# Series3 eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion



## bkdtv

The FAQ below applies to the unofficial eSATA support in versions 8.3.x and earlier. It is no longer current as of v9.2.

Please see the current eSATA FAQ for 9.2.

*Frequently Asked Questions*

 *How do I enable eSATA drive expansion on the Tivo Series3?*

Instructions @ Engadget with screenshots
Instructions @ MFSLive

 *Does this method work on the TivoHD?*

No. However, with the TivoHD software v8.1.7c2 released September 5th, it is now possible to enable eSATA with an alternative method. This alternative method is more complicated and requires that you to remove the original drive from the TivoHD.

I recommend that TivoHD owners wait for Tivo to officially support eSATA expansion. For those that cannot wait, here are the instructions:


spike2k5 said:


> Connect both internal [TivoHD drive] and eSATA drive to your computer:
> 
> For WinMFS, use mfscopy (answer "yes" at the end), restore(answer "yes" at the end) or mfsadd and will take care of it.
> 
> For mfstools, mfsadd -x -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb (notice there is no "e" that was required for Tivo S3)
> /dev/sda is your internal drive, dev/sdb is your eSATA drive.



 *Is it easy to do with the Series3?* Yes, it is simple and fast.

 *How do you use the extra storage?* It's seamlessly integrated. The Tivo appears as if it has a single, larger hard drive.

 *Is eSATA expansion officially supported by Tivo?* Not yet. But it works very well.

 *Is this expansion sanctioned by CableLabs? Will they make Tivo disable it?*

On April 20, CableLabs updated their DFAST licensing agreement to allow Tivo (and others) to support eSATA and other forms of drive expansion without explicit CableLabs approval or certification. Further information is available in this post by dt_dc.

 *I previously upgraded the internal drive in my Series3. Can I still use eSATA expansion?*

The method described in #1 will not work if you previously upgraded your internal drive. An alternative method is now available to support expansion on upgraded units.

The alternative method supports both upgraded internal drives and eSATA expansion using the new WinMFS utility or the MFSLive V1.3 boot CD. With it, the Tivo Series3 will support 1TB internal and 1TB eSATA drives, for a total of 2TB storage. This second method is more complicated, as it requires you remove the Series3 hard drive and connect to a PC. Further instructions are available here.

 *How reliable is eSATA drive expansion on the Series3? Are there bugs?*

The Series3 supports multiple drives the same way the Series2 has done internally for years. The only significant difference is that the Series3 automates the drive "marriage" process, whereas a PC was required to "marry" a second drive to the Series2. The eSATA interface on the Tivo Series3 is very stable and reliable if you use the appropriate hardware. When users do experience problems, it is typically because a poor eSATA cable or unsuitable drive was used.

Recommendations for reliable eSATA cables and drives can be found in FAQs #31-34.

 *Does this work on 8.1.x and 8.3.x?* Yes, it also works on the 8.0.1b (factory) software.

 *Are USB drives supported?* No, only eSATA.

 *What is the maximum capacity supported?*

The Series3 currently supports a maximum of 2TB total storage (binary). Each drive is limited to a maximum of 1TB. With the current method -- described in #1 -- you can use a 1TB eSATA drive in addition to the internal 250GB drive, for a total of 1.25TB storage. A future method should allow use of 1TB internal and 1TB eSATA drives.

Note for marketing purposes, most drive manufacturers use the decimal definitions for megabyte and terabyte. For example, the one terabyte drive sold by Hitachi is actually 1,000,000,000,000 bytes, but industry standards define 1TB as 1,099,511,627,776 bytes. Hence, the Series3 actually supports about 10% more capacity than you get with the 1TB eSATA drives now sold at retail.

 *How much high-definition recording time do I get with a 500GB eSATA drive? With a 750GB? With 1TB?*

High-definition programming consumes up to 8.6Gb per hour, but most high-definition programming requires less. With a 500GB eSATA drive, your Tivo Series3 will store a minimum of 81 hours. With a 750GB eSATA drive, you'll get a minimum of 108 hours. With a 1TB eSATA drive, you'll get a minimum of 135 hours. In actual practice, usable storage will be anywhere from 1.3x to 2.0x that amount, depending on what channels you record.

The Tivo System Information screen reports expected capacity during typical use as follows:


Code:


[b]Tivo System Information: Variable Recording Capacity, Hours[/b]

[b][u]eSATA[/u]            [u]  HD[/u]        [u]  SD[/u][/b]
None               32         303
120GB              47         445
250GB              65           ?
300GB              71         673
500GB              98         927
750GB             131        1244
800Gb             138           ?
1 TB              165        1561


 *Is there any disk preparation required?* No.

 *Do I need to format the drive?*

No. There is no disk preparation required of any kind. The Tivo Series3 will automatically repartition and format the drive.

 *When you add the external drive, are the programs already recorded on the internal disk lost?* No.

 *Will programs recorded before I added the external drive be affected if I remove it?* No.

 *What happens when I disconnect the eSATA drive?*

If the eSATA drive is off or disconnected when you power up the Series3, the Tivo will give you two options. You can 1) reboot and reattach the drive *or* 2) switch the Series3 back to "single-drive mode" which deletes any recordings on that eSATA drive.

If you decide to switch to single-drive mode -- by pressing Thumbs Down three times --- the Series3 may delete some or all of the recordings made since the drive was connected. All recordings on the eSATA drive are deleted. Recordings made before the drive was connected are not affected.

When you disconnect or power off the eSATA drive while the Series3 is on, the Tivo will reboot and ask you to re-connect (or divorce) the drive.

 *If I want to replace my current eSATA drive, can I just "divorce" it and then "marry" it to another?*

Yes, you can repeatedly "divorce" and "marry" the Series3 to as many different eSATA drives as you want, but you'll _permanently_ lose all existing recordings on every drive you divorce. Whenever you "divorce" an eSATA drive, you lose access to its recordings forever. You do not lose recordings made before the drive was added.

 *What is the best way to replace an existing eSATA drive?*

You must "divorce" the existing eSATA drive before you can replace it with another.

To divorce the old drive, connect it back up with your eSATA cable and reboot the TiVo. While it is hooked up, unplug the eSATA cable and it should bring up the divorce screen. Follow the steps (three thumbs down, etc.) to divorce it. You can't install a new drive until you've done this divorce. Remember that divorcing a drive deletes all recordings on that eSATA drive.

 *Can I swap between multiple eSATA drives to multiply my capacity?*

No. When you connect an eSATA drive to the Series3, that drive is "married" to the internal hard drive. Only one eSATA drive can be "married" to the Tivo's internal hard drive at any given time. You can "divorce" (remove) an eSATA drive to replace it with another, as per the instructions in #19, but then you lose access to the recordings made on that drive.

 *I have three Tivo Series3 DVRs, can I move my eSATA drive between them without losing my recordings?*

No. The eSATA drive is married to a specific Tivo Series3, and cannot be used with more than one Tivo at a time. Recordings are not viewable on another unit. You can move an eSATA drive from one Tivo to another, but doing so will divorce it from the original and delete any recordings stored on that drive.

 *Can I backup the recordings on my eSATA drive?*

No. Once you seperate a drive from the S3 it "divorces" and any programming recorded on that drive is deleted. You can use a multi-disk RAID1 setup to provide some protection against eSATA drive failure, but you must do so from the beginning.

 *Can I use a multi-disk eSATA enclosure with RAID?*

Yes. However, the Series3 is only confirmed to support external drive capacity up to 1TB.

 *Can I view the recordings on the eSATA drive with my PC?*

No. All recordings are encrypted, as required by the CableLabs' licensing agreement (page 30).

 *My eSATA drive also has a USB port. Can I share it between the Tivo and my PC?*

No. The Tivo deletes any existing computer data and creates its own MFS partition. If you are not careful, using the eSATA drive with a PC or MAC could also corrupt the Tivo partition table, causing you to lose all recordings made since you connected the drive.

 *Why do I still get the message, "this recording may be deleted {within a day}" when using half my total available space?*

The Tivo Series3 always displays the ! indicator 24 hours after the "keep until" time expires. You can ignore that warning, because the Tivo won't delete any programming until all space is used.

 *How important is eSATA drive performance?*

Virtually all new 7200rpm SATA drives should provide sufficient throughput to handle three different HDTV streams (two recording, one playback) simultaneously. Tivo guide, indexing, and buffer information is still stored on the internal drive, so external eSATA drive performance shouldn't have any impact on the responsiveness of the program guide or searches.

 *What features should I look for in a drive or an enclosure?*

Any new 7200rpm drive should provide the necessary performance.

As the eSATA drive runs full time with the Tivo Series3, we recommend members select drives certified by the manufacturer for 24/7 operation. Standard desktop drives work just as well in many cases, but buying a drive certified for 24/7 operation provides more assurance of long-term reliability. Ultimately, one must decide whether they are willing to pay a premium for extra 'peace of mind.'

Some drives are specifically marketed for DVR use. These drives are certified for 24/7 operation, but also feature modified firmware to reduce seek noise at the expense of some performance. Performance is very important in a desktop drive for a PC, but less so for eSATA expansion on the Series3, which still uses the internal drive for all guide and index information. You won't notice 20% less performance with an eSATA drive, but you may notice 20% less noise. Examples of drives marketed for DVR use include the Seagate DB35 and Hitachi Cinemastar series.

To best ensure long-term reliability, it is also a good idea to buy a drive or enclosure _with_ a quiet fan. Enclosures _without_ fans can cause some drives to overheat with continuous operation, especially if they are stored in closed cabinets with poor ventilation. Buying a drive or enclosure _without_ a fan for use in an closed cabinet area is just asking for trouble. If you purchase a drive or enclosure _without_ a fan, be absolutely sure it has adequate ventilation.

Another important feature to have in a drive or enclosure is the ability to automatically turn itself back on following a power outage. Many external drives and enclosures use *soft* power switches that revert back to the 'off' state whenever there is a loss in power, requiring a manual push of the button to turn them back on. In the event of a brief power loss, these *soft switch* drives are 'off' when the Series3 boots up, and the error screen (described in #15) will result, which asks you to reconnect the drive and reboot the Tivo. Any time your Tivo is stuck on that 'reconnect the drive' screen, it won't record programs you have previously scheduled.

