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TiVo Hacked to Include Ethernet
snmcbride writes "Bob Edwards, Paul Mackerras, and Andrew Tridgell have hacked a 3com ISA network card into a Phillips TiVo. They've used a custom adapter to connect the ISA card to TiVo's proprietary bus. This will likely be the largest hack since adding more storage space to the TiVo became easy. A lot of people now have broadband at home, and it would be nice to pull TiVo's data via DSL or Cable." Here's a more
direct link since Tivo's forums have bogged a bit.
With a network connection you can get around needing a phone line...which is handy for some.
For others, it means you can mount storage on a network drive to store shows on. Adding a drive to a TiVo is easy... changing a drive for a larger one is NOT. This way you can just dump stuff on a server somewhere.
Ok, well, maybe I didn't read the slashdot article too closely. The purpose of this is in order to download the schedule data. Oops...
Either way, this still is NOT beneficial for TiVo. The reason being, the whole way they make money, is that they get you to buy this TiVo box... however, the money is made in the long term. You pay $9.95/month for TV schedule listings for as long as you can afford, in order to get the benefits of TiVo. They of course, make a lot of money this way, and the short term of it... the $300-$500 investment isn't their only source of revenue.
Well, anyway, my point is, that TiVo may not like this either, since, you're stealing a huge source of revenue from them.
Sheesh, whatever happened to the hack for the sake of the hack? You need to read today's article in the New York Times on the MIT Media Lab.
I don't have an anger problem, I have an idiot problem
no I'm serious, this is a very valuable dialogue for me. thanks for teaching me about dsl and slashdot, sir.
Judging from current content, this has already taken place.
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ahh . . . broadband enabled TiVO devices. I'm finishing the touches on Tivoster . . .
I think a better question is if you could hack out a NFS volume to store MPG in, or even better, figure out a way of networking several Tivo's together to share movies and recording times. I wouldn't mind having a stack of Dish recievers and Tivo's in the A/V rack all networked with video distribution.
wow I think you need some therapy dude.
Oh, I forgot, that would take some effort.
do NOT listen to or mod UP this foolio. DSL necessitates that one simply must have a land line. You pay the $15 for a damn POTS connection as part of the basic billing. anyone with DSL CAN MAKE PHONE CALLS, and thus hook up tivos and dreamcasts all day long.
thank you.
One useful thing Tivo could do with ethernet ports would be clustering. (No, this isn't the obligitory "imagine a Beowulf cluster of these things" comment)
Take 2 Tivos and a crossover cable, now you can record 2 shows at once, watch shows recorded on one Tivo in on the TV connected to the other Tivo, use 1 phone call to update both units, etc.
You could probably do this with 10BaseT bandwith, it would be trivial with 100BaseT.
If Tivo included this in their units it would be a HUGE selling point
A ten minute warning for preparation? What do you think can be prepared in ten minutes? No, it's more like "In ten minutes you'll notice increased activity on your server. This is not an attack. The story will be visible at http://slashdot.org/"
Then you keep the signal digital, don't need to worry about compression (or generation loss). And you can edit on the Mac/PC using Adobe Premiere/Final Cut/etc. Remove commercials, add your own commentary... your imagination is the limit. A lot of MiniDV camcorders can take RCA/S-Video input... just route your cable signal into your camcorder. Or be super cool and get one of those Sony DV decks. They're nice. :)
Of course, then there's the problem that you only get 4 minutes per gig. But one could easily make a 320 gig (or greater) RAID array using the latest ATA/100 drives.
use the ethernet card that you already have and save yourself the hack! ;) www.snapstream.com -- networked personal television. networked based viewing of recordings and networked based of control (interface it web-based). of course, it's only windows software, no linux version at the moment... --RKA
Uh.. you would/could still get the info from them.. just via a faster link instead of a phone line.
- My favorite error message: xscreensaver, running on an old Sparc 5 w/ 8bit color: bsod: Couldn't allocate color Blue
Wow - talk about timely. Just yesterday Virgin Connect cancelled their free connectivity program and are now asking users to ship their Webplayers back.
I got one of those for my mother-in-law, who wanted to send email to my wife, but didn't want to learn to use a "real" computer (I was going to teach her to use FreeBSD/Emacs/Gnus to read email :). Virgin asserts that the little appliances cannot be reprogrammed to use another ISP, and while I'm skeptical about that, I'd really rather hook the unit into my LAN.
