Tivo without subscription

I was surprised to see that our Tivo with a subscription that expired 6
weeks ago is still functioning. Previously recorded material is still
playable although it appears that the first few seconds may be garbled.
Recordings can still be scheduled by time and channel and the last 30
minutes of live tv is still being updated.

This is more than I expected without a subscription. Is further reduced
functionality coming?

In article , (NoSpam)
wrote:

This is more than I expected without a subscription. Is further
reduced
functionality coming?

That's the normal behaviour of a series 1 box except none of your recordings should
have become garbled. Its probable that you may need to start thinking about
replacing the hard drive before it becomes unreadable.
If you leave it connected to the phone line, the daily call becomes a one in six
days call which is enough to keep the clock correct.

Stephen

On Wed, 12 Dec 2007 00:52:19 GMT, (Stephen
Forbes) wrote:

In article , (NoSpam)
wrote:

This is more than I expected without a subscription. Is further
reduced
functionality coming?

That's the normal behaviour of a series 1 box except none of your recordings should
have become garbled. Its probable that you may need to start thinking about
replacing the hard drive before it becomes unreadable.
If you leave it connected to the phone line, the daily call becomes a one in six
days call which is enough to keep the clock correct.

Stephen

It's a Series 2 unit. It's definitely not a hard drive problem.

I've noticed on pre-recorded programs that the video is garbled from the
start of the program but the audio is fine. If I use the 30-second skip
ahead, the all is well and if I reverse the direction to the beginning of
the program it's fine.

It's not connected to the phone line and I've been powering down the cable
modem before enabling networking on the unsubscibed Tivo. It won't access
the other Tivos on the network when I plug it into the network.

This is a academic but it does show that an unsubscribed Tivo can still be
a useful dvr.

In article , (NoSpam)
wrote:

This is a academic but it does show that an unsubscribed Tivo can
still be
a useful dvr.

This is interesting as series 2 devices are supposed to be doorstops without a
subscription. It may be that because programs from an active subscription period
are still on the hard drive it still allows you to watch them and a side effect is
manual recording features still work.

My advice, keep at least 2 such programs on the HD indefinitely.

Stephen

On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 13:39:45 GMT,
(Stephen Forbes) wrote:

In article , (NoSpam)
wrote:

This is a academic but it does show that an unsubscribed Tivo can
still be
a useful dvr.

This is interesting as series 2 devices are supposed to be doorstops without a
subscription. It may be that because programs from an active subscription period
are still on the hard drive it still allows you to watch them and a side effect is
manual recording features still work.

My advice, keep at least 2 such programs on the HD indefinitely.

Stephen

FWIW, I've had a Tivo without subscription for a couple of years, and
can still watch those programs that I recorded while I had the
subscription. But I've never been able to record additional material
manually.

--
Charlie Hoffpauir
http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.com/~charlieh/

On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 09:02:15 -0600, Charlie Hoffpauir wrote:

On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 13:39:45 GMT, (Stephen
Forbes) wrote:

In article ,
(NoSpam) wrote:

This is a academic but it does show that an unsubscribed Tivo can
still be
a useful dvr.

This is interesting as series 2 devices are supposed to be doorstops
without a subscription. It may be that because programs from an active
subscription period are still on the hard drive it still allows you to
watch them and a side effect is manual recording features still work.

My advice, keep at least 2 such programs on the HD indefinitely.

Stephen

FWIW, I've had a Tivo without subscription for a couple of years, and
can still watch those programs that I recorded while I had the
subscription. But I've never been able to record additional material
manually.

It could be he has one with Tivo basic. In fact, that's the only way I
know of that he could still use an S2 without a sub.



--
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My Tivo Experience http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/tivo.htm
Tivo HD/S3 compared http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/mythtivo.htm
AMD cpu help http://wesnewell.no-ip.com/cpu.php

On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 16:20:19 GMT, Wes Newell
wrote:

On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 09:02:15 -0600, Charlie Hoffpauir wrote:

On Thu, 13 Dec 2007 13:39:45 GMT, (Stephen
Forbes) wrote:

In article ,
(NoSpam) wrote:

This is a academic but it does show that an unsubscribed Tivo can
still be
a useful dvr.

This is interesting as series 2 devices are supposed to be doorstops
without a subscription. It may be that because programs from an active
subscription period are still on the hard drive it still allows you to
watch them and a side effect is manual recording features still work.

My advice, keep at least 2 such programs on the HD indefinitely.

Stephen

FWIW, I've had a Tivo without subscription for a couple of years, and
can still watch those programs that I recorded while I had the
subscription. But I've never been able to record additional material
manually.

It could be he has one with Tivo basic. In fact, that's the only way I
know of that he could still use an S2 without a sub.

Actually it was a "plus" subscription that was canceled on Oct 29. I'm
still expecting that it will die completely but right now it's still doing
it's dvr thing. Additional recordings (by time and channel) are still
chugging along and the last 30 minutes of live tv is still being recorded.

On or about Thu, 13 Dec 2007 13:39:45 GMT did
(Stephen Forbes) dribble thusly:

In article , (NoSpam)
wrote:

This is a academic but it does show that an unsubscribed Tivo can
still be
a useful dvr.

This is interesting as series 2 devices are supposed to be doorstops without a
subscription. It may be that because programs from an active subscription period
are still on the hard drive it still allows you to watch them and a side effect is
manual recording features still work.

My advice, keep at least 2 such programs on the HD indefinitely.

I think the key thing is keeping it away from the phone line. Maybe
you didn't notice that he said it was unplugged from that.

So maybe it's designed to give the owner the benefit of the doubt in
the event that it can't phone home. So it still works until he plugs
it in and it's told to become a brick because of the lapsed
subscription. That's my theory, anyway.