Products with a *hard switch* are generally preferable, as they turn back on automatically after a loss in power, so you never have to worry about coming home to a 'reconnect your drive' screen. Products with a *hard switch* typically have a dedicated on/off toggle at the rear that can be physically moved to the 'on' position and will remain there until you move it back to the 'off' position.

 *I don't understand why it is important to have a hard power switch. Could you explain some more?*

If the eSATA drive isn't 'on' during Tivo startup, the Series3 will sit at the 'reconnect the drive' screen until you physically turn it on, which means any programs you have scheduled do not get recorded. That's why it is important to have an eSATA drive/enclosure with a *hard* switch that will automatically power back up after brief power outage. The obvious alternative is a UPS; if your drive never loses power, it doesn't matter what kind of power switch it has.

 *I just bought a new eSATA drive but it didn't include a cable. What kind of cable do I need?*

You want an "eSATA II" cable. The Tivo Series3 expects the longer connector found on eSATA II cables. The "eSATA I" cables feature a shorter connector which will not create a reliable connection with the Series3. Both types of cables are sold at Microcenter and Fry's. If your local retailer doesn't label their eSATA cables, then look for one with a longer connector, as pictured in this thread.

Cables of 1m length are preferred to minimize potential electromagnetic interference (EMI). It is best to avoid eSATA cables longer than 2m.

Cables with a [too] short connector are the #1 cause of problems with eSATA expansion on the Series3.

 *Where can I order a good eSATA cable online?*

The best eSATA cable we've found for the Series3 is the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 (1m). This cable is available in 1m and 2m versions from Provantage.com (1m, 2m), Buy.com (1m, 2m), Amazon.com (1m, 2m), and TheNerds.net (1m, 2m). This cable "snaps" in to provide a firm connection.

The Tripp-Lite P950 eSATA cable is also confirmed to work well with the Tivo Series3. You can order it in 0.5m (18") and 1.0m (36") lengths for about $6 from Provantage.com (0.5m, 1.0m), Buy.com (0.5m, 1.0m) and TheNerds.net (0.5m, 1.0m).

 *What are recommended eSATA drives with their own enclosure?*


Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model    [/u]        [u]Capacity  [/u]   [u]Fan? [/u]   [u]On/Off switch?[/u]   [u]Incl. eSATA Cable?[/u][/b]
Western Digital  WDG1S5000N       500Gb        No      Always On        Yes


 *What are recommended drives to use with a separate eSATA enclosure?*


Code:


[b][u]Make   [/u]  [u]Model    [/u]    [u]Size [/u]  [u]Part #         [/u]  [u]Intended for DVRs[/u]    [u]Cert. for 24/7 Use[/u][/b]
Hitachi  Cinemastar   750Gb  HCS721075KLA330  Yes                  Yes
Hitachi  Cinemastar  1000Gb  HCS721010KLA330  Yes                  Yes
Seagate  DB35         250Gb  ST3250820SCE     Yes                  Yes
Seagate  DB35         300Gb  ST3300820SCE     Yes                  Yes
Seagate  DB35         320Gb  ST3320820SCE     Yes                  Yes
Seagate  DB35         400Gb  ST3400820SCE     Yes                  Yes
Seagate  DB35         500Gb  ST3500830SCE     Yes                  Yes
Seagate  DB35         750Gb  ST3750640SCE     Yes                  Yes
Seagate  DB35         750Gb  ST3750840SCE     Yes                  Yes
WD       AV           250Gb  WD2500AVJS       Yes                  Yes
WD       AV           250Gb  WD2500AVBS       Yes                  Yes
WD       AV           320Gb  WD3200AVJS       Yes                  Yes
WD       AV           320Gb  WD3200AVBS       Yes                  Yes
WD       AV           500Gb  WD5000AVJS       Yes                  Yes


Note all of the above models require an eSATA enclosure (FAQ #34).


 *What eSATA enclosures are confirmed to work with a user-supplied SATA drive?*


Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model       [/u]   [u]Fan? [/u]     [u]Bridge chip?[/u]  [u]On/Off switch?[/u]   [u]Incl. eSATA cable?[/u][/b]
3Gen             IntelliVault   Yes       Yes           ?                ?
Adaptec          ACS-300        No        Yes           Hard             ?
Antec            MX-1           Yes       Yes           Hard             Yes
Apricorn         EZ Bus DTS     Yes       Yes           Hard             Yes
AZiO             ENC311SU31     No        Yes           Hard             ?
AZiO             ENC311SU41     No        Yes           Hard             ?
Bytecc           ME-747         Yes       Yes           Hard             ?
CoolGear         SataVault      Yes       Yes           Hard             ?
Icy Dock         MB559          No        Yes           Hard             Yes
Kingwin          JT-35EU        Yes       Yes           Soft             Yes
Sans Digital     MS2UT          Yes       Yes           Hard             ?
Thecus           N2050          Yes       Yes           Soft             ?
Ultra            ULT33053       Yes       Yes           Hard             Yes
Vantec           NexStar3       No        Yes           Hard             Yes
WiebeTech        TTE0           No        No            Hard             ?

Most other enclosures should work too, they're just not confirmed here
yet.  If you've upgraded your Series3, and what you used isn't listed
here, please post or pm what you used.


 *What other eSATA drives with their own enclosures are some members using successfully?*


Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model    [/u]        [u]Capacity  [/u]   [u]Fan? [/u]   [u]On/Off switch?[/u]   [u]Incl. eSATA Cable?[/u][/b]
Apricorn         EZ Bus DTS       250-750Gb    Yes     Hard             Yes
Apricorn         DVR Xpander      250-750Gb    Yes     Hard             Yes
Seagate          ST3500601XS-RK   500Gb        No      Soft             No
Seagate          Free Agent       250-500Gb    No      Soft[COLOR=Red][SIZE=1]*1[/SIZE][/COLOR]           No
Seagate          Free Agent Pro   320-750Gb    No      Soft[COLOR=Red][SIZE=1]*1[/SIZE][/COLOR]           No
Western Digital  WD5000F032       500GB        Yes     Soft             No
Western Digital  WDG1SU5000N      500Gb        No      Soft[COLOR=Red][SIZE=1]*1[/SIZE][/COLOR]           No       

[SIZE=1][COLOR=Red]*1[/COLOR]  These drives do not have a "hard" power switch but they do turn on automatically,
    when the device they are connected to is supplied with power.[/SIZE]

Be aware that none of these drives are certified for 24/7 operation, so their long-term
reliability as a DVR drive is questionable.

If you want assurance of long-term reliability, then the best option is the Western
Digital WDG1S5000N mentioned in FAQ #32, or a bare drive certified for 24/7 operation
with a fan-cooled enclosure, such as one of the drives listed in FAQ #33 with an
enclosure from FAQ #34.


 *Are there any drives or enclosures I should avoid?*

A number of members have reported problems with Cavalry CAUE37500 500Gb drives and the Seagate Free Agent Pro 750. Neither of these solutions was intended for 24/7 use.

Initially, these drives work just fine, but a significant number develop problems after a few days to a few weeks. This results in reboots and lost recordings. The source of the problem isn't known, but neither includes a fan, so it is possible that both lack sufficient cooling for 24/7 operation. If you take the risk and buy one of these drives, make sure it is stored in a cool, well-ventilated environment.

With regard to external enclosures, units with fans are greatly preferable if you intend to use it in an enclosed space (such as a cabinet) with limited ventilation.

 *Too much information! Please just tell me what to buy!*

If you want pre-packaged solution with its own case, and you are willing to settle for 500Gb, then the Western Digital My DVR Expander (WDG1S5000N) is the best choice.

If you want to build your own solution, or want more than 500Gb of expansion, then the Seagate DB35 and the Antec MX-1 enclosure is the most popular combination.

You may also want to buy the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 (1m) eSATA cable listed in FAQ #31, since it provides a firmer connection than you get with the bundled cables.

 *What about the Seagate Free Agent Pro 750Gb? It's on sale for $199.*

Some forum members are using the Free Agent Pro 750Gb with their Tivo Series3 with success. It includes an enclosure. It does *not* include an eSATA cable, so you will need to purchase one (see FAQ #31).

The Seagate Free Agent Pro was never intended for 24/7 operation, so its long-term reliability as a DVR drive is questionable. Many feel the FAP750 was not built to dissipate the heat generated by the constant disk activity associated with a DVR. It works fine for some, but many members have had this drive *fail* after a few weeks.

If you buy the Seagate Free Agent Pro, under no circumstances should this product should not be placed in a closed cabinet with limited or no ventilation. If you are not able to provide the FAP750 with relatively low ambient temperatures and excellent ventilation, then you should probably return that product (or use it with a Mac/PC instead) and replace it with one of the recommended solutions from FAQ #32-44.

 *Who figured out how to enable eSATA? Who do I thank?*

Others discovered references to the kickstart code in the past, but forum member *spike2k5* was the first to actually confirm that eSATA support was functional. He was also the first to publish instructions on the procedure. You may want to check his web site, MFSLive.

The contents of this FAQ were compiled from member posts to this forum.

*Troubleshooting*

 *I can't get my drive to work, what do I do?*

The first step is to check your cables. Member *kdmorse* discovered that the connectors on many eSATA cables sold by major retailers are not sufficiently long to create a reliable connection with the Tivo Series3. Some retailers sell "eSATA I" and "eSATA II" cables. You want the "eSATA II" cable with the longer connector.

If your local retailer doesn't label their eSATA cables, then look for one with a longer connector, as pictured in this thread. Alternatively, you can order the right cable online (see FAQ #31).

 *I am having trouble applying the code sequence to enable eSATA.*

Some devices -- such as microwaves, plasmas, and certain forms of lighting-- can interfere with the Tivo's IR signals, so you may wish to turn those off while applying the key sequence to enable eSATA. It should not matter what remote code you use, but some members have had better success with the Tivo Series3 set to use remote code 0.

Make sure the drive is connected and powered on. Make sure the eSATA cable is seated properly -- some cables "snap" in.

Route your eSATA II cable away from electrical power sources and other devices with strong magnetic fields, such as voltage regulators, subwoofers or speakers.

When using the kickstart 62 code sequence to activate eSATA expansion, be sure to *hold down* the pause key until *only* the orange LED is lit. This can take up to three minutes. Once the orange LED is lit, release the pause button and then punch 62 on the remote. After you hit 62, the LED will go off and the Series3 will reboot about 30 seconds later, and then you will see a screen that says the second drive is activated.

