues, no cable card issues, no regulator issues, it simply is a no market issue.


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## Jonathan_S (Oct 23, 2001)

fonewiz said:


> I mean, HD and dual tuner is great but not getting half the channels I am paying for, Tivo/Tuning Adapter not happy after power hit etc is not.
> 
> I have used the IR blasters with various companies cable and satellite boxes and NEVER had an issue. So, I guess it's all about the luck you have.


It is luck. For example I've had several cable boxes over the years that wouldn't automatically turn back on after a power outage. So an IR blaster solution would fail to record anything until I noticed and manually turned on the box.

And I recall others *****ing about a particurally stupid box design that threw up a warning message if you changed to a channel you didn't recieve. You'd have to press a specific button to clear the message ('enter' or 'clear' or something like that). Attempts to change the channel would fail until you did that. So the IR blaster would be unable to get out of that trap if it ever screwed up a channel change.

It seems you were really lucky with those IR blasters. I recall a lot of *****ing about getting them working reliably. (And I was glad at the time that I had the DirecTiVo which didn't need the seperate box or IR blasters)

Tuning adaptors seem to be a major problem for TiVos causing all kinds of weird issues and failures. Cable cards, by themselves, seem pretty reliable once you go through the hassle of getting them up and working in the first place.


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## danjw1 (Sep 13, 2005)

CableCard exists because the FCC told the cable companies that they had to come up with a way to allow third party set-top boxes on to their systems. The tuning adapter allows the Tivo to work on a "switched" network. This is when the cable company only sends the signal down the line that is requested by the tuner. The CableCard standard did not envision this sort of network topography.

With HDMI taking over, and component quickly being deprecated, a Tivo that uses a cable company's box, doesn't make any sense at all. Also, component is limited to 1080i, while HDMI supports 1080p and 3d.

For a better understanding of CableCard, Wikipedia has an article.


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## scandia101 (Oct 20, 2007)

seattlewendell said:


> *The primary purpose of cable cards is not to save space. It is to allow boxes like Tivo to record HD. Without it all Tivo can do is record SD.*


No, not even remotely close. I and many many others have no cable cards and we record HD content.

The purpose of cablecards is to take away the monopoly that cable providers have had on equipment.


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## CharlesH (Aug 29, 2002)

The one active S2 that I still have talks to the standard-definition STB via serial port rather than IR. No reliability issues. Fast channel changes. But not many STB models support that.

Yes, it seems that component is a short-timer, to be supported at best with degraded resolution. And the HDMI output from set-top boxes is restricted to display devices like TVs; recording it with a DVR would be a license violation and would get TiVo into a lot of trouble.


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## L David Matheny (Jan 29, 2011)

atmuscarella said:


> While I do not believe TiVo will every build an HD DVR with IR Blasters, it isn't because of technical reasons, it is because I do not believe at this point the market would be big enough for it.
> 
> That doesn't mean lots of people wouldn't find a HD DVR without cable cards and dual OTA tuners that could also record HD from a STB via component inputs very useful.


Actually, there is one technical issue. The last time I checked, ATSC encoders cost several times the price of a TiVo. Prices tend to decline, but I suspect that any HD encoder would add _a lot_ to the price of a DVR. The only reason for IR blasters would be to keep people from being at the mercy of arrogant cable companies, but since it would take two IR blasters controlling two cable boxes, that would probably just be playing into their hands.


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## smbaker (May 24, 2003)

scandia101 said:


> The purpose of cablecards is to take away the monopoly that cable providers have had on equipment.


Is it? The effect seems to be the opposite. Whereas I used to be able to simply plug a Tivo into a cable outlet, now I need to rent a device from the cable company and (until recently) pay them to come to my house and insert the device into my Tivo. Seems I'm even more dependent on cableco hardware than I was before.


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## dianebrat (Jul 6, 2002)

scandia101 said:


> The purpose of cablecards is to take away the monopoly that cable providers have had on equipment.





smbaker said:


> Is it? The effect seems to be the opposite. Whereas I used to be able to simply plug a Tivo into a cable outlet, now I need to rent a device from the cable company and (until recently) pay them to come to my house and insert the device into my Tivo. Seems I'm even more dependent on cableco hardware than I was before.


And that is the sad reality of what happened to the CableCARD mandate because they let the MSOs run wild on their own, it certainly was not the intent.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Jonathan_S said:


> It is luck. For example I've had several cable boxes over the years that wouldn't automatically turn back on after a power outage. So an IR blaster solution would fail to record anything until I noticed and manually turned on the box.
> 
> .........


Nothing to do with being lucky or unlucky. If you had been using a UPS it would not have been an issue.


