# Freeze and Reboot During Transfer of a Show



## AppleWhat (Jul 20, 2011)

I don't know when exactly this started, but it has been recent. 

When I try to transfer a show from one Tivo Premiere to another using the standard method of selecting the menu option, the show will freeze up about twenty minutes in, and then after a minute or two of being frozen will reboot itself. The only way to watch the show is to go and watch it directly from the other Tivo. It appears to be happening on shows that were recorded in HD, and are typically one hour in length. 30 minute shows appear to be transferring OK...

There was a similar thread related to this, but it appears to be from using 3rd party streaming software, which I am not using. It's a stock Premiere.

Is there anything I should try to remedy the issue??

Thanks!


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

AppleWhat said:


> I don't know when exactly this started, but it has been recent.
> 
> When I try to transfer a show from one Tivo Premiere to another using the standard method of selecting the menu option, the show will freeze up about twenty minutes in, and then after a minute or two of being frozen will reboot itself. The only way to watch the show is to go and watch it directly from the other Tivo. It appears to be happening on shows that were recorded in HD, and are typically one hour in length. 30 minute shows appear to be transferring OK...
> 
> ...


is it streaming or transferring between Premieres? When streaming some people were having issues around the 20 minute mark. The streaming is not officially announced yet so it is not an official feature yet.

Personally I've never had any issues transferring between my Premieres, but when messing around with multiple concurrent streams, there were issues around the 20 minute mark.


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## NYHeel (Oct 7, 2003)

The same thing started happening to me over the last few weeks. I've had my premieres since last November and they've always been solid except for that remote control won't respond bug from last month. It hasn't been consistent but I've had frequent reboots on transfers. And yes they were transfers and not streaming. I don't know what has been causing it. I'm on a pretty solid fios connection and though I did switch routers that was about 1.5 months ago and this started in the last 2 weeks. 

At first I thought I was accidentally streaming and not transferring but I have made sure to transfer and it still periodically reboots. I think it actually started around when the streaming ability became public and I tried it.


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## AppleWhat (Jul 20, 2011)

aaronwt said:


> is it streaming or transferring between Premieres? When streaming some people were having issues around the 20 minute mark. The streaming is not officially announced yet so it is not an official feature yet.
> 
> Personally I've never had any issues transferring between my Premieres, but when messing around with multiple concurrent streams, there were issues around the 20 minute mark.


I am doing a transfer, and I have a wired connection...I had my house wired partially for this reason. I am guessing that a software update somewhere along the line might have caused the problem, but who knows. I've only had my Tivos since February, so I cannot imagine the hard drives are going bad...

Does anyone think it is worth a call to Tivo support? I've never tried to call them before so I don't know what level of help to expect.


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## innocentfreak (Aug 25, 2001)

My main premiere has started doing this. I am on a wired network with gigabit switches and lately transfers will cause my main TiVo, the receiving TiVo to reboot. This happens whether I am transferring from a pc or another TiVo premiere. 

I am starting to think my drive may be going bad since some channels are breaking up but when transferred to the pc the portion that transfers plays fine if I strip the TiVo container.


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## AppleWhat (Jul 20, 2011)

Right now, I am resigned to the fact that if I want to transfer a HD show and watch it on another Tivo, I need to let the transfer complete prior to watching...or really prior to getting to about the 20 minute mark in the show (it seems that was the point where it would crash).

If I let the entire show transfer before watching, I dont have any problems (knock on wood). In my case I don't think its a hardware issue, I think that whatever changes they made to do streaming (the 14.8U update) instead of transferring screwed up the software and is causing this...


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

I'm not seeing issues here. I can still start an HD transfer and start watching it right away and continue watching with no issues.

Although I do hope they re-enable streaming again.


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## innocentfreak (Aug 25, 2001)

Mine doesn't happen every time and it never did before until recently. Originally I thought it might be switch related so I upgraded the switch. Then I thought it might be some issue with transferring from my server, but then it happened transferring from another Premiere. 