 *Help, my Series3 keeps rebooting since I added the eSATA drive!*

Reboots are not normal. Many users have not experienced a single reboot since they installed an eSATA drive in their Series3. The eSATA functionality on the Tivo Series3 is generally quite stable if you use the appropriate drive and cable.

Reboots are caused by
 poor quality eSATA cable connections (most common);

 out-of-spec eSATA implementations (some ultra-cheap enclosures);

 faulty or overheating hard drives; or

 electromagnetic interference (EMI) caused by voltage regulators, subwoofers, or speakers near your eSATA cable.

Recommendations for reliable, trouble-free operation

 Use a new, quality eSATA cable with an appropriate-sized connector, like that mentioned in FAQ #31. Shorter cables are preferred to minimize EMI.

Make sure the eSATA cable is seated properly in both the Series3 and the enclosure. Some eSATA cables "snap" in.

 Use a recommended storage solution from FAQ #32. Alternately, build your own solution using a drive that is rated for 24/7 operation, like the Seagate DB35 drive (see FAQ #33) with a fan-cooled eSATA enclosure that features an on/off togle switch, like the Antec MX-1 or Apricorn EZ Bus DTS (FAQ #34).

 Route your eSATA cable away from electrical power sources and other devices with strong magnetic fields, such as subwoofers and speakers.

 *Help, I am trying to replace my eSATA drive with a new, larger drive and it's not working!*

When the Tivo thinks it is still connected to an older drive, you can't add a new one. You've got to "divorce" the old drive before you can replace it with another.

To divorce the old drive, hook it back up and reboot the TiVo (don't do a Kickstart). While it is hooked up, unplug the eSATA cable and it should bring up the divorce screen. Follow the steps (three thumbs down, etc.) to divorce it. You can't install a new drive until you've done this divorce. Remember that divorcing a drive deletes all recordings on that eSATA drive.
[/quote]


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## lcann44

OMG...I can't believe it. Can't wait to try. Best news I've heard since the S3 came out. Thank you.


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## jeffett

Has anyone tried it with the 8.3 release?


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## davezatz

jeffett said:


> Has anyone tried it with the 8.3 release?


If we don't find out soon, I'll pick up a drive this weekend and report back. I just hate paying retail...


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## dianebrat

and it's not my birthday OR Christmas, wow.. *WOW*
I just ordered an eSATA enclosure for my soon to be spare 500GB SATA drive


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## lcann44

davezatz said:


> If we don't find out soon, I'll pick up a drive this weekend and report back. I just hate paying retail...


I've got one ready to hook up. Maybe. I have to check the connection on the back to make sure it works but I don't think that will be a problem. I should have it hooked up in about an hour or two. I have some things to do first. I have 8.3.


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## lcann44

I've got a Maxtor Quickview Expander I just hooked up. TiVo has acknowledge that it is hooked up and my HD hours went from 32 to 71 hours. I do have 8.3, however I'm a bit troubled because the hard drive is flashing an orange light at me 8 times and then it pauses and starts again.

I can no longer find documentation for this unit on the internet so I have no idea what the 8 flashing lights mean, but I can only assume since the S3 says it's there and acknowledges the space available that it is true.


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## monkeyboy1010

WORKS! 8.1 and a 500GB eSATA gives you 97 HD or 9** SD hours! (I didn't pay close attention to the SD hours as I record maybe 1 to 2 hours a week in SD)

Come on in, the water is fine...


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## lawilson2

I'm reading this on Engadget now. Best. News. Ever.


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## HiDefGator

Wouldn't a hack like this put them in trouble with the cable card people?


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## Carsten

HiDefGator said:


> Wouldn't a hack like this put them in trouble with the cable card people?


I wouldnt even go that far and call it a hack. I think Tivo is prephared on releasing official eSata in the next firmware update. I'm sure they are just finializig the officiual UI.


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## Jack D

I just tried it with a Seagate "Free Agent Pro" 750 GB drive. This drive comes with its own external case and is supposed to be plug and play. It does have dual interface (USB and eSata).

It didn't work.

I think I followed the instructions properly:

I plugged in the drive to the T3 with the power plug on the T3 unplugged. Turned on the power to the external drive. Plugged in the T3 while pushing pause. Lights on T3 turned off as it was booting and then the small orange light came on. I then pushed "62" on the remote while pointing it at the T3.

The T3 just booted up as usual and no notification that a second drive had been actived. Drive capacity shows 32 hours so same as when I bought it.

Thoughts:

1. Does the sata drive have to be initialized with a computer first or is it ok to use it brand new with the T3?

2. Could it be that something about the dual interface of the Seagate is messing things up?

Anyone have any thoughts about what I'm doing wrong?


Thanks for help.

PS I've got FW 8.3.


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## SCSIRAID

HiDefGator said:


> Wouldn't a hack like this put them in trouble with the cable card people?


Thats the scary part of this.... If cablelabs revokes S3 approval, that would be a bad thing.


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## HiDefGator

I would think they either have approval for external storage or they don't. If they got approval I would have thought they would have been telling everyone already.


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## lawilson2

my initial fear is that 8.3 will wipe this out. No one has posted to confirm that they did this with 8.3 so I may wait. But there is a nice sale on 750GB drives!


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## lawilson2

Jack D said:


> I just tried it with a Seagate "Free Agent Pro" 750 GB drive. This drive comes with its own external case and is supposed to be plug and play. It does have dual interface (USB and eSata).
> 
> It didn't work.
> 
> I think I followed the instructions properly:
> 
> I plugged in the drive to the T3 with the power plug on the T3 unplugged. Turned on the power to the external drive. Plugged in the T3 while pushing pause. Lights on T3 turned off as it was booting and then the small orange light came on. I then pushed "62" on the remote while pointing it at the T3.
> 
> The T3 just booted up as usual and no notification that a second drive had been actived. Drive capacity shows 32 hours so same as when I bought it.
> 
> Thoughts:
> 
> 1. Does the sata drive have to be initialized with a computer first or is it ok to use it brand new with the T3?
> 
> 2. Could it be that something about the dual interface of the Seagate is messing things up?
> 
> Anyone have any thoughts about what I'm doing wrong?
> 
> Thanks for help.
> 
> PS I've got FW 8.3.


Hey Jack,

In the Engadget pic, they have a dual drive, so I don't think that's the issue. It could very well be 8.3. It will be interesting to see what others who have 8.3 say.


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## pmace

Jack D said:


> I just tried it with a Seagate "Free Agent Pro" 750 GB drive. This drive comes with its own external case and is supposed to be plug and play. It does have dual interface (USB and eSata).
> 
> It didn't work.
> 
> I think I followed the instructions properly:
> 
> I plugged in the drive to the T3 with the power plug on the T3 unplugged. Turned on the power to the external drive. Plugged in the T3 while pushing pause. Lights on T3 turned off as it was booting and then the small orange light came on. I then pushed "62" on the remote while pointing it at the T3.
> 
> The T3 just booted up as usual and no notification that a second drive had been actived. Drive capacity shows 32 hours so same as when I bought it.
> 
> Thoughts:
> 
> 1. Does the sata drive have to be initialized with a computer first or is it ok to use it brand new with the T3?
> 
> 2. Could it be that something about the dual interface of the Seagate is messing things up?
> 
> Anyone have any thoughts about what I'm doing wrong?
> 
> Thanks for help.
> 
> PS I've got FW 8.3.


That drive comes pre-formated with Windows NTSF. The test cases cited thus far were all with raw drives. I suspect that's the problem, not 8.3.


----------



## lawilson2

pmace said:


> That drive comes pre-formated with Windows NTSF. The test cases cited thus far were all with raw drives. I suspect that's the problem, not 8.3.


I missed that; I bet that is the issue too. Good catch!


----------



## rdrrepair

Looks like I'm SOL. I have a 500g hard drive inside of my TiVo. According to the post I can't add the external drive because I've upgraded my original drive. Has anyone tried that has upgraded their original drive?


----------



## Rob Helmerichs

HiDefGator said:


> I would think they either have approval for external storage or they don't. If they got approval I would have thought they would have been telling everyone already.


They probably wouldn't say anything until they were ready to roll it out, to forestall the inevitable constant clamor of "ARE WE THERE YET?!?"


----------



## Jack D

pmace said:


> That drive comes pre-formated with Windows NTSF. The test cases cited thus far were all with raw drives. I suspect that's the problem, not 8.3.


Is there something I can do to make it work? If I connect to my computer, I guess the only way to wipe the formatting is to reformat but then I'll have to use a format! Any ideas?


----------



## XBR

Jack D said:


> Is there something I can do to make it work? If I connect to my computer, I guess the only way to wipe the formatting is to reformat but then I'll have to use a format! Any ideas?


I see fdisk in your future...do you have a PC or laptop with SATA support?


----------



## davezatz

500GB eSATA drive WITH cable for $135 shipped via NewEgg:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16822101030


----------



## Jack D

XBR said:


> I see fdisk in your future...do you have a PC or laptop with SATA support?


Yeah I have a pc. So I have to go to the dos prompt for that drive and just enter "fdisk"? Does that wipe all formatting?

Alternatively, I wonder if I could format the disk with Linux and have it work. I just did a quick check and it seems that with XP fdisk is not supported.


----------



## pmace

Jack D said:


> Is there something I can do to make it work? If I connect to my computer, I guess the only way to wipe the formatting is to reformat but then I'll have to use a format! Any ideas?


You don't have to reformat it. You do have to remove the NTSF partition with fdisk. Connect to your windows [i'm guesssing] machine Start | Run | CMD type fdisk and press enter. Make sure you clobber the external drive and not the internal one.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, find someone who's comfortable with all this. Seagate may have some software that will do this for you relatively safely


----------



## dt_dc

HiDefGator said:


> Wouldn't a hack like this put them in trouble with the cable card people?





HiDefGator said:


> I would think they either have approval for external storage or they don't. If they got approval I would have thought they would have been telling everyone already.


No. As long as they follow the CableLabs guidelines for external drives (posted here: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5116249&&#post5116249 ) ... they're fine. CableLabs released a revised version of the DFAST licensing agreement 4/20/07. External drives are now included in the license agreement without any approval / verification / certification / whatever from CableLabs. You _do_ have to follow certain security / encryption guidelines. But ... as long as you do ... you're fine.

