# Does the 30 minute cache on TiVo drive anyone else nuts?



## senses3 (Apr 7, 2013)

I have a new TiVo Premiere and I love most of it, but this 30 minute cache is the dumbest thing I have ever seen. Every other DVR I have ever used has atleast been able to pause for 1-2 hours. 

I have found a hack to change this, but it's only for earlier tivo boxes .

Anyone have any suggestions for changing this? Also, let me know what you think about this madness.


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## caddyroger (Mar 15, 2005)

I do not have problem with it. If I know I am going to be longer the 1/2 hr I hit record and record it.


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## replaytv (Feb 21, 2011)

caddyroger said:


> I do not have problem with it. If I know I am going to be longer the 1/2 hr I hit record and record it.


amen brother! ;-)=


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

senses3 said:


> I have a new TiVo Premiere and I love most of it, but this 30 minute cache is the dumbest thing I have ever seen. Every other DVR I have ever used has atleast been able to pause for 1-2 hours.
> 
> I have found a hack to change this, but it's only for earlier tivo boxes .
> 
> Anyone have any suggestions for changing this? Also, let me know what you think about this madness.


Anything I watch on the TiVo I hit record. Then if I am interrupted or even if I change the channel by accident I know the show will be there watch. This has worked very well in my 10+ years of TiVo use.
Plus TiVo has an individual buffer for each tuner. I know many of the cable companies DVRs used to only have one buffer. But I don't know if that is still the case. But either way there is no need for a 2 hour buffer.


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## astrohip (Jan 7, 2003)

aaronwt said:


> But either way there is no need for a 2 hour buffer.


IYHO.

I have both TiVos (including an Elite) and DirecTV. And yes, I record everything I ever want to watch. And yet there are still times I find myself going back thru the DirecTV 1.5 hour buffer looking for something. It's never critical, usually something like a weather report or whatnot, but it does happen.

Is this a big deal? Nah. But would it be handier if a TiVo had a longer buffer, maybe user configurable? Why not.


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## WhiskeyTango (Sep 20, 2006)

Hell, why not make it 4 hours. Maybe 8. Why not 24?


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## NorthAlabama (Apr 19, 2012)

i've had dtv and comcast w/tivo, and the buffer isn't an issue for me. like others have posted, if there's any question, i hit record, then pause. no big deal.


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## replaytv (Feb 21, 2011)

There are so many other features, and even fixes on stuff broken needed that this would be _WAY _down on wish list.


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## Wil (Sep 27, 2002)

WhiskeyTango said:


> Hell, why not make it 4 hours. Maybe 8. Why not 24?


Not enough. To all available disk space.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

NorthAlabama said:


> i've had dtv and comcast w/tivo, and the buffer isn't an issue for me. like others have posted, if there's any question, i hit record, then pause. no big deal.


And when you do hit the record button the buffer is also recorded.


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## celtic pride (Nov 8, 2005)

I really think we need at least a 60 to 90 minute buffer because sometimes my wife and i will come home and there will be a movie or even live breaking news that has been on longer than 30 minutes and so even if i rewind the buffered program its still not enough to see the movie,so i have to check the tivo guide if its been replayed later sometimes i get lucky and it is ,sometimes not, so i'm out of luck,as for breaking news i can only go back to the start of the 30 minutes and see what i missed from there. our local los angeles area channels are always covering high speed car chases, shootouts, even emergency airplane landings,brushfires,and flooding during storms in winter.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

celtic pride said:


> I really think we need at least a 60 to 90 minute buffer because sometimes my wife and i will come home and there will be a movie or even live breaking news that has been on longer than 30 minutes and so even if i rewind the buffered program its still not enough to see the movie,so i have to check the tivo guide if its been replayed later sometimes i get lucky and it is ,sometimes not, so i'm out of luck,as for breaking news i can only go back to the start of the 30 minutes and see what i missed from there. our local los angeles area channels are always covering high speed car chases, shootouts, even emergency airplane landings,brushfires,and flooding during storms in winter.