So someone, anyone, please figure out how to hack a NIC into Virgin Connect's defunct Webplayers so that I can have a neat little web appliance in my kitchen.
Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
The objection that "Oh, that might overpower the TiVo's limited CPU power" seems weak; if it can only update its schedule database at a "low speed," this is not fundamentally a severe problem.
The Really Cool Idea would be if this allowed the unit to "push" archived shows off to a remote host via NFS or some such thing.
Personally, I don't much care if this would involve basically generating personalized, encrypted "blobs," not usefully readable by anything other than the given TiVo. Having the ability to "push blobs to backup" would allow me to keep all the episodes of [whatever] sitting on a cheap disk array, or perhaps even archived out onto a 30GB tape drive.
K001er still would be the ability to generate my own DVDs out of this, but I expect the MPAA and the TV networks would take an understandably dim view to this; that wouldn't get accomplished without a legal conflagration that would likely eliminate TiVo from the marketplace...
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
Or make PPP run over another serial link: S-Video...
TiVo dials up a local UUNet POP, gets an IP address and then downloads guide data via HTTP. The ability to retrieve the data is based on having an active account which is keyed to the serial number of your TiVo. There has been some discussion about how to get the guide data for free, but since TiVo is not complaining about us hacking around with it (instead of screaming like i-Opener did), no one really wants to piss them off by trying to get the service for free. Not least of which, it's unethical to do so.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
I'm pretty sure it is just a TCP connection over PPP or SLIP. It's actually a very good solution to the problem of getting program listing, software updates, and other things to TiVo subscribers. Rather than having to set up an extensive network of dial-in numbers all over the country or spending way too much on 800 numbers, it makes a lot more sense for TiVo to partner with an existing ISP to leverage their existing network of telephone numbers. This also means that TiVo doesn't have to waste time developing and maintaining proprietary protocols - they can just use the standard protocols that come with Linux. It also means that moving to other communication channels which use the same higher level protocol (TCP) will be a snap for them if they decide to sell boxes with ethernet cards, for example. I'm sure this benefitted them when they released the DirectTV/TiVo combination units recently.
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Free P2P Backup, Windows & Linux
I understand that the dialup typically doesn't take much time at all. Its just when the software updates come over the wire that it becomes annoying.
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Never hit your grandmother with a shovel, for it leaves a bad impression on her mind...
This is not just a broadband issue. Even if your internet connection is with a modem, this is just as cool, since it means that now your Tivo can talk to the service at the same time you're surfing. Multiplexing your phone line is more efficient and more convenient.
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As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Haha, Jeff K. is so damn funny. I'd like to see him a do a guide on how to hack a TIVO. I especially love his guide on video cards.
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Check out my blackbox styles
As many of you know, the TiVo runs linux. The guide data and software updates are usually downloaded in a nightly call to either a 1-800 number or a local UUnet access number.
What has been done is set up the 'DSS' port (also a serial port) to be a linux console. Another hack has made it redirect the 'nightly call' through the serial port as PPP instead of the modem. This way you can hook it up to a box with a PPP server and a cable modem, but you only get 115,200 bps.
This will allow the TiVo to connect to a network and get TiVo guide data without the serial port hack.
Currently, this will NOT let people download TiVo video data to the computer. It is stored in a proprietary format that has not been hacked yet.
Whatever support the Ethernet has in tivo, it is from hacking the backend linux part. The front end, the graphical shell that you see on the TV (its called myworld) has NO SUPPORT for this.
As for why TiVo never put Ethernet support in the thing, it was a corporate decision. TiVo has deals with a few major networks, including NBC. These nets hate having their stuff put on the internet minus ads. Ethernet would make this easier. Since the phone connection is toll free or local, they decided to go with a phone-only system. I dont blame them.
--IronHelix
Dude!
:-D
They JUST RESTARTED the B5 series in Widescreen, like 6 weeks ago.
Now wear this white cone and stand in the corner for not paying attention.
meme, you're a donut short of a dozen
"If you can't be knowledgeable, be funny"
Be more funny! (turbosk bangs on meme)
pax
It is for the rest of this planet! Well, the UK at least.
They're selling TiVo's over here in the UK, and since we use the PAL format too, I imagine it's only a matter of time before it gets to Argentina.
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jambo
system.admin.without.a.clue
-- js.
