Recovery or DR app

In case the Tablo device itself fails. 

Currently, if the Tablo fails you lose it all. Maybe weeks or months worth of recordings, perhaps more! It’s not gone, it’s still on the drive, it’s just that they’ve left out any way for a new device to read what’s on that drive. That’s rare in the recording field, next to unheard of in computers. 

I’d really like to see Tablo work on a DR app and perhaps skip the nice fun shiny stuff in order to make this a “coming VERY soon” feature.
Those of us who will use this to record through the heavy TV months so we can catch up on things during re-run season risk losing everything should the Tablo device go south - few other devices leave you hanging like that, at risk of losing it all. 
I can’t see it being THAT hard to create an app that would run on a PC - you pull the drive from Tablo, plug it into a PC, and you can recover all that’s been recorded,
or,
An app that you run one time from a PC against a new Tablo that lets it find and recover recordings made with a prior device. The PC could rebuild whatever database Tablo keeps of recordings, and push the database back to Tablo that way the Tablo isn’t doing all the processing and doesn’t need a heavy redesign. Off-load the work to some other device then toss the newly reconfigured database back to Tablo or however it works.

By the way, if you work in IT you know DR is disaster recovery and any serious computer person takes DR seriously, it’s their priority! (unless they love starting everything from scratch, all new installs and losing all of their data, maybe years worth of work)

Tablo needs a DR app or method and it needs to be before added features of other sorts, IMO.
They leave us hanging in case their device fails.
But what makes it worse or harder for me to accept is the fact that the stuff is all there on the drive - seriously.
It’s all still there, in perfect order and condition. It’s not like it’s GONE, they just can’t read it is all!
Recovery from a bad Tablo should be a piece of cake, IMO. 

Why should you lose your stuff because their device fails? VHS didn’t do that. DVD recorders didn’t do that. If my Toshiba DVD recorder blows, I still have hundreds of disks I can use elsewhere because the data is still there and other devices can read and play my recordings even if the Toshiba DVD-based “DVR” fails.
(hey, isn’t that a DVR - it records to a digital storage device using a file system just like recording to a hard drive connected via USB or SATA, except it records in the DVD file format and not NTFS or whatever.)  

Every DVR I have ever owned (Comcast, Dish, DirecTv, and Uverse) loses all recordings if the box fails or you just want to upgrade to a newer device.  Even if you have an external hard drive, these commercial DVRs pair them with that hard drive so that they won’t work on other DVRs of the same type.


It’s not a bad idea to have some way to switch a drive and all the recordings on it to another Tablo, but I just wanted to explain the standard.

Those are done that way for a reason but it’s not DVR standard. Please don’t say “standard” as I work with IEEE and other standards daily. 

Those expensive pay services also require that you are a customer and subscribe. I do not equate a free OTA no monthly subscription to a cable or satellite service required type device to that of those offered by those turkeys (I would never buy anything from them, TV or Internet so I don’t know what they have and no offense at all intended but I don’t really care what they have because they are supplied as part of a subscription service and never stand-alone devices. Try to use one without their cable or satellite service - they won’t function, so they are not an option for us.)

That doesn’t have to be “standard” it’s just their choice for commercial reasons, no other reason at all. There’s no standard there. 

With that out of the way (sorry I HATE those services and how they force you into things. I’m too American, too independent to be forced into their services.)

Even the DVR option I used to run in my computer recorded in such a way that if the card died, the content was still very there and usable so standard it’s not, commercial and money reasons it is. 
Because others do something isn’t a good reason for Tablo to do it that way. 
After all, the others require a subscription to a broadcast or satellite monthly service at a crazy fee (and I thought you guys were cord cutters trying to break the molds and get out from under the control of those companies…), 
Tablo does not have requirements that you buy their satellite or cable services just to get a DVR so right there Tablo has broken the mold and is in a different and better class that, gag, Dish, comcast and DirectTV, etc.

I’ve never had anything other than broadcast TV, free through the air television as it was originally conceived, paid for via advertisers. I’ve never had cable or satellite and never will. 
My only DVR has been the DVD recorder (Toshiba, pretty nice unit really) and a card in my PC with a TV tuner - it recorded to my PCs drives. If those died I lost nothing, all recordings were there so no, I’ve never lived with "lose the device, lose your recordings and don’t understand why people put up with that, I’ve never had to. Why should we? Is it a rule? I changed computers and lost the ability to use that tuner card and the software that it came with, but the recordings are still on my drive, and I can watch them any time I want to this day even though I’ve since gotten rid of the card. 

+1

I think people have unrealistic expectations of Tablo as it’s a new product and there’s an actual communication with the developers.

Other products people accept for face value and then quote they’re amazing products.

Any DVR with an internal hard drive does not let you recover your recordings.