If your that concerned just leave the TiVo recording when you leave your home, than if there is nothing you want on the ONE channel you left the TiVo on, just erase the program. I do agree it would nice if it was user selectable, but I not sure where on the drive the buffer is stored, I don't think it is on the program part of the drive, so changing the buffer size may be a bigger software deal than we all think as partitions may have to be changed in size. With the TP-4 TiVo can store 2 hours now (30 min for each tuner) if you made it 90 minuets you are talking about 6 hours of buffer, that about 8% of the drive space of the TP-4).


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

caddyroger said:


> I do not have problem with it. If I know I am going to be longer the 1/2 hr I hit record and record it.


It would be nice it was an hour buffer. I have had instances when I turn on the TV and an interesting program just happens to be recording on a tuner and I find that I would like to record it. However, it may be 45 minutes in, and if I hit record, I lose the first 15 minutes.

However, this can still be easily fixed by simply looking for another showing of the program recording that.


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## jrtroo (Feb 4, 2008)

If you use suggestions and thumbs enough, and have adequate hard drive space, the tivo may well already be recording such programs.


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## az1097 (Apr 3, 2013)

senses3 said:


> I have found a hack to change this, but it's only for earlier tivo boxes .


For which earlier models and how?


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## lonewoolf47 (Nov 16, 2001)

I've always felt the thirty minute buffer was too short. Most TV series are an hour long so it would be nice to have that leeway. If you are into sport programming it is helpful because sometimes you forget to record an event. To me it is something that TiVo just refused to explore while other DVR'S made it one of their major features.


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## scandia101 (Oct 20, 2007)

Sometimes a longer buffer would be nice, but on the rare occasions that I find a program that I'd like to watch in it's entirety but find that it started well over 30 minutes earlier, I just say "oh well" and move on to something else. 30 minutes later, I've forgotten all about it.


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## Riverdome (May 12, 2005)

As with any feature such as this it should be a USER OPTION. If you have the HDD space to allow for a 2 hour buffer then go for it. It's a value that is hard coded somewhere in the Tivo kernel, make it a variable and ask the user what they prefer.


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

Agreed, but as with all things we don't get it is apparently not the Tivo Way.


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## MPSAN (Jun 20, 2009)

Riverdome said:


> As with any feature such as this it should be a USER OPTION. If you have the HDD space to allow for a 2 hour buffer then go for it. It's a value that is hard coded somewhere in the Tivo kernel, make it a variable and ask the user what they prefer.


+1, as I have ALWAY wished for this option!


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## ltxi (Feb 14, 2010)

lol...I haven't watched anything not pre-recorded in damn near 10 years.


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## Wil (Sep 27, 2002)

I want an infinite buffer. I want a Cloud hookup such that the buffer begins as soon as my subscription does and lasts as long as I subscribe to that Tivo.

And I want all purchasers of Tivos to subsidize my needs, whether they want an infinite buffer or not.

Plus I want a free pony.


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## Leon WIlkinson (Feb 13, 2000)

scandia101 said:


> Sometimes a longer buffer would be nice, but on the rare occasions that I find a program that I'd like to watch in it's entirety but find that it started well over 30 minutes earlier, I just say "oh well" and move on to something else. 30 minutes later, I've forgotten all about it.


With a Premiere you can find a another airing of it or make a wishlist also in like 15 sec.


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## jrtroo (Feb 4, 2008)

My impression is that TiVo is looking for users to optimize disc space by recording content it knows we want rather than using the box to basically randomly pick up whatever happens to be on. I could see this perhaps changing this to a user selection with future larger disc sizes, but with 4 tuners the box is already allocating two precious hours to basically do nothing of direct benefit.

Where are these ponies?


