Ragu Spaghettisauce

I got Grand Theft Auto IV, will be playing that tonight.

I'm so bad at games like this that the main selling point for this is that I can do side things. Like: fashion, prancing, standing too close to people while they read their scripts, stealing hot dogs, did I mention fashion, car wrecks, etc.

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I was watching the Red Sox game the other night and saw an ad for Comcast having Tivo. I phoned them the next day to get it installed, and they said they would send out a guy to install a card into my current DVR. I asked if this was something I could do myself to avoid the $13ish charge. They said it was not.

The guy came the next day, was right on time, gave us a new DVR as the old one supposedly would not work, and then there was no card. He spoke to a tech guy on a fancy phone/radio thing they carry, and then said to leave the unit on for at least 3 or 4 hours, but the TV could be turned off (durrr). This was not an issue as I was going back to work.

I came home 5+ hours later and saw that the DVR was exactly the same as what we had before, just more responsive (the other unit was slloooooww). No sign of Tivo - wondered if something was up, or if the Comcast Tivo just doesn't look very Tivo-y.
Later that night, I watched the Red Sox game, but during that, it cut out - this happens, and it will usually switch from the HD signal to the crap signal, even though you are on the HD channel. Technical difficulties.

Then it was off for so long that I actually forgot that the TV was on (I was playing poker, not sitting there watching the blank screen in suspense). Then it came back on and it was Tivo! Woo hoo! Except nope.

It said "Welcome to Tivo" or something like that, and showed the startup symbol, which is supposed to be a yellow screen with a sunrise sort of thing. The LED screen on the device said "db01" which is part of the device boot sequence.
I left it like that and it wasn't changing. Went to bed, it was like that over night. Went to work the next day, got home, still like that. Watched a DVD, then afterwards it was still like that.
I restarted the machine - and this time it was a green startup screen (which a tech later told me "should never happen" - oops).
I decided to press every button on the Tivo remote, from left to right, going down the device.
Somewhere around the ABCD buttons, I got the screen to go to a candy cane striped screen and the next said HAPPY HOLIDAYS!
An Easter Egg of sorts.
Couldn't get it back.
Restarted it again at the tech's suggestion after calling their support line, and he said he had no idea about the Happy Holidays. I suggested that maybe my Tivo observed a religion different than the majority of us (I observe no religion, as I am a dirty heathen).

Eventually it was decided that a tech would come out and replace my unit this weekend and I would just go back to the normal DVR, which at least worked, and there is a firmware patch for the Tivo coming out in June, so I will try out Tivo again in July.
It would be great if I could get this new DVR box, but the old service - it is a better box.

I am expecting I will have some issues in that they are charging me for the techs to come out, and they are charging me for Tivo - that's fine, were it to work - but the fact that this didn't at all work, means I don't want to have to pay for it - as we also cannot watch *any* TV at all for several days (that doesn't phase me, but it bothers The Wife) - not paying for their service if I cannot use their service.

Good times.

Thanks to the anon person who warned me in the comments that this would happen - you were right. Although Comcast tech support is infinitely nicer to deal with than any of my Verizon experiences, so this wasn't really so bad.