With that said, the fact that Tablo has an external hard drive you must purchase on your own, it would be nice to be able to plug the drive into another Tablo and have it recognize the recordings.

I think the limitation so far might be the database is held locally / internally on the Tablo for quick response time but the actual recordings are on the external drive. There is a pairing of Tablo and hard drive let’s say - which is totally reasonable.

I actually prefer their “you must purchase on your own” thinking for the drive.

And I agree with your last paragraph entirely. That’s why I suggest that if it’s considered at all, if it’s too much overhead for the device itself, have a small app run from a PC that does the work. Build a database based on current drive content and then push that to the new Tablo or have a PC build the database through Tablo (not able to really word what I’m thinking but I’ve seen similar things happen elsewhere. . 

I understand that any DVR that people here have used doesn’t have recovery mode - but that’s only because people didn’t know how very possible and easy it could be. It’s not “standard” it’s just that no one has done it. No one has done what Tablo is doing either!  ;-)

I also realize that Tablo is small, relatively inexpensive, and passively cooled because they can and do minimize the processing power, RAM and other functionality internally. But I also suggested an app running on a PC or other device that does this for them if the Tablo developers deem it’s not worth doing internally. 
Tablo has already broken the mold, so really saying “it’s standard” doesn’t fit Tablo from day one. 
No offense, but because 10 manufacturers do something a certain way doesn’t mean it can’t be done or shouldn’t be done… Also has anyone here used ALL DVR products? All of them, Magnavox or others? PC based obviously allows recovery, at least mine did. I still have the recordings and can use them any time, even burn them to DVD (and I’ve done that for some of them) even through the card and hardware is long gone. 
Please, no offense, but the old “no one else does it” doesn’t mean it’s a written standard and does’t mean Tablo can’t. 
I bet if you put up a poll, the response would be “yes, please!” but no one has asked because it’s assumed “no one else does it must not be possible” or they were blasted and sent away after seeing “no one else does, that’s standard”. 
It’s possible. No one else has by choice, that’s all. And the rate of failure isn’t that big, the others have INTERNAL drives, Tablo uses a USB drive, a drive that sits on a shelf and could be plugged into another computing device and used or read. 
So Tablo is already so totally different I really prefer to not compare them in that way. I’d rather they stand on their own merits. (which they are doing quite nicely thus far!)  Hope that makes sense and isn’t misunderstood in any way. It’s support for Tablo and their users. Not blasting 'em.
;) 

We’re saying it isn’t a standard thus it’s not a need but a want. Your initial post presented it as Tablo is subpar because it lacks this feature.

We would like to add download for offline storage utilities which would also hopefully help with DR situations. Stay tuned!


We’re saying it isn’t a standard thus it’s not a need but a want. Your initial post presented it as Tablo is subpar because it lacks this feature.

No, not at all. It’s something that would be great to have and save tons of frustration as devices age or people decide to upgrade from 2 to 4 tuner, or maybe trade for one with a built-in antenna (the Metro) and so on.
It makes it easier to spend more money, upgrade to bigger and better, move up to newer models and so on. PLUS we don’t lose our favorite shows or movies we’ve recorded.
Give folks a simple upgrade path with promise of using existing drive or not losing a single recording, they’ll be back spending more for a more expensive version or upgrading faster. It’s a marketing plus for Tablo - see how simple an upgrade is - move your drive with your 500 shows to a newer device and just continue on, not a thing lost.
For only being on the market a few short months it’s an amazing leap and way better than the tiny offerings out there that force us to subscribe to their services or have few benefits or tie you to a single TV, etc.
And heading up security and DR for years I guess I simply cringe at the very thought of a single failure causing loss of “everything”. Once you’ve been where I’ve been you’d see why.

@TabloTV that would be great but if that’s way out there or complex, honestly a simple app run from PC to rebuild a database and allow using an existing drive with existing recordings on a new or replacement Tablo device is more than fine.
But if you want to go whole-hog, who are we to refuse the offer! 
:smiley:

We would like to add download for offline storage utilities which would also hopefully help with DR situations. Stay tuned!

You could pull a Microsoft or “insert your favorite software vendor’s name here” and buy one of the fledgling solutions Tablo owners are working with, finish it up and polish it and add it to the stable and not have to start from scratch.   I mean look at the apps and utilities others buy instead of recreating the wheel. Leverage Tablo owners.
Or not, might be a bad idea if there’s too much legal stuff involved…

@shadowspapa - We have had 1 successful third-party app (Plex) done by some Tablo power users so we’re not opposed to this process at all. Just want to get our API finalized & documented before we move into a true developer program. 


And we want to make whatever this is something that both power users and the average person would feel comfortable using. Which means it can’t be something that will only run if you know command line Linux… :slight_smile:  

SurLaTablo will have an app like i/f (eventually).

Just fyi… (just having fun)

Duly noted @cjcox!