I think it may be drive related because I have had some bad recordings that broke up which were fine on the other TiVos. Also when I transferred one of the bad recordings to my PC, it seems like only the TiVo container was corrupted. When I decrypted the file, at least the 30 minutes out of the hour show that transferred, the MPG played flawlessly but the TiVo file was unwatchable.


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## caddyroger (Mar 15, 2005)

Well it happen me tonight. Transferring Burn Notice and watching a recorded program, about 15 or 20 min in it froze up and rebooted. I have a funny feeling I will not be buying another Tivo again. I am thinking about buying Tivo hd off ebay with lifetime. For use the future.


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## NYHeel (Oct 7, 2003)

It just happened to me again. I also thought it might be a drive issue as I'll occasionally see pixelation during shows in spots. But now that I see so many people seem to be having the issue hopefully it's just crappy software on tivos part.


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

Happening here too, since around July. 2 premiers, both upgraded (one to 750gb, one to 1tb). I foolishly called TiVo and they told me to wipe both TiVo's (will erase all programs) and then try again. I haven't gone to that extreme.

Both are now on 14.8c and are still crashing. 

It doesn't matter if the transfer happens when I'm watching something else that has been recorded or not.

Can anyone shed any insight on this? I can't seem to find any TiVo logs that are visibile via the UI. Is there a backdoor or something that'll show error codes?


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

-bump-

anyone else? Anyone have any insights? I no longer try to transfer as it crashes almost every time - and it doesn't seem to matter if transfer from tivo a to tivo b or vice versa.

I'm coming up on my renewal date. While I love TiVo, I'm considernig searching for something else just to get transfers to work.


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## jenz (Sep 19, 2009)

weinberk said:


> they told me to wipe both TiVo's (will erase all programs) and then try again. I haven't gone to that extreme.


Have you tried this? Seems like the only option left to isolate whether it is sw or hw. I'd do that asap given your renewal date, so if it is hw related, you can push for a replacement.

I haven't had any issues and just did a LOT of transfers between Premieres before receiving an Elite.


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

Chat with an agent

Jessica (Listening)
Jessica: Thank you for contacting TiVo! My name is Jessica. So that I may better assist you, are you an existing customer?
(ME): Hi Jessica.
(ME): Yes, I'm an exsting customer.
Jessica: In order to fully assist you today I will need to pull up your account. For your security, could you please provide your street address and your telephone phone number so that I may verify your account? 
(ME): [[ my address ]]
Jessica: Thank you for verifying your information. How may I assist you today?
(ME): I need some advanced tech support
(ME): I called on this issue a while back and was told to try wiping a tivo
(ME): I did that, to no avail
Jessica: Ok. What are the symptoms of this technical issue?
(ME): It's a basic problem: I cannot transfer HD recordings from one premier to the other
(ME): after about the 20 minute mark, the recieving tivo crashes
(ME): I'm a network technician by trade
(ME): I've replaced the switch
(ME): I've used new ethernet cabling
(ME): I've used a consumer router hooked directly to our cable modem with no other devices connected
(ME): I'm seeing no other problems.
Jessica: When you say the receiving unit "crashes" does it reboot?
(ME): no studdering
(ME): it does. if I'm watching something else, that freezes for 5 or 6 seconds, and then the tivo reboots
(ME): goes to the welcome screen
(ME): then it reboots again, several times because it keeps trying to transfer
(ME): I pull the network cable or cancel the transfer to stop the restarts
(ME): based on tivocommunity.com, I'm not the only one that this has happened to
Jessica: Normally this indicates a failure of the router, or a break in the connection.
(ME): others also see it at the 20 minute mark
(ME): why is it always there?
Jessica: Unfortunately I can only recommend contacting your ISP, if the connection fails this is how the TiVo will react.
(ME): But my connection isn't going down
Jessica: The fact that rebooting the router allows the TiVo to boot successfully also indicates a problem with the router or network connection.
(ME): I can use a computer on my home network to confirm that - pinging external hosts without a problem
Jessica: *Unfortunately all troubleshooting has been done for this issue and all signs point to the network.*
(ME): I didn't say that rebooting the router allows the system to boot, I said that stopping the transfer or pulling the ehternet cable does
(ME): What about a SOFTWARE error with your software or a hardware error with the tivo?
(ME): Please don't just dismiss me. I've been a loyal tivo subscriber for more than a dozen years
Jessica: This issue is not related to a software error.
(ME): Are you an advanced technician?
(ME): why would this always happen at the 20 minute mark or so?
Jessica: I apologize, I understand this issue is very frustrating but the information I am providing is accurate: this is a problem with the router or network disconnecting, it is possible that you are hitting a bandwidth limit at 20 min. I cannot offer any further troubleshooting.
(ME): Are you telling me that there is no one there who is willing to helptroubleshoot this?
(ME): I have a 250gb monthly allotment. I use about 30gb a month
Jessica: I am telling you that all available troubleshooting has been exhausted.
Jessica: There is no further troubleshooting to be offered.
(ME): Why?
Jessica: *Some companies set a bandwidth limit for each download, it is possible you are hitting a bandwidth limit.
Jessica: I cannot offer any further troubleshooting because there is nothing else that we can do.
* (ME): The video is not transferring over the internet, it's transferring locally
Jessica: Yes, some routers limit the amount of data that can be sent in one download as well. Unfortunately this issue is going to be on your network or router. 
Jessica: You can try changing the data packet size in your routers settings or looking at other advanced settings.
(ME): Not true. This used to work just fine, with the same hardware. THere is nothing wrong with my network
Jessica: I apologize, but I cannot offer any further information or suggestions.
(ME): PLEASE, can I speak to an advanced technician who has the skill and interest to fix this? You're giving excuses like it's my ISP's fault.
(ME): What is my case number.
Jessica: Your case number is xxxxx
(ME): Seems like you're in a lousy mood - you've been compeltely unhelpful.
(ME): Who is your supervisor?
Jessica: There is no advanced technician for you to speak to and unfortunately no one is going to be able to offer any further troubleshooting, this issue will need to be addressed with your ISP or router manufacturer.
(ME): Yeah, you mentioned that. I would like to speak with your supervisor.
Jessica: To speak to a supervisor you may call our Support line at 877-367-8486.

