I've talked to TiVo and the cable company. Both originally said I probably needed new cable cards. Did the new install and still have the same problem (though in general reception is much better ). Happens about once a week. I turn on the unit and there's a blank/blue screen where my program should be. No error message. The digital display shows the name of the program it should be recording. If I change channels, sometimes I get reception on low-end channels only, sometimes high-end only, sometimes HD only....random choice. Switching between tuners sometimes causes both of them to drop all channels one by one. If I check the system, check the cable card info, do the cable card pairings on both cards and test channels, sometimes that's enough. More often I have to restart the system THEN do all that stuff. It's a little voodoo-esque, but it works.

Now the cable company is telling me it's not their cards, it's my slots that have gone bad. It helped a lot that they sent out a tech who had never seen a TiVo or a cable card before. That meant I did the repair myself but got charged for it. I'd buy the slot demise premise if I wasn't successful every time with the above process. No other problems with reception, recording, playback...nothing. Everything is working perfectly with this one glitch.

Any suggestions?