# What has to be done to install M-Card?



## abooch (Apr 21, 2010)

Just in case an incompetent installer comes from Comcast to put in and pair my M-card what exactly has to be done so I could "tell" him or do it myself?


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## nrc (Nov 17, 1999)

Your TiVo will come with an instruction sheet for cable card installation that says "give this to your cable installer". That should provide all the information they need. Most cable installers ignore them.

If they run into trouble call TiVo customer service. They have cable card experts that can help.


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## SugarBowl (Jan 5, 2007)

abooch said:


> Just in case an incompetent installer comes from Comcast to put in and pair my M-card what exactly has to be done so I could "tell" him or do it myself?


My install happened saturday with Time Warner. They sent 2 people in 2 trucks. The installers would not come into the house until they had verified all the signal strength from the street to the side of my house. They then would not insert the cablecard until they had removed all splitters between the house entry and the tivo.

Once the card is plugged in, they go to the cablecard hostID screen, and they have to call someone and read off those numbers. From there, they go to one of the other cablecard screens and look for the EMM Count, and make sure it starts going up.


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## abooch (Apr 21, 2010)

SugarBowl said:


> My install happened saturday with Time Warner. They sent 2 people in 2 trucks. The installers would not come into the house until they had verified all the signal strength from the street to the side of my house. They then would not insert the cablecard until they had removed all splitters between the house entry and the tivo.
> 
> Once the card is plugged in, they go to the cablecard hostID screen, and they have to call someone and read off those numbers. From there, they go to one of the other cablecard screens and look for the EMM Count, and make sure it starts going up.


Why did they do all of that?


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## janry (Jan 2, 2003)

I went by the Comcast office, picked up an M-card, took it home, put it in the slot and called Comcast. I didn't have to read any numbers or jump through any hoops with them. While I was still on the phone with them, premium channels starting coming through.

This is how easy it was for my TiVoHD. I ordered a Premiere over the weekend. Crossing my fingers hoping its connection goes this well.


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## HunkaBurninLove (Jan 29, 2007)

Glad you had better luck than I did, janry.

Took me a couple of evenings on the phone and chat with Comcast before I could get my M-card to work with my HD channels on Comcast.

At first, my card wasn't "paired" with my account/Premiere. Then I had the "Auth:MP" error so I had to get Comcast to "hit" it a couple of times and re-ran Guided Setup. Eventually got it to work.


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## eaayoung (Feb 5, 2008)

Mine was a breeze with Brighthouse Central FL. I used an M card from a tv..., just removed it from the tv, inserted into the S4 and called Brighthouse. Gave them the card info and they sent a hit to the card. It was that simple.


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## DaveWhittle (Jul 25, 2002)

Set up the Premeire the day before the installer is scheduled, and choose the "install cable card later" option when prompted.

Also ask for a Comcast truck to arrive and _not_ a contractor. You might not want to mention TiVo, but I asked for an installer with TiVo experience and the guy was moderately familiar with them. Tell them to bring as many M-cards (multi stream) as they can because it might take a couple different cards to get one to work. My install worked on the second card.

If the installer has difficulty, ask for a "staged hit".


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## andydumi (Jun 26, 2006)

janry said:


> I went by the Comcast office, picked up an M-card, took it home, put it in the slot and called Comcast. I didn't have to read any numbers or jump through any hoops with them. While I was still on the phone with them, premium channels starting coming through.
> 
> This is how easy it was for my TiVoHD. I ordered a Premiere over the weekend. Crossing my fingers hoping its connection goes this well.


Good to hear from a fellow Nashvillian.

We are getting a Premiere in the next few days. Ill just go down and get a card too and see how it goes.

I called Comcast and they said just what you said, go pick it up and do it myself. No truck roll needed.


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## janry (Jan 2, 2003)

andydumi said:


> Good to hear from a fellow Nashvillian.
> 
> We are getting a Premiere in the next few days. Ill just go down and get a card too and see how it goes.
> 
> I called Comcast and they said just what you said, go pick it up and do it myself. No truck roll needed.


