Tivo Dual Tuner

"Adam H. Kerman" wrote in message
...
Peter Pan wrote:

never say never, very simple and available now.... unit/board has dual
ATSC
tuners, and fits right inside the tivo (in place of the ntsc tuner board)
(you do have to open the tivo and replace a circuit board, but then it
uses
atsc tuners instead of the ntsc ones)

From whom are these aftermarket parts purchased?



i use weaknees... (no financial interest, i just happen to like their
service)

http://www.weaknees.com/tivo-upgrade.php

In article , "Peter Pan" wrote:

"Adam H. Kerman" wrote in message
...
Peter Pan wrote:

never say never, very simple and available now.... unit/board has dual
ATSC
tuners, and fits right inside the tivo (in place of the ntsc tuner board)
(you do have to open the tivo and replace a circuit board, but then it
uses
atsc tuners instead of the ntsc ones)

From whom are these aftermarket parts purchased?



i use weaknees... (no financial interest, i just happen to like their
service)

http://www.weaknees.com/tivo-upgrade.php


No sign of replaceable ATSC tuner board

Peter Pan wrote:
"Adam H. Kerman" wrote:
Peter Pan wrote:
"Adam H. Kerman" wrote:
bilb2765 wrote:

My Dual Tuner will not attach to an antenna. Maybe if hacked, but I just
need to do something with it.

Weren't there any digital converter boxes that TiVo could change the
channel? The problem may have been the need to map channel numbers
that TiVo could send to subchannel numbers (which are already mapped),
but you'd think one of the converter boxes out there could use a
user-specified channel map.

At least one tuner would be usable.

are you using a 75-ohm antenna cable (tivo takes 75 ohm coax), but will
NOT
accept 300 ohm twinlead antenna cable...

It's not my setup. I have a Series2 built into Toshiba DVD-RW, single
tuner. I use it to control a cable DTA. Never tried it with over the
air due to having no idea how to map the channels.

got ya, not a tivo dual tuner for you, but a toshiba single tuner dvr (dvd
drive instead of the second tuner)
even easier
the unit accepts video in from either a)output from the tuner, or b)the
video in plugs (yellow red white), what you may want to do (for yours or any
single tuner s2 - or even s1) is just get a converter box (used to be free
with govt coupons)

I never found a free one, but I did purchase two for low prices when
the coupons were being distributed. They can be set to change the channel
in advance of a recording, which I figured I would do record to TiVo.

the toshiba units use an "ir blaster" to control the box... (like hitting
the buttons on a remote control)

They came in the box. It's what I use to change channels on the cable DTA.

the converter box itself controls the mapping, the toshiba just tells it
change to a channel (for example say channel 99 maps to 12.3) toshiba/tivo
sends command to box (via ir blaster) to go to channel 99, converter box
tunes digital channel 12.3 and outputs an analog signal on channel 99,
toshiba/tivo records 99...

It's not a feature of the converter boxes I have.

It probably wouldn't be an overwhelming task to take an IR sensor, a
Microchip PIC processor, an IR LED, a digital oscilloscope to measure
the needed timing once and write a couple of pages of software that
would translate one Tivo code set to one or a handful of DTA code
sets.

Funny you should mention that. There's this thing called the USB
IR Toy which consists of just this, along with a USB port to talk
to a PC (and it uses the PC as a power supply). It's "open source
hardware", so you can re-design the printed-circuit board. Or buy
one assembled for $20. Firmware that comes with it (open source),
can, among other things, accept a signal from a remote and spit out
the signal timings, so no need for a digital oscilloscope if you've
got a computer with USB. You can also pass back the signal timings
for a code and have it send it. You can also use the USB connection
to load new firmware.

(An alternative set of firmware, called "TV-B-Gone", intended to
be used standalone, sends out a set of POWER OFF codes for all known
TVs, hopefully turning off all of them in the area.)

