# 6TB HDDs compatible with the new 1TB Roamio OTA



## JTHOJNICKI (Nov 30, 2015)

Looking for a 6TB HDD upgrade for my just ordered 1TB Roamio OTA. I want a good, long-lasting drive. I've had really good luck with Hitachi drives in my computers over the years. Does anyone know it the 6TB HGST Deskstar NAS will work?


----------



## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

I can recommend the WD60EFRX. You would need to use MFSR or MFSTools 3.2 for drives 4TB and larger.


----------



## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

I'd say you probably just want the drive with the longest warranty you can get (but AFAIK they only go up to 3 years typically)..

and/or store externally to the Tivo on a RAID..

Over the years, people have recommended basically ALL drives for various uses.. it's all anecdotes.


----------



## mattack (Apr 9, 2001)

ThAbtO said:


> I can recommend the WD60EFRX. You would need to use MFSR or MFSTools 3.2 for drives 4TB and larger.


I just checked the mfstools thread.. I don't see mention of > 4 TB drives, either in the discussion after my last comment a while ago, or in the first message of the thread..

(I put a 6 TB drive in my Premiere 4, and had a bit of discussion about getting boot blocks manually updated to see the whole thing.. but haven't bothered.. yet... so it just thinks it's 4 TB..)


----------



## JTHOJNICKI (Nov 30, 2015)

I exchanged messages with the author of MFSR. Version 1.0.0.4 preps drives up to 8TB now. The HGST NAS drive has a 3-year warranty. That's the main reason I'm considering it. HGST also has about the best reputation from the large data farms. Seagate the worst.


----------



## jerrykur (Jun 23, 2009)

Is the 5400 rpm fast enough? That is, is there a reason to get a 7200 rpm WD red.


----------



## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

7200 RPM will only spin up more heat then the Tivo could dissipate.


----------



## ggieseke (May 30, 2008)

jerrykur said:


> Is the 5400 rpm fast enough? That is, is there a reason to get a 7200 rpm WD red.


The standard Reds are 5400 RPM. The Red Pro line is 7200, but a TiVo doesn't need the additional speed and it would generate more heat.


----------



## jonw747 (Aug 2, 2015)

JTHOJNICKI said:


> Looking for a 6TB HDD upgrade for my just ordered 1TB Roamio OTA. I want a good, long-lasting drive. I've had really good luck with Hitachi drives in my computers over the years. Does anyone know it the 6TB HGST Deskstar NAS will work?


The key thing about the WD Red drive is that it's designed for RAID and has been tweaked to not keep retrying for minutes on end. That's important because as the drive ages and develops errors, you don't want your DVR to lockup playing video, but just fail with a momentary glitch and move on ASAP.

If the Hitachi drive is designed in a similar manner with RAID in mind, it may work fine, but it's 7200 RPM and has been pointed out the extra speed would be wasted and possibly undesirable if it requires more power than the TiVo is designed to supply, generates extra heat, or makes more noticeable noise because of the spin frequency.


----------



## JBDragon (Jan 4, 2004)

I would use a WD 6TB Green drive. You get power savings , low noise, and less heat. It's run at I believe 5400 RPM which is more then fast enough for a DVR like Tivo. I'm using the 3TB version currently. The WD Red drive could also work. It's a little more money, and not going into a NAS, but it's also the same low speed. It's just a little more money but a year longer warranty at 3 years instead of 2 years with the green drive. I have 4 of the WD 3TB Red drives in my NAS, the oldest installed in Jan 2013, so I'm past the 3 year mark already on 3 of them, Jan 17, Jan 18th, May 23rd 2013, my forth Dec 9th 2014th. I label my HDD's to keep track. My green one I installed last year when TIVO was doing their $299 Roamio OTA 500 Meg HDD deal. So 1 year is coming up fast.

The largest you can go without having to do anything is 3TB. Anything larger requires extra work to make work, but it can be done without to much effort.

I wouldn't install a 7200+ RPM drive into a TIVO. It's over kill in speed, uses more power, and makes more noise. I can put my ear up to my Tivo and I can't hear anything. That's how it should be. Less heat and less speed should equal a longer lasting HDD. You can always get a Lemon no matter what HDD you get. 

