Is there a way to reload the Tivo software and keep the shows intact

[blast0212]

I had a problem with 1 Tivo last week and ended up reloading it. I applied the superhack to it and tried streaming a show to my PC to see if it worked. It did not. It crashed WMP(This is not the problem it plays other .ty files). Then I got a dumb idea and transferred a show from the Tivo that was still encrypting to another Tivo that had encryption turned off. After I did this the Tivo with encryption off started locking up and rebooting. I then tried doing a clear and delete(not a full delete just suggestions Todo.. it was the option right above doing all). It has been sitting and please wait this might take 1 hour for about the last 48 hours.

My question is can I reinstall the Tivo software and keep just the shows. I can use a new drive if necessary. I know that it is possible that the drive is hosed but I do not think that is the case. I do not care about season passes or hacks, I can redo those, just the shows. Or is there a way to stop the clear and delete. I can pull the drive if necessary.

When fixing the other Tivo I was not concerned about loosing anything as most of the important stuff was duplicated on the now broken Tivo. Now I really want to try and get the shows off somehow.

I am not an expert but have used a variety of the patches that are out there. Anybody have any ideas how to do this or where to start?

[crashHD]

If you have an image, and a spare hard drive to work with, you can possibly patch it up. If you restore your image to said spare drive, and use dd to copy the entire root partition from the spare drive over to the current drive, overwriting it's hacked root filesystem with the original one. You just have to be careful with dd. One wrong keystroke when specifying your output, and dd is more than happy to bulldoze through whatever you just pointed it at.

[blast0212]

I got it working now. I went home that night and plugged my serial cable in and loaded up hyperterminal. It looks like it was the drive going bad as I was getting an unrecoverable error in what looked like a chkdsk. It was the same sector over and over again. I rebooted and about 5 min after I turn it on, before the bootup was completed, it started a chkdsk and gave that error. That means that the 48hrs+ that I had it clearing and deleting, it was just giving that error over and over.

I tried to find a way to cancel or skip the error with no luck. I then decided to try copying the whole drive from 1 to another using mfsbackup and mfsrestore keeping all of the shows and info.

I put this drive back into the Tivo and it started booting again. Then it hit something about converting databases. I left it there thinking that was the clear and delete. I came back to it about 24 hrs later and it was still there at the converting databases.

I then started looking in to the startup process and saw that in stageE under /etc/rc.d/stageE.... there was a file called something like convertDb. I opened it with VI and saw that this was the file that ran the convert database that I was stuck on. I commented everything out with # and saved it and rebooted. The Tivo booted up!!

I then used tytools to copy off my shows. I went to bed and decided to watch TV, when I brought up the guide, the Tivo rebooted. It came up again so I decided not to watch TV and just get the shows off. The all came off and as far as I can tell, there are no errors in them.

I was planning on completely rebuilding the new drive after I pulled off the shows and after the reboot when trying to bring up the guide, I probably will. Looks like for now the wife will be happy that I kept the shows. I also discovered Tivoserver the other day and I will probably use that to get the shows back on.