Again, exact wording here:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5116249&&#post5116249

BTW, I find it interesting that this 'hack' magically surfaced right after CableLabs released their revised license agreement which allows for external drives ... me-thinks someone from Tivo dropped the dime themselves.


----------



## rdrrepair

Wait til TiVoPony see this. It'll very hard to put this genie back into the bottle.

I just worry about what will happen when TiVo really makes this active. What will happen to everyone that has done this. Will it still be the same code when all is said and done?

Maybe they will roll out 8.4 now with this active. Could that be the big holdup with the rest of us getting 8.3?


----------



## davezatz

rdrrepair said:


> Wait til TiVoPony see this.


Why would he be surprised or concerned - TiVo obviously built support for this into _deployed_ software, this feature didn't get there by accident.


----------



## lawilson2

davezatz said:


> 500GB eSATA drive WITH cable for $135 shipped via NewEgg:
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16822101030


Cool! Microcenter (if you have one in your area), has a Seagate Barracuda 750GB sata drive for $259 with a $60 mail in rebate. Not a bad deal. You still have to get an enclosure and possibly cable, but the drive is nicely priced. Newegg's best offer on 750 is $249 I believe.


----------



## rdrrepair

dt_dc said:


> BTW, I find it interesting that this 'hack' magically surfaced right after CableLabs released their revised license agreement which allows for external drives ... me-thinks someone from Tivo dropped the dime themselves.


This makes the most sense. Why would the code be there already?

1) Your TiVo does not do 30 second skip. Yes it does, play with the s-p-s codes
2) External drive expansion not active. Yes it is, play with the remote while hooking up an external drive.
3) MRV not active yet. It's not active because someone hasn't flipped on the switch at TiVo yet. A version of the code is in there, just waiting to get out.


rdrrepair said:


> Wait til TiVoPony see this. It'll very hard to put this genie back into the bottle.





davezatz said:


> Why would he be surprised or concerned


I am sure that TiVoPony or someone from TiVo would have liked to announce this themselves.

I wonder if the final version that will be officially released will allow people with larger upgraded HD to hook this up?


----------



## spike2k5

dt_dc said:


> BTW, I find it interesting that this 'hack' magically surfaced right after CableLabs released their revised license agreement which allows for external drives ... me-thinks someone from Tivo dropped the dime themselves.


That's because I was sitting on it until I saw that post.
It's not a hack but a discovery. It's built into software 8.1 & 8.3 already.

I got no help from Tivo Inc. but I will take it if they offer


----------



## Jack D

pmace said:


> You don't have to reformat it. You do have to remove the NTSF partition with fdisk. Connect to your windows [i'm guesssing] machine Start | Run | CMD type fdisk and press enter. Make sure you clobber the external drive and not the internal one.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, find someone who's comfortable with all this. Seagate may have some software that will do this for you relatively safely


OK I wiped the partition using Partition Commander. Went through the procedure with the T3 again and still didn't work.

Some dumb questions  : The only way I know how to turn the T3 off is to unplug it. When I do that I have to reach around back to plug it in again to turn it on. So there is a very short amount of time when the T3 starts booting before I can get to the front, point the remote at it and press the pause button. Could that be the problem? Other than that the only thing I can think is that somehow I'm not doing the "62" correctly. You just push the 6 and then the 2 in rapid sucession?

Thanks for any further help.


----------



## spike2k5

Jack D said:


> OK I wiped the partition using Partition Commander. Went through the procedure with the T3 again and still didn't work.
> 
> Some dumb questions  : The only way I know how to turn the T3 off is to unplug it. When I do that I have to reach around back to plug it in again to turn it on. So there is a very short amount of time when the T3 starts booting before I can get to the front point the remote at it and press the pause button. Could that be the problem? Other than that the only thing I can think is that somehow I'm not doing the "62" correctly. You just push the 6 and then the 2 in rapid sucession?
> 
> Thanks for any further help.


You don't have to remove partition. Tivo takes care of that when you do kickstart 62.
Are you using eSATA cabel or usb?


----------



## bdraw

This was discovered on the other forum back in February (search SATA), but no one actually tested it till yesterday when it was posted here by spike2k5.

The drive I used (the pictures on Engadget) had both a USB port and a eSATA port. The drive itself was formated on a Mac and had both a HFS+ and FAT32 partition on it. After using it on the TiVo the drive had the following partition table.



Code:


/dev/disk2
   #:                   type name               size      identifier
   0: Apple_partition_scheme                    *111.8 GB disk2
   1:    Apple_partition_map                    31.5 KB   disk2s1
   2:                    MFS                    2.0 MB    disk2s2
   3:                    MFS                    111.8 GB  disk2s3


----------



## Jack D

spike2k5 said:


> You don't have to remove partition. Tivo takes care of that when you do kickstart 62.
> Are you using eSATA cabel or usb?


Well I was just responding to the suggestion that I should get rid of the NTFS formating so I wiped the partition.

I'm using the eSata cable.


----------



## spike2k5

Jack D said:


> Well I was just responding to the suggestion that I should get rid of the NTFS formating so I wiped the partition.
> 
> I'm using the eSata cable.


Are you wating long enough with your pause button?

You should hold on to it unitl front panel turns black, orange LED on then let go.

Orange LED should be on until you type 62


----------



## Jack D

spike2k5 said:


> Are you wating long enough with your pause button?
> 
> You should hold on to it unitl front panel turns black, orange LED on then let go.
> 
> Orange LED should be on until you type 62


Sorry, as you know, I have this question posted in both threads. So we are repeating ourselves. Yes I must be doing something wrong because the orange light does not stay on after I release the pause button. I keep the pause button pushed down throughout the boot up process......


----------



## Boot

rdrrepair said:


> I wonder if the final version that will be officially released will allow people with larger upgraded HD to hook this up?


Actually, my biggest concern is that this was implemented based on an older scheme, not the one that CableLabs approved, and that once we get the real deal, any recordings on our external drive will be lost.

That could explain Pony's silence.


----------



## keenanSR

Jack D said:


> Sorry, as you know, I have this question posted in both threads. So we are repeating ourselves. Yes I must be doing something wrong because the orange light does not stay on after I release the pause button. I keep the pause button pushed down throughout the boot up process......


I'll be picking up the very same drive in a few hours, I'll post my experience when I do, hopefully I/we can figure it out. I saw mention that this drive does not come with an eSATA cable, is it possible that the internal connection is not eSATA, and that may be causing the problem?

BTW, not sure if it's been mentioned, but what happens when/if you remove the external drive, will the S3 need to completely re-set up, or will it just do a restart, retaining all your settings and previous recordings?


----------



## rdrrepair

keenanSR said:


> BTW, not sure if it's been mentioned, but what happens when/if you remove the external drive, will the S3 need to completely re-set up, or will it just do a restart, retaining all your settings and previous recordings?


Read this - screen shots too.
Good screen shots and other info


----------



## Jack D

keenanSR said:


> I'll be picking up the very same drive in a few hours, I'll post my experience when I do, hopefully I/we can figure it out. I saw mention that this drive does not come with an eSATA cable, is it possible that the internal connection is not eSATA, and that may be causing the problem?
> 
> BTW, not sure if it's been mentioned, but what happens when/if you remove the external drive, will the S3 need to completely re-set up, or will it just do a restart, retaining all your settings and previous recordings?


Well it says right on the unit where the sata connection is that it is eSata. I don't think I've unplugged the drive when the T3 is on but since I haven't succeded in getting the T3 to recognize the drive I don't think it matters at this point.


----------



## Jack D

Jack D said:


> Sorry, as you know, I have this question posted in both threads. So we are repeating ourselves. Yes I must be doing something wrong because the orange light does not stay on after I release the pause button. I keep the pause button pushed down throughout the boot up process......


I tried again and this time I kept pushing the pause button even when the orange light came on but it only stayed on for a second. So I don't think it was that I was releasing the pause button too quickly.


----------



## spike2k5

keenanSR said:


> BTW, not sure if it's been mentioned, but what happens when/if you remove the external drive, will the S3 need to completely re-set up, or will it just do a restart, retaining all your settings and previous recordings?


If you remove eSATA drive or turn it off during reboot, you will get a "want to divorce screen".
Looks like it tries to save some shows but I'm not sure how much. Most likely shows that were on eSATA drive will be lost. Some shows on "A" drive that have partial recordings on eSATA drives will be lost I think.

Settings are all stored on "A" drive so you don't have to worry about that.


----------



## keenanSR

rdrrepair said:


> Read this - screen shots too.
> Good screen shots and other info


Thanks, it's a little vague, but it appears everything should be okay.


----------



## keenanSR

spike2k5 said:


> If you remove eSATA drive or turn it off during reboot, you will get a "want to divorce screen".
> Looks like it tries to save some shows but I'm not sure how much. Most likely shows that were on eSATA drive will be lost. Some shows on "A" drive that have partial recordings on eSATA drives will be lost I think.
> 
> Settings are all stored on "A" drive so you don't have to worry about that.


Okay, that makes sense on the settings part, the disclaimer is a little vague though on if just the recordings made while the external drive was attached are lost, or if all of them are lost. Logically though, the original recordings are probably safe as they were never on the eSATA drive in the first place.


----------



## spike2k5

Jack D said:


> I tried again and this time I kept pushing the pause button even when the orange light came on but it only stayed on for a second. So I don't think it was that I was releasing the pause button too quickly.


So something is not right.
Orange light should stay on longer than a second.

Keep hitting 62 and see what happens.

If you can't get the kickstart 62 to work, there is another way to do it.
If you are comfortable with opening your tivo & have a computer with SATA ports, you can do it that way too so not all is lost.


----------



## Jack D

spike2k5 said:


> So something is not right.
> Orange light should stay on longer than a second.
> 
> Keep hitting 62 and see what happens.
> 
> If you can't get the kickstart 62 to work, there is another way to do it.
> If you are comfortable with opening your tivo & have a computer with SATA ports, you can do it that way too so not all is lost.


I tried hitting 6 2 a bunch of times but no luck. What do I have to do if I open the T3?


----------



## lcann44

Wow, what a day. I didn't have faith in the first eSATA I hooked up as I was getting error messages from a blinking light so even though TiVo acknowledged the drive and space available, I decided to disconnect and install another eSATA drive.