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## PCurry57 (Feb 27, 2012)

senses3 said:


> I have a new TiVo Premiere and I love most of it, but this 30 minute cache is the dumbest thing I have ever seen. Every other DVR I have ever used has atleast been able to pause for 1-2 hours.
> 
> I have found a hack to change this, but it's only for earlier tivo boxes .
> 
> Anyone have any suggestions for changing this? Also, let me know what you think about this madness.


I was with DirecTV for 14 years. The old DirecTiVo's had the same 30 minute per each tuner limit. When I upgraded to DirecTV HD-DVR's the 90 minute live buffer was kewl but also only one the current tuner. If I wanted dual tuner buffering I had to record programs on both tuners; then I could have dual buffering and the entire program; just delete when done if you don't want to keep it.

So how exactly is that different TiVo is at least offering you dual live 30 minute buffers; if you want more you can do like you would need to do with DirecTV for dual live buffers.

Sorry but your issue, isn't!


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

They should offer options up to 90 or 120 minutes.


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## NorthAlabama (Apr 19, 2012)

PCurry57 said:


> When I upgraded to DirecTV HD-DVR's the 90 minute live buffer was kewl but also only one the current tuner. If I wanted dual tuner buffering I had to record programs on both tuners


actually, there is a feature with directv, i think it's called double play, that enables dual tuner, 90-minute buffering without recording, but it's a pain in the @$$ to operate, so it's of little or no use.


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## Jeff_DML (Mar 3, 2009)

I would prefer 1 hour buffer, the Virgin TiVo has this setup.


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## scandia101 (Oct 20, 2007)

Leon WIlkinson said:


> With a Premiere you can find a another airing of it or make a wishlist also in like 15 sec.


Those aren't exactly Premiere only features. 
I could also find another airing with a series 1 or WL it with a S2.


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## seattlewendell (Jan 11, 2006)

celtic pride said:


> our local los angeles area channels are always covering high speed car chases, shootouts, even emergency airplane landings,brushfires,and flooding during storms in winter.


Sounds like it would be easier to just get the hell out of Los Angeles. Sounds like a dangerous place.


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## sharkster (Jul 3, 2004)

I agree with the others that if 30 min isn't enough I hit 'record'. 

My only complaint is that, with the last updates to my Premieres, if you are watching something semi-live and it needs the tuner to record something it kills your buffer. Before I could do this and keep my buffer as it is recording something. I'm not sure I'm making sense, but I know in my head what I'm talking about.


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## chrispitude (Apr 23, 2005)

Yes, I want a longer buffer. I have a 2TB drive; space is not a problem. If others are concerned about space, it's easy enough to add an option in Settings. You may not want it; I (and others) do. Easy enough to make everyone happy.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

seattlewendell said:


> Sounds like it would be easier to just get the hell out of Los Angeles. Sounds like a dangerous place.


I want LA channels just for the car chases!


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## NorthAlabama (Apr 19, 2012)

Bigg said:


> I want LA channels just for the car chases!


:up:


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

chrispitude said:


> Yes, I want a longer buffer. I have a 2TB drive; space is not a problem. If others are concerned about space, it's easy enough to add an option in Settings. You may not want it; I (and others) do. Easy enough to make everyone happy.


I am not a software person but the buffer may be in another part of the drive that as designed can't take advantage of your extra recording space that your 2Tb drive gives you, TiVo may have to allocate a fixed buffer space in this part of the drive, so having a user select the size would make no difference in available record time, in the old days when you had only 9 hours of record time adding another hour to the buffer may have cut the record time down by another hour, today that would make no difference but TiVo would have to design a new fixed buffer size, 60min or 90min. The buffer size can't change the total record time and must be allocated to the max buffer size, that today is about 12Gb/hour (or more). So with 4 tuners set to 90 min each, that would be 6 hours taken from the record time as now TiVo only has to give up 2 hours of record time. If TiVo goes to 6 tuners the buffer size would have to go to 9 hours (for a 90 min buffer) from 3 hours.


