I have setup 3 tivos in the past, 2 for family and 1 of my own. Two of these however have been DOA. One just displayed a grey screen on boot up with a flashing orange light on the front. The other kept crashing the day I got it. All the replacements when they have been swapped, have worked fine and are still running fine.
However I have just got my free tivo from telecom as part of they broadband deal, and this is also DOA. With this one you get a powering up message and then flicks to a grey screen. It doesn't progress from that screen after half and hour, and the fan on the tivo remains blowing at a high level. It should slow down after it has booted up.
I can't believe the high failure of these things out of the box. Will have to ring up telecom to get it replaced, but is is frustrating to have 3 out of 4 tivos DOA. I know it isn't anything I am doing, because the replacements all work fine.