# Bolt bit the big one today



## Dr_Zoidberg (Jan 4, 2004)

I discovered that my 6 tuner bolt got the infamous four flashing lights on the front when I got home from work today. powered it off, unplugged everything, plugged in just the HDMI and power, and nothing. Ended up calling TiVo, and they had me verify that it was DOA by moving the external power to the wall outlet, and it still died. Because it was a 3GB unit, they were going to charge me $149 to replace it, but they cut me a break and gave me $70 off, to make it $79. I opted for that instead of just replacing the hard drive myself.

That was my main device, which was 95% full. So annoyed I never took the time to watch all the obscure movies I recorded on it. Anyway, while I wait for the replacement, I brought the Premiere I have in the master bedroom, so I can at least watch my premium channels on the big TV, and I come to find that there's no signal here. The Premiere barely gets any signal on a couple channels. I'm beginning to wonder if there was a power spike that fried the TiVo (which is on a surge suppressor behind a UPS) AND perhaps the splitter. I poked around on the TV upstairs and had to do a manual channel scan, and it found a few channels, but I stopped the scan and didn't look for actual HD channels.

I am on FIOS, and I did reset their device. Networking is obviously fine, since I am posting this...

My mind goes back to that splitter. I hope I have another one in the house that works...


----------



## MANOWAR© (Mar 6, 2005)

Dr_Zoidberg said:


> I discovered that my 6 tuner bolt got the infamous four flashing lights on the front when I got home from work today. powered it off, unplugged everything, plugged in just the HDMI and power, and nothing. Ended up calling TiVo, and they had me verify that it was DOA by moving the external power to the wall outlet, and it still died. Because it was a 3GB unit, they were going to charge me $149 to replace it, but they cut me a break and gave me $70 off, to make it $79. I opted for that instead of just replacing the hard drive myself.
> 
> That was my main device, which was 95% full. So annoyed I never took the time to watch all the obscure movies I recorded on it. Anyway, while I wait for the replacement, I brought the Premiere I have in the master bedroom, so I can at least watch my premium channels on the big TV, and I come to find that there's no signal here. The Premiere barely gets any signal on a couple channels. I'm beginning to wonder if there was a power spike that fried the TiVo (which is on a surge suppressor behind a UPS) AND perhaps the splitter. I poked around on the TV upstairs and had to do a manual channel scan, and it found a few channels, but I stopped the scan and didn't look for actual HD channels.
> 
> ...


Heat kills hard drives. When you get it replaced do what I did. Buy a cheap but silent USB laptop cooler fan and put the Bolt on it. Whenever the Bolt is running it's being cooled. cheaper $20 insurance and my Bolt never gets hot.


----------



## osu1991 (Mar 6, 2015)

Dang, I didn’t get the reduced price deal.  I got hit with the $149 plus tax on my 3.5 yr old Roamio today. Came home to a dead hdmi port on my main cable Roamio. They said they had no more Roamios, so they’re sending me a Bolt. Should be here Monday.


----------



## Mikeguy (Jul 28, 2005)

osu1991 said:


> Dang, I didn't get the reduced price deal.  I got hit with the $149 plus tax on my 3.5 yr old Roamio today. Came home to a dead hdmi port on my main cable Roamio. They said they had no more Roamios, so they're sending me a Bolt. Should be here Monday.


Sounds pretty good. :up:


----------



## osu1991 (Mar 6, 2015)

Mikeguy said:


> Sounds pretty good. :up:


Yes, better than what I was expecting.


----------



## Dr_Zoidberg (Jan 4, 2004)

osu1991 said:


> Dang, I didn't get the reduced price deal.  I got hit with the $149 plus tax on my 3.5 yr old Roamio today. Came home to a dead hdmi port on my main cable Roamio. They said they had no more Roamios, so they're sending me a Bolt. Should be here Monday.


I guess that's a good consolation prize. I do have Lifetime on the unit, maybe they cut me a break for that.


----------



## osu1991 (Mar 6, 2015)

Dr_Zoidberg said:


> I guess that's a good consolation prize. I do have Lifetime on the unit, maybe they cut me a break for that.


I have lifetime on the Roamio too, along with 4 others on my account. I didn't push, as I really didn't expect them to do much. If it happens again on one of the other units, I'll think differently .


----------



## Dr_Zoidberg (Jan 4, 2004)

New TiVo arrived, and Hail Hydra! I was still running with the old menu system, so it's a bit of a change. I think I'll try it out, now. They had already performed the All In service transfer, so I was good to go, once the cable card was re-initialized for the new unit.

Then it came to transferring my One Passes from the old to the new. WELL, apparently the old system has to be reachable online to allow you to do it. They don't keep a record of them for any length of time on their site (http://online.tivo.com/start/manage). I tried powering the old one up and it's doesn't get past the HD failure of 4 lights flashing. so if the old one is dead, you're SOL. There go 150 'finely tuned' One Passes. I'll never remember them all. Some were seasonal, but others like Big Bang Theory and Game of Thrones I won't be needing any more. sigh.


----------



## UCLABB (May 29, 2012)

Dr_Zoidberg said:


> New TiVo arrived, and Hail Hydra! I was still running with the old menu system, so it's a bit of a change. I think I'll try it out, now. They had already performed the All In service transfer, so I was good to go, once the cable card was re-initialized for the new unit.
> 
> Then it came to transferring my One Passes from the old to the new. WELL, apparently the old system has to be reachable online to allow you to do it. They don't keep a record of them for any length of time on their site (http://online.tivo.com/start/manage). I tried powering the old one up and it's doesn't get past the HD failure of 4 lights flashing. so if the old one is dead, you're SOL. There go 150 'finely tuned' One Passes. I'll never remember them all. Some were seasonal, but others like Big Bang Theory and Game of Thrones I won't be needing any more. sigh.


You can save one passes via Kmttg. Obviously you need to do this proactively before your unit dies.


----------



## djones18 (Jan 6, 2006)

Like many I keep my Bolt Vox full with movies and TV series I've yet to watch. Kmttg is certainly an option for backup but it is labor intensive for some and requires a certain amount of computer skills. Another option, albeit more expensive, is to use a second TiVo as a backup duplicating all One Passes from the main unit. In addition to my main Bolt Vox I use an older Premier XL with Lifetime Service for this purpose. I pay the monthly cable card rental for the second card. I've had two unrecoverable Bolt failures in three years so I feel this is worth it. Transferring recordings from the backup Premier XL to a new Bolt is now easy.


----------