I had a HDD in my PC that was failing, it was only used to record my TV using Media Center. Then was before getting my TIVO. I was having these strange issues and couldn't figure out was what going on. Nothing was telling me the HDD was going bad. Then I ran some HDD tools and saw what was going on. It wasn't good!!! Got a new 3TB green drive to pop into my PC, which is still there even now, that I used for Media Center and all my problems disappeared.


----------



## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

For pricing on the WD30EFRX VS. WD30EURX on Amazon. At my last look (last night), the EFRX was $106, but the EURX was $37 more, and its the old model.


----------



## JTHOJNICKI (Nov 30, 2015)

Leaning toward the 6TB WD 5400rpm RED for the 1 million hour MTBF rating. I hate losing DVR hard drives and want too be able to store all of our OTA recordings for a whole season.

Does anyone know how to specifically identify the WD externals that have Reds in them? Serial number ranges, SKUs, etc.


----------



## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

Wouldn't it be better to just get the internal drive rather than an external and voiding its warranty/return?


----------



## mark1958 (Feb 13, 2005)

I believe the externals are some times cheaper than just buying the drive, and just gut out the external for the drive,thats the reason for asking. (Serial number ranges, SKUs, etc)

Edit: at least I hope he knows it won't work thru the Tivo Esata port.


----------



## jonw747 (Aug 2, 2015)

JBDragon said:


> I would use a WD 6TB Green drive. You get power savings , low noise, and less heat. It's run at I believe 5400 RPM which is more then fast enough for a DVR like Tivo. I'm using the 3TB version currently. The WD Red drive could also work.


Technically what we want is a 6TB+ AV/GP drive (aka one designed for DVR usage), but it doesn't exist in those sizes.

Many of us are using the WD Red for the reason I mentioned in my earlier post - that when bad sectors start popping up (and they eventually will) and one needs to be read, it will fail quicker than other drives like the Green which are designed for desktop usage - hanging up the DVR for less time.

The Green drive would be fine, if you could tweak it to make it act more like the Red or better yet the AV/GP, but I don't know the current state of this.


----------



## jerrykur (Jun 23, 2009)

ThAbtO said:


> Wouldn't it be better to just get the internal drive rather than an external and voiding its warranty/return?


I am pretty sure that you cannot get a high capacity, Tivo certified drive that will marry via the Tivo eSata port. And as soon as crack open the box you have voided the warranty.

With that said, I can see the value of an external drive. Having the drive external gets a big source of heat out of the Tivo box.


----------



## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

I have not seen any WD Red drives in an external as they were designed for NAS.


----------



## lmacmil (Oct 26, 2015)

As one who have never gone above 52% capacity on the 500GB Roamio drive, I'm wondering why so many seem to need (or want) terabytes of storage. Once I watch a show, I delete it. Is that not typical? Or do you just record so much stuff, 500GB won't cut it? Or do you like to save entire seasons of a show? Inquiring minds want to know!


----------



## jonw747 (Aug 2, 2015)

lmacmil said:


> As one who have never gone above 52% capacity on the 500GB Roamio drive, I'm wondering why so many seem to need (or want) terabytes of storage. Once I watch a show, I delete it. Is that not typical? Or do you just record so much stuff, 500GB won't cut it? Or do you like to save entire seasons of a show? Inquiring minds want to know!


Just a matter of having more shows we want to watch then we have time to watch. There's also a ton of streaming content, but watching that doesn't help with the TiVo backlog.

The whole idea of a DVR is time shifting ... it's just sometimes we shift by months, or even years.


----------



## jonw747 (Aug 2, 2015)

ThAbtO said:


> I have not seen any WD Red drives in an external as they were designed for NAS.


They pop up from time to time based on supply. I believe WD makes a two drive external that they advertise as including red drivers.


----------



## JTHOJNICKI (Nov 30, 2015)

In our case, it just comes down to finding the time to watch television. Sometimes we wait until the end of the season to binge watch certain shows. That's the reason I want a 6TB drive in my Roamio OTA.

Also, we just migrated from Dish with their Prime-Time Any Time, so we're used to recording all network shows nightly - let's us try new shows periodically. Dish did it with 2TB drives due to their heavy compression of the satellite signal.