Hours of operation
Monday - Friday, 7AM Pacific Time to 7 PM Pacific Time
Saturday - Sunday, 8AM Pacific Time to 6 PM Pacific Time
(ME): Who is YOUR supervisor?
Jessica: I apologize, for security purposes I cannot provide you with that information.
(ME): I understand. 
(ME): Good day.
Jessica: If you call our support line you may request to speak with the Chat supervisor currently available.
Jessica: Have a great day!


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## tvhank (Oct 25, 2010)

weinberk said:


> Chat with an agent


Why don't you use a cross over cable and then chat with Jessica again? She can't complain about the router then.


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

tvhank said:


> Why don't you use a cross over cable and then chat with Jessica again? She can't complain about the router then.


Then she'll say that it's the modem's fault (which by the way, I'm about to swap out too). Or she'll say it's the ISP.

For super simplicity, I've removed all of my networking gear from the fold. I'm now using a very basic dd-wrt linksys router, the cable modem and 2 short ethernet cables with the tivo's side by side. no more house wiring, nothing.

This is totally a software problem. Frustrating that Tivo support has multiple times essentially told me "too bad."


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

Couldn't it be a hardware problem? I'm not see issues transferring Premiere to Premiere.


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

aaronwt said:


> Couldn't it be a hardware problem? I'm not see issues transferring Premiere to Premiere.


Yeah, you'd think but should wouldn't budge. I'm going to try calling a supervisor, but have no expectation of anything other "than wipe the tivo" "call the isp" "go ahead and cancel service"... none of which I want to do.


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

weinberk said:


> For super simplicity, I've removed all of my networking gear from the fold. I'm now using a very basic dd-wrt linksys router, the cable modem and 2 short ethernet cables with the tivo's side by side. no more house wiring, nothing.
> 
> This is totally a software problem. Frustrating that Tivo support has multiple times essentially told me "too bad."


From what I understand, Premieres need internet connectivity to function properly, but for testing purposes, take the modem and router out of the picture since transferring is your issue.

