With the crazy heat all over the country, we’re seeing a huge increase in the number of failed hard drives. Most of our customers are assuming that this is due to the heat directly – the unit heats up and kills the drive. The heat undoubtedly affects TiVos to some extent, and that could be part of the issue, but we’re pretty sure the bigger issue is power fluctuations.
We’re in California, and our power problems are once again making national news. But in many other parts of the country the power problems are affecting TiVo users as well.
The problem is that with the blackouts, and maybe even more so with the brownouts, the power fluctuates enough to speed up and slow down the hard drive, potentially while the head is reading and writing.
So, we’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again: Get a UPS for your TiVo! This may not make you completely immune to all power problems (your UPS can still run out) but it does help with many.
Here’s our UPS info: