# Tivo Cooling Question



## croup (Feb 23, 2007)

I am experiencing some freezing of my tivo - after ti runs for a day it just freezes just like to hit pause  I see picture and nothing works.

Wondering if it could be heat causing this? 

Can the PSU handle it if I put a few more fans in the unit?

I would like to put an intake and an additional exhaust as well as a fan on the HD.

Any other suggestions?

Thanks, Croup


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

More likely it is a failing HD.


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## croup (Feb 23, 2007)

I was leaning on that as well. But it has been running for the last 2 days fine and it it much cooler in the room. I am going to replace the HD.

Back to my previous question thought, Can the PSU handle the addition of 2-3 cooling fans?


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## croup (Feb 23, 2007)

Why is this such a tough question for you Tivo guru's

Can the PSU support additional fans in the unit?

Anyone ever done this?


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

Check your TiVo's temperature - It can be found on the account information screen.

I don't think that this has even been done - Why? Because it is not needed. The one fan is all the TiVo box needs. Second, where are you going to put additional fans? There is room inside the box but not much to mount them to - not to mention there is still only the 1 exhaust fan. You could modify the box by cutting holes in it for more fans, but then back to question one.
Can the PSU handle 2-3 more fans? I would quess that the addition of a fan or two would not hurt anything (depending on draw) but then again - 3,4,5 fans in a TiVo box - you might as well put an F-16 on top of your TV.
Like I had previously said, the more likely cause of your freezing problem is a failing HD.


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## ForrestB (Apr 8, 2004)

What's the temperature displayed on your Tivo info/setup screen?


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## mick66 (Oct 15, 2004)

croup said:


> Why is this such a tough question for you Tivo guru's
> 
> Can the PSU support additional fans in the unit?
> 
> Anyone ever done this?


Being ignored does not make it a tough question.

Did you do no research on your own over the past three days or are you just waiting for the answer to be handed to you on a platter?
A tiny little bit of googling will give you the yes or no answer that you're begging for.

[give a man a fish... / teach a man to fish...]


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## mick66 (Oct 15, 2004)

ForrestB said:


> What's the temperature displayed on your Tivo info/setup screen?


When you don't know what something is called, it's not really of much help to anyone asking. It's called the _System Information_ screen.


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## croup (Feb 23, 2007)

mick66 said:


> Being ignored does not make it a tough question.
> 
> Did you do no research on your own over the past three days or are you just waiting for the answer to be handed to you on a platter?
> A tiny little bit of googling will give you the yes or no answer that you're begging for.
> ...


Save your jabber for someone else - if you don't want to answer the question stay out of the post. That is your right.


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## croup (Feb 23, 2007)

supasta said:


> Check your TiVo's temperature - It can be found on the account information screen.
> 
> I don't think that this has even been done - Why? Because it is not needed. The one fan is all the TiVo box needs. Second, where are you going to put additional fans? There is room inside the box but not much to mount them to - not to mention there is still only the 1 exhaust fan. You could modify the box by cutting holes in it for more fans, but then back to question one.
> Can the PSU handle 2-3 more fans? I would quess that the addition of a fan or two would not hurt anything (depending on draw) but then again - 3,4,5 fans in a TiVo box - you might as well put an F-16 on top of your TV.
> Like I had previously said, the more likely cause of your freezing problem is a failing HD.


Thanks , I was not going to go fan crazy  just wanted one fan on the HD - I replaced the bad HD as you said and just figured if it handle 2-3 more fans one wouldn't hurt it for sure.

My fault for using an old HD to replace my first one that went out  
Agian thanks a bunch.


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## mick66 (Oct 15, 2004)

croup said:


> Save your jabber for someone else - if you don't want to answer the question stay out of the post. That is your right.


I'm sorry to hear that you are actually either that lazy or at an intelligence level that prevents you from actually using the simplest of tools that are already at your fingertips to find an answer to your question even after it is suggested. Your Mom must be proud.


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

croup said:


> Thanks , I was not going to go fan crazy  just wanted one fan on the HD - I replaced the bad HD as you said and just figured if it handle 2-3 more fans one wouldn't hurt it for sure.
> 
> My fault for using an old HD to replace my first one that went out
> Agian thanks a bunch.


So? Did it fix the freezing problem? Have you added another fan? 
I have also seen 60mm to 80mm fan adapters - but I do not think there would be enough room inside the TiVo for that. Another option would be to simply cut a hole in the top of the case - there is plenty of room for the biggest fan you can find on top - however if you did add another larger fan to vent the TiVo, I would almost suggest that you reverse the stock fan to puch air into the unit...

Keep us update, and pics if possible.


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

croup said:


> Why is this such a tough question for you Tivo guru's
> 
> Can the PSU support additional fans in the unit?
> 
> Anyone ever done this?


There's no good reason to add another fan to these units; and given the scenario you've described, even less of a reason.

The first thing you should do is pull your hard drive and run diagnostics on it. Until you've ruled out the chances of it being a bad hard drive, chances are you are heading down the wrong path.

Secondly, if your unit is running too warm, you should find out why. Is it in a properly ventilated space? Adding fans and altering the airflow in your unit is not the answer - let the fan do its job - exhausting warm air and drawing in cool air - if you add a fan , you make make things worse.

Lastly... you are new here; try not to get too testy if you are not given direct answers to questions raised and addressed many years ago; the sarcasm of the quoted response above is not a good way to endear yourself to the TiVo gurus.


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## HomeUser (Jan 12, 2003)

If the freeze is time based then I would suspect heat over the hard drive however heat may be the cause of early HD and/or other components failure.

If your TiVo is 2 years or older then the existing Fan probably should be checked and replaced if it does not turn freely or if there is any bearing noise.

As for the power supply it depends on which unit you have, most TiVo's are capable of driving 2 hard drives so powering an additional fan should not be a problem.

I would recommend placing a fan under the Disk Drive especially if you have replaced the hard drive. High performance drives tend to draw more power and give off more heat Weaknees has cooling kits available for the different models of TiVo's.


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## luder (Sep 7, 2006)

OP what type of hardrive do you have? 
but, to give you the heads up on intake and exhaust setup.. 
I have to agree with everyone it does not make a huge differance if you have this setup the best thing you could do to notice a maybe 5 degrees is if you replace the factory fan with a higher cfm and routing the power lines to molex connector the only reports i heard were noise from fan


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