Put the Premieres in SDUI mode (to make them less reliant on the internet) and only hook one ethernet cable between them. Try and see if you can replicate the transfer issue.


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

I hadn't tried that yet Steve, but will. I thought they needed a net connection for transfers to happen. I know the transfer doesn't go over the net, but I think there's some kind of autorization or something that happens.

I can't imagine that this is due to two bad hard drives, but I might also try replacing the drives. THat's a real pain though... I bet something is corrupted in the software image. Does *anyone know if there's a temp file location or something that's used that I might be able to clean up buy putting the drives into a linux box?*


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## shamilian (Mar 27, 2003)

This happens to me about once every 40 to 50 transfers.
I have a gigabit switch and both Tivos are hardwired.
This has nothing to do with the internet or a router...

This is likely a buffer overrun and/or memory buffers not being released in the receiving Tivo, it only happens on my Premier. I have seen these kinds of bugs many times, mostly on ethernet drivers.. and sometimes in systems that rely on applications to service/read a buffer to free a memory pool, but the application does not get enough cycles and falls behind. 

I guess we could snoop the connection to try and figure out what is triggering the failure,but not having access to the linux terminal it would be all guess work.

My guess is that if we slowed the connection the receiving Premier would be fine.

And the CSR is useless...she was reading the script for a netflix crash.


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

shamilian said:


> This happens to me about once every 40 to 50 transfers.
> I have a gigabit switch and both Tivos are hardwired.
> This has nothing to do with the internet or a router...
> 
> ...


Good points. I wonder if I knocked down my ports to 10mbs (just as a TEST)....

Why does this happen every single time on my transfers now (2 premiers, in either direction) but only occasionally to yours? -edit- make that every single time on my transfers with a full HD recording more than an hour. 720 seems ok.

I'm only 10/100, not gigabit, but the tivos are only 100bit anyway right? I've tried with my regular Cisco managed switch, and taking that out of the equasion and using only a dd-wrt linksys router/switch.

-edit- oh and this didn't used to happen with these boxes, only since July.

Thanks for your thoughts. - this is getting upsetting now - all I want is to be lazy and not have to go all the way downstairs to watch something that's recorded there


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

well, after months of no luck, different switches, cabling, etc, I dropped the ports on my switch that the tivo boxes connect to down to 10mbit. I'm now able to transfer 1hr 1080i shows without freezes or crashes.

Of course it takes absolutely forever (a 7gb file over 10mbit wihtout any condiseration that 10mbit won't really run at 10 will take close to 2 hours).

I'm thinking that maybe BOTH of my hard drives are having trouble??? I see no pixelation or freezes (expect freezes when transferring at 100mbit). Anything's possible, but is this a likely cause of my crashes at 100mbit but not 10?

THanks all


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## shamilian (Mar 27, 2003)

weinberk said:


> Good points. I wonder if I knocked down my ports to 10mbs (just as a TEST)....
> 
> Why does this happen every single time on my transfers now (2 premiers, in either direction) but only occasionally to yours?


Different switches have more / less amount of internal memory and may respond to ethernet pause/back-pressure.

It is hard to get information on how much internal memory the cheap unmanaged switches support.


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

shamilian said:


> Different switches have more / less amount of internal memory and may respond to ethernet pause/back-pressure.
> 
> It is hard to get information on how much internal memory the cheap unmanaged switches support.


I've used cheap-o unmanaged to test, but my main switch, the one that I use on a regular basis and the TiVo's are connected to normally is an enterprise grade Cisco WS-2950-24.


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## NotVeryWitty (Oct 3, 2003)

FWIW, I get occasional reboots on my Premieres when doing one of two things:

1) Watching Netflix shows. Happens approximately 10% of the time, usually at random locations, but perhaps more frequently near the start of the show.

2) Premiere to Premiere MRV transfer. Happens infrequently (maybe 2% of transfers), but by unhappy coincidence happened last night.

My Premieres are both connected by wired ethernet to an Apple TimeCapsule router. My ISP is Verizon Fios 25/25 Mbps.

