# Serial access to HR10-250



## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

How do you use a serial cable to get the bash prompt? I found these instructions and they seems to be old. Do they still apply to 6.3?

What you'll need to do is access the TiVo's diagnostic mode. It's a little like trying to catch your BIOS screen when your computer first boots. If you can't get this next part to work right, go read the Hack FAQ for more troubleshooting info. This part is not strictly necessary, but helpful. See below.

Once you have a good hardware serial connection to your TiVo, fire up your favorite terminal program (I used Minicom) and set it to use the serial port, no dialing strings, flow control, or anything, 9600, 8,N,1 (if that doesn't work, try 38400,8,N,1). Plug your TiVo in and hit enter on your terminal once. The timing is a little tricky here. I've found that you need to do it within three seconds of plugging in the TiVo. Your mileage may vary. Don't wait for the TiVo to start showing graphics.

At the prompt, use the password "factory". Then, select X for "Extended Menu". Then select P for "Boot Parameters". The system will display your current boot parameters. They will include a reference to either hda4 or hda7. This is your primary boot partition. Remember it for later. Write it down if you have to. Select B to continue booting.


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

those instructions are VERY old... the default password is no longer factory, so that method isn't usable (plus, there is new anti-hacking protection that can't be overcome via serial only -- at least nobody has published it, if it does exist)

Hacking the tivo requires pulling the drive and modifying it using a PC running linux.


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

BTUx9 said:


> those instructions are VERY old... the default password is no longer factory, so that method isn't usable (plus, there is new anti-hacking protection that can't be overcome via serial only -- at least nobody has published it, if it does exist)
> 
> Hacking the tivo requires pulling the drive and modifying it using a PC running linux.


Some how the guys on DDB are managing to get in via the serial cable.

Step 10 in the following post.

http://www.************.com/forum/showpost.php?p=263471&postcount=235


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

rrr22777 said:


> Some how the guys on DDB are managing to get in via the serial cable.
> 
> Step 10 in the following post.
> 
> http://www.************.com/forum/showpost.php?p=263471&postcount=235


I have asked the guy who posted about how he used the cable. Waiting for my newbie thrashing


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## thespacepope72 (Jan 25, 2005)

They have hacked Tivos to begin with.



rrr22777 said:


> Some how the guys on DDB are managing to get in via the serial cable.
> 
> Step 10 in the following post.
> 
> http://www.************.com/forum/showpost.php?p=263471&postcount=235


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## cheer (Nov 13, 2005)

As sethjvm states, a serial cable will only get you bash if you've already hacked the Tivo and configured it for serial bash.


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

gee... isn't that what I said?


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

BTUx9 said:


> gee... isn't that what I said?


Sorry. Yes my Tivo is hacked with Instantcake and PTVNet CD which I belive adds lines to .author to enable serial. Of course I have no way of checking my .author file now.

So once it is hacked how do I use the cable to get to the prompt?


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## cheer (Nov 13, 2005)

rrr22777 said:


> Sorry. Yes my Tivo is hacked with Instantcake and PTVNet CD which I belive adds lines to .author to enable serial. Of course I have no way of checking my .author file now.
> 
> So once it is hacked how do I use the cable to get to the prompt?


Plug it in. Once the Tivo is booted, just hit enter from your terminal program and you should see a bash prompt.


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## cheer (Nov 13, 2005)

BTUx9 said:


> gee... isn't that what I said?


Sorry -- I read your post but for whatever reason it did not register with me!


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

cheer said:


> Plug it in. Once the Tivo is booted, just hit enter from your terminal program and you should see a bash prompt.


Man that is simple. Thank you. I had tried this on a Series 1 a long time ago and could not get it to work. This one is probably hacked correctly with the entries in .author.


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## madgrizzle (Feb 18, 2004)

It took a setting of 115.2Kbps for mine to work on my Windows XP Pro laptop.


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## boody (Nov 16, 2000)

Will serial console access be preserved after 6.3 is allowed to autoinstall (after a phone call), or is it one of the hacks that will disappear?


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

it'll disappear if you allow any software upgrade to proceed automatically... user intervention is required to keep the machine hacked (except for more exotic self-hacking setups)


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## tivoupgrade (Sep 27, 2000)

PTVnet (currently only available on the HR10-250 on 3.1.5f) does enable serial/bash access. It does not do this from the rc.sysinit.author file. It does do this with an invocation of bash that occurs using a startup file in the /init directory.

