# My Tivo has fallen off my network.



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

For some reason my Tivo has fallen off my network. I'm unable to Ping or Telnet to the box. I know that there is a connection by the lights on the turbonet card and at my router.

I've tried reinstalling the NIC_INSTALL with the Tivo drive in my PC and I have also tried changing the IP address too. But all to no avail.

Can anyone suggest what I should try next?

Thanks


----------



## mutant_matt2 (Dec 16, 2008)

What's the IP addresses of the PC, router and TiVo (and the default gateway and subnet mask set on TiVo?)


----------



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

PC = 192.168.1.7
Router = 192.168.1.254
Tivo = 192.168.1.200
Tivo Gateway = 192.168.1.254

Subnet = 255.255.255.0

Any ping request to 192.168.1.200 just times out.


----------



## mutant_matt2 (Dec 16, 2008)

Bizarre then. Can you ping the router (192.168.1.254) from TiVo?

Edited to add, you can't get onto the TiVo to ping anything can you? Doh!


----------



## johala_reewi (Oct 30, 2002)

Have you tried a tracert (windows/DOS) or traceroute (unix/linux) command?

For example on PC type: tracert 192.168.1.200

Also, on the PC you can type route print (in DOS window) to show the routing table.


----------



## RichardJH (Oct 7, 2002)

I wonder whether the card has worked loose it has happened before. Has the Tivo been moved recently.


----------



## mutant_matt2 (Dec 16, 2008)

If you have a crossover cable, connect directly to your PC, after setting the PC's IP address to a static 192.168.1.x (where x = anything but 200). See if you can ping then?

Richard's suggestion is also a good one, and very occasionally, depriving this kind of kit of power, can solve the problem, which of course, you'd be doing anyway to re-seat the card, but you could try, depending on how easy access to your TiVo is...


----------



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

Hmmm - My Tivo is sort of back but not for very long.....

If I PING 191.168.1.199 -t
and then reboot my Tivo I get a reply, half way through the startup sequence until the Tivo animation has finished. As soon as the Now Playing menu appears the Ping responces stop.

I'm assuming that something has become corrupted somewhere. (During the Ping response I can see TiVoWeb and start a Telnet Session!)

Any further suggestions?

PS: Tivo was powered down all day today and I have reseated the Card.


----------



## ...coolstream (Dec 10, 2005)

Just a stab in the dark, but I wonder if sysinit or tivoweb.cfg has become corrupted or if there is some change in either that could be locking the turbonet card.

Not sure if this could be a possibility and less sure how it could be remedied in the short connection time you have.


----------



## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

Help, I've fallen and can't Tivo!


----------



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

Would re-installing TivoWeb help then? IF not how can I make my Tivo Dial out for listings?


----------



## Ian_m (Jan 9, 2001)

Sure you haven't got a duplicate IP address clashing with your TiVo ?

I had exactly the same issue when I got my Blu-ray player, plugged it into my wireless ethernet bridge and by default player uses DHCP to get an IP address and my routers DHCP was on  (which is never normally is, as I was messing around with a wire PDA previously) and the router assigned it the same IP address as my TiVo (which is fixed IP of course).

Took a while to figure this one out. I was getting 1/2 a telnet screen, TiVoweb hanging all types of strange issues.


----------



## ...coolstream (Dec 10, 2005)

Ian_m makes a good point, but I can't see why DHCP would attempt to allocate an IP to a device that was already being used.


re re-installing tivoweb...
I think you should try some diagnostics first. What I would try to do is get accesss to sysinit and remove the line that starts tivoweb. If tivo was then able to talk to PC, you would know that tivoweb was the culprit.


----------



## verses (Nov 6, 2002)

...coolstream said:


> but I can't see why DHCP would attempt to allocate an IP to a device that was already being used.


As TiVo has been given a fixed IP address the DHCP server won't know about it (unless the address has been explicitly removed from the addresses the DHCP server is allowed to allocate) so it may give out that address to another client.


----------



## Ian_m (Jan 9, 2001)

...coolstream said:


> Ian_m makes a good point, but I can't see why DHCP would attempt to allocate an IP to a device that was already being used.


Its because my router starts DHCP dishing out addresses at .200 and my TiVo was at .200.

Works for ages with no one requesting IP addresses, then bang Blu-ray player requests address gets give first address of .200 and TiVoweb + telnet goes funny.

I do normally try to run my home network with all devices fixed IP address and DHCP off, but these things are sent to try us......


----------



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

I don't think that its a IP conflict. However I have a spare switch that doesn't do DHCP so will try setting a static IP on my laptop and talk to it that way. 