I'm waiting for the day when I can hack my DirecTiVo to offer SMB or NFS shares of recorded MPG files. If SciFi channel repeats the series again, I want to save the entire run of Babylon5 on VCD. :) If the filesys hasn't been hacked by 2nd run on SciFi, I plan to hack my DirecTivo for more disk space, so I can keep all 110 episodes on it.
Wonder how much a Tivo with all 110 Bab5 episodes could fetch on eBay? :)
Edith Keeler Must Die
Well, can you run PPP through the serial port connected to the IR? You do need a serial-connected IR device on the other end, of course, but they're available.
This is great news - one of the things that I require before I will buy a TiVo is Ethernet support. The other thing is a program guide for C-Band (large dish) satellite service, esp. the backhaul feeds.
Several people have talked about reverse engineering the TiVo program guide service. While I agree that TiVo should be able to make money selling a service, I also think that a little competition would be a good thing: I don't think TiVo wants to support C-Band. Perhaps somebody else will. I'd happily pay for a guide service for C-Band (I already pay for a paper guide for C-Band), preferably one I can grep for what I want to record (SELECT all from MOVIETYPE="Spaghetti Western" AND COMMERCIALS="false") (OK, that was psuedo-SQL not grep regex).
Being able to archive programs (as provided by Fair Use ) would be nice too.
www.eFax.com are spammers
I know that Paul Mackerras was a key player in the first port of Linux to the Power Mac platform. Given that the TiVo is another PowerPC Linux box, it's no great surprise to see him working on that, too! Andrew is another known persona in the kernel world, I believe. Just another reason I need to get one... [grin!]
Haaz: Co-founder, LinuxPPC Inc., making Linux for PowerPC since 1996.
-- haaz.
You obviously missed the Hitchhiker's allusion.
Of course, the hackers would have to stay ahead of every little TiVo software update to avoid the same problems our Samba brethren get from every SP Microsoft releases
Not really, if you don't connect TiVo to a modem, it can't call up and auto-upgrade to the new software. Right now, TiVo works fine for me, so if I could connect to a 3rd party source of TV schedules I could just stay with the current version of the software. Of course, you might argue that they could decide to add new features, but if that happened we could all just wait until we got an OK from whoever was doing the schedule conversions...
My other
While you're trying to figure out your Tivo / phone line problem, I wonder if you've come across a more general solution to this - specifically, have you heard of any solutions that allow you to bridge a POTS telephone to a broadband cable connection? That would be very very cool, but I haven't the slightest how to do it. I imagine you would need one of those IP-to-telephone services, plus a hardware adapter to provide an RJ11 port.
fm6, he said he wanted to play VIDEO over ethernet. VIDEO. not "a small amount of data from a T3". Try that over serial, why dont you. He wants to have his box far far away from everything else, not right next to his TV. try that over serial, why dont you. Without a "complicated kludge" external repeater. Please, PLEASE read previous posts before passing judgement on what someone else wants. and consider.. if he wants ethernet "just because" ... then that's a perfectly reasonable reason for him to work out how to GET ethernet. Nobody said that *you* had to use ethernet, or that since ethernet can be added that your serial link is useless, outdated, archaic, and no longer cool. *however*, if you think that, and dont know how to wire up an ethernet connection, and feel bad because of it, that's no reason to belittle what they accomplished.
Please think about it, even for only a second; hey?
[CK]
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Video meliora proboque deteriora sequor - Ovidius
Good! I am sure both parties here stand to gain.
There's always sufficient, but not always at the right place nor for the right folks.
It would be nice to have Tivo in my country (Argentina PAL-N) but they're only thinking in NTSC since day one.
Most part of the world uses PAL standards, and they refuse to gain this huge market. Why not sell the program updates thru the web and go Global?
NEOCA - Custom LED Flashlights
finally i'll be able to see the conclusion to that "masculine itch" commercial with joe montana and ronnie lott.
That model works in some situations, like cell phones, but not all, like free PCs.
The better model for both the tivo and i-opener would be to at least cover the cost of the hardware and other expenses. Then split the profit margin between the hardware and the service so they can survive. This way they can release the hardware, and if people hack it they are still making money. This gives them some long term viability.
Now they can develop a community around the hardware and service. They have the oppertunity to really get to see what the customers want from their services and they might even be able to include the hacks into future models, if they played their cards right. the community gets better products and the company can expand their market.