Scarry when it said it would "likely" remove recorded programs, but I figured since they were all recorded on the internal hard drive that wouldn't happen. Fortunately it didn't.

So off I went and came home with a Seagate 500gb drive and an enclosure. Sure, I could have done better on the internet but I'm already pushing it now as it is and it's sweeps month. So now I have 98 hours HD, 927 SD hours. That's plenty for me. Man, this is great!


----------



## moxie1617

lcann44 said:


> ....................
> So now I have 98 hours HD, 927 SD hours. That's plenty for me. Man, this is great!


That was on 8.3, right?


----------



## lcann44

moxie1617 said:


> That was on 8.3, right?


That's correct.


----------



## Carsten

Is there any speed requirements? I have noticed the Engadget folks used a 2.5 in HDD. Which I'm sure they dont perform like the 3.5in 7200 RPM hdds?

Any thoughts?

Luckly, today is the day my warranty runs out. Which means....I'm gonna open her up and see if I can build something to mount another hdd internally.

Major props Spike2k5! :up: :up: :up: :up: :up:


----------



## sparkomatic

I worked like a charm for me so I thought I'd post the equipment I used for everyone else.

Tivo 8.1.1-01-2-648
Jumped from 32 hrs HD to 98 hrs HD

Maxtor SATA II/300 Internal Hard Drive Kit (500GB)
Vantec NexStar 3 HD Enclosure (came with the SATA cable that I used to connect to the Tivo

One thing I did notice while I was looking at enclosures was that some said they had a max capacity on the size HD you could use with it. Maybe some of the other experts here can comment on it but it looked like any enclosure could handle up to 500GB but above that and some might not work?


----------



## pcjackson

I used a Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB HD - my recording time jumped to 131HD, 1244SD.  What a great day...


----------



## Jack D

pcjackson said:


> I used a Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB HD - my recording time jumped to 131HD, 1244SD.  What a great day...


That is what I've been trying to use but I can't seem to get it to work. Did you just plug it in out of the box? Anything you can share?


----------



## pcjackson

Just plugged it in out of the box... (Just bought it at BB - never plugged it into a computer.) Used an eSata cable I had lying around. Shut the TiVo down and followed instructions on Engadget. All worked happily.


----------



## Jack D

pcjackson said:


> Just plugged it in out of the box... (Just bought it at BB - never plugged it into a computer.) Used an eSata cable I had lying around. Shut the TiVo down and followed instructions on Engadget. All worked happily.


A dumb question: How did you shut the Tivo down?


----------



## pmace

pcjackson said:


> Just plugged it in out of the box... (Just bought it at BB - never plugged it into a computer.) Used an eSata cable I had lying around. Shut the TiVo down and followed instructions on Engadget. All worked happily.


8.3?


----------



## pcjackson

Hrmm, 8.1.1.

Interesting - we'll have to see what happens when 8.3 installs.

/pj


----------



## Jack D

pcjackson said:


> Hrmm, 8.1.1.
> 
> Interesting - we'll have to see what happens when 8.3 installs.
> 
> /pj


Yeah well I have 8.3.......and I can't seem to get it to work. But icann44 said he got it to work with 8.3.


----------



## keenanSR

Jack D said:


> Yeah well I have 8.3.......and I can't seem to get it to work. But icann44 said he got it to work with 8.3.


I ended up getting a different drive. I went with the Seagate 500GB External Drive eSATA 3.0. Model No. ST3500601XS-RK

http://www.compusa.com/products/pro...product_code=341441&Pn=eSATA_500GB_Hard_Drive
CompUSA.com: Seagate eSATA 500GB Hard Drive - ST3500601XS-RK - Computer Upgrades » Hard Drives

It was $162 out the door, there was some sort of $20 discount program, plus it comes with a 6' eSATA cable.

Works perfect! 

Used with 8.3.1


----------



## keenanSR

Jack D said:


> A dumb question: How did you shut the Tivo down?


I pulled the power plug. When everything was hooked up and the external drive was powered, I plugged the power cable back in while holding the pause button.

It seemed to reboot at least twice, maybe a third time, and then I got the 2nd drive screen. The whole power-on boot process took about 10-15 mins.


----------



## synch22

staples just had the free agent pro 500gb for $209. I picked it up have not opened yet, i was under the impression it comes with the cable. I am ready to try it but thinking what my wife will say whne she finds out i put even more $$ into the tivo.



BYY whats the chances of Tivo turning this off once they find out about it and if they never had the intention of this being released.


----------



## lcann44

synch22 said:


> staples just had the free agent pro 500gb for $209. I picked it up have not opened yet, i was under the impression it comes with the cable. I am ready to try it but thinking what my wife will say whne she finds out i put even more $$ into the tivo.
> 
> edit:
> 
> yikes just looked on amazon its $141 there. Looks like i wont be opening it up.
> 
> BYW whats the chances of Tivo turning this off once they find out about it and if they never had the intention of this being released.


You have to get her to understand that this isn't just for you, it's for the benefit of the entire house. Now she has more room to record shows she wants. If you got kids use them in the explanation too.

Always make sure you include the wife in the reason for purchase.


----------



## lawilson2

I bought this Seagate 750GB sata drive and it works great; installation was a snap! http://microcenter.com/byos/byos_single_product_results.phtml?product_id=249512

$259 with a $60 mail in rebate. I bought this enclosure for $49.99: http://microcenter.com/byos/byos_single_product_results.phtml?product_id=240919

I have an extra external cable now so that's cool.

131 hours for HD is awesome! I can now keep all of the Planet Earth's without fear of needing to delete for room.


----------



## A J Ricaud

sparkomatic said:


> Vantec NexStar 3 HD Enclosure (came with the SATA cable that I used to connect to the Tivo.
> 
> One thing I did notice while I was looking at enclosures was that some said they had a max capacity on the size HD you could use with it. Maybe some of the other experts here can comment on it but it looked like any enclosure could handle up to 500GB but above that and some might not work?


Question: does the Vantec enclosure have a fan?


----------



## Jack D

keenanSR said:


> I ended up getting a different drive. I went with the Seagate 500GB External Drive eSATA 3.0. Model No. ST3500601XS-RK
> 
> http://www.compusa.com/products/pro...product_code=341441&Pn=eSATA_500GB_Hard_Drive
> CompUSA.com: Seagate eSATA 500GB Hard Drive - ST3500601XS-RK - Computer Upgrades » Hard Drives
> 
> It was $162 out the door, there was some sort of $20 discount program, plus it comes with a 6' eSATA cable.
> 
> Works perfect!
> 
> Used with 8.3.1


I happen to have one of those too. I tried it but couldn't get it to work either. I must be doing something wrong. I give up for the night unless someone has a brilliant idea.


----------



## synch22

the free agent pro does not come with a esata cable...the guy told me he thought it did. WIll staples carry the cable? How much do they run.


----------



## dt_dc

spike2k5 said:


> That's because I was sitting on it until I saw that post.
> It's not a hack but a discovery. It's built into software 8.1 & 8.3 already.
> 
> I got no help from Tivo Inc. but I will take it if they offer


Ahhh ... right cause, wrong effect. 

Sorry 'bout that ... good work / discovery!


----------



## lawilson2

A J Ricaud said:


> Question: does the Vantec enclosure have a fan?


No fan. http://reviews.cnet.com/Vantec_NexS...ial_ATA_300/4507-6517_7-31850277.html?tag=sub


----------



## hiker

Jack D said:


> I happen to have one of those too. I tried it but couldn't get it to work either. I must be doing something wrong. I give up for the night unless someone has a brilliant idea.


I haven't tried a eSATA drive yet but try making sure your S3 remote to set to IR ID 0. Press and hold the PAUSE and TiVo buttons simultaneously until the red light at the end of the remote control comes on, remains steady, and then stays on when you release the buttons. Then press 0 and the red light should blink 3 times. Then try the eSATA procedure again.


----------



## A J Ricaud

lawilson2 said:


> No fan.


Thanks.


----------



## keenanSR

synch22 said:


> the free agent pro does not come with a esata cable...the guy told me he thought it did. WIll staples carry the cable? How much do they run.


I don't know about Staples, but I checked Best Buy, Office Depot, CompUSA and Circuit City and could not find a eSATA cable. I wanted to get at least a 6' cable in case the cable supplied with the drive I purchased was too short. Turns out it came with a 6' cable.

I suspect that other than a specialized computer store, an eSATA cable would probably have to purchased online.


----------



## Rob Helmerichs

davezatz said:


> 500GB eSATA drive WITH cable for $135 shipped via NewEgg:
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?item=N82E16822101030


I just ordered one of these...exciting news!

(About the activation, not my order...)

(Well, my order is exciting too, but probably more for me than anybody else.)


----------



## sparkomatic

lawilson2 said:


> No fan. http://reviews.cnet.com/Vantec_NexS...ial_ATA_300/4507-6517_7-31850277.html?tag=sub


Yep, no fan. I think the box advertised that the glossy metal or aluminum finish actually keeps the drive "cool". Not sure I believe that 100%. I would have liked a fan but there was only one enclosure there with a fan out of all of them so I thought it might not be to bad if it didn't have one.


----------



## pcjackson

Here's an interesting question - because the eSATA port was unusable prior to a recent software upgrade, should a user find the eSATA port is not functional for some reason or another -- and assuming the warranty is up on the Series3, what's the warranty status of repairing the port/logic board? The user has no way of knowing whether or not the port was functional until now. (Assuming this new feature is in fact legit which I imagine it is because of recent CableCard approvals on eSATA devices.)


----------



## synch22

can someone educate me.

Do i need the Free Agent Pro from seagate or can i use the freeagent.

I see a huge cost difference, they both say esata. So are they the same thing but one has firewire? I see harddrives advertising esata....but are they true esata?


----------



## pcjackson

I bought the Free Agent Pro 750GB and it works fine on the Series3. Not sure what the difference is, though. The pro does not have firewire - it has USB 2.0. That said, there is a Pro being advertised on BB.com with firewire. Maybe they have a few flavors or maybe the site is -f-d up.


----------



## morac

I'd be careful before jumping headfirst into this. Since the eSATA drive has not been official announced as operational, there is nothing that says it won't be disabled or something might change in a future software release that would cause you to lose all your recordings made after the eSATA drive was attached. Of course the same thing could be said if the eSATA drive goes bad.

