# Serial ATA drive in an IDE Tivo, Anyone tried this?



## Renee6 (Nov 3, 2006)

Hi there,

I am making plans to do my very first Tivo upgrade.
Don't worry, I've read the online guides and sticky notes, I'm new at this but I'm not just posting for information that I have not made an effort to search for.

I'm curious if anyone has had any experience using an adapter to turn the Tivo's IDE controller to allow one or two SATA hard drives to be connected.

I am looking at a device like this:
{edited, ok, it wont let me put in the web page. the manufacturer is "startech", the model number you can search for is "PATA2SATA"}

My goal is to take an 80 GB dual tuner Tivo.
Buy one or two 750GB SATA drives.
Replace the single IDE drive with the two SATA drives.

Why, you ask? Why not just use IDE. I don't know, I could.
There would be little cost advantage, and little speed advantage because it is still an IDE controller. 

I kind of want to only buy SATA now, in case I want to use the drives for something else in the future. Not a terribly great reason, but I'd like to try this. It is going to be a big investment, money wise.

Any thoughts? Questions? Comments?


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## Dkerr24 (Oct 29, 2004)

I wouldn't put dual drives in a tivo for a number of reasons: 1) More heat 2) More Noise 3) double the chance of failure.

I don't see why a SATA drive with a SATA to IDE converter wouldn't work, but not sure anyone has successfully done it and posted their success.


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## classicsat (Feb 18, 2004)

I'd put like a 200-300 GB PATA drive in the TiVo, and the dual 750 SATA drives in a RAID NAS device.


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## Renee6 (Nov 3, 2006)

I guess this means I'm exploring new territory.

A friend of mine drove 20 miles to buy the IDE to SATA adapter. It doesn't look like something many places sell.

I have a small 120GB serial ATA drive I decided to try to see if this would work.

I hooked up the drive, transferred the data, everything seemed ok.
But the Tivo sticks on the Powering Up screen and does not act like it is making any progress. So I'm depressed now.

There is one more thing I want to try if I can find them. There are adapters that plug directly into each drive. Maybe I'd have better luck with those. If not, I guess I'll have to stick with IDE.


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

Renee6 said:


> There are adapters that plug directly into each drive. Maybe I'd have better luck with those.


What kind of adapter are you using? One on its own board?


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## Renee6 (Nov 3, 2006)

supasta said:


> What kind of adapter are you using? One on its own board?


It is made by Startech
You put it in the IDE port on the motherboard and connect one or two sata data cables. It does not need any drivers. It has jumpers to select which sata port is the master and which is the slave (or if it is one drive only).

It worked fine on the computer's motherboard.
It even worked on a USB/IDE drive enclosure.

But the Tivo didn't like it.


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## comp4pod (Dec 31, 2004)

In the "other" tivo forum, someone succesfully used this Rosewill adapter. You can get it at newegg: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16812206001


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## Renee6 (Nov 3, 2006)

comp4pod said:


> In the "other" tivo forum, someone succesfully used this Rosewill adapter. You can get it at newegg:


Cool, thanks. That was exactly what I was looking at to try next.


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## supasta (May 6, 2006)

Renee6 said:


> Cool, thanks. That was exactly what I was looking at to try next.


And if you do, PLEASE report back here or in a new thread the the item worked or not. THANKS!


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## 1283 (Sep 8, 2000)

Renee6 said:


> I kind of want to only buy SATA now, in case I want to use the drives for something else in the future.


By the time you want to use it for something else, there may be better alternatives at that time. For fast depreciating items such as this, planning for the distant future is generally not a good idea. By adding an adaptor, you're introducing another item that can become lose or break.


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## Renee6 (Nov 3, 2006)

c3 said:


> By the time you want to use it for something else, there may be better alternatives at that time. For fast depreciating items such as this, planning for the distant future is generally not a good idea. By adding an adaptor, you're introducing another item that can become lose or break.


Yeah, but I'm having fun.
And I haven't burned down the house yet.


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## urungus (Aug 17, 2002)

I successfully used the Rosewill RC-203 bridge from newegg to install the Western Digital WD5000KS 500GB SATA drive in my IDE Series2 Humax DRT400 Tivo.

Had to jumper the drive to SATA-150, the native SATA-II 300 speed didn't work.

More info: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=4963342


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## ChrisEd (Oct 1, 2005)

I submitted this to WD Tech support but got nonsense/canned responses.