We recommend you use TERATERM PRO (its free and you can google for it) and I'm pretty sure you need to have your serial port set up for 9600,8,N,1 for everything to work smoothly.


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## boody (Nov 16, 2000)

OK, so besides adding "console=2,115200" to the bootpage what are the (manual/actual) steps to get bash over serial cable?


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## aaronwt (Jan 31, 2002)

After the 6.3 update all I did was load Tera Term Pro on my PC and connected the serial cable to the TiVo. I rebooted the Tivo and started Tera Term after giving the TiVo a few minutes to boot and I had the bash prompt. Now if I just knew how to re-enable network access and TiVoWeb plus I would be very happy.


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## sgerbode (Dec 18, 2004)

aaronwt said:


> After the 6.3 update all I did was load Tera Term Pro on my PC and connected the serial cable to the TiVo. I rebooted the Tivo and started Tera Term after giving the TiVo a few minutes to boot and I had the bash prompt. Now if I just knew how to re-enable network access and TiVoWeb plus I would be very happy.


It sounds like what you are saying is that in the 6.3 distribution, after the upgrade, serial bash is already enabled without your having to set the boot parameters. Is that correct? And did you need to give any particular parameters to teraterm to make it work?

I would assume that with a bash prompt, you should be able to take the necessary steps to enable telnet access without having to pull the drive, but maybe I'm wrong about that...


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## Finnstang (Sep 11, 2003)

sgerbode said:


> It sounds like what you are saying is that in the 6.3 distribution, after the upgrade, serial bash is already enabled without your having to set the boot parameters. Is that correct? And did you need to give any particular parameters to teraterm to make it work?
> 
> I would assume that with a bash prompt, you should be able to take the necessary steps to enable telnet access without having to pull the drive, but maybe I'm wrong about that...


His was a prehacked HR10, so bash was setup already. He upgraded via slices and access was still there.


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## boody (Nov 16, 2000)

Can someone confirm/deny these are the steps to get it setup:

bash-2.02# bootpage -p /dev/hda
root=/dev/hda7 brev=0x100A

bash-2.02# bootpage -P "root=/dev/hda7 brev=0x100A dsscon=true console=2,115200"

the following lines should be in rc.sysinit.author:

export TERM=xterm
export PS1='\h:\w$ '

#Setup HOSTNAME
hostname HDVR2

#Start BASH
/bin/bash</dev/ttyS2&>/dev/ttyS2&


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

tivoupgrade said:


> PTVnet (currently only available on the HR10-250 on 3.1.5f) does enable serial/bash access. It does not do this from the rc.sysinit.author file. It does do this with an invocation of bash that occurs using a startup file in the /init directory.
> 
> We recommend you use TERATERM PRO (its free and you can google for it) and I'm pretty sure you need to have your serial port set up for 9600,8,N,1 for everything to work smoothly.


Thank you for confirming this. Does it use /dev/SA0?


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## sgerbode (Dec 18, 2004)

Finnstang said:


> His was a prehacked HR10, so bash was setup already. He upgraded via slices and access was still there.


Hmmm. I guess there is no Santa Claus...


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## tnedator (Dec 4, 2003)

cheer said:


> Plug it in. Once the Tivo is booted, just hit enter from your terminal program and you should see a bash prompt.


I know this should be simple, but I couldn't get connected last night. I am on XP using hyperterminal.

I plug the cable into the Tivo, have the other end in a com port on the PC. Open hyperterminal and tell it to connect at 115k? Then I reboot the Tivo, and at some point during the reboot, hit enter?

Those are the steps I tried, and I didn't have any luck.


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

is the cable wired correctly? You shouldn't hit ENTER too early, otherwise you'll get the prom menu, which won't help you


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## tnedator (Dec 4, 2003)

When should you hit enter? At what point in the reboot? What should be displayed on the TV?


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

any time after the 2nd screen is displayed, though you may have to hit it more than once, depending on when bash is called in the startup code... you DO have it starting up correctly, I hope (how is the box hacked?)


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## tnedator (Dec 4, 2003)

BTUx9 said:


> any time after the 2nd screen is displayed, though you may have to hit it more than once, depending on when bash is called in the startup code... you DO have it starting up correctly, I hope (how is the box hacked?)