Having the device itself recognize the codes (a couple hundred bytes
of timing transitions can be condensed down to a protocol name and
a 32-bit or 48-bit code and a couple of parameters, and once you
figure out which protocol you have to send and receive, you need
only deal with that one) might be problematic unless you get one
with more RAM: the one they used only has 2KB of RAM (that's *K*
not *G* for those of you used to PCs) and a timing pattern for one
code uses about 20% of that. I have not looked at the firmware to
see how much of the RAM is already in use. You might need 4K
instead.

I do have some hacked-together code that takes the timings from the
IR Toy and decodes (on the PC) two different protocols from all the
old and new remotes I can find and spits out the code. So far I've
discovered that certain keys on my Universal Remote don't work for
my converter box because the Universal Remote doesn't have any codes
for those keys and sends a broken code.

Then you duct tape the Tivo leds to the project's sensor and the
project's LED to the DTA sensor. The timing isn't so fast that that
would be a really hard project for anyone with some skill, equipment
and experience with the parts. But the question is, is it really worth
spending the time to do that project? I don't know, but I suspect it
would be marginal at best.

If you like hacking stuff and have the time, it might be interesting.
If you just want your TV setup to work so you can reliably record
TV on the correct channel, probably not.


I've contemplated a very similar project for a completely different
reason, because my Tivo brand Series 2 has always had some problems
talking to my GI cable box. But the Comcast handheld remote NEVER has
that problem. This problem has gotten a LOT worse recently, perhaps
because the Tivo seems like it has become much slower recently and may
be having problems of its own. The project of writing code that would
be so forgiving that it could always avoid whatever is causing the
problem between the Tivo and GI would likely be a more challenging
task.

Is the problem with the Tivo *sending* a code or the cable box
*receiving* it? An IRToy set up to log what the Tivo sends might
detect whether the signal is not getting sent at all, vs. getting
sent weakly or with poor emulation. If there's no signal (occasionally),
you probably can't fix it. The IR Toy firmware as is is a pretty
good IR debugging/hacking tool. I haven't seen any firmware for
code mapping/translation for it (yet).

Is the real cause of my much more frequently seeing channel
change errors in the last 2-4 months because the hard drive is failing
or because something else I might be able to do something about is
failing? I don't know. A few years ago I did a scan of the drive when
I thought it might be failing and it reported zero errors. If anyone
knew how I could diagnose exactly what the problem was, especially if
it turns out to be something I could fix, then I would be very
appreciative. Would I be appreciative enough to spend the time to
build them a TivoToDTA converter? That I'm not so sure about, but I
might consider it.

"GMAN" wrote in message
...
In article , "Peter Pan"
wrote:

"Adam H. Kerman" wrote in message
...
Peter Pan wrote:

never say never, very simple and available now.... unit/board has dual
ATSC
tuners, and fits right inside the tivo (in place of the ntsc tuner
board)
(you do have to open the tivo and replace a circuit board, but then it
uses
atsc tuners instead of the ntsc ones)

From whom are these aftermarket parts purchased?



i use weaknees... (no financial interest, i just happen to like their
service)

http://www.weaknees.com/tivo-upgrade.php


No sign of replaceable ATSC tuner board

no sep tuner board, tuners are actually part of the "motherboard"
replacement....

In article , "Peter Pan" wrote:

"GMAN" wrote in message
...
In article , "Peter Pan"
wrote:

"Adam H. Kerman" wrote in message
...
Peter Pan wrote:

never say never, very simple and available now.... unit/board has dual
ATSC
tuners, and fits right inside the tivo (in place of the ntsc tuner
board)
(you do have to open the tivo and replace a circuit board, but then it
uses
atsc tuners instead of the ntsc ones)

From whom are these aftermarket parts purchased?



i use weaknees... (no financial interest, i just happen to like their
service)

http://www.weaknees.com/tivo-upgrade.php


No sign of replaceable ATSC tuner board

no sep tuner board, tuners are actually part of the "motherboard"
replacement....


So wheres this magical motherboard replacement for our older tivo's?

"GMAN" wrote in message
...
i use weaknees... (no financial interest, i just happen to like their
service)

http://www.weaknees.com/tivo-upgrade.php


No sign of replaceable ATSC tuner board

no sep tuner board, tuners are actually part of the "motherboard"
replacement....