Has anyone succeeded in using the new Green drives this way? I'm hesitant to think the bridge is at fault, but I suppose it is possible.



> The HR10-250 DirectTV/Tivo has an ATA-33 interface. I am using an IDE/SATA bridge (ROSEWILL SATA 2 IDE BRIDGE RC-203 R).
> 
> This works perfectly with the WD7500AAKS and WD5000AAKS.
> 
> ...


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## lessd (Jan 23, 2005)

ChrisEd said:


> I submitted this to WD Tech support but got nonsense/canned responses.
> 
> Has anyone succeeded in using the new Green drives this way? I'm hesitant to think the bridge is at fault, but I suppose it is possible.


I found a problem with these drives (TiVo booting) when the mfg date was 2008, all the drives worked when the date was Dec 2007 and earlier. I have no answer as to why some working drives have problems booting with TiVo.


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## bmgoodman (Dec 20, 2000)

ChrisEd said:


> I submitted this to WD Tech support but got nonsense/canned responses.
> 
> Has anyone succeeded in using the new Green drives this way? I'm hesitant to think the bridge is at fault, but I suppose it is possible.


I got a very helpful  response as well regarding the S3 "soft reboot" failures:
Thank you for contacting Western Digital Customer Service and Support.

I'm sorry but there is nothing that we can do. All drive replacements for a TiVO are authorized by TiVO and tested to ensure that they work. If you are replacing it with a drive that hasn't been tested or approved by them, then it most likely will not work.

I'm really wondering about their new line of CE drives and if they'll care about whether those work in a Tivo....


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## ChrisEd (Oct 1, 2005)

lessd said:


> I found a problem with these drives (TiVo booting) when the mfg date was 2008, all the drives worked when the date was Dec 2007 and earlier. I have no answer as to why some working drives have problems booting with TiVo.


My 750 drive is Dec 15 2007. My 1 TB drive is Oct 3, 2007.

So, I don't think your date has anything to do with it.

Were any of your drives the WD Green drive?

I'm still wondering if a different Ide/Sata bridge will make any difference. I'm skeptical. My next experiment is to try the drive & bridge in a ATA-33 PC to see what happens. Maybe then I can get WD to support it.


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## tflitter (Jan 3, 2006)

has anyone figured this out yet
i wanted to use my seagate 250 gb Ultra ATA drive in my series 2 IDE tivo -- but gets stuck on the welcome/loading screen....

could use some help -- or do I have to go find an IDE drive?


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## dwit (May 5, 2004)

tflitter said:


> has anyone figured this out yet
> i wanted to use my seagate 250 gb Ultra ATA drive in my series 2 IDE tivo -- but gets stuck on the welcome/loading screen....
> 
> could use some help -- or do I have to go find an IDE drive?


I think this has pretty much been answered by Spike(mfslive.org) when he posted about the 540040 he modified(successfully) with 2 1TB drives.

I'll post the link later if I find it again. It's some where at mfslive.org.

2TB 540040

That said, IDE drives are readily available and would make for a much simpler upgrade.

You do realize that any drive you use will need to be prepared by installing the Tivo image/software on it. You can't just stick a bare drive in and expect it to work. It won't.

Go to mfslive.org to learn how to do this, or purchase the Instant Cake software from dvrupgrade.com to prepare the drive.


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## macwizard8112 (Aug 24, 2007)

Renee6 said:


> Hi there,
> 
> I am making plans to do my very first Tivo upgrade.
> Don't worry, I've read the online guides and sticky notes, I'm new at this but I'm not just posting for information that I have not made an effort to search for.
> ...


The reason I'd avoid these: Unless your willing to fork over big bucks, 99% of the SATA to PATA adapters drop the speed of the SATA to SATA Level 1 or 1.5 Mbs, the latest spec is Level II or 3.0 Mbs. So using a cheap $ 15.00 adapter would give you slower access time. I use these adapters when I am fixing an older PC that has no SATA connectors, but I'm doing a hard drive upgrade. Because SATA drives are so cheap, I use the adapter. Since the PC is slow because it's so old, it does not notice the 1.5 Mbs slower access time.

Also I'd stick with a 1 drive swap as opposed to adding 2 drives for 2 reasons:
1) Heat generation
2) Noise

Just my 2 cents worth.


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