If you don't care or think it's worth the risk, then go ahead, but do so at your own risk.


----------



## lawilson2

morac said:


> I'd be careful before jumping headfirst into this. Since the eSATA drive has not been official announced as operational, there is nothing that says it won't be disabled or something might change in a future software release that would cause you to lose all your recordings made after the eSATA drive was attached. Of course the same thing could be said if the eSATA drive goes bad.
> 
> If you don't care or think it's worth the risk, then go ahead, but do so at your own risk.


I look at it this way, if they disable it and I can't use it anymore, then I have a great external 750GB hard drive for my PC. My external enclosure came with an adapter to add to the back of my PC, so it's not an issue for me as far as being out of money.


----------



## myosh_tino

sparkomatic said:


> Maxtor SATA II/300 Internal Hard Drive Kit (500GB)
> Vantec NexStar 3 HD Enclosure (came with the SATA cable that I used to connect to the Tivo


Went out to Fry's today and got the Maxtor 500 GB hard drive and the same Vantec enclosure. Came home, installed the drive in the case and followed the instructions. Works like a charm. HD recording time jumped to 98 hours and SD recording time is now almost 1000 hours.   

The Fry's store I went to had the 500 GB SATA/II Maxtor drives (retail kit) for $130.


----------



## dieman

lawilson2 said:


> No fan. http://reviews.cnet.com/Vantec_NexS...ial_ATA_300/4507-6517_7-31850277.html?tag=sub


If you are at microcenter you might want the 'sata' powerspec case, which has no usb2, and is half the price. ($25) also no fan.


----------



## jfh3

buy.com has this:
Seagate FreeAgent Pro - 750GB, 7200 RPM, USB 2.0, eSATA, External Hard Drive - ST307504FPA1E2-RK 
for $249.99. 

bkdtv said in another thread that an external drive with no external controller chip would be better, but I can't find a 750GB drive + an enclosure for this $.


----------



## jfh3

hiker said:


> I haven't tried a eSATA drive yet but try making sure your S3 remote to set to IR ID 0. Press and hold the PAUSE and TiVo buttons simultaneously until the red light at the end of the remote control comes on, remains steady, and then stays on when you release the buttons. Then press 0 and the red light should blink 3 times. Then try the eSATA procedure again.


Is having the remote set to code 0 a requirement? This would make using this procedure much more of a pain for me with 5 active Tivos ...


----------



## synch22

so does the original hard drive still record shows?

How about power for the external, does it have to be left on at all times like the tivo?


----------



## bkdtv

jfh3 said:


> buy.com has this:
> Seagate FreeAgent Pro - 750GB, 7200 RPM, USB 2.0, eSATA, External Hard Drive - ST307504FPA1E2-RK
> for $249.99.
> 
> bkdtv said in another thread that an external drive with no external controller chip would be better, but I can't find a 750GB drive + an enclosure for this $.


Using an external drive without an extra controller chip ensures that you get maximum possible performance from a particular drive.

From the reviews I've read in the past, some solutions with bridge chipsets degrade performance significantly, while others do not harm performance at all. On one SATA enclosure with a bridge chipset, you might lose 20% performance. On another, you might lose 2%. On still another, the SATA connection might be split before it enters the bridge, so you lose nothing. _Updated._

The real problem is distinguishing the bridge solutions that significantly degrade performance from those that do not. Published reviews and comparisons on these products are pretty sparse. The _easiest_ way to ensure that you are getting top performance from your hard drive is by picking a solution without a controller. However, if you know what to buy, bridge solutions are still available with good performance.

I think you'd be fine with the product linked above. Do you really care whether a search takes 25 seconds or 30 seconds? Given the choice between a $250 product that did a search in 30 seconds and a $400 product that did the same search in 25 seconds, I think most members would choose the cheaper unit.


----------



## jfh3

bkdtv said:


> I think you'd be fine with the product linked above. Do you really care whether a search takes 25 seconds or 30 seconds? Given the choice between a $250 product that did a search in 30 seconds and a $400 product that did the same search in 25 seconds, I think most members would choose the cheaper unit.


Thanks. I understood the difference in performance, but had no idea how much difference it would make on a Tivo. I figure I'll get this unit, and if I have any problems, let my wife use it for storing her her audio books.


----------



## Welshdog

Anyone going to try a SATA raid?


----------



## lcann44

morac said:


> I'd be careful before jumping headfirst into this. Since the eSATA drive has not been official announced as operational, there is nothing that says it won't be disabled or something might change in a future software release that would cause you to lose all your recordings made after the eSATA drive was attached. Of course the same thing could be said if the eSATA drive goes bad.
> 
> If you don't care or think it's worth the risk, then go ahead, but do so at your own risk.


Well, I'm certainly concerned about it but as someone else already pointed out the genie is out of the bottle. Anyway it's not like we hacked into it. And if you read the rest of the thread Cable Labs made a favorable ruling on the eSATA port.

I go along with the theory that once this ruling was made somebody at TiVo leaked the info. And as the water rushes out of the damn, it's going to be mighty hard to stop it. I'm more then willing to take the risk.

My drive is a regular internal drive in an enclosure without a fan but it has a huge screen to allow air in. I compared this to my old drive that didn't have any openings and it is much cooler (by touch) then my old eSATA that came with an enclosure.

And think positive!


----------



## morac

synch22 said:


> so does the original hard drive still record shows?
> 
> How about power for the external, does it have to be left on at all times like the tivo?


The external drive would need to be powered up and on at all times since the TiVo would now be using both drives to record programs. If the external drive were powered off the TiVo would shut down and pop up that warning screen as shown in the Engadget article.

Though it is always a good idea to use a UPS with TiVos, this basically makes it mandatory since you don't want power going out on the eSATA drive.


----------



## morac

lcann44 said:


> Well, I'm certainly concerned about it but as someone else already pointed out the genie is out of the bottle. Anyway it's not like we hacked into it. And if you read the rest of the thread Cable Labs made a favorable ruling on the eSATA port.
> 
> I go along with the theory that once this ruling was made somebody at TiVo leaked the info. And as the water rushes out of the damn, it's going to be mighty hard to stop it. I'm more then willing to take the risk.


I'm not saying TiVo will disable it, I'm just saying it is possible. Genie or no Genie, TiVo could do so, though I agree it is unlikely at this point. The other possibility is that they make changes to the way the drive pairings work which makes it incompatible with what is used now. This is more likely than a straight out disabling of the functionality since I doubt that when the functionality is released, this is the method that users would have to go through to enable it. There was also speculation that TiVo might need to make some changes to comply with the new Cable Labs ruling on external storage.

Also the person who released this already stated he found it on his own without help from TiVo.


----------



## morac

Welshdog said:


> Anyone going to try a SATA raid?


Already been done.


----------



## 1283

FWIW, most of the ready-made external drives have 1-year warranty only. If you want longer warranty such as 3 or 5 years, get an internal drive and an external enclosure.


----------



## sriggins

c3 said:


> FWIW, most of the ready-made external drives have 1-year warranty only. If you want longer warranty such as 3 or 5 years, get an internal drive and an external enclosure.


Right, my Segate 500gb I got from Frys for $119 and has a 5 year warranty. The enclosure I ordered is $48 shipped.

And if this TiVo deal falls apart before the enclosure arrives, I can use the drive with my MacBookPro (i have a eSata card)


----------



## ckelly33

I have three S3 TiVo's. Anyone tried to port the external drive to a second TiVO? How does it respond when the drive is removed?


----------



## jeffett

Jack D said:


> I tried it but couldn't get it to work either. I must be doing something wrong. I give up for the night unless someone has a brilliant idea.


I purchased the eSATA Seagate FreeAgent Pro 500gb @ my Sam's Club for $175 and got a 6' eSATA cable @ Fry's for $13 (BTW, Fry's wanted $220 for the same drive.).

I hooked it all up and followed the instructions and had the same problem Jack D did. Tried it one more time and noticed that the external drive was lit up but the drive wasn't spinning. I tapped the ON button on the front of the drive, got the drive spinning and then followed the instructions again. It worked perfectly the second time.

98 hours of HD, BABY!

Jack D, can you feel the Seagate drive spinning?


----------



## 1283

ckelly33 said:


> I have three S3 TiVo's. Anyone tried to port the external drive to a second TiVO?


That should not work, if TiVo has any hope of getting CableCard certification for eSATA.


----------



## Welshdog

morac said:


> Already been done.


 Wellllll, kind of. While what that guy did is promising it isn't quite the same as plugging in a raid to the eSATA port and having it work. Maybe Lightrunner can give it a shot.


----------



## jfh3

lcann44 said:


> My drive is a regular internal drive in an enclosure without a fan but it has a huge screen to allow air in. I compared this to my old drive that didn't have any openings and it is much cooler (by touch) then my old eSATA that came with an enclosure.


What enclosure is this? I'd like a good enclosure, but not sure I want the noise of a fan.


----------



## lawilson2

My Tivo reset an hour ago, and said that a serious error occurred and it would take 3 hours. It only took about 10 min but I have never had errors on my Tivo, so I will have to monitor this. I also had an info screen inadvertently pop up out of nowhere. I'll keep monitoring.


----------



## mathewbeall

Upgraded with a 500gb seagate, worked like a charm following the instructions.

Matt


----------



## slimoli

lawilson2 said:


> I also had an info screen inadvertently pop up out of nowhere. I'll keep monitoring.


I'm getting this info screen popping out once or twice a day for the last 10 days or so. Still at 8.1 and no e-Sata yet.

Sergio


----------



## Cpen

I have a spare 250Gig EIDE Drive lying around. Does anyone know how I might be able to use it with my Series 3's ESATA port?

Does anyone make a drive enclosure that can take a 3.5inch IDE drive AND output to a ESATA?

-C-


----------



## lcann44

jfh3 said:


> What enclosure is this? I'd like a good enclosure, but not sure I want the noise of a fan.


It's called PowerSpec. I purchased it at a retail store I'd never heard of before called Micro Center and it was 24.99. My Internal Hard drive is a Seagate Model ST3500641AS 500 gb NCQ 16 mb. It cost 159.99 and has a 5 year warranty.