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## Bigg (Oct 31, 2003)

lessd said:


> I am not a software person but the buffer may be in another part of the drive that as designed can't take advantage of your extra recording space that your 2Tb drive gives you, TiVo may have to allocate a fixed buffer space in this part of the drive, so having a user select the size would make no difference in available record time, in the old days when you had only 9 hours of record time adding another hour to the buffer may have cut the record time down by another hour, today that would make no difference but TiVo would have to design a new fixed buffer size, 60min or 90min. The buffer size can't change the total record time and must be allocated to the max buffer size, that today is about 12Gb/hour (or more). So with 4 tuners set to 90 min each, that would be 6 hours taken from the record time as now TiVo only has to give up 2 hours of record time. If TiVo goes to 6 tuners the buffer size would have to go to 9 hours (for a 90 min buffer) from 3 hours.


Even on MPEG-2 FIOS, that's less than 100GB. It wouldn't work well on the smaller units, but it would work fine on something like an XL4.


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## wkearney99 (Dec 5, 2003)

NorthAlabama said:


> actually, there is a feature with directv... but it's a pain in the @$$ to operate, so it's of little or no use.


But doesn't that also describe their equipment in general?


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Bigg said:


> Even on MPEG-2 FIOS, that's less than 100GB. It wouldn't work well on the smaller units, but it would work fine on something like an XL4.


This could be consistency of the software or maybe TiVo will make this buffer bigger when going to 4Tb drives becomes possible. I agree with you that for the TP-4 units a 1 hour buffer would not make much difference, except TiVo does say that it is a 75 hour unit, it reads 76 hours, if you went to a 90 min buffer the record time would go to 74 hours.
We get what we get, and I can live with the 30 min. buffer if it will get me dynamic tuner allocation faster.


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## L David Matheny (Jan 29, 2011)

lessd said:


> I am not a software person but the buffer may be in another part of the drive that as designed can't take advantage of your extra recording space that your 2Tb drive gives you, TiVo may have to allocate a fixed buffer space in this part of the drive, so having a user select the size would make no difference in available record time, in the old days when you had only 9 hours of record time adding another hour to the buffer may have cut the record time down by another hour, today that would make no difference but TiVo would have to design a new fixed buffer size, 60min or 90min. The buffer size can't change the total record time and must be allocated to the max buffer size, that today is about 12Gb/hour (or more). So with 4 tuners set to 90 min each, that would be 6 hours taken from the record time as now TiVo only has to give up 2 hours of record time. If TiVo goes to 6 tuners the buffer size would have to go to 9 hours (for a 90 min buffer) from 3 hours.


I suspect that the live TV buffers are dynamically allocated just like regular recordings, from the same partition space, but they are automatically de-allocated from their tail ends to reclaim the disk space. A dedicated buffer area would be an awkward complication when the user decides to record the show being buffered. The TiVo would then have to copy the dedicated buffer to the main recording area instead of just updating some directory pointers.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

L David Matheny said:


> I suspect that the live TV buffers are dynamically allocated just like regular recordings, from the same partition space, but they are automatically de-allocated from their tail ends to reclaim the disk space. A dedicated buffer area would be an awkward complication when the user decides to record the show being buffered. The TiVo would then have to copy the dedicated buffer to the main recording area instead of just updating some directory pointers.


Good point; but would that mean that if you had a full disk could the buffer delete some programs, what if you set all your programs KUD, the TiVo may not record any more programs when full but what would happen to the buffers ? If you filled the TiVo up when in standby mode when there are no buffers, take the TiVo out of standby, for say a TP-4, and 4 buffers start, so within 30 minutes you will need 2 hours of record space, what would give, the programs or the buffer size ? That why I thought the buffers were somewhere else on the drive.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

lessd said:


> If you filled the TiVo up when in standby mode when there are no buffers, take the TiVo out of standby, for say a TP-4, and 4 buffers start, so within 30 minutes you will need 2 hours of record space, what would give, the programs or the buffer size ? That why I thought the buffers were somewhere else on the drive.


Why do you think there are no buffers in standby on a non-DirecTV TiVo? This has been discussed countless times over the years. All standby does is shut off the output and disable response to the EAS. It continues recording, even all of the live buffers. The only thing that will prevent recording of the live buffers is if the tuner(s) is/are set to an empty channel or all of the tuners are otherwise occupied.

As far as allocation, I suspect TiVos _*always*_ have enough space allocated for each tuner to handle 30 minutes of highest resolution and lowest compression video.

Edit: Possibly _*twice*_ that in case you decide to permanently record a live buffer. Otherwise, you risk not having live buffers. Then again, they could do it by not allowing you to save the live buffer unless there is sufficient space available to allocate a new one.


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## Bierboy (Jun 12, 2004)

Bigg said:


> I want LA channels just for the car chases!


It would have to be a 24/7 channel then....


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## TIVO_GUY_HERE (Jul 10, 2000)

senses3 said:


> I have a new TiVo Premiere and I love most of it, but this 30 minute cache is the dumbest thing I have ever seen. Every other DVR I have ever used has atleast been able to pause for 1-2 hours.
> 
> I have found a hack to change this, but it's only for earlier tivo boxes .
> 
> Anyone have any suggestions for changing this? Also, let me know what you think about this madness.


I'll take your premiere off your hands.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

AsSeenOnTv said:


> i see people talking about this alot why not just adjust from screens? works for me i chose the middle one which was 90


What the heck is this?


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## slowbiscuit (Sep 19, 2006)

Let me guess, you have a Tivo provided by your cable company.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

AsSeenOnTv said:


> sorry i did middle one which was 60 i have not done 90 cause it said more space was needed still works for me


This menu item is not available on retail TiVos in the USA. If it is it has been well hidden for many years.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

AsSeenOnTv said:


> mine is normal tivo not from TWC or anything like that maybe its got new software


On the "System Information" screen, what does it have for "Manufacturer Brand:", "Platform:", "Software Version:", and first 3 characters of the "TiVo Service Number:"? Also, how do you navigate to the "Saved Live TV" screen?


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## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

Was that copied from some other thread? This thread doesn't have the message that was quoted from? That's not a photoshopped joke, is it??


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

mattack said:


> Was that copied from some other thread? This thread doesn't have the message that was quoted from? That's not a photoshopped joke, is it??


Nope, they were there. Looks like AsSeenOnTv deleted all of his posts in this thread. Maybe he is beta-testing something or has a seriously hacked TiVo and shouldn't have revealed anything. I suppose _*he*_ could have photoshopped the screenshot but cannot imagine what his motive would be. He just joined the TCF today. The 4 posts of his in other threads that are still there are nothing like that.

Can a user even delete posts that are several hours old and have been responded to or would it require a moderator?


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Well if it is real and some kind of beta feature. Alot of people will be happy if/when it's implemented.


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## MichaelK (Jan 10, 2002)

I vote Beta - 

which makes me 1) very excited they worked on the primary DVR features in the next release, cant wait to see what other improvements/options made it in 2) want to scream since they actually ADDED a new screen in SD- i was dreaming everything old would have been converted over to HD by now, never mind NEW stuff showing up in SD.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

MichaelK said:


> I vote Beta -
> 
> which makes me 1) very excited they worked on the primary DVR features in the next release, cant wait to see what other improvements/options made it in 2) want to scream since they actually ADDED a new screen in SD- i was dreaming everything old would have been converted over to HD by now, never mind NEW stuff showing up in SD.


My guess is that seldom used screens will stay in SD, most of the SD screens will be set and forget type. Like how much does one look at the SI screen, or most screens under settings.