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## fonewiz (Jul 20, 2011)

aaronwt said:


> Nothing to do with being lucky or unlucky. If you had been using a UPS it would not have been an issue.


Yes and a UPS cost money just like the Tivo, upgrading space, having a HUGE LED or 3D TV and so on.

At some point, I for one would like to stop spending so much money to watch TV.

I agree a UPS is a good solution for any sort of electronic or computer equipment.

With that being said, I never needed a UPS in order to keep my Tivo setup from flaking out after a power outage. Of course, that was luck because none of the power hits ever caused hard drive failure etc.

In my mind, whatever the setup or combination of hardware is (Tivo, Tuning Adapter and Cable Card in my case) the whole setup should be able to recover from a power failure and continue to record shows. If it can't handle a power failure, a UPS is not going to solve the problem every time. UPS devices only last so long and then they die along with everything plugged into if the power doesn't come back up after a short time.

I haven't proven yet that my combination of hardware actually fails after a power hit but I am sure I will find out soon enough if we ever get any rain storms here is South Texas EVER again. Drought is rough down here these days and about 103 or so outside right now.


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## Jonathan_S (Oct 23, 2001)

aaronwt said:


> Nothing to do with being lucky or unlucky. If you had been using a UPS it would not have been an issue.


Depends on how long the outage was an how big a UPS you're using.

I was addressing a comment that was contrasting the behavior of (that poster's) cable boxes with (that poster's) tuning adaptor _after_ they'd lost power. A UPS might make that a rairer occurance but doesn't change the basic point that he was "lucky" in that he had cable boxes which auto-powered up after power was restored.

For what it's worth I've always had my Tivo on a UPS. (And one of these days I'll get another one for the FIOS optical termination point so the TiVo can actually keep recording during a power loss)


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Jonathan_S said:


> Depends on how long the outage was an how big a UPS you're using.
> 
> I was addressing a comment that was contrasting the behavior of (that poster's) cable boxes with (that poster's) tuning adaptor _after_ they'd lost power. A UPS might make that a rairer occurance but doesn't change the basic point that he was "lucky" in that he had cable boxes which auto-powered up after power was restored.
> 
> For what it's worth I've always had my Tivo on a UPS. (And one of these days I'll get another one for the FIOS optical termination point so the TiVo can actually keep recording during a power loss)


The ONT doesn't draw to much power so even a smaller UPS will probably help. But for me i have my ONT plugged into an APC with an extended runtime battery so i can get up to 18 hours or so if needed from my ONT. Fortunately, in the 17+ years I've lived there, I've never had a power outage anywhere close to that long.


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## seattlewendell (Jan 11, 2006)

davezatz said:


> No. There are plenty of devices that can record in HD. As poorly as it may seem implemented, CableCARD is an industry standard and designed to simplify integration. As Diane mentions, it also allows for a pure digital transmission, tuning, and capture of the protected content.
> 
> Now I will agree with OP that Tuning Adapters are awful in so many ways. That's what I'd like to get rid of. Actually, *I* did get rid of them when I dumped Cox for FiOS.


I believe the OP got the point without me having to explain every little detail. You should try to make the leap. We are talking about receiving HD from the cable company, I do not need to say that other devices can record HD content.
Do I really need to explain that the card "allows pure digital transmission, tuning, and capture of the protected content."
Really?


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## seattlewendell (Jan 11, 2006)

scandia101 said:


> No, not even remotely close. I and many many others have no cable cards and we record HD content.
> 
> The purpose of cablecards is to take away the monopoly that cable providers have had on equipment.


This thread is about HD via the cable companies. My response was specific to that implementation. Try to pay attention. I am not talking about your situation; over the air, DirecTivo, Comcast Tivo, etc.


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## Jonathan_S (Oct 23, 2001)

aaronwt said:


> The ONT doesn't draw to much power so even a smaller UPS will probably help. But for me i have my ONT plugged into an APC with an extended runtime battery so i can get up to 18 hours or so if needed from my ONT. Fortunately, in the 17+ years I've lived there, I've never had a power outage anywhere close to that long.


Yeah, that's what I figured. I just get power outages so rairly here that I never seem to think about it except when the power actually goes off or a thread like this pops up.


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## scandia101 (Oct 20, 2007)

seattlewendell said:


> This thread is about HD via the cable companies. My response was specific to that implementation. Try to pay attention. I am not talking about your situation; over the air, DirecTivo, Comcast Tivo, etc.


Don't say you were being specific when you weren't.



> *The primary purpose of cable cards is not to save space. It is to allow boxes like Tivo to record HD via cable. Without it all Tivo can do is record SD.*


That would have been specific, but it's still wrong. *Cable cards are for digital signals* and most cable channels received via cablecard are SD.

So now your statement was wrong for two reasons.


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