The problems related to the spring update happen with every update - each update just exposes latent problem on a hard drive. If the problems are where the video is stored, you might see a momentary glitch. But if they are where the OS goes, then it just won't work. But the update isn't causing the problem - it's the bad drive causing the problem.

Your symptoms suggest a bad drive. Have you tested them in a PC?

I haven't tested them - saw something about not using Windows XP. How would I test them on my PC? Take drive out of PC, plug in drive from TIVO, do what? Make a boot disk with a diagnostic on it and then run it on my TIVO drive?

Here's what I just did that got me into my TIVO - seems to be working now but have to cross my fingers and see how long it works:

Used the Kickstart procedure to make it reinstall the existing software:

http://alt.org/wiki/index.php/TivoDiagnostics
KICKSTART
While booting the power light will change from green to yellow as the line 'checkpanic' in the rc.sysinit gets executed. This happens a few seconds before the screen changes from the startup image to "almost there" and it's your cue to hold down a button (use pause) on the remote to trigger a panic. (You can also press and hold the pause key immediately after reboot.) When the record light changes yellow (or both lights turn yellow), key in one of the following sequences:

0 - emergency call to tivo, touchtone dialing
1 - emergency call to tivo, pulse dialing
9 - emergency call to tivo, touchtone w/ 9 prefix
-- I suggest not doing any of these unless explicitly instructed

52 - emergency reinstall
-- this will act like you've received new software but will reinstall the existing software on the alternate root partition and boot it, particularly useful so you don't have to go trolling for backup images when your hacks fail.

56 - software install


57 - mfs check
58 - perform mfs cleanup
-- both of these will cause the green screen and various mfs checks (sometimes you won't see a green screen, but just get the "loading new software" screen even though it is mfs-checking)

More info at these URLs:
http://forums.tivo.com/pe/action/for...ostID=10192098
http://www.dealdatabase.com/forum/ar...p/t-22085.html


I did the 'hold the pause key immediately after reboot' - plugged it in and held the pause key until the yellow lights came on, hit 52, it rebooted and then TIVO came back! I guess I could have bad sectors or something on one partition and ok on the next. My software looks like it's still 8.1, so I have that to look forward to.

Here's the thread about testing your drives:

http://www.wkforums.com/forums/showthread.php?t=9