I never heard of Micro Center. I went to Circuit City and they couldn't help me so they sent me there.

I think I got a good price for retail.


----------



## stevereis

Adding an eSATA drive with kickstart 62 only works with an unmodified S3 with the original factory drive, for now. There are folks investigating and unpublished details that adding eSATA to upgraded units may be possible with some kind of filesystem tweak.
http://www.zatznotfunny.com/2007-05/tivo-series3-esata-backdoor/

Has anyone tried the opposite - adding an eSATA drive and then adding a larger capacity internal drive (copying all the content, etc.). I'm wondering if the internal upgrade will work if the original internal drive has already been married to an external drive. This is an attractive option for me as I could take the easy capacity upgrade route now with eSATA and then upgrade the internal drive later when I want to maximize capacity.

On those same lines, does anyone know what the max capacity is for a single drive and total system with eSATA? There have been reports that 1TB is the max for a single drive. With eSATA now available, posters in this thread have added 750GB for 1TB total but has anyone added a 1TB eSATA successfully and have more than 1TB total in the system? If it's 1TB max for the system, I would rather just upgrade the internal drive rather than have an external drive hanging off the side.

Finally, are these external enclosures quiet enough that I would benefit from a Seagate db35 'quiet' drive? Or, is there so much extra noise from the enclosure that the db35 is overkill and the cheaper non-db35 version would just as quiet overall?


----------



## Dssturbo1

Cpen said:


> I have a spare 250Gig EIDE Drive lying around. Does anyone know how I might be able to use it with my Series 3's ESATA port?
> 
> Does anyone make a drive enclosure that can take a 3.5inch IDE drive AND output to a ESATA?


this might do it for you.
http://www.satasite.com/sata-usb-drive-enclosure-sata-ide.htm
takes eide drive
has sata output but does include a sata to esata cable adapter


----------



## Adam1115

pcjackson said:


> Here's an interesting question - because the eSATA port was unusable prior to a recent software upgrade, should a user find the eSATA port is not functional for some reason or another -- and assuming the warranty is up on the Series3, what's the warranty status of repairing the port/logic board? The user has no way of knowing whether or not the port was functional until now. (Assuming this new feature is in fact legit which I imagine it is because of recent CableCard approvals on eSATA devices.)


Well, their answer would likely be (at this point) that the use of the eSATA port is not supported....


----------



## lcann44

morac said:


> This is more likely than a straight out disabling of the functionality since I doubt that when the functionality is released, this is the method that users would have to go through to enable it.


We are all indeed speculating at this point but I personally wouldn't be surprised if TiVo didn't make this the process to activate it. I'm saying this just based on other things like 30 sec skip and other various coded features.

When I had external hard drive on my cable company DVR there was a reboot process as well and instructions were never "officially" handed down from the cable company or SA. You would reboot after hook up, and powering up your eSATA then a message would come on the screen asking if you wanted to add this hard drive. Outside of the 62 kick, not much different really.


----------



## aaronwt

richsadams said:


> For anyone looking for a dependable fan-cooled eSATA enclosure or complete HDD (currently using Seagate) including cables have a look at the Apricorn options. Lowest prices appear to be from newegg.com at the moment:
> 
> External eSATA enclosure (no HDD), $39.99 + shipping here . The current ad (and photos) indicates this is eSATA _only_, but reviews say it also has a USB port. I just ordered this one and will update this post when I receive it.


Is this actually an eSATA enclosure? In the desription it only says SATA. And the pictures of the back look like a SATA port. I have several enclosures right now that are SATA, not eSATA. The connectors are different for eSATA and SATA. If I get an enclosure I would like it to be an eSATA enclosure not SATA. 
Just checking to make sure.

eSATA and SATA have different connectors. If the enclosure has what looks like at SATA connector then it's not an eSATA.

" The External connector has no L shaped key, and the guide features are vertically offset and reduced in size. This prevents the use of unshielded internal cables in external applications.

 To prevent ESD damage, the insertion depth is increased from 5mm to 6.6mm and the contacts are mounted further back in both the receptacle and plug.

 To provide EMI protection and meet FCC and CE emission requirements, the cable has an extra layer of shielding, and the connectors have metal contact points.

 There are springs as retention features built into the connector shield on both the top and bottom surfaces. "


----------



## morac

Welshdog said:


> Wellllll, kind of. While what that guy did is promising it isn't quite the same as plugging in a raid to the eSATA port and having it work. Maybe Lightrunner can give it a shot.


Dunno if it's supported or not. I would think as long as the RAID looks like a drive to the TiVo it should work.

I was originally thinking that a RAID would be kind of pointless since the S3 apparently can't support more than 1 TB of storage, but then I remembered that a RAID 1 setup would be ideal because if a drive dies you can just hot-swap it and not lose any recordings. All that would be needed is a 2 bay RAID 1 setup (if it works).


----------



## Welshdog

morac said:


> I remembered that a RAID 1 setup would be ideal because if a drive dies you can just hot-swap it and not lose any recordings. All that would be needed is a 2 bay RAID 1 setup (if it works).


 That appealed to me as well. Redundancy good. Redundancy good.


----------



## slimoli

aaronwt said:


> Is this actually an eSATA enclosure? In the desription it only says SATA. And the pictures of the back look like a SATA port. I have several enclosures right now that are SATA, not eSATA. The connectors are different for eSATA and SATA. If I get an enclosure I would like it to be an eSATA enclosure not SATA.
> Just checking to make sure.
> 
> "


It looks to me this is a good choice. It's e-Sata for sure and maybe you are looking at a diffrent model. Here is the link:

http://www.apricorn.com/printer_detail.php?id=37&type=family

Sergio


----------



## Dssturbo1

aaronwt said:


> Is this actually an eSATA enclosure? In the desription it only says SATA. And the pictures of the back look like a SATA port. I have several enclosures right now that are SATA, not eSATA. The connectors are different for eSATA and SATA. If I get an enclosure I would like it to be an eSATA enclosure not SATA. Just checking to make sure..... "


aaronwt, 
you do not have to have an esata external drive enclosure, for you and others that already have external enclosures you can simply get a new cable with a sata connection (Type L) on one end and an esata connection (Type I) on the other, like this example for about $10.

http://www.satacables.com/html/sata_external_cables.html

or this one gives better pics
http://www.satagear.com/eSATA-100_SATA_External_Cable.html


----------



## bkdtv

richsadams said:


> For anyone looking for a dependable fan-cooled eSATA enclosure or complete HDD (currently using Seagate) including cables have a look at the Apricorn options. Lowest prices appear to be from newegg.com at the moment:
> 
> External eSATA enclosure (no HDD), $39.99 + shipping here . The current ad (and photos) indicates this is eSATA _only_, but reviews say it also has a USB port. I just ordered this one and will update this post when I receive it.
> 
> Complete eSATA/USB drives, $113.99 (250GB), $198.99 (500GB) and $352.99 (750GB) + shipping here . (Be sure its an eSATA/USB, not USB only.)
> 
> Ive had good luck with these in small enclosures where heat can build up. They have a large but quiet fan that keeps the drive very cool. They should do the trick for an external TiVo eSATA application but no guarantees of course.





slimoli said:


> It looks to me this is a good choice. It's e-Sata for sure and maybe you are looking at a diffrent model. Here is the link:
> 
> http://www.apricorn.com/printer_detail.php?id=37&type=family


This looks like most popular case on the market for use with other DVRs that support eSATA expansion, like the SA8300HD with SARA. Most of the rave reviews on AVS were published before they added the bridge chip and USB interface, so it's not clear how that affected performance.


----------



## keenanSR

stevereis said:


> Finally, are these external enclosures quiet enough that I would benefit from a Seagate db35 'quiet' drive? Or, is there so much extra noise from the enclosure that the db35 is overkill and the cheaper non-db35 version would just as quiet overall?


I used the below linked drive and it's not any louder than the S3 itself, might even be a bit quieter. During normal TV viewing it's a non-issue. The DB35 is probably quieter but I'm not sure the decrease in noise is worth the cost. Depends a lot on where the drive is placed. At a distance of about 6' I can't even hear it, and that's with a dead silent room.

http://www.compusa.com/products/pro...product_code=341441&Pn=eSATA_500GB_Hard_Drive
CompUSA.com: Seagate eSATA 500GB Hard Drive - ST3500601XS-RK - Computer Upgrades » Hard Drives


----------



## davezatz

keenanSR said:


> http://www.compusa.com/products/pro...product_code=341441&Pn=eSATA_500GB_Hard_Drive
> CompUSA.com: Seagate eSATA 500GB Hard Drive - ST3500601XS-RK - Computer Upgrades » Hard Drives


Same drive is $20 less at Buy.com with free shipping. Though I was told it may not turn on automatically after a power outage. Something to research... or an argument for an UPS.

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=202636811


----------



## Welshdog

Wiebetech makes an enclosure that is eSATA only, no bridge. It is also fanless which I think is a plus for quietness. It is called ToughTech eSATA and is available from Wiebe's site for $39. Seems like a good choice. Check here WiebeTech for information and click the buy now button to see the price. It seems to be on sale even.


----------



## Jerry_K

I am not getting the second drive activated. In an external enclosure with its own power supply. Drive spins, SATA to eSATA cable. Turn on the Tivo with the pause button pushed and I get the orange dot, then press 62 and the dot goes blank. No reboot, goes directly to the next screen boots with no extra drive. Tried it four times

Had remote set of 2, reset remote to 0 and it did reboot but no recognicion of the drive. Later maybe when I have more time.


----------



## keenanSR

davezatz said:


> Same drive is $20 less at Buy.com with free shipping. Though I was told it may not turn on automatically after a power outage. Something to research... or an argument for an UPS.
> 
> http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=202636811


At CompUSA they have some sort of promotion going on, it was $20 off the listed price. It cost $162 out the door.

I have my external drive plugged into the same power center as the S3 so if power goes out on the drive it will go out on the S3 as well. As far as not powering on after losing power, I don't know. I believe the Monster power center I'm using needs to be manually re-started after a power outage so at that point I can make sure the drive is powered up as well when re-starting the S3

If the S3 is powered up without the external drive being powered up will the recordings be lost forever?

I guess the question is, if power is ever removed from the external drive, are the recordings lost, requiring a re-marrying, re-booting, re-setup of the drive?