This is definitely a software bug on the Premieres, likely in the ethernet driver. Last night's reboot happened while the Tivo was recording my wife's favorite show (NCIS) -- since it takes so long to reboot the Tivo, we lost about 10 minutes of the show. Needless to say, my wife did not have very good things to say about Tivo, and is starting to ask about the Verizon DVR again.


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## weinberk (Jun 12, 2001)

Alright, so first off, using a crossover cable isn't going to work. The tivos apparently check for internet connectivity fairly frequently. If the connection goes down in the middle of a transfer, the tivo complains and stops the transfer (it doesn't crash though). So that's not a possibility, you need a switch.

I looked at every conceivable setting on my switch, nothing makes a difference except for knocking the port down to 10mbit, which makes transfers terribly slow.

I just tried using a gigabit consumer grade switch. The tivos connect at 100mbit as expected. And we're back to crashing....

So what do you all think? Could this be a disk problem?????


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## unitron (Apr 28, 2006)

steve614 said:


> From what I understand, Premieres need internet connectivity to function properly...


Am I the only one who finds this absolutely insane, and one of the great design/engineering blunders of all time?


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## steve614 (May 1, 2006)

unitron said:


> Am I the only one who finds this absolutely insane, and one of the great design/engineering blunders of all time?


I agree about the insanity from a consumer perspective, but I don't think it was a blunder on TiVos part.
With previous Tivo models, you could cancel service, unplug the Tivo from the network, and stiff effectively use it manually.
Sounds like with the Premiere, doing the above would render it useless.
One more way TiVo can control what users can and can't do.
I just hope they don't get the idea to lock down the software to prevent users from doing their own hard drive upgrades.


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## L David Matheny (Jan 29, 2011)

steve614 said:


> I just hope they don't get the idea to lock down the software to prevent users from doing their own hard drive upgrades.


That would be a very effective way for them to lose much of what should be (and has been) their most enthusiastic customer base.


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## jimcarver (Dec 25, 2004)

I can't speak to any of the technical issues here and my transfer problem is a little different but my experiences make me believe it is a bandwidth or conflict problem. I'm not very familiar with how WIFI works but I only have problems when I try to do anything else on my network while I'm transferring a show. A show will transfer ok as long as I don't use my iPad, Droid, internet or watch a recorded show at the same time. I can watch live TV at the same time with no problem. I'm even leary typing this right now as I am trying to transfer a show at the same time. If I do "overuse" the network the TiVo transfer will crash the network and I have to reboot the network and the TiVo box. I think my internet connection is very fast (Comcast) but TiVo transfers seem to demand a lot of network resources and will fail and crash my network if other devices are using the network at the same time. I can use my other devices simultaneously and I don't crash as long as I'm not trying to transfer a TiVo show although I do, of course, notice a slowing of response time. I can only assume that TiVo just puts too much demand on the network to allow the use of other networked devices at the same time. I do wish TiVo could do something to alleviate this problem.


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

unitron said:


> Am I the only one who finds this absolutely insane, and one of the great design/engineering blunders of all time?


Maybe. My Internet connection has more uptime than my power. And my power company has excellent uptime in my area.

No idea why the OP is having issues. I've not had any issues transferring between my premieres over my gigabit backbone. I can have several concurrent transfers, all getting 80mb/s to 90mb/s transfers rates without any reboots.

I do have my TiVos isolated from my other newtork devices using one port of my router. Each port of my router goes to a five or 8 port switch. And each of those switches are connectected to different devices depending on the section of the network(I use several other switches down the line to connect all my devices). The only time data is sent through my router from my TiVos is for internet access(My TiVo desktop Pc is also in my TiVo network section). I have several sections on my network setup the same way. My VOIP, femtocell, and alarm system are connected to one switch.. My severs, media players and PCs are connected to one switch. And my IP cameras and WifI connections are connected to another.

This way the data traffic from all these devices doesn't cause any issues between all the devices. With around 70 devices on my network, if i did not separate it this way I would have issues. or I could also go to managed switches but I didn't see the need since my unmanaged setup works great.


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## jimcarver (Dec 25, 2004)

I have no clue how to do all of that. Seems like it should be much simpler for the average guy and unnecessary to have to do all of that. (If TiVo got it right or didn't market something that doesn't function for most people??)


