Tivo Announces PC Based Solution

Posted on September 29th, 2008 by William.
Categories: Modding, Tech.

Tivo announced an interesting solution that should be on sale after October 15th.  So far, it appears to be a tuner, presumably a USB tuner, and a remote.  It’s supposed to have the wonderful Tivo interface and run on the Windows platform.  It’s $200 for the package with the tuner, remote and software, or $100 for the software only.  That will include a year of Tivo schedule information, with a price of $99/yer for updates after that.  This package is supposed to allow you to save the shows to your video enabled iPod, a Playstation Portable, and DVD.

I’ll be intrested in taking a peek at this solution, but what remains to be answered is how well it will work over the network with my existing Tivo solution.  FYI, there’s many PC’s out there with a DVI (Digital Video Interface) connection on the video card, and the newer HD displays have HDMI ports.  There are cables available with DVI on one end and HDMI on the other. Keep in mind that using one of those cables, you’ll still have to run a cable for audio.  Do NOT purchase the cables from Best Buy, they ask 3 times too much.  You can get the cables cheaper at Altex, if you can just get over your nerd-phobia.

If this works well with my Sony Playstation Portable (PSP), then I can justify an 8GB memory card to hold some shows.  I like the idea of being able to back up shows to DVD.

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Great Time To Build An XBMC

Posted on September 9th, 2008 by William.
Categories: Modding.

Anyone that’s been to my house knows that I love my XBMC (X Box Media Center). Gamestop has dropped the price of the original Microsoft Xbox to $59.99 and there’s a coupon for $20 off that’s good until September 11, 2008. For those keeping score at home, that means an original Xbox can be had for $40. Sure, many of you are thinking “why in the world would I want an old video game console?” Well, check out XBMC.org to see what can be done. I’ll be adding:

Xecuter 3 modchip ($50) that will allow me to load custom BIOS and drive the LCD

XIR remote control mod ($30) because with the default Microsoft remote, there’s not a way to turn the Xbox on and off remotely. Kinda a major oversite for a $300 console that came out in 2004.

LCD faceplate. ($50) this is a faceplate that replaces the front of the original case and has a spot for the IR eye for the XIR mod, a built in LCD display with four lines of text that will display the file being played, a bar graph of how far you are into the file, and many useful things like adding USB ports. The modchip is required to drive the LCD display.

A larger hard drive. The original BIOS in the Xbox didn’t have supsport for 48 bit LBA (Logical Block Access) so it couldn’t read any hard drive larger than 137GB. The BIOS in the modchip allows for drives up to 750GB, even a 1TB drive, if you could find one that has a PATA interface instead of SATA.

The original Microsoft DVD playback kit that has it’s own IR eye and remote, so you can control the whole thing.

The Microsoft high def AV pack. This is a breakout box that connects to the back of the Xbox via a short cable and give you optical audio output so you can have DTS and Dolby 5.1 surround during your movies and games that support it. The video output is component output (the three RCA connectors colored red, green and blue). Once the Xbox sees the high def pack, it will support up to 1080i.

If you’re interested in joining the fun, let me know so I can see about getting a group discount on the mods.

NOTE: The original large PS2 (Playstation 2) is on sale for the same price. The great thing about that the larger PS2 has space inside for a hard drive (I believe it has to be under 137GB), but you need the Ethernet adapter because it provides power and a data connection to the drive. With a boot disc, you can load your purchased games onto the hard drive and play them from the drive. That really makes GTA III load times drop and the scenery is drawn much quicker so there’s less ‘pop up’ of trees and buildings as they come closer.

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How To: Decoding Tivo Error #86

Posted on April 10th, 2008 by William.
Categories: Modding, Tech.

My faithful DirecTV Tivo has been upgraded with a 120GB hard drive about four years ago and has been on 24/7 ever since. I noticed that it had recorded anything since Saturday night, and with nearly 40 season passes, that’s highly unusual. I tried to record off the air, to transfer a show from another Tivo in the house and also from my Tivo Server, even just try to keep an existing show - every time I’d get an ‘Message #86′. I did the lazy tech thing - aka ‘rebooted it’. No love, still an angry Tivo. Then a large storm came through the area came through the area last night and the power loss resulted in completely cold reboot. Still no happiness was to be found. Now it was time to summon the powers of Google and roll up my sleeves for some good ol’ hand to circuit combat.

The search pointed me HERE which gave me this advice:

Phase 1:
1) Unplug the Tivo power cable.
2) Hold the pause button on the remote.
3) Plug the Tivo power cable back in; while continuing to hold the pause button on the remote.
4) When two yellow/orange lights on the front of the Tivo light up (may take several minutes), release the pause button and type 57 on the remote (you only have a couple seconds to enter 57 so hurry).
5) The machine will boot and eventually enter a green screen. While in this screen the Tivo will run a scandisk utility and fix any bad sectors on the hard-disk. This can take several hours (3 hrs or so). Do not unplug or power down the Tivo until it has completed.

If after 3 hours it is still on the green screen you can either wait a bit longer, or try the steps above a second time. My suggestion is to wait a bit longer.