Sorta a community based product.
what would this do that an s-video jack on your video card doesn't?
pezpunk
Internet killed the video star,
i could live a little longer in this prison
So does this mean that Jeff K. will be able to HaX0R into your TiVo late at night? I'd hate to think what could be done with that dangerous power... maybe something like those spy movies where the evil genius broadcasts the same mind-control show on every channel.
:)
N4st0r, trixx0r h0bb1tz0rz! Th3y st0l3 0ur pr3c10uzz!
Now, if they can do it to a Sony, and make a cheap kit for us slackers ... that would be something. :)
The real link with all the info is here
Mirror soon, mirror often!!
SealBeater
-- Its survival of the fittest...and we got the fucking guns!!!
As for speed: who cares? Tivo downloads a few K of program information once a day, during carbon-unit downtime. Does it matter whether this takes 10 minutes or 10 microseconds?
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The dialup on the TiVo works just fine.... there wasn't a need for Ethernet.
There *is* a need for ethernet. Just because *you* don't need it doesn't mean the rest of us don't. The Tivo makes one call per day. That's about 30 calls per month. Ameritech allows me 40 calls per month before I start paying for each call (the next level is 400, which tacks another $10 onto my monthly bill).
I am in the process of cancelling all my land lines and just using my cellphone for all calling, but the Tivo is the only thing preventing that. I have DSL. Why shouldn't I use it?
But how many know how to NAT more than one box behind their connect? Few..VERY few.
LOTS of people can do it (and do). If you can NAT one box, you can NAT several just as easily.
"Tell me doctor, with all of your defenses, are there any provisions for an attack by killer bees?"
I do not have a phone line at home. I only use a Cell phone and Cable modem. This is how many more single working professionals are living. Why is it that "connected" appliance developer can't support ethernet (with possible additional hardware purchase obviously) right out of the box? Hello?!?!
Kudos, cool hack! Now I can get a Tivo...
Here's why I want my TiVO to have ethernet:
I already have Cable modem. I don't want the TiVo to hog my phone line. It doesn't always dial in carbon-based lifeform downtime, sometimes it prefers to dial during daytime tv hours. annoying.
I have witnessed several modem failures in Tivo that weren't due to lightning strikes. The Tivo forums were full of these reports at the time I purchased my Tivo. I would rather have reliable ethernet than unreliable modem.
Best situation: both modem and ethernet availability in the box.
A host is a host from coast to coast, but no one uses a host that's close
I ain't got one but I've always assumed the requirement for the server connection was to upload information on your viewing habits rather than the need to get listing information.
Anyone know if this is true or just paranoia?
It's a half truth. The Tivo (standalones anyway) get the guide data from the Dial-up, as well as the network showcases and Tivolution Magazine, which are just "what's hot" lists of shows. At the same time, they send back anonymous viewing data.
The combo boxes get their Guide Data from the sat. feed, but dial-in to get those Network Showcases / Tivolution Magazine. They also send back anonymous viewing data at that time. The call is significantly shorter on the DirecTivo combo boxes (2-3 minutes).
The reason they don't use Teletext type info: most people don't get this type info. There. Simple enough.
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- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
But you don't need ethernet on the tivo to use your DSL connection. Just run PPP on the serial port to your PC that's on the DSL line. The only issue there is whether you've got enough serial ports, since you may be using both the IR blaster serial port and the DSS serial port already.
Perhaps a cheap/easy hack to use the serial port the modem currently uses directly as a serial port would be useful.
Awesome furniture, accessories and cabinetry in Santa Rosa, CA: http://humanity-home.com/
All standard protocols. All easily proxied.
I do not deploy Linux. Ever.
No, the IR port is uni-directional (just an output).
I hadn't known there were so many idiots in the world until I started using the Internet -Stanislaw Lem
The TiVo does use FTP to upload a file to their server, the file contains the 'anonymous' viewing data on what shows you have recorded/watched.
Lastly, it uses NTP to set the clock. Without setting the clock every few days, the hardware clock in the unit will drift quickly, and you end up missing the begininng/end of shows.
I do not deploy Linux. Ever.
Does the teletext have the next week or month's viewing schedule? I think it downloads a few day's worth when it calls.
That's not true, sdsl requires a dedicated line.
a beowulf cluster of these things?!
-acm
Yeah, which means he/she is old enough to get the joke in the next line.
I see even classic Slashdot is now pretty much unusable on dial up anymore.
