# unknown partition table



## Kevk (Nov 23, 2007)

This may be my first post, but I have spent a number of hours on various occasions here searching.

I'm going to try to provide as much useful information as possible, but this might be a bit wordy...

Ultimate goal: upgrade existing Series 2 Tivo & DTivo with new / larger drive, while saving the recordings.
- Dtivo - RCA DVR 40, currently 120GB drive, target is 320 Seagate PATA .
- Series 2 Tivo - Tivo 240004a, currently 100GB drive, Dtivo - target is 320 Seagate PATA.

Plan to use the command
mfsbackup -Tao - /dev/hdc | mfsrestore -r 4 -s 127 -xzpi - /dev/hda/ 


As you can figure out, the original drives have been upgraded before (with the help of posts here).

I have tried a couple of different Boots discs (PTVs/Tiger, MFSTools2, & Weaknees) and have slightly different outcomes.

I started with the DTivo first.
Primary IDE Master - New Target Drive
Primary IDE Slave
Secondary IDE Master - Existing Tivo drive 
Secondary IDE Slave - CD drive

The drives seem to recognize okay in the Bios.

I launch into the boot discs and when I scroll back up and check the readout of what it recognized, i find this...

========
hda 625142448 sectors (320073MB) w/16384KiB Cache, CHS=38913/255/63
....
Partition check:
hda: unknown partition table {PTV / Tiger}
or
hda: (0x0) unknown partition table {Weaknees}
========


With the MFStools 2 disc I get this....
=======
hda: 268435455 sectors (137439mb) w/16384kIb Cache, CHS=16709/255/63
...
Partition check:
hda: Signature 0, be16 signature 0
03:00 block 0 has signature 0 rather then 1492
unknown partition table 
========

It looks like the MFStools 2 is not recognizing the full size of the drive, but more importantly, none of the processes will allow me to proceed.

I have tried this procedure in two different machines (P3 & P4), I have tried two different Seagate drives, I've tried (in one of the machines, moving the new drive to a different location (secondary Master), I've tried without the Tivo drive (I don't want to miss too many of the shows I have set to record).
I've also tried on at least two occasions adding a byte swapping command (I find the command I used at this moment).

So, at this point, I plan to pull out a Maxtor test disk to see if there is any problems with the current drive (I've tried two). Another step that I think i'll attempt to tackle is MFSlive, but I need to do a little more reading.

Any suggestions?

Thanks much


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## Kevk (Nov 23, 2007)

Well... I downloaded WinMFS and I'm restoring an OLD Dtivo drive that I had sitting on the side. It looks like there is an error or two, but we will see how it goes.


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## rbtravis (Aug 9, 2005)

Kevk said:


> Well... I downloaded WinMFS and I'm restoring an OLD Dtivo drive that I had sitting on the side. It looks like there is an error or two, but we will see how it goes.


The unknown partition table is a sign the disk has at one time been running XP prior to service pack two and had placed the XP partition signature on the boot partition. If this occurred after Tivo had been loaded on the disk there is a chance it can be recovered with MFStools from www.mfslive.org. If it occurred prior to the image installation it probably cannot be recovered by mfstools. If that is the case the best thing to use is Instantcake from www.dvrupgrade.com which will overwrite the boot partition and put a known good image on your TiVo drive. Remember your CDrom should be primary slave and the TiVo target should be secondary master. You should connect your PC to the Internet and upgrade your XP to service pack 2 which is required to run WinMFS. The minimum requirement is XP professional service pack 2. I do not know if you can use XP home service pack 2 but it may work. you need to keep XP from writing the signature to the boot track. Good Luck.


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## Soapm (May 9, 2007)

rbtravis said:


> The unknown partition table is a sign the disk has at one time been running XP prior to service pack two and had placed the XP partition signature on the boot partition.


Do you know if this can be removed by running FDISK and removing all partitions? What if you use a DOS disc to run FDISK or even a drive utiliy to reformat the drive?


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## rbtravis (Aug 9, 2005)

Soapm said:


> Do you know if this can be removed by running FDISK and removing all partitions? What if you use a DOS disc to run FDISK or even a drive utiliy to reformat the drive?


It still would not replace the TiVo image if it were not there before. If the image was already there it can be fixed with MFStools, It the image was not he must get a new TiVo image.


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## Kevk (Nov 23, 2007)

Thanks for the help. As an FYI... The drives were brand new, never booted into and OS other then the boot discs I mentioned.

I did manage to have WinMFS recgonize the drive, but the application stopped whenever I tired to copy or restore to the disk. Not sure if there were errors on my original disc or what the issue was.

I decided to try the PTV disc again and everything seems to work. I used the command...

backup -Tao - /dev/hdc | restore -r 4 -s 127 -zpi - /dev/hda/ 

The restore went flawlessly. So I just installed the new drive into the Dtivo, and checked the sys info page.
One concern.
- Capacity is still at 102hr, which was where it was at before.

Not sure if this post should be moved, or if I should start another post with a more accurate header.


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## Kevk (Nov 23, 2007)

So i remembered there was a command in WinMFS (MFSadd)
When I ran that on the drive, it gives me an error

Error Number 5
Error message Partitions are configured wrong, you cannot force expand.

I guess the other option I can try is using the MFStools 2 disc and redoing the restore and seeing that would help.


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## rbtravis (Aug 9, 2005)

Kevk said:


> So i remembered there was a command in WinMFS (MFSadd)
> When I ran that on the drive, it gives me an error
> 
> Error Number 5
> ...


Are you trying to add a second disk and make a two disk system? The command you are using is for the second disk in a two disk system.
GO here and read:
http://mfslive.org/softwareguide.htm


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## Kevk (Nov 23, 2007)

The answer would be no, just upgrading a single disk to a single disk.

Let me double check the command I used, yep.. I believe I entered it correctly. I found the info from
http://tivo.upgrade-instructions.com/step4.php
and 
http://www.newreleasesvideo.com/hinsdale-how-to/index9.html (upgrade option 3)

I tired with the "x" command, but I got an error about the target not being large enough. I did check and see if the Boot process recognized the drive completely and it look to be close to the size (320GB). 
I read a couple of other posts with similar errors and dropping the "x" command seem to work for them.


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## rbtravis (Aug 9, 2005)

http://mfslive.org/softwareguide.htm
If you are going to use WinMFS use the instructions from MFSlive.org and best ask your questions to Spike2k5 in his forum, after all he WROTE the software. It is always to direct your questions there than using a copy from unknown origins.
Remember ypu are using Beta software and doing so at your own risk.


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## Kevk (Nov 23, 2007)

Thanks for the help.

As I noted, i got past this first problem and figured I would need to move to another forum to solve the next problem.


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