----------



## junesen (Jun 17, 2008)

lmacmil said:


> As one who have never gone above 52% capacity on the 500GB Roamio drive, I'm wondering why so many seem to need (or want) terabytes of storage. Once I watch a show, I delete it. Is that not typical? Or do you just record so much stuff, 500GB won't cut it? Or do you like to save entire seasons of a show? Inquiring minds want to know!


1. I have kept whole seasons of my NFL team's games.
2. I have set OnePasses on many new fall season shows, and wait until to see which ones don't get cancelled before starting to watch them.
3. Recorded all NFL games each weekend and only watch them if they were interesting games.
4. Kept whole seasons of a show so you can go back and remind yourself what happened if you forget a plot thread.


----------



## jerryez (May 16, 2001)

WOW, I forget the plot thread to most shows from week to week, because most shows suck to begin with. Then they not only add sub plots every few weeks, if the show gets renewed for a second season, the second season in many shows completely starts over with a new plot and then they add two new characters and get rid of one. Example: NCIS Then, the new characters have no personality.


----------



## alex_h (Feb 10, 2004)

lmacmil said:


> As one who have never gone above 52% capacity on the 500GB Roamio drive, I'm wondering why so many seem to need (or want) terabytes of storage. Once I watch a show, I delete it. Is that not typical? Or do you just record so much stuff, 500GB won't cut it? Or do you like to save entire seasons of a show? Inquiring minds want to know!


With our 300GB drive, we'd eventually fill up and I'd need to clean in out. Basically, we'd set a show to record, then not watch it, end up with 10 episodes on there... do this a few times, it's an issue. If you actually manage your recording, not an issue.

Just picked up an Roamio and stuck a 3TB drive in there. I don't see it having a problem.

We'll tend to have weeks where we watch nothing, and we get caught up during winter hiatus/summer. We probably record 15 hours of shows (drops to 10 as shows cancel) + 5 hours of "specials" a month and watch < 10 hrs/week, so stuff builds up.

We also were sloppy, had programs recording on both Premiers, etc. If you actively maintain your Tivo, cut OnePasses you don't watch, actually watch your shows, remember to delete at the end, 500GB is plenty...  My wife tends to doze off in Act 4 of shows, leave it to watch later, and never watch it... That builds up a bunch of garbage.

I think that the people needing >2TB are largely hobbyists or have evolved "odd" Tivo based habits... Back in the end of the SD days, you could get insane amount of storage space on a Tivo before HD changed the equation. So people got in odd habits of recording entire seasons to watch at the end. I guess it's not odd, plenty of people binge watch on Netflix. But the "odd" part it deciding in September that you will binge watch a show in May.

Hulu + Netflix have changed the equation for me a bit. A few times, decided to catch up on a show, watched an old season or two on Netflix, then in the current season bought the old videos for $3 from Amazon/Vudu then Hulu'd the last 5. We decided that with $100/mo in savings since cutting the cord, we'd not complain about the $9 for Hulu and an average of $5/month where I catch up or buy a show that was pre-empted.


----------



## jonw747 (Aug 2, 2015)

alex_h said:


> With our 300GB drive, we'd eventually fill up and I'd need to clean in out. Basically, we'd set a show to record, then not watch it, end up with 10 episodes on there... do this a few times, it's an issue. If you actually manage your recording, not an issue.
> 
> Just picked up an Roamio and stuck a 3TB drive in there. I don't see it having a problem.
> 
> ...


There's nothing odd here. DVR's are designed to record entire series of shows and as many movies or other content you want until you feel like watching it, or watching it again, and again, and again.

Where things will get interesting (in my mind) with Amazon/Netflix/Hulu is when they can provide a show in better quality than my TV provider (aka 4K+HDR), but can we trust they'll still own the rights to a show we want to watch when we want to watch it?


----------



## alex_h (Feb 10, 2004)

jonw747 said:


> There's nothing odd here. DVR's are designed to record entire series of shows and as many movies or other content you want until you feel like watching it, or watching it again, and again, and again.
> 
> Where things will get interesting (in my mind) with Amazon/Netflix/Hulu is when they can provide a show in better quality than my TV provider (aka 4K+HDR), but can we trust they'll still own the rights to a show we want to watch when we want to watch it?