Tivo Army Captain (Usually a 'Senior' or 'Special Member' on the forum): "Wait a sec. Wait just a goddamn sec. Do you know the percentage of people who have (cable/dsl/broadband)? Do you know the percentage of people who have a home network? NO ONE NEEDS THIS HACK. NO ONE WANTS THIS HACK. NO ONE NEEDS ETHERNET. NO ONE HAS A HOME NETWORK. THE TIVO IS NOT JUST FOR GEEKS."
.85 Gig/hour.
I wouldn't go quite that far.
Nobody really needs this hack as it's not useful. It's very cool, admittedly, but in terms of what you can do right now, it's just not that handy. Ooh, yeah, sure, you can get your program guide data in 2.5 seconds, but it still takes 20 minutes - 2 hours to index it. Running a webserver on the Tivo itself is fine and dandy, but man, is it ever slow (due to the tiny processor).
The really good hacks won't need this because there's not the need for that much bandwidth on the Tivo itself. Even WITH this hack, you can only get around 250kbits/sec, so it's still a tad slow to be sending huge MPEG data, even assuming you've figured out how to get the data off of the MFS directly in the first place. Don't forget that even at lowest quality, the video is around
Yes, it's damn cool though.
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- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Everybody can setup several comps with the internet, they use sygate. Every idiot can use this.....
Make a man a fire and he will be warm for a day, set a man on fire and he will be warm for the rest of his life
yes, it requires a dedicated line, but the POTS functionality is still present. I have awesome 6Mb SDSL, and I use the POTS for my DSS system. so I am not just assuming this stuff. maybe elsewhere in the country the have some sort of different dsl technology? different routers and switches? I think not. I have had a couple different flavors of dsl and a number of friends of mine have it as well. in every case, you can just punch in and dial on the dedicated line. try it sometime if you don't have a jack hooked up. it works.
I would like to take this opportunity to point people to my TiVo Web Project. I've been working on this for a while and it can do quite a lot.
(Now, imagine the security exploits possible from having a "Beowulf cluster" of these... There is certainly some dangers to this insofar as there is for any incoming "web server.")
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
If you have a broadband connection, you can still get your Tivo updates even if the phone line is in use. It would also speed up such updates.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
However, is this just a one-time hack, or perhaps will someone sell some of these? And, does it require a static ip, or can it use DHCP?
Alex Bischoff
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Alex Bischoff
HTML/CSS coder for hire
So could you use the dial-up number that the TiVo dials as a dial-up ISp for your regular computer?
hacking the tivo to not use a phone can also be done by making it use PPP over the serial (DSS control) port. Then a linux box w/ a PPP server and net access can be the gateway. This has been successfully done many times
--IronHelix
Hmmm... Combine the hax0red TiVo with one of the lovely storage devices from mondays' slashdot article and you could store some serious TV time... Commercial free and what you want when you want it. I'm sounding like a commercial for TiVo/Network Engines, I know... Anyways, this could make for some interesting TiVo applications. It could also make for more pirating controversy because people will have an easy way of recording _all_ of their movies/shows/etc and freely/easily distributing them via scour or gnutella. The lawyers would have a field day! Anyways, just my $.02
This is my Sig.
The fairer strategy that the "bad guys" might agree with could be for it to be readable by any TiVo that you have licensed.
If you're not part of the solution, you're part of the precipitate.
I've mirrored the page at http://www.verm ont el.net/~vengnce/slashmirror/tivo-ethernet.html
If you build it, they will hack it.
Great work guys.
Could these hacks scare off management types when they choose operating systems for various devices? They are probably saying to themselves that these hacks are possible due to TiVo using Linux (whether it be true or not, I'm not sure).
Probably more than you would guess. I was in a local PC outlet the other day and the woman in front of me had a little diagram that she had printed out showing how to connect a home network. She had very little knowledge about what she needed or how it worked, but she knew it could be done and she knew enough to ask the right questions and purchase the equipment she needed to set up a home LAN.
When I first heard of the tivo, I was impressed, but a little confused. Why does the box have to dial up a server (thus requiring more hw and tying up your phone) to get TV listing information when that information comes for free in the top line of the TV picture in the form of teletext data????
This ethernet hack is impressive, but more impressive would be to hack the Tivo OS to read the teletext TV listings instead.
Too late.
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
In the interest of avoiding a slashdoting, I have set up two mirrors of the information. One of the links is here
Another one is here
Sealbeater
-- Its survival of the fittest...and we got the fucking guns!!!