Will I be able to see the SYSINIT file if the drive is mounted in my PC?


----------



## mutant_matt2 (Dec 16, 2008)

Most routers start their DHCP range from 1, usually assigned to themselves (as the gateway), and dish out .2 and .3 and on for everything else. Usually, it would get nowhere near .200, but if it's range starts at .200, that would do it! 

I personally prefer the gateway on .254, fixed desktops on static addys in the single digit range, other fixed devices such as TiVo, NAS boxes and such up high (like 100, 110, 120 etc.), then have DHCP serve from .10 to .20, leaving the rest of the range for the future (am unlikely to need more than 10 DHCP addys any time soon!).

Anyway, the only key is to ensure that the router does not give addys out in the range that covers the TiVo address. A proper DHCP server should not give out an addy already in use, even if it doesn't specifically know about it, but we are talking about cheap consumer devices here (if indeed, that even has anything to do with the problem).

You might also get some clues from checking the MAC address of the TiVo IP in your computer's ARP cache (and compare it with what the router reports for that IP, if it does report it). My Turbonet card's MAC address vendor code is 00:0B:AD (which is apparently PC-PoS Inc., Ontario, Canada). If you get something well known (Intel/3Com/Broadcom etc.), you can probably be sure it's not the TiVo, and you probably have a clash.

HTH!

Matt


----------



## ...coolstream (Dec 10, 2005)

smiffy said:


> I don't think that its a IP conflict. However I have a spare switch that doesn't do DHCP so will try setting a static IP on my laptop and talk to it that way.


Why not, for purpose of testing, just switch off/unplug everything but tivo and PC. Then, if still no joy, change the PC's IP. Assuming that tivo will be allocated the same IP as before, you should be able to rule out the IP conflict question.



> Will I be able to see the SYSINIT file if the drive is mounted in my PC?


Definitely not by just attaching the tivo drive to a windows PC. In fact, that would trash the tivo drive.
A tivo boot disc would probably let you do it, but my knowledge ends here!

When you said you could ping until the NP menu appeared, I wondered if there would be enough time to telnet into tivo and get the sysinit file to your PC. If so, you could edit the file at your leisure then reboot tivo and telnet the edited file back to tivo.

Thanks for the replies about DHCP. I guess I'm lucky, because I've never encountered an IP conflict. Fingers crossed that Smoothwall never lets me down!!


----------



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

Morning All, 
It's definately not an IP conflict as I've created a dedicated two device netwrok I.E. Tivo & a PC both with Static IP addresses. 
I have the same problem. The Tivo stops the NIC as soon as the now Playing Menu appears. TivoWeb seems to function briefly as does a telnet session, but only for about 20 seconds.

I have a couple of MFS Tools & NIC Install Linux Boox disks so can I recreate the SYSINIT file from the Linux Boot session?

I'm no Linux expert, using the NIC boot disk I can mount the three Tivo Partitions. Following this thread http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=376446&highlight=edit+sysinit

I can mount the root partition and get to the rc.d directory and can run joe to edit the rc.sysinit file.

The final few lines are:

echo "rc.sysinit is complete"
source /etc/rc.d/rc.net
/bin/bash </dev/ttyS3 >& /dev/ttyS3 &
/sbin/tnlited 23 /bin/bash -login &
/sbin/tivoftpd

I also have an rc.sysinit.author which contains :-

#!/bin/bash
/var/hack/TivoWebPlus/TivoWeb
/var/mfs_ftp/mfs_ftp.tcl

Not sure what to do next. :-(


----------



## ...coolstream (Dec 10, 2005)

Good Morning and well done to get so far!

You say you have network connectivity for about 20 seconds. Both mine take longer from cachecard installation to NP menu ( but then again, I have more in sysinit including a sleep command as part of the mode0 hack and the delay included in the autospace.tcl). From what you say, it looks like you lose connectivity after tivoweb and mfs_ftp are loaded.

It therefore makes sense to eliminate each from the suspect list.

Backup rc.sysinit.author.
Remove the line _/var/hack/TivoWebPlus/TivoWeb_ from rc.sysinit.author.
Put the edited version back onto tivo.
Reboot.

(This will eliminate tivowebplus from the suspect list.).

Now do the same with mfs_ftp

If there's still no joy, then I can only think it could be a HW issue.

_Good Luck!_


----------



## mutant_matt2 (Dec 16, 2008)

You could try commenting out the two lines in rc.sysinit.author, and even the last one in rc.sysinit, put the drive back in TiVo and see if that helps. If so, you should still have telnet running, so if you can solve the ping problem, you could then telnet in and try re-enabling one by one, with reboots, until you break it again  

Failing that, perhaps it's actually a hardware problem with the card, where it dies after a certain amount of time powered up (but does sound unlikely to me).