I assume you are going to the service center on Mainstream Drive (in the metro center area). That's where we got ours. Their location information has a section of "Self Installation Kits Available" and one of the items listed is "Cablecard".

I suggest taking a print out of the website for the Mainstream location with you and if they give you any flack, show them that it says cablecard for the self istallation kit. If they refuse after that, I'd insist the truck roll not be charged since you drove all the way to their service center for nothing.

I've heard of people going there and being turned down. I think one of the reasons we were successful is we just went to the window and said "We need a multistream cablecard". We didn't say anything about TiVo. The employee went to the back, came out with a cablecard, handed it to us and then printed out a receipt for us to sign.

When I called to have it activated, the employee on the phone tried to claim they couldn't do it unless they rolled a truck. I told that guy I already had it in the TiVo and no installer was needed, just hit it. He started to say something more and I cut him off and said "activiate it or cancel our service". He activated it.


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## janry (Jan 2, 2003)

janry said:


> This is how easy it was for my TiVoHD. I ordered a Premiere over the weekend. Crossing my fingers hoping its connection goes this well.


Spoke too soon!

We picked up the card Saturday morning - no problem. Went home, installed and called Comcast. Spent about 45 minutes on the phone with a tech who could not get it activated claiming it was because the clerk that gave us the card did not enter our account information associated with the card. She claimed she could not do that due to internal controls and so would have to get another department to do so and they would call me back within two hours.

Of course, they didn't So I called back and got a different tech who worked with me for about an hour. We were getting most channels but not all. We were only getting 1 of 4 HD premium channels we subscribe to. He claimed the fault must be the signal strength and they'd send out a truck on Monday to resolve. By this time, I was frustrated and relented. I told my wife to not let them touch anything but the new TiVo in the breakfast room. I didn't want them messing with the old TiVo HD (den) since it was working fine.

I got home and wife said it took them a couple of hours but they finally got everything working. Everything? What do you mean everything? She said before they arrived she tried to watch TV in the den through the cable set-top box (we have it in addition to the TiVo for VOD and PPV), and it was displaying a message that the channels were not available so she had the Comcast guys take a look. They apparently had to switch out the cablecard in the set top box. I went to the den and found they had made a mess. Cables were dangling everywhere behind the equipment rack. The power ship had been neatly fitted on a shelf and they'd knocked it off the shelf causing the TiVo to become unplugged and of course causing us to miss one recording. 

To top it off, I tried the set top box and it was giving the same message wife saw earlier in the day. So, I called Comcast and got them to send a hit to fix that.

Anyway, as of this morning everything is working and I sure hope it stays that way.

Oh, and the original problem I had activating the Premiere on Saturday: it was just a matter of getting a knowledgeable person on the phone at Comcast. The guys that came to the house spent less than 5 minutes on the phone and admitted it wasn't a problem with the signal, just a problem with the techs I got on the phone over the weekend. Lesson learned: don't deal with weekend phone support.


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## almighty (Jun 17, 2001)

My install was pretty simple. One I got an M card that is. Charter was scheduled to show up Friday afternoon for the install. Tech arrives, no cable card. Tried to get him to take an M card out of the DCX box he had in his truck, but he didnt think he was allowed to do that. So monday, a Charter tech dropped off the cable card at my work. When I got home, I contacted a friend of mine, gave him the numbers he needed, and 2 minutes later it was all working, sans 3 channels. This morning he added another billing code to my account, and they should now be on. Its too bad Charter doesnt normally allow self installs of cable cards, its just too darn easy!

p.s. I did get the tech to leave me the DCX dvr over the weekend for a test run. My god, what an awful GUI! Really makes you appreciate a Tivo gui, even the SD version!


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## Unix_Beard (Dec 22, 2003)

I picked up an M-Card from my cable provider, set the Tivo all up, downloaded the updates, did the whole setup. I called to activate the card, they said it was initialized but the Tivo just said "Acquiring Channels, Please Wait." Eventually, it times out saying it cannot acquire any channels through the cable card. 