The SlashDot effect is taking a toll, so I can't look to see if this is answered. The TiVo has barely-adequate processor power to do the functions it presently handles. I'm wondering if the increased processor load imposed by a higher-bandwidth download might cause problems if record and/or playback is going on at the same time. Or can the ethernet connection handling be dropped in priority so that the other time-critical functions take precedence?
Though as a consumer, I think this TiVo hack is more exicting than accidentally voting for Monca Moorehead.
tcd004
LostBrain, Where our ballots are free to flap in the wind
Actually, this happens every time a new Tivo hack comes out. I bet the admin of avsforum's getting mighty sick of it too. I know I am.
-- cc on avsforum
if the data is only moving at 250kB/s. At that rate, it would take over an hour to move 1 GB from networked storage back onto the TiVo - and foget about trying to play video directly from network storage at that data rate.
The cure for cancer is coming: Reovirus
You forgot:
11. Post an article describing the Sequence for a typical Tivo article on slashdot.
..Jeff Keegan
seven syllables explain TiVo: kee gan dot org slash ti vo
Well, maybe if they didn't run their web server on their TiVo they'd have an easier time handling the load...
Granted, that is a possible solution. However, having a box just for this is not worth it. That is why I don't own a Tivo. If they supported Ethernet out fo the box, or with add ons, I would buy one tomorrow.
... is busy, hung or dead.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
The TiVo relies on very low-level file and partition formats on local hard drives, there is curerntly no way to add remote storage, even with network connectivity. You can't just NFS mount /mnt/tivo and tell it to save the files there, as it doesn't use high-level file formatting. Until someone writes a shim to re-direct the low level calls (which will require a complete reverse-engineering of the filesystem), and figures out a way to guarantee data throughput over ethernet, remote storage won't be a reality..
Think outside the... Hey, where'd the friggin' box go?
http://linuxcare.com.au/tridge/tivo-ethernet/
Please, for crying out loud, the avsforum's aren't built to handle this load and are dying even as I type this. Someone change the URL in the story to this and/or someone post mirrors!
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- Give a man a fire and he's warm for a day, but set him on fire and he's warm for the rest of his life.
Okay, This will probably be moded as flame bait, cause it will be about the giant evil empire. But here goes anyway. We are currently beta testers of the ultimate TV box. And yes, unfortuantely it is by MicroSoft. However, the box itself is very very cool. It's similar to the Tivo box, except it has a directTV feed, so all the recording is digital. It has an expandable hard drive. It has a network card in it already, cause it's really a modified webTV box. We have gotten it to work with our DSL hookup. It has 2 tuners, so you can record AND watch at the same time. Which you can't do with the current TIVO box (although I hear they are doing a DirectTV version also). And no, I don't really like MS. But I think a good product is still a good product no matter who its made by.
Not that I'm interested in pissing off TiVO, but... Does this open the door for someone to reverse-engineer the guide format, and then offer an alternate guide, either cheaper than TiVOs or free? TiVO needs to put a stop to this, or get some really good encryption...
Do not confuse duty with what other people expect of you; they are utterly different.Duty is a debt you owe to yourself.
I want to use the ethernet to swap video files with friends. Using a PPP connection over a serial line is an easier way of doing this? Are you out of your friggin mind?
TiVo uses UUNet dialups to send their information. It would be a simple configuration to reach the "Next Step" and get guidedata via broadband. Currently the information is only at 215k, which isn't SOOPAFAST or anything, but for what is normally a 15 minute or so call via 33.6, it would be much different.
-Remove the 86 from my email to contact me.-
http://www.tivofaq.com/hack tells you how. Put the new drive in a PC, boot off the Linux boot disk and run a command. Put the drive in the TiVo. Easy.
Actually, that's not the main idea. The ethernet need arose from the people that want to control the TiVo over a shell prompt/ppp/whatever, but at the same time need to free the serial port that controlls their satellite boxes. Obviously you cannot have both on the same physical link, so why not put the shell over ethernet.
I hadn't known there were so many idiots in the world until I started using the Internet -Stanislaw Lem
Yes, you're wrong. This is exactly what is being done. It calls a custom ppp-dialup server that only gives access to one ip-address. Fortunately this address is also mapped in the regular internet and so you can connect to it either way. It is STANDARD PPP & TCP/IP. If tivo wanted to play nasty they could block all connections besides those taken from their custom&limited ppp-dialup.