Before completing phase 2, run the guided setup and test to make sure you still get error #86. If you don’t get the error, great, your problem is fixed. If you still get the error continue on to phase 2.

Phase 2:
1) Enter messages & settings from the main tivo screen.
2) Select Restart or Reset System.
3) Select Clear & Delete everything.
- WARNING: This will erase all your recordings and settings on the tivo box.
The Tivo will do a low-level format on the disk, which may take several hours. Do not power the Tivo down during this time.
4) After the Tivo reboots complete the guided setup and test to ensure the problem has been resolved.

If you have completed both phases and your Tivo still has error #86 you may have to replace the hard-disk, or the entire Tivo box.

I had to go through all the steps, finally erasing all the shows and having the Tivo rebuild itself. Now I’ve got a healthy, happy Tivo once again. I used TivoWebPlus that was already installed to connect to the Tivo and attempted to backup the Season Passes, but that didn’t work because the internal database in the Tivo was mad at the world and wasn’t about to unleash any meaningful data. That’s OK, now I have a fresh Tivo with the same 200GB drive just waiting to get filled once again.

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Latest Tivo Task Complete

Posted on January 14th, 2008 by William.
Categories: Modding, Tech.

Today, I finished upgrading the Tivo I added upstairs. This one makes the third DirecTV Tivo in the house. Collectively they are able to record nearly 15 days of video, if played back 24/7, and that doesn’t include the XP box that I have acting like a Tivo server so I can share .avi files.

Next up, I’ll have to tweak TivoWeb Plus on the other Tivos so that I can record using all six tuners (two per receiver) to eliminate recording conflicts.

The MRV (Multi-Room Viewing) option means that I can record a show in the bedroom Tivo then pull it over the network to the home theater Tivo and watch it from the couch. Now I can start watching Law & Order in the home theater, then pause it and when I go to pull it over the network, the Tivo will ask if I’d like to start at the beginning or from the paused location.

The HMO (Home Media Option) allows any of the Tivo’s in the house connect to a computer in the house and display photographs on the TV, or play .mp3 files.

Some of you may be saying “So what?”, Tivo comes with these options. Well, that would be right - a stand alone Tivo has these options, but the DirecTV Tivo’s have USB ports, but they are not active. By hacking the DirecTV Tivos, it’s possible to activate the USB ports, then load networking drivers, and then load an disk image that allows these features to function. Check out DVRUpgrade for more information. I couldn’t have completed this without the help of the Deal Database forums.

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Hope for DirecTV/Tivo Users

Posted on August 10th, 2007 by William.
Categories: Modding, Tech.

For users of the DirecTV/Tivo units, there’s been uncertainty about our future for a long time. When Rupert Murdock purchased DirecTV, he severed the ties with Tivo and then rolled out a DVR (digital video recorder) based on the tech from a company that Murdock owns. Now Murdock sold DirecTV, so the relationship with Tivo is on again. Anyone that knows me, is already aware that the DirecTV Tivo is a wonderful platform for modification, it’s dual tuners allowing two programs to be recorded at once, I enabled the USB ports and loaded the network drivers so that I can transfer shows between the Tivos, stream shows to my computers, save programs on DVD, transfer .avi files from my computer to the Tivos and all sorts of fun stuff, such as a total of 11 days worth of video.
Today, I received an email from DirecTV stating that in early 2008, there will be an upgrade for the existing Tivo users. New features include:

  • DIRECTV Remote Booking. Forgot to set up a recording before you left the house? From any computer with Internet access you can schedule recordings remotely by visiting directv.com.
  • Recently Deleted Folder. Quickly restore deleted programs to your “Now Playing” list.
  • Overlap Protection™. Never worry about recording conflicts again. For consecutive scheduled recordings that overlap, TiVo will clip the ending of the first show or the beginning of the second (based on the higher priority), but will never cancel one of your recordings.

The feature that caught my eye is the Remote Booking feature. So far, I understand that it will be like the feature on the stand alone units that allows you to log into a website and choose what to record and set recording options from anywhere you can get ‘net access. Logically, this would mean the USB ports will not be enabled by DirecTV and we’ll be much closer to having the TIVO to Go features. Tivo to Go allows you to pick a favorite recording and have it automatically transfered to your laptop, then watch Heroes on the plane, or where ever you happen to be. There’s an option add-on that will transfer the shows to a PSP, video iPod and other mobile devices. Cross your fingers and stay tuned.

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Smart with Hayabusa Engine

Posted on August 8th, 2007 by William.
Categories: Modding, Automotive.


It’s been a long known fact that the best recipe for speed is simply to jam the largest engine you can into the smallest/lightest car possible. Another fact is that men get hook on acceleration at an early age and John Force showed us that there’s no known cure for acceleration addiction. Now take a car that’s shorter than some Harley Davidson motorcycles, take out it’s 600CC engine a shove in a 1300CC Hayabusa engine, add some high octane and a standing order at the local tire shop and here’s what you get.

For reference, here’s video of a turbo Hayabusa with a claimed 499HP.

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