# lifetime service via transplanting chips



## ejonesss (Aug 13, 2007)

I hope this is not "taboo" here I understand if it is. i was wondering what chip does the subscription live in because i am considering buying on ebay 2 tivo motherboards from lifetime subscribed tivos that the power supplies and/or har d drives had failed and taking a soldering iron to the motherboards and my 2 tivos and swap the chips to get lifetime service on my box.

i was wondering too would that cause the hard drive not to work because it would see the drive as coming from another box too?

thanks and i am sorry if this is a banned subject.


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

The subscription is based on the TSN and youu didn't say what series TiVos. To avoid any issues of legality, just use the motherboards as is. You'll need to transfer your shows to another TiVo or PC if not copy protected and do a Clear and Delete everything on the hard drive due to the new TSN.

Scott


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## jmbach (Jan 1, 2009)

Subscription is tied to the TSN. Recordings are tied to TSN. 

Would just transfer your hard drive/power supply to the eBay boxes and do a c&de. No sense transferring chips as the outcome is the same.


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## ejonesss (Aug 13, 2007)

i am running the series 4 witch is i think 746 based.


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## ejonesss (Aug 13, 2007)

jmbach i was thinking that 1 chip holds the subscription and another holds the tsn and second authentication factor required for the shows.


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## jmbach (Jan 1, 2009)

The TSN is tied to the subscription. In S3 and earlier it was a separate chip and people who had bad motherboards with lifetime were able to take the chip out of their board and put it on a non sub board. With the S4 series, the CPU has the TSN burned into it.


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## unitron (Apr 28, 2006)

jmbach said:


> The TSN is tied to the subscription. In S3 and earlier it was a separate chip and people who had bad motherboards with lifetime were able to take the chip out of their board and put it on a non sub board. With the S4 series, the CPU has the TSN burned into it.


Actually it was up through the first of the Series 3 platform, the TCD648250, the one with the Organic Light Emitting Diode display on the front, that the TSN was on a separate crypto chip that could be moved if you knew what you were doing unsoldering and soldering Surface Mount Devices.

It was beginning with the next two S3 platform models, the TCD652160, called the HD, and the TCD658000, called the HD XL, that the crypto chip function was incorporated into the main chip, which is a Ball Grid Array device, which is a giant leap miserywards when it comes to unsoldering and resoldering.


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## unitron (Apr 28, 2006)

ejonesss said:


> I hope this is not "taboo" here I understand if it is. i was wondering what chip does the subscription live in because i am considering buying on ebay 2 tivo motherboards from lifetime subscribed tivos that the power supplies and/or har d drives had failed and taking a soldering iron to the motherboards and my 2 tivos and swap the chips to get lifetime service on my box.
> 
> i was wondering too would that cause the hard drive not to work because it would see the drive as coming from another box too?
> 
> thanks and i am sorry if this is a banned subject.


Once you move the crypto chip (which contains the TiVo Service Number) from TiVo model "fill in the blank" motherboard A to TiVo model "fill in the blank" motherboard B, which I did with 2 TCD649080 motherboards, then motherboard B becomes motherboard A, for practically all intents and purposes.

When it contacts the TiVo servers that keep track of the subscription status, it reports the TSN on the crypto chip, so TiVo thinks it's still motherboard A.

Which is handy if you have a whole bunch of recordings tied to a particular TSN, or a lifetime sub tied to a particular TSN, and the motherboard goes bad.

But if you have a TiVo that does not have a lifetime sub, and you're going to buy one that does, pay for a month of sub on the old one, use the time to copy any shows on it you want to save to an NTFS-formatted partiton on a PC with the free version of TiVo Desktop, then take the lifetimed TiVo and swap in your old power supply if needed, or give it a new hard drive if needed, rather than taking both motherboards out of both chassis and having to go to the nerve-wracking trouble of Surface Mount Device unsoldering and resoldering to move the crypto chip when it's already sitting on a perfectly good motherboard.


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