The TiVo does make a PPP connection to UUNet servers nightly, where it then downloads the guide data via FTP. These FTP servers are accessible via the Internet, but the rest of the Internet is not accessible via TiVo's UUNet connection. TiVo probably won't be too upset about this hack since it will reduce some of their dial-up costs, unless somebody decides to circumvent TiVo's guide data and start importing data from another Internet source (trust me, not too hard at all). Then again, this could also be done over the current modem connection. The main reason I'm attracted to this hack is that it now allows me to add/remove/edit recording schedules on the fly without being at home and without having to wait until it places the daily call.
While I certainly wouldn't knock the impressive nature of hacking an ISA NIC onto a proprietary bus, there have been a few articles recently on setting up a TiVo to connect to a Linux PPP server behind a cable modem or your broadband of choice, which isn't a difficult thing to accomplish. This was discussed recently discussed in a Slashdot article, and also make sure to check out the TiVo forum here. Lastly, be sure to check out LinuxToday, as there have been a few articles recently on this same topic.
Interested in open source engine management for your Subaru?
...forgive me, for I am not a TiVo owner, but is that all it would take to get your TiVo information from your broadband connection? Seems unlilkely to me that the TiVo is making a PPP or SLIP connection to the net and downloading it's info via some TCP/IP protocol... am i wrong about this?
What I don't understand is the motivation for Tivo in leaving Ethernet out of the original design? Maintaining dialup servers across the country can't be cheap for them.
This raises a question - How much of design (in this case or others) is due to deliberate consideration of goals and the best means to achieve them, and how much is due to the people working the project being ignorant of thier alternatives/options?
I mean, do you think it's possible that it never occured to Tivo's development team to include something as obvious as Ethernet??
Tivo doesn't care about hacks. In fact, they encourage it.
After all, it's yours, you bought it, money exchanged hands, you are perfectly within your right to do whatever you want to with it.
In fact, I bet that some of the more interesting hacks (such as this one) could result in Tivo calling the individual(s) up and offering them a job.
That's the way it should work. Tivo is a-okay in my book.
Mike
"I would kill everyone in this room for a drop of sweet beer."
Don't tell anyone!!! Come on, this always happens. A wicked hack to do some real cool stuff gets out and the RIAA / MPAA / DMCA find out about it... let's keep the lid on this one for a while.
Why can't all geeks just have a *private* network so that only we know about this stuff... well at least until it's WAY to late to do anything.
This
Is the Tivo service on the internet? It was my understanding that the Tivo dialed a 1-800 number to reach it's service, more BBS style than internet style. So who's going to be providing the service that you can reach with your ethernet card? And, worse, even if someone will be (and I don't doubt the CAN) - won't this prevent people from needing to pay the monthly 'fee' the Tivo box is supposed to be making it's manufacturer?
Okay, that sounds like flamebait, I admit. But with the I-opener, they were selling the hardware at a loss. So when people modified it (yes, like I did. I admit that too) to not have to use their service, it cost them money. And people here yelled and screamed that they decided to implement a contract with the selling of the unit. (Which was the ONLY thing they could do to not go out of business straight away.) With the BlessTivo utility (which allowed you to add a 2nd hard drive to your unit) the company response was more towards 'hey, neat' rather than 'hey, stop that!' This, however, may very well make them, well, upset. Does anyone know if they're selling the hardware at a loss, and depending on subscription revenue to keep afloat?
In case you want to skip the forum messages (or it get's /.ed) here is story on http://linuxcare.com.au/tridge/tiv o-e thernet/
Hey there everyone.
We weren't technically slashdotted. AVSFORUM had a default Apache install with the MaxClients set to 256.
This has been corrected. I don't think UBB was taxed at all. The load ave never went above 1.00.
We'll be ready next time...
With all these < $200 "DSL" routers on the mkt, you don't need to know how.
cat
Sequence for the typical Tivo article on slashdot:
1. Wow, a new hack!
2. Click on the avsforum link just to find it's slashdotted, pissing off the people who actually are creating the hacks.
3. "Won't this let us steal service (not that I'd do that)?"
4. "Does this mean I can not pay for a subscription now?!"
5. "I don't own a Tivo, but I have all these assumptions about how the Tivo works that I'd like to throw out and have disproved by anyone who knows anything about a Tivo."
6. "What's the point, Tivo is just digital VCR. Did I mention I don't own nor understand a Tivo?"
