# Remote Access To Tivo - Port Forwarding Question



## ericgoldy (Dec 27, 2007)

Hello,

I'm looking to be able to download my files from my tivo remotely.

When I am within my network, i can download files a variety of ways -- i have the TIVO2Go software on a PC, I have iTivo on a MAC and I can access it through the web access via the Tivo's IP address (192.168.1.108 slash nowplaying (slash) ndex.html) 

I have set up my router with dyndns so that I can access my network (e.g. mynetwork.dyndns.org). 

I have a Linksys router and I'm trying to figure out the right settings (port forward settings) to access my tivo.

I've tried forwarding ports 80, 8080, and 443 to the IP address for the tivo and then entering in my dyndns URL, so if I forwarded port 80, i then typed:

mynetwork.dyndns.org:80
or www (dot) mynetwork.dyndns.org:80

Nothing seems to work.

Ideally, I'd like to be able to use iTivo which asks for an ip address - not sure if I can even enter in my URL/port to gain access.

I know people are doing this and I think I'm a heartbeat from making it work correctly.. Any ideas?

Thanks...d


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## Yoav (Jan 13, 2007)

It will be EXTREMELY slow, but what you need to do is set up port forwarding of port 443 from the outside to your tivo. (that's the https port).
See if you can connect to https://<external ip>/ first.
Then worry about dydns or any other method of using a name instead of an IP.


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## spocko (Feb 4, 2009)

There are several threads on this topic, but I chose to resurrect this one since it has the most relevant title. (Here is another good one: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=410424)

I'm just trying to find a simple way to download a recording from my Tivo to my laptop when I'm away from home. I won't be doing this very often, so I'm trying to keep it simple. Accessing the web server in the Tivo seems like the perfect solution. Unfortunately it's not working right for me. Here's the scoop.

I have a Tivo HD with software ver 11.0b. My internet access is via a Comcast cable modem with 6mpbs/512kbps. I have a D-Link DI-524 router. I have setup port forwarding in the router for ports 80 and 443 to route them to my Tivo. The good news is that I can connect to the router's outside address, log into the Tivo, and see the now playing list. The bad news is that it is incredibly slow. I takes like 30 sec just to load the web page with the now playing list. If I try to download a recording, it always times out. The web server is fast if I connect from within my home network direct to the Tivo's IP address. If I connect to my router's outside address from within my home network, it's also extremely slow just like when I'm truly accessing it from the outside. Something about going through the router really seems to slow it down.

Any ideas or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.


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## Yoav (Jan 13, 2007)

spocko said:


> Any ideas or suggestions would be greatly appreciated.


Your home network is clearly unable to handle serving data. If it's taking 30 secs just to get a list of the shows, then you'll need to figure out why your home network is that slow. (the tivo doesn't know or care who is asking for the list, its responding the same way to everyone). try updating your router's firmware.

For what it's worth, even if you had a VERY nice connection to your tivo, you'd still be trying to upload from your home network around 5G - 10G of data per HD show. I seriously doubt you'll get a better than 100kbps connection from your home, and assuming Cox doesn't shut you down for running a server, or traffic shape your network to 10kbps, we're still talking about 48 hours to download one show. Not too surprising that it's timing out.


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## spocko (Feb 4, 2009)

Hmm, good point about the file sizes. The program I'm interested in will probably be about 4GB. Downloading that through a hotel internet connection may not be feasible. To overcome that barrier, I could remote access into my home PC, transcode the file there, then upload it to my laptop. Anyone have any tips on how to do this as simply as possible? Perhaps kmttg to create the file on my home pc and then ftp it to my laptop?


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

If your home PC has XP pro or Vista Business or Ultimate then you can set up a Remote Desktop connection. You just need to enable your PC for remote desktop connections, then forward port 3389 from the router to that PC.

If you don't have XP Pro or Vista Business/Ultimate then you'll need a 3rd party terminal server like pcAnywhere to do it.

Another option is to simply buy a SlingBox. With that you can watch and control your TiVo via the internet without having to get a PC involved.