I used the zipper. I am beginning to think my cable is no good.


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

quite possible... you can check for continuity by shorting the last 2 pins on the tivo side, then hyperterm should echo whatever is typed... but that won't tell you if it's cross-wired or not (has to be xmit to rcv and vice-versa)


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## tnedator (Dec 4, 2003)

BTUx9 said:


> quite possible... you can check for continuity by shorting the last 2 pins on the tivo side, then hyperterm should echo whatever is typed... but that won't tell you if it's cross-wired or not (has to be xmit to rcv and vice-versa)


Ok, thanks. I might try that, if not I think I have a real Tivo cable at work that I will look for.


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

I have a stupid question... I bought the serial cable. One end is serial the other end is a 1/8" stereo plug. Where on the HR10-250 is a place to plug in the stereo plug?


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## Finnstang (Sep 11, 2003)

In the back there is a connection labelled serial and one labelled IR. Plug it into the one labelled serial.


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

Finnstang said:


> In the back there is a connection labelled serial and one labelled IR. Plug it into the one labelled serial.


That was embarassing but thank you. Found it!


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

did you check the back, near the USB ports? I don't have an HDTivo, but that's where it is on other S2s


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

Starting to wonder what the Slicer preserved? I had a drive imaged with PTVNet. Used Slicer 1.1 to update to 6.3 - no bash prompt. Not a single characted on Tera Term. So no networking and no serial access!


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## sgerbode (Dec 18, 2004)

I have a different problem: I connected the serial cable, set it up with bootpage for speed of 115200 and /bin/bash < /dev/ttyS2 >& /dev/ttyS2 &

I attached the serial cable, fired up hyperterm on my PC with speed=115200,8 data bits, 1 stop bit, and flow control = none, and I had a bash prompt. Also, if I did cat > /dev/ttyS2 and typed a few things or cat'ed a file to /devttyS2, it showed up on hyperterm just fine.

But when I tried hitting a few <return>'s on my screen in hyperterm -- nothing happened on the screen. It did not respond to whatever I typed.

I also tried teraterm -- same result.

Am I missing something?


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## rrr22777 (Jul 31, 2002)

sgerbode said:


> I have a different problem: I connected the serial cable, set it up with bootpage for speed of 115200 and /bin/bash < /dev/ttyS2 >& /dev/ttyS2 &
> 
> I attached the serial cable, fired up hyperterm on my PC with speed=115200,8 data bits, 1 stop bit, and flow control = none, and I had a bash prompt. Also, if I did cat > /dev/ttyS2 and typed a few things or cat'ed a file to /devttyS2, it showed up on hyperterm just fine.
> 
> ...


You may have to do something like ttyS2 sane


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

might also want to check the cable... shorting the last 2 pins should make hyperterm echo what you type... if it doesn't, your send line is shorted or disconnected.


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## BigBearf (Aug 18, 2005)

Any one use a Mac to gain serial access. 
I have a serial cable but Ratshack wants $35 for a USB to serial adaptor which is a lot. Before I spring for the adaptor. What program would be good to use. If anybody uses a Mac to gain serial access please post 
Thanks, 
Jeff


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## STL (Feb 10, 2005)

tivoupgrade said:


> PTVnet (currently only available on the HR10-250 on 3.1.5f) does enable serial/bash access. It does not do this from the rc.sysinit.author file. It does do this with an invocation of bash that occurs using a startup file in the /init directory.
> 
> We recommend you use TERATERM PRO (its free and you can google for it) and I'm pretty sure you need to have your serial port set up for 9600,8,N,1 for everything to work smoothly.


So if I used files from *ptvlba48-4.04* then I don't need to add anything to my author file to have access via a hyperterm?

I verified my cable is good, but I'm getting nothing in my hyperterm after I reboot my HR10.


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## BTUx9 (Nov 13, 2003)

STL said:


> So if I used files from *ptvlba48-4.04* then I don't need to add anything to my author file to have access via a hyperterm?
> 
> I verified my cable is good, but I'm getting nothing in my hyperterm after I reboot my HR10.


depends on which files and how you used them 

As he said, if you used PTVnet to hack the tivo, it would have installed the serial bash hook early... if you used a different method to hack, then whether or not you have serial bash early depends on the method you used to hack


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