[Update: Fixed] TiVo breaks its Android TV stick by disabling setup

Ben Schoon | Jul 5 2023 - 8:00 am PT

The TiVo Stream 4K, launched in 2020, is an Android TV stick with some useful features and a great price, but it seems to slowly be losing its touch. Not long ago the software lost support for a key integration and, now, TiVo has itself broken the software needed to activate the TiVo Stream 4K, leaving new users unable to set up the Android TV device.

As spotted by ZatzNotFunny, TiVo has broken activation for the TiVo Stream 4K entirely, leaving users who either just bought the device (which is often heavily discounted at retailers such as Amazon) or were unlucky enough to have reset it recently. The problem first showed up on TiVo’s forums as one customer ran into the problem on the device they’d just purchased.

Update 7/5: In a statement to 9to5Google, TiVo has confirmed that this issue has now been resolved.

TiVo completed a scheduled infrastructure update to improve current TiVo devices and prepare for future services. This resulted in certain services being temporarily unavailable for a brief period of time. All devices have been upgraded and restored.

This occurred as TiVo took its entire customer service portal offline for a few days, with a message appearing on TiVo’s website saying:

We’ll be right back.

We’re busy improving our site to supercharge your shopping experience; unfortunately credit card transactions will not be completed during this time. We will be back as quick as SkipMode^® zips through a commercial break. Please reach out to Customer Support team https://www.tivo.com/contact-us for any transactions in the meanwhile. We will be back online on 7/05/2023.

The good news here, at least, is that TiVo’s customer service, and in turn activation for the TiVo Stream 4K, will be back up and running again on July 5.

Thankfully, this shouldn’t affect users who have the device up and running already, but it’s obviously a massive pain for those affected, and a massive oversight on TiVo’s part. It’s also certainly a bad look for TiVo from the point of view of customers who just purchased the device and are now unable to use it in any capacity until July 5.

If you’re in that situation, the Chromecast with Google TV has nearly the same feature set, costs just $10 more, and has way better software support, too.