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## L David Matheny (Jan 29, 2011)

jimcarver said:


> I can't speak to any of the technical issues here and my transfer problem is a little different but my experiences make me believe it is a bandwidth or conflict problem. I'm not very familiar with how WIFI works but I only have problems when I try to do anything else on my network while I'm transferring a show. A show will transfer ok as long as I don't use my iPad, Droid, internet or watch a recorded show at the same time. I can watch live TV at the same time with no problem. I'm even leary typing this right now as I am trying to transfer a show at the same time. If I do "overuse" the network the TiVo transfer will crash the network and I have to reboot the network and the TiVo box. I think my internet connection is very fast (Comcast) but TiVo transfers seem to demand a lot of network resources and will fail and crash my network if other devices are using the network at the same time. I can use my other devices simultaneously and I don't crash as long as I'm not trying to transfer a TiVo show although I do, of course, notice a slowing of response time. I can only assume that TiVo just puts too much demand on the network to allow the use of other networked devices at the same time. I do wish TiVo could do something to alleviate this problem.


It sounds like there is some error in TiVo's network drivers at the most basic level. We all know that Premieres are currently too dependent on network access, in that they will apparently stop and wait for network data when they should continue with their primary mission. But maybe network buffering is actually buggy. A slow or overloaded network connection should just make a TiVo sluggish, but it shouldn't do much else unless the delay is so long that something times out, and even that shouldn't cause a crash.


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## shamilian (Mar 27, 2003)

unitron said:


> Am I the only one who finds this absolutely insane, and one of the great design/engineering blunders of all time?


It was worse before, if the connection to netflix servers went down or netflix had a service outage, and you were watching a netflix program at the time, you would be stuck and the tivo would never get past the boot screen. It would just wait until it could connect to the netflix server before it would continue the boot process. After many months and much pain they fixed that bug.


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## Scott NY (Jul 26, 2005)

I've had the same issue recently with two brand new TiVo premiere models, and I think I have figured out the cause of the problem. At least for me. 

I had gotten a refurbished TiVo premiere as a replacement for a defective unit and was transferring shows from the old one to the new one with no issue. In the middle of the transfers, I went into the video on demand menu and started to set up my season passes to those. That's when the first crash happened. That unit continued to reboot as I tried to transfer things, so I called TiVo and had them send me another replacement. 

This time, they sent me a brand-new premiere in a retail box. I started transferring shows from my original defective unit to the brand-new unit, and there were no problems again. Then I decided to see if the video on demand shows were the problem, so I went into that screen and set up a season pass to one of them. About a minute later, my TiVo crashed and rebooted. After it rebooted, I went back to the now playing screen and started transferring the shows from the old TiVo again, because apparently the to do list got wiped out. I specifically told it to cancel the video on demand items that were about to transfer and let it do it's thing with the remaining shows that were being transferred from the other TiVo. 

When all the transfers are done, I am going to set up my season passes to the video on demand podcasts, and will see if any problems occur. I have not had any problems when transferring a show from my computer to a TiVo while a video on demand podcast was being transferred, so my guess is that this issue is related to transferring the show from one TiVo to another while a video on demand show is being transferred over the Internet.

If anyone has two premiere models and would like to test this out by setting up a large number of transfers from one to the other and then going into video on demand and setting up a new season pass so that the most recent episode of that show will start to transfer and see if the TiVo crashes, that would be great. 

Good luck. Can't wait to see if this is the real issue.


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## Scott NY (Jul 26, 2005)

So as a follow-up, when I waited for all shows to transfer from the old TiVo to the new one, I was able to successfully set up video on demand season passes and had podcasts from there download while the TiVo was recording shows from live tv and several podcasts have downloaded since then while the TiVo was both recording shows from live tv and while it was idle. So it would appear that transferring a show from one TiVo to another while downloading a video on demand podcast is what caused the issues, at least for me. If I feel brave, I may try to test out the other method again by transferring shows and podcasts at the same time. But I've had too many issues to risk it. Anyone else want to try?


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