Good day, I purchased a new Tablo 4th generation in December of 24. Since that purchased, I have had two of these 4 generation burn out. Tablo has great customer service and in both occasions my burned out tablo’s were replaced with new ones. Now this isn’t a software issue or similar. The unit burned out. It is not near any other electronices that give out heat and it is not stacked with other electronics. It sits on the des all by itself waiting to burn out. Anyone else have a similar problem? This is a great product with a big fat flaw!
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Is burn out a technical term? Or did the unit stop working for some unknown reason and it’s cheaper for tablo to replace the unit then spend hours debugging the condition. And were the units sent back to tablo for investigation.
I had one die after just about a year. Tablo made good on it. I assume that it died due to overheating, but will admit that is strictly speculation on my part. I have significantly improved cooling for the new one in hopes of preventing this one from going south. My new solution involves a mesh shelf and a fan blowing up through the unit.
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And did tablo want the old unit back for evaluation or did they just ship you a new one.
This maybe too much for some people’s budget… but in my living room entertainment center I have a small Anker UPS for all my stuff. But my Tablo is in my network rack in my office, which is on a APC UPS. Anker makes affordable battery backup devices.
edit: i posted this cuz it may save your device from any power issues.
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Ditto here + a fan. Not taking any chances. They make residential-/consumer-grade UPS’s exactly for this reason. Of course, there’s no guarantee except maybe on devices connected to the UPS.
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Initially, they had said they were going to send me a return shipping label. Once I got the new one up and running, I kinda forgot about it. I found the dead Tablo on my workbench a few days ago and realized I hadn’t sent it back. I reached out to them and apologize and asked about return shipping, and they told me to just dispose of it.
Either lazy workers or crappy contracts. When companies engage in contracts with 3-party manufacturers for products there are usually quality metrics and credits for defective products. And when the failure rate is too high companies may switch 3-party manufacturers or demand that better quality components are used.
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Mine just died. I came on here to find a post about warranty info, and didn’t even have to start searching when I saw this post. I was watching TV, walked into the other room, came back and the app said it cannot find the Tablo. I went upstairs to the Tablo and no lights were on. I tested the power supply and it’s working. Let it sit over night unplugged, and tried again this am. Nothing. What is the warranty like on these things? If they die after a year, I’m not going to get another one.
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Hi @Ala ,
All Tablo DVRs have a 1-year limited warranty.
Reach out to Tablo Support; they should be able to help.
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I had one die. Tablo was very good, and fairly quick about warranty replacement. Getting the new one set up went pretty quick, too.
As for ‘if this one burns out’… At this point, I would get another one. Again, I am not saying that Tablo is flawless, I do think they need to make the device more hardy. However with the low price point, a little less than $150.00 for a four-tuner, and the fact that it has saved me more than $2000.00 in cable/satellite fees, I think it would be worth it. Also, no one has pointed me toward and better, more cost-effective product.
And, yes, Tablo should make it so you can migrate an external HD to a replacement device.
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Ok thanks. It’s a bummer because I bought it in June 2024, so definitely over a year. I reached out anyway.
I really don’t use it much. Just to watch the local news and occasional football games. If I did not have it, I would not resubscribe to a service with locals.
It would be a simple process for Tablo to copy from one drive to a larger.
My guess is they don’t want you make a copy and use it elsewhere.
Copyright infringement or whatever.
Still, would be easy to allow the consumer to do it by not autoformatting an unknown drive, and give user an option to use new drive as is.
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I’m pretty impressed - they’ve asked for my shipping address. Even though I bought it June 1, 2024.
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I just responded to your earlier post about sudden failure. I had the same problem and determined a capacitor had suddenly failed internally.
I have two Tablo TV Gen 4 units that have burned out (died, no longer working, for those nitpicking technical terms) since October 2024. Each unit lasts less than one year. My unit sits on top of my TV console and adding a cooling fan is not an option. I have noticed since day one that the unit runs extremely hot. Heat will damage electronic parts. Although Tablo makes you verify the unit is no longer functional twice, they do replace the defective unit. I agree with Vikingtu that this is a design flaw. I hope that I do not have to replace the unit a fourth time.
04/02/26: Quick Update. Tablo has started the replacement process. They also told me to recycle the defective unit. Waiting is the hardest part.
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This is the cooling fan i have the Tablo Gen4 sitting on. You just plug it into an old usb cube.
It’s not a complete guarantee against failure, but it does cool some.
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That is the same one that I have. I think it helps. I built a little mesh shelf so air will pass through it, put the fan on that blowing upward and placed the Tablo on top of that. Some folks also pop the top off the Tablo to give it more air exposure.
PhilP,
Thanks for the information. I am going to try mounting the Tablo on the wall behind my television first. Is this fan quiet? I don’t want to add noise to my living room.