When you go into the Cablecard Setuo menu, there are no submenus. Just a message saying something like "Your cable company did not supply the necessary information on the Cable Card."

I've tried getting them to activate it several times, did so through their website also. To no avaiil. I pulled the card so we can at least watch the analog channels. 

I did call Tivo and they were of no help. They wouldn't even say whether it was a bad card or anything. I'm going to swap the card tomorrow and just hope it was a bad card. 

My TivoHD with two cards went smoothly a few years back. This is disappointing.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

IN my experience with Cable cards, the service provider is usually at fault. But I have also had a couple of bad Cable cards too. So hopefully replacing the CC will fix it.


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## Unix_Beard (Dec 22, 2003)

Got a new cable card and it worked. The first one had to be blank (if that's possible) because I wasn't even given the pairing menu or anything. The new one worked right away but I had to call and get all the premium channels refreshed as they did not come through right away. Transferred about 5 times until someone could help.


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## andydumi (Jun 26, 2006)

janry said:


> I assume you are going to the service center on Mainstream Drive (in the metro center area). That's where we got ours. Their location information has a section of "Self Installation Kits Available" and one of the items listed is "Cablecard".
> 
> I suggest taking a print out of the website for the Mainstream location with you and if they give you any flack, show them that it says cablecard for the self istallation kit. If they refuse after that, I'd insist the truck roll not be charged since you drove all the way to their service center for nothing.
> 
> ...


Cool. I picked one up yesterday at Metrocenter, lady was perfectly nice. I put it in today and called in. Read them three sets of numbers and now the channels work just fine. Except the only HD channels I get are the locals and not the extra Digital Starter stuff like USA and TNT and so on. I will call in the morning to see what's up.


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## falcon26 (Mar 17, 2010)

I went to my local comcast office picked one up went home plugged it in called comcast and it was done in about 5 minutes....


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## jimsocks (Jan 16, 2004)

Advised by Comcast agent that "50&#37;" of Cablecards (Motorola in my case) will "fail" at the outset...My 1st one did fail, 2nd one didn't. My advice - as SOON as you buy the Premiere - schedule a Comcast service visit - EVEN if you pick up an M card at Comcast...(you can always cancel) would have saved me a week of angst...

The advice to have the Comcast service guy bring as many M cards as possible is absolutely right. I'll tell you, though, that's what I asked for (was promised it would happen) - called mid-week to remind Comcast to have the service tech bring "several" cards due to failure rate...Shows up with ONE. Luckily, it worked.

Tivo recommended having them on the phone when the Comcast guy shows up so they can walk them through it...Good advice.


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## timcooper62 (May 31, 2010)

I also have charter and have had a miserable time keeping my cable card activated. It looses the connection to the head end about every month or so. They send a truck to my house and it usually takes hours or getting just the right person at the dispatch office to get the card working again.

What did charter do for you that was so simple? In my experience their techs are not very familiar with cablecards and it is difficult.

I once again have an issue with the card losing connection. TIVO called charter with me and they still could not get the card working. Just wondering what I could suggest to charter to activate this Mcard and keep this card activated. Thanks for any help you could offer.

TIM



almighty said:


> My install was pretty simple. One I got an M card that is. Charter was scheduled to show up Friday afternoon for the install. Tech arrives, no cable card. Tried to get him to take an M card out of the DCX box he had in his truck, but he didnt think he was allowed to do that. So monday, a Charter tech dropped off the cable card at my work. When I got home, I contacted a friend of mine, gave him the numbers he needed, and 2 minutes later it was all working, sans 3 channels. This morning he added another billing code to my account, and they should now be on. Its too bad Charter doesnt normally allow self installs of cable cards, its just too darn easy!
> 
> p.s. I did get the tech to leave me the DCX dvr over the weekend for a test run. My god, what an awful GUI! Really makes you appreciate a Tivo gui, even the SD version!


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