What a weird one! Good luck,

Matt


----------



## RichardJH (Oct 7, 2002)

Not sure if it will help but my sysinit file does not have " /bin/bash </dev/ttyS3 >& /dev/ttyS3 &" in it so I googled for that info and it seems that it is used for achieving a bash prompt over a serial connection see http://************.com/forum/showthread.php?t=46965
I know it means taking the hard drive out again but might be worth commenting out that line and trying again.

BTW that link is to the database of deals forum


----------



## mikerr (Jun 2, 2005)

smiffy said:


> Would re-installing TivoWeb help then? IF not how can I make my Tivo Dial out for listings?


If you urgently need guide data, a quick fix is to physically remove the turbonet card, then do a dialup over the phone line.
Tivo happily ignores the drivers if there is no turbonet card present, but doesn't reset any settings, so it will use it next time you reinstallthe card.

Once indexed (overnight) you can put the turbonet card back in and continue troubleshooting...


----------



## RichardJH (Oct 7, 2002)

Mike as more of an expert do you think my previous post has any relevance.


----------



## mikerr (Jun 2, 2005)

Possibly!

Having hacks not backgrounded properly in rc.sys.init.author often causes the daily call to fail, but not loss of connectivity as seen here.

I'd comment out that "/bin/bash </dev/ttyS3 ..." line, and rename rc.sysinit.author to rc.sysinit.autor.old to eliminate anyting causing trouble in there.


----------



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

Hmmmm. I'm not getting much further with this. I've removed the NIC and plugged in an old Laptop Modem Cable under the hope that the Tivo will dail our for listings.

Unfortunately the Tivo is reporting a Communication Failuire and doesn't seem to attempt to dial out.

I've some spare 80gb HDD's kicking around and was wondering if I am able to get a blank Tivo Series 1 image anywhere that I could then put into the Tivo and start afresh? 

Or if there is anthing I can check about the failed dial up? The NIC_CONFIG_TIVO is probably still set to network, but there is no longer an NIC installed.


----------



## lcsneil (Jun 18, 2002)

How weird I've lsot my Tivo as well. I have been having trouble getting listings (via the Cachecard) since Tue last week (No dial tone) and so was playing with that over the weekend. 

I altered the debug settings using nic_config_tivo and set it to full test, rebooted it and now I can't ping, telnet etc into the tivo.

Have taken the case off and found out that after power up the red Cache LED on the cachecard comes up for about 90 secs then the link light illuminates briefly (about 30 secs) then goes out.

However, I cant see the Tivo during that time. (Edit: actually it pings for about 10 secs but wont telnet)

Would altering the debug to full test have disabled the network card? 

Anyway round making it work apart from pulling the drive - which I dont have time for at the moment. 

It's been so long since I have had network connectivity to my Tivo I have also forgotten how to make it talk network once the drive is pulled!


----------



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

Ahhhhhh. I may well have changed my debug level too!

I've put it back in the PC this evening and see what level its set to!


----------



## ...coolstream (Dec 10, 2005)

smiffy said:


> 1. Hmmmm. I'm not getting much further with this. I've removed the NIC and plugged in an old Laptop Modem Cable under the hope that the Tivo will dail our for listings.
> 
> Unfortunately the Tivo is reporting a Communication Failuire and doesn't seem to attempt to dial out.
> 
> ...


1. So, you plugged the old NIC into the TiVo motherboard? Did you then install drivers for it to tivo? And if so, how?

2. Try here http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=113155&highlight=image+begging

3. As far as I am aware, NIC_CONFIG_TIVO has to have tivo running in its own environment, but it must send its result somewhere in the settings. Not sure which file to change though.


----------



## BrianHughes (Jan 21, 2001)

Yes, for some reason the full level of debugging does disable the card. That may be it.


----------



## lcsneil (Jun 18, 2002)

BrianHughes said:


> Yes, for some reason the full level of debugging does disable the card. That may be it.


So what's the way to get it back online?

Anyway of doing it WITHOUT pulling the drive?


----------



## smiffy (Mar 6, 2002)

BrianHughes said:


> Yes, for some reason the full level of debugging does disable the card. That may be it.


I can confirm this - as I've just reset my debug level and all is back to normal!

Thanks to all who have contributed to this thread!


----------



## lcsneil (Jun 18, 2002)

smiffy said:


> I can confirm this - as I've just reset my debug level and all is back to normal!
> 
> Thanks to all who have contributed to this thread!


So I presume the only way to reset it is to pull the drive?

Which file is the debug setting in?


----------