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## Punker1234 (Aug 28, 2009)

Anyone find any updates to this? I'd be amazed and so happy if this was indeed a future feature.


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## crxssi (Apr 5, 2010)

caddyroger said:


> I do not have problem with it. If I know I am going to be longer the 1/2 hr I hit record and record it.


OBVIOUSLY you press record if you want to watch something, don't rely on the stupid buffer. But if you just turn on the TV and notice something interesting, AND IT HAS ALREADY BEEN MORE THAN 30 MINUTES OF THAT PROGRAM AIRING, then you can't record it all by pressing record.

Sometimes I can search and find another airing of the program, but often I am not that lucky.

So yes, having a larger buffer is a very desirable feature. a larger buffer will take just a tiny portion of hard drive space from the main pool. With hard drives so huge, there is really no reason to NOT just bump it up to at least an hour. At the very minimum, allow the user a choice to give up those few percent of their space to a larger buffer size or not.

Somehow I missed this thread in the past- glad to see I am not the only one who is irritated by this limitation.


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## bkoester (Sep 29, 2008)

Wil said:


> Not enough. To all available disk space.


I believe that's how the buffer on the ReplayTV worked.


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## MrJedi (Apr 13, 2011)

crxssi said:


> OBVIOUSLY you press record if you want to watch something, don't rely on the stupid buffer. But if you just turn on the TV and notice something interesting, AND IT HAS ALREADY BEEN MORE THAN 30 MINUTES OF THAT PROGRAM AIRING, then you can't record it all by pressing record.
> 
> *Sometimes I can search and find another airing of the program, but often I am not that lucky*.
> 
> ...


My thoughts exactly on all of this, but especially the bolded part. This is the only thing I miss from my cable DVR, which had a 2 hour buffer. I would settle for a 1 hour buffer though.


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## gweempose (Mar 23, 2003)

bkoester said:


> I believe that's how the buffer on the ReplayTV worked.


Yes. The Replay would use all the available space on the hard drive for the buffer.

The 30 minute buffer rarely bothers me on the TiVo, but it does seem rather arbitrary. I say give the user the choice.


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## celtic pride (Nov 8, 2005)

YES ! it woud be nice to have the 3 options ,I would go for the 90 minute option,but it would also be nice to go down to a 60 or even 30 minute IF you really thought you needed the space.


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## zarthon (Sep 5, 2002)

crxssi said:


> OBVIOUSLY you press record if you want to watch something, don't rely on the stupid buffer. But if you just turn on the TV and notice something interesting, AND IT HAS ALREADY BEEN MORE THAN 30 MINUTES OF THAT PROGRAM AIRING, then you can't record it all by pressing record.
> 
> Sometimes I can search and find another airing of the program, but often I am not that lucky.
> 
> ...


I agree. But the 30 min pause limit is not the worst of it.

What happens to me is that I'll paused it for 10 or 20 minutes and the program ends and I come back and think ... oh i want to record the end to watch later. So I hit Record. Blamo! It dumps the end of the movie or program I've there watching for even an hour or more and starts recording the next show or worse yet an infomercial ! Silly! ! I can't believe it still does this in gen 4 ! 
I think though that we need to take this apart. Does the buffer really need to be longer to make it behave? We are really talking about two things. There is the buffer length but also the behavior of breaking out of pause when the end is reached.

It's not the length that is obnoxious, it's the behavior.

If 'live tv' is paused, automatic recording should be triggered just before pausing for 30 minutes, overrunning the buffer, or just before the program ends which ever comes first. You should always come back to the TiVo paused where you left it. This could be called "Intelligent pause".

What about scheduling conflicts while you are away? Obviously it should ask then default to pre-recording. 
It would be nice to deal with it intelligently based on when and if the two or three shows replay and viewing habits. If you usually watch a program that's going to be recorded after a repeat broadcast then it should probably just fail over to that, but given that it does not seem to do this in other situations its really another feature rather than a detail of this one.


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