Tablo and Roku without internet

I would bet your nightly tablo guide update downloads more then 1 days worth of updates. Otherwise how would all of those TBD’s spread across 14 days disappear out of the sports section of the guide.

You are correct - I meant approximately 1 day. After the initial setup and it downloads all 14 days, I can only assume the nightly downloads are 24 hours worth of data plus any updates for other events in the next 13 days. I have no idea how mucn / many updates there are for the next 13 days, but I can’t see it being a ton?

On the forum, based on my number of channels and show (not episodes) I ask that question 30-60 days ago. And surprising tablo support supplied the amount of MB/month.

So if you want their answer it’s somewhere in the forum.

I have no intention of terminating my cable internet access, but would like to know if we have an internet outage, say from a storm, can I still watch OTA via Tablo on my TVs assuming we have power?

If it is a Roku, then yes you can. For FireTV to work, you would have to disable automatically logging into the internet at startup, otherwise you won’t get anything to work on it. I have no idea on AppleTv or AndroidTv boxes.

In another thread I just located Tablo Support said:
The phone and tablet apps have since been updated to work on the LAN without Internet connectivity. The only Tablo app that requires an Internet connection is now http://my.tablotv.com/

You’ll be able to watch Tablo recordings, and Live TV without internet.
However, without internet, my Rokus don’t display guide data, like what show is on, for Live TV.
I can still select the channel to watch Live TV, but won’t know what’s on until it tunes in that channel.
You’d think they’d cache the guide data, but yeah, no.

We had a short internet outage the other day and I could not get my iPad to connect to my Tablo. I would get the Connect to Tablo screen. When I tapped the button it said it could not find the Tablo on my network. I have my own router and the Tablo is hard wired to it. When the internet connection came back on the Tablo worked as usual.

Since the router probably was retaining the WAN IP address is there something I would need to do to use my own LAN without the internet?

Note I have only Apple devices: iPhone, iPad and Apple TV.

I just tried to use my Tablo without the house WiFi on which meaning no internet and it does not work on my Roku 3, it just takes me to the screen that says, “Discover live TV and DVR” shows on my Roku 3 and can’t find my Tablo without the internet so I would love to know how I can make it work without the internet. Thank you

“without the house WiFi on”. You have to have a functional LAN.

My Roku 3 has worked just fine without a WAN working. As long as the DHCP server has allocated IP addresses my Roku 3 works.

But I also prefer a router-behind-router configuration where my LAN is connected to the non-ISP router because it’s a better router.

Hate to rain on your parade, but try this…
Disconnect your ISP WAN modem network cable from your router.
Reboot your Roku.
You won’t be able to connect to your Tablo.

Do you think that when you reboot you Roku, it just might have to contact the DHCP server for an IP address - dah? DHCP discovery is part of the device boot protocol required to obtain an IP address.

Some ISP routers don’t disable the DHCP server when the WAN is down. Some do.

Some people enable the DHCP server on their bridge router. In fact I’ve successful access the tablo with a Roku 4210, where both were connected via the same switch when the bridge router was inaccessible. Why! because both devices already had their IP addresses and the switch recognized that the IP addresses were just different ports on itself.

Do think there is a way to just have the ethernet wire cable connected directly to the tablo and the other end connected to the moden/router and then from the modem to the Roku with another Ethernet cable? I’m trying this method but it’s not working, I don’t want to use the “wi-fi” I just want to use the internet with the Ethernet wire and have the Tablo work :confused:.

Yes you can hard wire the Tablo to your combo modem/router, and hard wire your Roku to the same combo modem/router. This is actually the most stable connection, definitely no drop in speed.

When the Roku is hard wired to your modem/router, can you access the internet and watch Netflix for example?

My router is separate from my ISP modem, and my router provides the Roku’s IP address.
Really, try it yourself.
Disconnect the WAN network cable from your router, reboot your Roku, and see if you can connect to your Tablo.
I should clarifiy that connecting to your Tablo is kind of incorrect.
It appears you can connect, but you won’t be able to do anything.
Every screen will display a spinning circle, like it’s trying to do something, but never displays anything.
By the way, I noticed this behavior began with Roku OS v8.0.0.

Yes, I can see YouTube, amazon prime, etc but not my tablo app, when I click on the tablo app it just goes to their page and it has the search again button.

Just for you I ran two tests after I re-enabled the DHCP server on my ATT Pace 5031 router.

Roku 3 (4200x) OS 8.0.4143. Roku connect via 5 Ghz WiFi.

Leave Roku in home menu

  1. disconnect the WAN cable.
    Start tablo app. Everything works like a charm.

  2. Reboot Roku. Then start tablo app. You get the message at bottom of the screen “can’t connect to internet”. Prior to 8.0 OS release this use to be a popup with an option to proceed.

Amazing I hit Okay on the remote and the tablo app worked. So you don’t know if it would have timed out proceeded or the Okay is required.

That Roku Tablo app connected, and displayed Live TV channels, and recordings, and stuff?
Hmmmm… definitely not doing that on mine.

I unplugged the WAN cable causing the green ethernet light to turn Red. Thus there was no cable Link light on. Because having link lights on is a different test then no WAN but ethernet link lights on.

I have three tablos. So I always disconnect before leaving the Roku tablo app. Thus when you start the tablo app it needs to do a LAN broadcast discovery.

That all worked but slower after the roku reboot… You then pick a tablo unit and enter.

Resumed watching the figuring skating. But I didn’t go into every menu and play around. To me tablo is a DVR - I want to watch recorded shows.

Each router can be a little different. But it would seem a little crappy if the DHCP server needed to drive a LAN device was impacted by WAN access.

Are you sure the Tablo and Roku are hard wired to the same device? Aka the same modem? The Roku should find the Tablo.

If you connect the Roku to the WiFi network you can connect to the Tablo?

You might have to open a support ticket to have them help you out.