# Red circle of death on the Mini



## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

Purchased a retail Mini a few days ago and a few months ago purchased my 3rd TP-4 (retail when the price was $199). I activated both with Lifetime a few days ago. The Mini and the new TP-4 set up great, could see all my Series 4 TiVos and use MRS on all of them. Set up the new TP-4 for the Mini to use one tuner. Set up my Mini and the new TP-4 had the red circle death, I could not select that unit, the other two TP-4s could be selected without problems. I have tried everything, re-booting the new TP-4, re-booting the Mini, even did a *C&D all *on the Mini, I can't select the new TP-4, I even tried disconnecting one of my older TP-4s, still had the circle of death on the new TP-4.
I give up, I did call TiVo and they could not see any reason for this problem on their side, will be escalated to engineering. 
My plan was to sell my other two Series 4s with 2 tuners, so I would be left with 3 TP-4 giving me 11 tuners (and one for the mini) and one Mini, more than enough for my home. 
Any help would be appreciated.


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## todd_j_derr (Jun 6, 2000)

I didn't quite follow your story but if "red circle of death" means a circle with a slash through it beside that DVR when setting up the mini, it might be my issue, see the tail end of the "pain in the ass" thread. Is it also greyed out and produces error V70 if you select it?


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

todd_j_derr said:


> I didn't quite follow your story but if "red circle of death" means a circle with a slash through it beside that DVR when setting up the mini, it might be my issue, see the tail end of the "pain in the ass" thread. Is it also greyed out and produces error V70 if you select it?


That the problem *exactly*,(on my 3rd TP-4 only) what have you done to solve it ?


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## todd_j_derr (Jun 6, 2000)

Over a week later I still have the problem, but it affects both of my XL4s so I can't use the minis at all. More details than you probably want to read are in the other thread I referred to, I've tried everything I could think of and spent hours on the phone to TiVo support to no avail.

Can you stream between the affected TiVo and the other TiVos? I am able to, just not the mini... If you can't do that then I'd suspect a setup issue with the affected box - make sure the sharing and download boxes are checked under "device preferences" on tivo.com. If streaming works for the TiVos and not the mini, then it sounds like the same problem as me... I'll let you know if/when they find the cause.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

todd_j_derr said:


> Over a week later I still have the problem, but it affects both of my XL4s so I can't use the minis at all. More details than you probably want to read are in the other thread I referred to, I've tried everything I could think of and spent hours on the phone to TiVo support to no avail.
> 
> Can you stream between the affected TiVo and the other TiVos? I am able to, just not the mini... If you can't do that then I'd suspect a setup issue with the affected box - make sure the sharing and download boxes are checked under "device preferences" on tivo.com. If streaming works for the TiVos and not the mini, then it sounds like the same problem as me... I'll let you know if/when they find the cause.


I a litter better than you as I can stream to my Mini and MRS works on all my TiVos, the Mini will mate to 2 of the older TP-4, can watch live TV all works correctly except to my newest TP-4, I can stream from that box to the Mini but not use that box (the new TP-4) as main unit for the Mini, to the Mini it looks like a 2 tuner box.


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

When you set up the new TP-4, did you change the settings to allocate one of the tuners for use by the Mini for live TV?


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

lpwcomp said:


> When you set up the new TP-4, did you change the settings to allocate one of the tuners for use by the Mini for live TV?


You bet, tried everything, the Mini works great with the other two TP-4s, why not the new one. I am going to try to have TiVo move all my TiVos into a new account (I will get a new MAC but I don't care) but I will get rid of the 15 old TiVos that still show up on my account screen, (they are not active in my account and do not show up in my account preferences, I have 7 active items inc the Mini, when I get this working will sell my two TP-2s)


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

lessd said:


> You bet, tried everything, the Mini works great with the other two TP-4s, why not the new one. I am going to try to have TiVo move all my TiVos into a new account (I will get a new MAC but I don't care) but I will get rid of the 15 old TiVos that still show up on my account screen, (they are not active in my account and do not show up in my account preferences, I have 7 active items inc the Mini, when I get this working will sell my two TP-2s)


*I guess I did not try everything:*

I solved the problem of the red circle my Mini saw with my new TP-4, I had two TP-2 units that I wanted combined into my new TP-4, so I copied the shows from the 2 TP-2 units and moved over the season passes, all seemed good but I left the cable cards in the two TP-2s during the time I was moving the programs. I was worried that my new TP-4 had a problem working with the Mini and I would have to do this all over again. I than moved one cable card from one of the TP-2 TiVos to my new TP-4, activated the card with Comcast (took 2 minutes), did a call home, than after that was finished rebooted the TP-4 and rebooted the Mini, guess what the Mini now could see all three TP-4s. The Mini will not work with a TP-4 without an *activated cable card*, simple as that. (at least for me) TiVo should tell its customers that (if as I found, it is true)


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## lpwcomp (May 6, 2002)

lessd said:


> *I guess I did not try everything:*
> 
> I solved the problem of the red circle my Mini saw with my new TP-4, I had two TP-2 units that I wanted combined into my new TP-4, so I copied the shows from the 2 TP-2 units and moved over the season passes, all seemed good but I left the cable cards in the two TP-2s during the time I was moving the programs. I was worried that my new TP-4 had a problem working with the Mini and I would have to do this all over again. I than moved one cable card from one of the TP-2 TiVos to my new TP-4, activated the card with Comcast (took 2 minutes), did a call home, than after that was finished rebooted the TP-4 and rebooted the Mini, guess what the Mini now could see all three TP-4s. The Mini will not work with a TP-4 without an *activated cable card*, simple as that. (at least for me) TiVo should tell its customers that (if as I found, it is true)


It makes sense. A TP 4 is pretty much useless w/o a CableCARD. Particularly when it comes to providing live TV to a Mini.


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## dsnotgood (Aug 26, 2010)

You should call tivo and give them that error code. Might me something wrong with your account settings on their end.


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

dsnotgood said:


> You should call tivo and give them that error code. Might me something wrong with your account settings on their end.


If you mean the V70 error code I did tell TiVo about that code, they did not know what it meant, I will call TiVo Sunday and tell them the fix as I have a case number, I even asked about the cable card and the CSR said he could not see why that would make a difference, I even pulled a cable card out from one of my TP-4s and the Mini still connected to that unit, so I don't know the full answer except get your cable card in your new TP-4 before you start the Mini up.


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