So wheres this magical motherboard replacement for our older tivo's?

depends, there are many many models of tivo's and dvr with the tivo software
logo, before you can see the upgrade options available, you have to pick a
manufacturer and type

In article , "Peter Pan" wrote:

"GMAN" wrote in message
...
i use weaknees... (no financial interest, i just happen to like their
service)

http://www.weaknees.com/tivo-upgrade.php


No sign of replaceable ATSC tuner board

no sep tuner board, tuners are actually part of the "motherboard"
replacement....


So wheres this magical motherboard replacement for our older tivo's?

depends, there are many many models of tivo's and dvr with the tivo software
logo, before you can see the upgrade options available, you have to pick a
manufacturer and type


I have never even heard of a ATSC upgrade for any standalone Tivo.

Show us one!!

"GMAN" wrote in message
...
In article , "Peter Pan"
wrote:

"GMAN" wrote in message
...
i use weaknees... (no financial interest, i just happen to like their
service)

http://www.weaknees.com/tivo-upgrade.php


No sign of replaceable ATSC tuner board

no sep tuner board, tuners are actually part of the "motherboard"
replacement....


So wheres this magical motherboard replacement for our older tivo's?

depends, there are many many models of tivo's and dvr with the tivo
software
logo, before you can see the upgrade options available, you have to pick a
manufacturer and type


I have never even heard of a ATSC upgrade for any standalone Tivo.

Show us one!!

huh? You asked above where the motherboard replacement is, now you ask about
upgrade instead of replacement.....
Various manufacturers made s1 and s2 tivos (not just tivo)
if your tivo unit was made by say
toshiba/humanx/philipps/emerson/sony/hughes/directv/etc you can replace the
motherboard, if it is a tivo made unit, you have to get the motherboard
replacement from tivo itself for lots of bucks

you seem to be under the impression that ONLY tivo made tivos

many different companies made tivos

personally i like the older toshiba and humanx units, no upgrade to lifetime
service, but free basic (3 days)


if you refuse to go to the select a manfacturer page and select a unit
check out this page specific to tivo made tivos... (motherboard upgrades for
http://www.weaknees.com/tivo.php
tivo made tivos upgrades are ONLY available from tivo, (but they have many,
made by tivo, that are already upgraded)

In article , "Peter Pan" wrote:

"GMAN" wrote in message
...
In article , "Peter Pan"
wrote:

"GMAN" wrote in message
...
i use weaknees... (no financial interest, i just happen to like their
service)

http://www.weaknees.com/tivo-upgrade.php


No sign of replaceable ATSC tuner board

no sep tuner board, tuners are actually part of the "motherboard"
replacement....


So wheres this magical motherboard replacement for our older tivo's?

depends, there are many many models of tivo's and dvr with the tivo
software
logo, before you can see the upgrade options available, you have to pick a
manufacturer and type


I have never even heard of a ATSC upgrade for any standalone Tivo.

Show us one!!

huh? You asked above where the motherboard replacement is, now you ask about
upgrade instead of replacement.....
Various manufacturers made s1 and s2 tivos (not just tivo)
if your tivo unit was made by say
toshiba/humanx/philipps/emerson/sony/hughes/directv/etc you can replace the
motherboard, if it is a tivo made unit, you have to get the motherboard
replacement from tivo itself for lots of bucks

you seem to be under the impression that ONLY tivo made tivos

many different companies made tivos

personally i like the older toshiba and humanx units, no upgrade to lifetime
service, but free basic (3 days)






if you refuse to go to the select a manfacturer page and select a unit
check out this page specific to tivo made tivos... (motherboard upgrades for
http://www.weaknees.com/tivo.php
tivo made tivos upgrades are ONLY available from tivo, (but they have many,
made by tivo, that are already upgraded)



Refuse????? I have never heard nor seen any motherboard upgrades to an old
tivo that would add ATSC to the internals of any unit that has used the tivo
OS period!!! Show us this mythical model?