Dan


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## Yoav (Jan 13, 2007)

spocko said:


> Hmm, good point about the file sizes. The program I'm interested in will probably be about 4GB. Downloading that through a hotel internet connection may not be feasible. To overcome that barrier, I could remote access into my home PC, transcode the file there, then upload it to my laptop. Anyone have any tips on how to do this as simply as possible? Perhaps kmttg to create the file on my home pc and then ftp it to my laptop?


kmttg would work, although you'd need to be able to access your home PC graphically (i.e vnc, remote desktop, etc).

If your only option for connection is ssh or the like, you may need to manually run the commands:

curl (to fetch your movie)
tivodecode (to strip the drm)
ffmpeg / mencoder / whatever encoder you like (to re-encode)

kmttg should print out the commandline it is invoking so you can figure out all the options you need.

As Dan said though, a slingbox might make your life a LOT easier... or (heaven forbid) torrents


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## spocko (Feb 4, 2009)

Thanks guys. I already have logmein setup for remote access, it's less hassle to setup than Remote Desktop, vnc, etc. since no firewall config changes are needed. The part of the process that I'm clueless about is converting the .tivo file into something smaller, which is why I thought kmttg might help. My recording of interest will be a college basketball game in SD. The last such game I recorded was about 4GB on the Tivo. I expect that mpeg4, vc1, or the like should be able to squish it down. If I could edit out commercials and half-time, that would also help.

I understand that a slingbox would make this much easier, but I don't plan to do this very often, so I'm not ready to go that route yet.


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## Yoav (Jan 13, 2007)

spocko said:


> Thanks guys. I already have logmein setup for remote access, it's less hassle to setup than Remote Desktop, vnc, etc. since no firewall config changes are needed. The part of the process that I'm clueless about is converting the .tivo file into something smaller, which is why I thought kmttg might help.


Yes, it will do what you're asking for (including pulling the show off the tivo).

Start kmttg, point it at your tivo. It will download the show, and re-encode it to the format you request. This can take a LONG while for certain encoding formats...


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## GBL (Apr 20, 2000)

spocko said:


> I'm just trying to find a simple way to download a recording from my Tivo to my laptop when I'm away from home. I won't be doing this very often, so I'm trying to keep it simple.


Depending on the kind of recordings you're trying to access, http://www.hulu.com/ may work better for you.


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

Yoav said:


> Yes, it will do what you're asking for (including pulling the show off the tivo).
> 
> Start kmttg, point it at your tivo. It will download the show, and re-encode it to the format you request. This can take a LONG while for certain encoding formats...


 Just to add, in kmttg config you will need to specify the WAN side port that you are forwarding to port 80 on your Tivo. (If it's already 80 then you don't need to specify but many ISPs block port 80 such that you have to use a different one on WAN side). This way when kmttg uses any http related functions it will add the port you specify to the URL. I think you already have it, but https port 443 also needs to be forwarded properly (and port forwarding should be 443->443).


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## spocko (Feb 4, 2009)

Thanks moyekj. My current thinking is to use remote access to run kmttg inside my LAN to transcode the recording before transferring it outside. 

Thanks for your work on kmttg! I plan to check it out this eve.


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## moyekj (Jan 24, 2006)

spocko said:


> Thanks moyekj. My current thinking is to use remote access to run kmttg inside my LAN to transcode the recording before transferring it outside.
> 
> Thanks for your work on kmttg! I plan to check it out this eve.


 Gotcha. Yes that would be quicker since the transcoded file should be quite significantly smaller than the original .TiVo file depending which encoding recipe you use.


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## spocko (Feb 4, 2009)

To followup, kmttg works great and is pretty easy to setup. The good instructions and the win32 tool package help a lot. Thanks moyekj!

The bad news is that I can't get all the way through a transcode without ffmpeg crashing. I tried the h264 and ipod profiles, and a custom profile using xvid with native audio. All three attempts started and ran for a while, then crashed after some seemingly random amount of time. Solving that is out of context of this thread, and I'm out of time for now anyway, so I'll let it rest. Thanks again for the help.


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