Swap hard drives - legal image?

[AbMagFab]

Okay here's the deal. I have 3 DTivo's (2 T60's and one DVR2). My main T60 seems to have a dead optical port (just got a digital receiver, and would like to get DD from my Tivo). I've swapped my other T60 in and the optical works fine. So I'm pretty sure it's not the cable or receiver config.

So, I'd like to swap the hard drives between the T60's. So I did this. But I get the dreaded error #51. I've got 100+ hours of recordings, including a bunch of older scrambled ones (so I can't copy them off). Anyone have any ideas on what to do?

I did a search, and it looks like there is some serial number "marrying" between the DTivo and the Hard Drives, but it also looks like this can be changed. I just have no idea what to change it to or how.

Any help would be greatly appreciated. I'm running:
- Stock 3.1.1b (or something like that, just downloaded from DTV/Tivo)
- 9th Tee Ethernet card (w/ drivers, ftp, telnet, etc.)
- TivoWeb
- autoscramble (only about half my recordings are unscrambled)

Help please!
Thanks,
Mark

[captain_video]

Install, chmod, and manually execute 51killer.tcl from the tivostuff website. This will get rid of the error #51 message without having to do a Clear & Delete Everything.

[AbMagFab]

Thanks! This kills the half of the programs that are scrambled, but that's better than none at all!

[captain_video]

You should be able to disable autoscramble or noscramble to watch the older scrambled recordings. I thought autoscramble was supposed to do this automatically. I've never tried it so I can't say for sure that it will.

[AbMagFab]

The README says that the scrambled stuff is scrambled using the "key" that causes the #51. So changing that key makes the scrambled stuff unplayable no matter what.

Right now I have autoscramble for playing the older stuff, but there are only 1 or 2 things that I've been unable to schedule a newer recording of (or buy the DVD).

If I just load noscramble, and stop loading autoscramble, will things continue to record unscrambled? Once I make the switch I won't need to toggle anymore.

[GREEK]

you could of reflashed the crypto chip and had the NO problems tricking the T60 into thinking it was the other one.

[AbMagFab]

I have flashed the PROM a while ago to allow a modified rc.sysinit. Sounds like this is different.

Do you have a link for a quick guide on flashing the crypto chip? Any negative side effects? Will it have any impact on my "official" image and continued regular connectivity to DTV/Tivo, or is it just internal to the box?

Thanks!

[mrblack51]

ok, so, as far as your old recordings, DO NOT do anything with clear and delete or error 51 (as i think you are aware), because you will never be able to salvage them. you can use mfs_ftp to extract them scrambled in hopes that they can be recovered. once you have extracted them, you need to use 51killer.tcl to reset the box keys without loosing recordings.

no matter what, you aren't going to play the old recordings on the new unit with current stuff, so you might as well not use autoscramble anymore.

flashing the crypto chip won't really work, cause it only changes one half of the serial number. the only real way is to physically swap the chip from the old unit.

[AbMagFab]

Is there any way to put the recordings back onto another machine? I'm basically swapping hard drives, so if I can put the scrambled shows on the swapped machine, I should be able to play them.

I've never put anything back on a DTivo, only taken things off. Will mfs_ftp let me do this? And will this work?

Also, if I run 51killer, and things don't work out, can I put everything back as it was and run 51killer again (and will things be back to normal)?

[mrblack51]

Originally posted by AbMagFab
Is there any way to put the recordings back onto another machine? I'm basically swapping hard drives, so if I can put the scrambled shows on the swapped machine, I should be able to play them.

I've never put anything back on a DTivo, only taken things off. Will mfs_ftp let me do this? And will this work?

Also, if I run 51killer, and things don't work out, can I put everything back as it was and run 51killer again (and will things be back to normal)?

if your only problem is dolby digital, i would suggest just setting up your totally working machine, and move everything over to it via mfs_ftp, then leave the problematic machine to the side for watching the scrambled shows and for possible future extraction.

mfs_ftp will let you remove unscrambled shows and watch them on any other tivo after re-inserting with mfs_ftp.

um, if you run 51killer, you will loose the keys that it removes (thats the point, as in, how you remove the error). there are some scripts on alt.org to restore various keys, but again, my understanding is that unscrambling, if the tools are released, will require the original unit to work. running 51killer multiple times will not restore anything, the only thing it does is delete the keys

[AbMagFab]

K, just installed mfs_ftp on both my T60's. Very cool. Some quick Q's:

- Do I need to make space on the target machine, or will it make space using the normal rules (since it shows up as a new recording)?

- Since it shows up as a new recording, can I still have 2 "real" recordings going on at the same time?

- I've tried first one a few times now, but it seems to cause a problem when I click it in TivoWeb from the Now Showing list. It also seems to get confused on the Tivo side (first time, it stopped at 26 minutes even though the FTP was still going, second time it showed up as Blind Date even though it was Average Joe???). Is there something I'm missing? Other than transfering the TMF, do I need to transfer something else?

Thanks!

[mrblack51]

Originally posted by AbMagFab
K, just installed mfs_ftp on both my T60's. Very cool. Some quick Q's:

- Do I need to make space on the target machine, or will it make space using the normal rules (since it shows up as a new recording)?

- Since it shows up as a new recording, can I still have 2 "real" recordings going on at the same time?

- I've tried first one a few times now, but it seems to cause a problem when I click it in TivoWeb from the Now Showing list. It also seems to get confused on the Tivo side (first time, it stopped at 26 minutes even though the FTP was still going, second time it showed up as Blind Date even though it was Average Joe???). Is there something I'm missing? Other than transfering the TMF, do I need to transfer something else?

Thanks!

1) um, there is no 'clearing space' necessary unless your tivo is full.

2) no, it doesnt count as a 'recording' in that sense. you are just transfering a file to the tivo, which happens to be a show.

3) if the show is scrambled, you wont be able to watch it on the new tivo. if its unscrambled, it should work.

[AbMagFab]

Okay, I tried again. I've turned off passive mode, and I'm using Smart FTP. The k/sec drops steadily throughout the ftp, starting at around 800, and dropping to below 300 by 30% complete.

It takes over an hour to tranfer an hour program (about 1 GB).

I set to non-passive in SmartFTP, but the log on my source Tivo says "Entering passive Mode". I'm confused...

Any ideas why the transfer rate stinks so bad? I'm on a full switched 100mbit hardwired ethernet, and I've removed the cascaded switch. I'm using 9th Tee ethernet cards in both T60's, and regular LinkSys switches. Any good software to quickly test transfer rates between PC's so I can move my laptop around and see if there's a network bottleneck (which I doubt, but it's worth checking)?

What about this "Entering Passing Mode" on the source Tivo. I've read that this is a problem with Tivo's TCP/IP stack?

[AbMagFab]

Also, it ended with the following message in the destination mfs_ftp log file:

09:58:48:AM - 226 File transfer complete
09:58:48:AM - mismatch, not setting csos
09:58:50:AM - updating cached recording info

And in TivoWeb, I don't see the transferred recording (I'm not at home now, so I can't see if it's actually on the Now Playing list, but I doubt it).

Help?!?

[AbMagFab]

Tried it again, going the other way, and I get the same "mismatch" error, with no recording saved.

Both T60's have noscramble loaded, and autoscramble for now.

I'm getting annoyed now... anyone have ideas?