7. Click on avsforum a few more times.
8. "Tivo is a dumb idea, just buy a video capture card."
9. "Aren't they violating the GPL?"
10. "Tivo won't like this and will stop it, even though it doesn't harm them in any way."
-- cc on avsforum
Are you asking how many slashdot readers have ethernet?
Are you kidding? I bet the majority of the readers on here have a home LAN, and the majority of the home LAN people also know how to set up NAT for Internet connection sharing.
This is "News for Nerds", man!
Hey, how about a home LAN poll?
I want to delete my account but Slashdot doesn't allow it.
Cool, can you tell me how to get from 1.2 to 3 mbps out of the tvio's serial port with ppp?
I tried the ppp route and sucking a mpeg from it took 4 hours. so therefore there must be a faster way.
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
You all know what this really means, right? A beowulf cluster of Tivos!
Sorry, but it had to be done.
This is certainly possible, although it would be quite a hassle for each user to customize the guide to contain their own cable lineup. Currently TiVo's guide does not contain DirecTV's PPV or pay-sports program info. An enterprising individual has come up with his own automated solution where he has a Javascript that runs on his PC, pulls the required data from DirecTV's website, formats that data to be compatible with TiVo's guide, and uploads it to a Geocities web site. The TiVo is then modified to make a 2nd PPP connection to any ISP after the call to TiVo takes place, it then downloads this DTV guide, and imports it into the TiVo guide. This doesn't bypass the TiVo guide but adds the data in addition to what is downloaded nightly from TiVo.
It's also for downloading software updates and for resetting your TiVo's internal clock to atomic time. I've found that the built in modem is very unintrusive (it was well designed in this respect), but I'm going to upgrade to an ethernet version the moment they release one (if they ever do). I know TiVo has some VOD plans in the works (e.g., their deal with Blockbuster) and taking advantage of my DSL would be one way to accomplish that.
-----
Free P2P Backup, Windows & Linux
How about a courtesy email to each site once you post a story? "Hello, this is Slashdot. We are going to post a story in five minutes about your site. In ten minutes you are going to experience The Slashdot Effect. Prepare accordingly. Thank you."
The story has been posted for several minutes on Slashdot.org. If the administrator's of these sites can hardly be bothered to type 14 characters to check out Slashdot, is that our problem?
After looking at the plans and instructions of how to do this, I decided that in the time that it would take me to configure this hack, I would be able to work at a normal job and make enough money to buy whatever it is I'm making with this hack.
kojent
No. I'm talking about TiVo owners. Most of the TiVo owners I know are just home consumer users, with zero need for an Ethernet port. By putting an Ethernet interface on a device they have to support it. Not something they want to do for the minority of users that use it.
... are much more than just downloading program guide data. In fact, most of the TiVo hacking community is against that, because it would probably bring retribution from TiVo. In my mind, the most useful feature to gain from an Ethernet card is an easy way to connect to my TiVo from the internet. It'd be great if I could schedule recordings from the office, handheld device, etc. I don't know how many times I've been at lunch talking about something that's coming up on TV and realized I forgot to set the TiVo to record it. If we can get even a PPP connection on the tivo, it should be a trivial matter to write code that'll accept commands and setup recordings based on those commands. Front end it with a web server and instant remote access to my TiVo! Aside from that, this could be tremendously useful for any other potential TiVo hackers who want quick and easy access to the shell (the console port is quite slow). Even without getting listings through broadband, there's some applications for this, and I'm sure there are several more I'm not even thinking of..
whats the point? What exactly does this allow you to accomplish with your TiVo?
Some do now with cable and DSL. But how many know how to NAT more than one box behind their connect? Few..VERY few. The dialup on the TiVo works just fine.... there wasn't a need for Ethernet.
But...hackers want Ethernet so we can do other things, like remotely mount network storage and such. These weren't in the original TiVo design as supported features, so why spend money on the Ethernet hookup?
I thought they just squeaked out some PPP connection to a national server for the program schedule. Oh well, if it really does work, then they must have had one hell of a hard time with firmware/software drivers for this hack. What's next, a TiVo with 10/100?
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
This is (possibly) the first time that a UBB forum has been slashdotted. Way to go, we gotta show 'em that perl/Bender is what to use for forums!
"Ancillary does not mean you get to rule the world." --U.S. Circuit Judge Harry Edwards, speaking to the FCC's lawyer
Ethernet does have advantages over serial connections, though.
Speed and wiring options come to mind.