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Tivo Roamio shutdown & flashing lights even after Weaknees HD replacement

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  • #1

    Tivo Roamio shutdown & flashing lights even after Weaknees HD replacement

    A few months ago I bought pre-formatted 2TB harddrive from Weaknees for my Mom's TiVo Roamio [OTA-only, with TiVo Lifetime-prog guide] that had stopped working. After I replaced the drive the Roamio again worked fine for a couple months.

    ...until a week ago, when it died again, with the symptom showing "everything boots up normally till it stops working and the light just flash" (the same thing it was doing before I replaced the HD). Based on that, it doesn't seem likely to be a power supply issue. And I can't believe that a new HD died after such a short time.

    Do you have any thoughts on the bad unit?
    Possible repair? -- another new HD, power supply, other?
    Possible junk?
    Tags: None
  • #2
    I got over the house with the Roamio-TiVo so I could take a look at the situation myself instead of relying on 2nd-hand info.

    The TiVo had been unplugged and off for the last few weeks so everything was cool.

    I first plugged the powerbrick into an outlet and measured the voltage at the barrel-jack = 12.0V, good per the 12V@2A brick rating.

    I plugged the powerbrick-jack into the TiVo and it booted OK. I used it for nearly an hour, trying to abuse it and get it to fail -- e.g. watching OTA channels & saved videos, starting multiple recordings. The brick got warm but never hot. Just when I was about give up the TiVo suddenly rebooted, showing me the TiVo "Welcome! Starting up..." screen (that never progressed beyond that), while all four front-panel lights (green=power, yellow=remote-activity, red=recording, blue) continuously fast-flashed. It remained in this state until I unplugged the TiVo.

    When I went to unplug things, I found that the power barrel-jack into the TiVo was hot/very-warm. The brick itself at the AC outlet was still only warm. I again checked the voltage at the jack = still 12.0V. I also popped the TiVo lid and don't see anything on PCB-top that should be getting the jack hot (unused rear connectors, power & data cables to harddrive).

    I've seen plenty of powerbricks die/"fade", with a drooping voltages when the brick (capacitors) ages & gets hot. This isn't behaving exactly like that--the brick is only warm and it's the barrel-jack end that's hot (most likely something hot inside the TiVo, conducting heat to the jack & cord). With the jack no longer connected to the TiVo I wasn't catching a drooping voltages, although by then there would have been no current draw. I could replace the powerbrick and see what happen. The jack measures as a common 5.5mm-OD, 2.1mm-ID, 12V-pos-center.

    ---------------
    Last week I ordered a replacement Roamio but unfortunately found when I went to install it today that I had accidentally ordered the CableCard-only Roamio Pro/Plus model. So I'm going to need to return that, to exchange for a Roamio Base OTA model. Assuming a new power brick doesn't fix this Tivo's problem.


    Tivo_Roamio-base_TCD846500_power-jack.jpg

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