Glad to hear that you're back up and running.

so now the TiVo is working great again after getting through the guided setup. i'm betting if the power went out or if i unplugged it, i would have to try and get through the guided setup again to prevent it from having the rebooting problems. at least this is my current understanding. no idea.

i had already tried using the two different cable lines and that didn't make a difference. i managed to get through the guided setup again in the living room with both cable cards after a few failed attempts. so far so good. i'm just thinking if the power went out or if i rebooted, i might have the same problem again. it's strange.

So the problem happens in one room, but not another room? Sounds like an issue with the cable line/signal in that one room.

UPDATE: I put the 2nd cable card back in and it still worked great. SO, I decided to move the TivO back into the living room. The problem is back. The capacitors look fine. I want to buy a power supply just to see, but nothing is making any sense right now.

Rebooting with two CableCARDs but not with one is generally a bad power supply - check your capacitors against these pictures:

http://www.weaknees.com/bps

Replacement power supplies for TiVos are here:

http://www.weaknees.com/ps

The forums have been very useful so I thought I would chime in and add my experience. I'm still in the process of nailing down the culprit. I have a Series3 TiVo with 2 Comcast cable cards and a WD external drive and started experiencing the random reboots. I hadn't/haven't been experiencing any other problems. The reboots got progressively worse to the point that TiVo became pretty useless. Many times if it hadn't had a long enough rest, it wouldn't get past the Powering Up screen and would just be in a constant reboot cycle. It seemed like a drive going bad. I did all the obvious Kickstarts. Everything passed on the S.M.A.R.T test. Tried a different SATA/HDMI cable. Then I stumbled upon this forum and the cable card issue. I followed the instructions to take the cable cards out and redo the guided setup but STILL experienced the rebooting even with no cable cards inserted. The system rebooted in the middle of doing the guided setup. I tried twice more and couldn't complete the setup. I removed the TiVo and put it in another bedroom so I could continue to troubleshoot it and not bother the wife/daughter. Just for curiosity sake I put the cable cards back in and tried to boot up, but still had the problems. Then I decided to try the guided setup with one cable card inserted. Eureka! It is working like a champ. After I get the essentials copied over off the hard drives, I'll try reinserting the 2nd cable card and see what happens. So while at first I was convinced it was a bad hard drive, it now seems to be either a bad cable card, bad power supply, OR some odd software/cable card glitch.

I have a series 3 that is doing this rebooting thing. I put in a new hard drive....didn't help (but happy to have more storage).I just installed a new power supply...same problem! and at least one capacitor had the bulge on the old supply. I confirmed that the new hard drive was fine with kickstart 54 and I tried the cablecard trick and disconnected the wireless network device too. Any more suggestions, or is my lifetime subscription now worthless?

Thanks in advance.

Sounds like a bad power supply to me - see this page for more info:

http://www.weaknees.com/bps

We've been seeing more and more reports of CableCARD problems that are linked to problematic power supplies in TiVo HDs and Series3s.

My Series 3 TiVo is also sick and suffering with this reboot issue.

4 months ago, I started getting some partial recordings. after talking with TiVo, they gave me some steps to try involving removing and reinserting the CableCards. I found I could reliably get the Cablecard in slot 1 to work, but if I put a card in slot 2 then the TiVo would not complete booting. When booting, the first TiVo screen appears, but when it should change to "just a few minutes more", it reboots.

I didn't have time to deal with the issue then, so I kept using just 1 Cablecard until Mother's Day when it would constantly reboot as described above if ANY Cablecard was in the slot. Somehow in talking with FiOS, the first cablecard was working again, but still not the 2nd, so they sent me a new cablecard.

The new cablecard is also not working. I have been getting bounced back and forth between FiOS and TiVo and have no resolution. And in all the things they have tried, the first cable card was not working again.

I found this post last night and followed the directions from the first post. I was able to get the first cablecard to work again, but still not the second. As of this morning, it is now constantly rebooting (with just the 1st cablecard inserted). From one of the other posts that seemed similar, I also took the cover off to check the power supply and it looks just fine.

One other detail...not sure if this is an issue or not, but when I insert a cablecard (either one) into the TiVo, the TiVo immediately reboots.

Any ideas where I go from here?

Troubleshooting isn't always convenient...but you need to inspect your power supply. See also:

http://www.weaknees.com/bps

SMART Testing Now ... Next Steps

This site has been amazing. Thank you all ...

My issue... Series3 (648-0001-8026-xxxx) began spontaneously rebooting last night (in service since 01/2007 -- all original, no secondary drive, case has never been opened). No power event, no other obvious external issues. I am a TWC customer with two cable cards and a tuning adapter. TiVo would restart, boot and then restart before coming all the way up.

After quite a few attempts to leverage the Kickstart codes, I finally was able to get Kickstart 54 running via the pause button on the TiVo itself (could not get the timing correct with the remote). I am currently in the middle of the 90-minute "Extended test" -- first three tests have passed.

I was hoping to get some troubleshooting tips to eliminate known-goods as a means to have some confidence in the root cause.

Assuming the Kickstart 54 completes with "Pass" on all tests, is it fair to assume that this issue is NOT my HDD?

Is there some value is seeing if the unit boots normally with one, or both of the cable cards (and tuning adapter?) removed? Will that be indicative of a failing power supply?

I know I could remove the case and perform a visual inspection of the drive and capacitors, but the unit is wired into a cabinet and is not easily removed... I'd prefer to leave physical removal and case opening till last, if possible.

Any other things I can try to better narrow the field of issues?

Thoughts?

I really think you should just replace the internal drive at this point.

I tried twice more to run the overnight test, it crashed both times. Should I run the S.M.A.R.T. test again, or is it just time to replace the internal drive?

Sounds like the primary drive is bad - I'd try to run the test again.