I'll argue that when the DVR/PVR was created, they were VCR replacements, even the name PVR/DVR played off VCR. The "new" feature was recording live TV and pausing, that was the splashy feature. Beyond that, they were fancy hard drive based VCRs. They had a single tuner and approximately 25 hours of space. I had a ReplayTV in the beginning, and modded it to add a bigger hard drive and get around 100 hours of space.

The first DVRs with the ability to archive absurd amounts of data were nearly 10 years later, as bigger hard drives to record 25 hours of HD gave you copious amounts of SD records, especially with digital satellite (DirecTivo type boxes) with no re-encoding. Indeed, with drives growing in size and HD being constant, it's only now that it's affordable to build this massive libraries.

I don't judge people for it, and for the people here, it's totally normal to have built your TV viewing around it. But I see with my friends with Cable DVR boxes and On Demand Boxes, they rarely watch a show after the night it airs, they may wait a few hours for the kids to go to bed. For them, TV is still built around discussing the show with friends the next day. For me, I'm routinely weeks behind on shows I watch. Watching years later on Netflix is fine with me too.

I think that the binge watching hobbyists are a very small part of the market. The basic boxes being promoted on Tivo.com store about as much programming as the average American watches in a week. The "core" market is time shifting programming for the modern America who doesn't work banker hours and isn't free for Prime Time, it's NOT the archiving and binging market.


----------



## jonw747 (Aug 2, 2015)

alex_h said:


> I'll argue that when the DVR/PVR was created, they were VCR replacements, even the name PVR/DVR played off VCR. The "new" feature was recording live TV and pausing, that was the splashy feature. Beyond that, they were fancy hard drive based VCRs. They had a single tuner and approximately 25 hours of space. I had a ReplayTV in the beginning, and modded it to add a bigger hard drive and get around 100 hours of space.


And I'd counter argue that many of us had the same behavior with VCR tapes - as the only limit to what we could record was how many tapes we cared to purchase and manage.

And while those of us who need more storage may not constitute the majority, that doesn't mean we're not important as we're likely among the most engaged users of the technology who follow forums like this to learn neat ways to use the product and in the process promote use and sales of the product - and likely have owned multiple generations of the product because it addresses our needs without taking anything away for anybody else.

Just because someone uses a product in a way you don't, does not mean that's an "odd habit" ... it means we're using a flexible product that can address multiple needs.

Welcome to the digital age.


----------



## alex_h (Feb 10, 2004)

jonw747 said:


> And I'd counter argue that many of us had the same behavior with VCR tapes - as the only limit to what we could record was how many tapes we cared to purchase and manage.
> 
> And while those of us who need more storage may not constitute the majority, that doesn't mean we're not important as we're likely among the most engaged users of the technology who follow forums like this to learn neat ways to use the product and in the process promote use and sales of the product - and likely have owned multiple generations of the product because it addresses our needs without taking anything away for anybody else.
> 
> ...


LOL, I replace my "odd" habit with "unusual" habit. 

Sorry for giving offense.


----------



## MacBrian (Feb 24, 2002)

jonw747 said:


> Welcome to the digital age.


"Digital Hoarding" -- that's what I'm doing.


----------



## JBDragon (Jan 4, 2004)

When I got my 500 gig Roamio last year, the first thing I did was throw in a 3TB HDD. When this HDD takes a dump, I'll throw in a larger one. There's only 2 people here, me and my Retired Dad who lives at my house. He records most of the stuff. All kinds of programs, older shows. Plus new stuff. My Tivo seems to always be recording. So it gets up around high 80% and then I go and start deleting some old stuff. The problem is I have no idea what he watched, and he has no idea what I may watch and so it's kind of hard to delete programs.

I wish there was a user Login option. Like with Netflix and others. I pick shows I want, and he picks shows he wants, and any of my shows I watch I can just delete. If it's something he watches, it's still there for him to watch and then delete and visa-versa. I don't have to see all the OLD programs he likes in my program listings, or Repeats of new shows. I sure don't need to see them again this soon. It's so much crap to weed through. So this is a feature I'd like to see come to Tivo.


----------