----------



## skweaz

davezatz said:


> Same drive is $20 less at Buy.com with free shipping. Though I was told it may not turn on automatically after a power outage. Something to research... or an argument for an UPS.
> 
> http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=202636811


I picked this one up at CompUSA yesterday, there was an additonal $20 taken off at time of purchase (I think this mentioned earlier in this thread). It was $161, taxes included. Only slightly more than Buy.com if you _must _ have it today.

Where did you hear about not turning on after a power failure? I have it on a UPS but I'm curious.


----------



## Dssturbo1

it should not lose them. guessing it probably will come up with an on screen prompt to remarry/accept it back in the system.

my compusa got closed


----------



## keenanSR

Dssturbo1 said:


> it should not lose them. guessing it probably will come up with an on screen prompt to remarry/accept it back in the system.
> 
> my compusa got closed


Sound logical, I suppose testing that idea would be a good idea before one gets many recordings done, I may try it myself later today before anything is scheduled to record tonight.

We got lucky here as there was no other CompUSA for miles and miles, closet being down in the bay area.


----------



## alee

Welshdog said:


> That appealed to me as well. Redundancy good. Redundancy good.


I'm considering this enclosure. In theory it should be just plug and play.

That said, noise is a concern according to this review. You can get quiet drives, but a noisy enclosure is a deal breaker.


----------



## ingenue007

i am looking at external enclosures on newegg....they don't come with power adapters. are these enclosures getting power from the esata port you connect to the tivo?? or do i need to buy an ext enclosure that has a power adapter?


----------



## greg_burns

alee said:


> I'm considering this enclosure. In theory it should be just plug and play.
> 
> That said, noise is a concern according to this review. You can get quiet drives, but a noisy enclosure is a deal breaker.


I got one of those at work. Compared to my Thecus N2050 it was quite a bit louder. (annoyingly so) :down: But very solidly built.

It has two tiny fans. The Thecus has just one. Not really sure what made it so much louder than the Thecus. I could have been the drives in it. 

As soon as I get my data copied off my Thecus (2x400GB) I am going to try reconnecting it to my Tivo again via the eSata port.

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=4482613&&#post4482613

Edit: Thecus is cheaper to boot.  (Although I have had problems with heat, as did some other reviewers on newegg)
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822102006

I'll report back tonight how it goes.


----------



## kylen

Anyone try the Western Digital 500 GB My Book Premium ES (WDG1SU5000N) for the TiVo?

I have one of the USB ones connected to my PC and it works great.


----------



## bearcat2000

I would also like to know if the My Books work well or not. They are incredibly quiet as I have 3 hooked up to my computer and the only fan I hear is the stupid Dells.


----------



## shaown

anyone tried one of these?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822101030


----------



## pcjackson

I don't really care to try this, but what happens when you mount the drive to your PC/Mac? How are the files stored? Is the FS accessible? Haven't heard much as far as this goes.


----------



## NOD

The user reviews for that one don't fill me w/ confidence for long-term use...


----------



## Adam1115

NOD said:


> The user reviews for that one don't fill me w/ confidence for long-term use...


It's a hard drive and an enclosure, what is there to it? They don't MAKE the hard drive, the eSATA interface is nothing more than an adapter....


----------



## NOD

well, one reviewer said it doesn't spin down w/ the power on, and another said it is extremely hot. Those things would make me wary for its long-term performance.

Then again, we all take our chances in terms of long-term performance. It's obviously up to you. It might work great. Just sharing my reservations...


----------



## mikeyts

Just found this post; I have a 320GB Seagate eSATA drive that was connected to the SA8300HD that I use to lease from Cox until four or five months back. It'd just been languishing in a closet and now it's happily back in service. Kudos to spike2k5 for revealing this .


----------



## 1283

NOD said:


> well, one reviewer said it doesn't spin down w/ the power on, and another said it is extremely hot.


Spin down is controlled by the host and should be passed to the drive through the enclosure controller (if any). With the S3, the drive will never spin down anyway. As for the temperature, I would not get an enclosure without a fan.


----------



## NOD

c3 said:


> Spin down is controlled by the host and should be passed to the drive through the enclosure controller (if any). With the S3, the drive will never spin down anyway. As for the temperature, I would not get an enclosure without a fan.


Yeah, the fan will be a must for me. I wasn't sure about the spin-down issue w/ an external from the Tivo, but I guess it stands to reason as it seems that recordings will be done on both drives. Thanks for clearing it up.


----------



## ingenue007

i just ordered: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822152052

and http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817106097

should be here by end of the week.


----------



## jhimmel

ingenue007 said:


> i just ordered: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822152052
> 
> and http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817106097
> 
> should be here by end of the week.


I happen to have one of those Azio enclosures laying around with a 250G SATA HD in it. I'm not currently using it for anything, and I'm thinking about plugging it into one of my S3's. If I do - I'll let you know what happens.

I had used this for backup data at one time. Do I need to fdisk it?

Jim H.


----------



## ingenue007

i would go ahead and format it before i plugged it into the tivo


----------



## riddick21

I really wish we could see what someone at TiVo has to say about this.


----------



## NOD

I wouldn't expect any official word either from our Tivo folks or the website. What are their options response-wise? Let's look at the possibilities:

1) They DON'T want us all to be able to do this. If they come on here and state that it isn't appropriate for use yet (or, even worse, if they say that there will be a FW update that will disable this capability for the consumer), then they'll get abused by the forum members. 

2) They DO want us all to be able to do this. If they come on here and admit that it has been enabled for a long time, then they'll be questioned for not revealing this to us in the past.

Then there's the 3rd option -- say nothing and let us all do that which we've wanted to do for months. Let it sit out there as a pseudo-hack and then announce it officially as prime-time ready w/ a future update. 

I have to admit that the worst possibility for many of us would be for them to say nothing and then disable it in a new FW update after all of us go out and buy expensive SATA add-ons.

Let's hope that they understand that...


----------



## greg_burns

Welshdog said:


> Anyone going to try a SATA raid?


Just connected my Thecus (currently with 2x400GB) drives. 250MB + 800MB = 138 hours of HD.

Is this the current record?


----------



## greg_burns

ingenue007 said:


> i would go ahead and format it before i plugged it into the tivo


I didn't bother formatting my drive (it was NTFS) and it worked just fine. I think you meant FDISK anyways. What would you format it as?


----------



## slimoli

This drive seems to be e-Sata only and is well known by the SA-8300 users. There is a model with both USB and e-Sata but the model # is different. This one seems to be the real deal:

http://www.apricorn.com/product_detail.php?other_info=specs&id=37&type=family&anc=#bottom

Look at the "System Requirements" and see that they already mention the Tivo S3 as being not supported despite claims that people are already using it.

Sergio


----------



## richsadams

slimoli said:


> It looks to me this is a good choice. It's e-Sata for sure and maybe you are looking at a diffrent model.
> Sergio


I missed this eSATA "DVR Expander" from Apricorn earlier. It does appear to be an ideal option for TiVo S3's. It has a large but quiet fan to keep the drive cool as well. The downside is that it's only available with 250GB and 500GB HDD's.

Edit: Apricorn added a 750GB option today (May 7th). They also updated their home page to feature this product. Fast thinkers! 

Thx Sergio! :up:


slimoli said:


> Look at the "System Requirements" and see that they already mention the Tivo S3 as being not supported despite claims that people are already using it. Sergio


Good point! I'd bet it works, but would really like to hear from anyone that tries it.

*Edit 05/07/07: I just ordered one of these and post and update when I receive it and see that it works.*


----------



## WSP

When you add the external drive, are the programs already recorded on the internal disk lost?


----------



## greg_burns

WSP said:


> When you add the external drive, are the programs already recorded on the internal disk lost?


Nope.


----------



## keenanSR

greg_burns said:


> Just connected my Thecus (currently with 2x400GB) drives. 250MB + 800MB = 138 hours of HD.
> 
> Is this the current record?


Seems to be, I didn't think TiVo could retain more than a TB of recordings though, of course you're probably right at that limit.


----------



## myosh_tino

WSP said:


> When you add the external drive, are the programs already recorded on the internal disk lost?


Let me take this one step further. Will programs recorded *before I added the external drive* be affected if I remove it?

I bought a drive and enclosure yesterday and the drive (Maxtor) is pretty noisy and the enclosure gets pretty warm. I probably can't return it but I'll use the drive in one of my desktop systems.


----------



## greg_burns

keenanSR said:


> Seems to be, I didn't think TiVo could retain more than a TB of recordings though, of course you're probably right at that limit.


Nah, 1TB is _only_ 131 hours. 

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5127441&&#post5127441

Somebody's gotta have some larger drives to try in their raid setups... I no longer have my 500GB pair.


----------



## lawilson2

NOD said:


> Yeah, the fan will be a must for me. I wasn't sure about the spin-down issue w/ an external from the Tivo, but I guess it stands to reason as it seems that recordings will be done on both drives. Thanks for clearing it up.


After reading the multiple posts here about the fan being a must, I went to check out my drive enclosure. Sure enough, it's very warm. One of the reasons is that the Tivo essentially never spins down, so it's always running. That helped me to see that I needed one with a fan or I could shorten the life of this 750GB drive. So I ran to the store this evening and got this one from Ultra: http://microcenter.com/byos/byos_single_product_results.phtml?product_id=254908

A bit more expensive than the ones you can order online, but I like the option of taking it back to a physical store if needed like I am doing with the one I bought earlier. Thanks you all!


----------



## bkdtv

_Edit: Updated first post._

I'll do some Q&A in the first post to answer commonly asked questions.

Common questions I've seen so far:

I previously upgraded the internal drive in my Series3. Can I still use eSATA expansion?
What is the maximum capacity supported?
When you add the external drive, are the programs already recorded on the internal disk lost?
Will programs recorded before I added the external drive be affected if I remove it?
Is there any disk preparation required?
How much recording time do I get with a 500Gb drive? With a 750Gb? With 1Tb?
Is this expansion sanctioned by Cable Labs?
What happens when I disconnect the eSATA drive?
What external eSATA solutions are confirmed to work?
What are recommended enclosures?
Does this work on both 8.1.x and 8.3.x?

Any other suggestions for Q&A?


----------



## keenanSR

If the S3 powers up and the Ext Drv does not, after a power loss for example, will the Ext Drv still have the original data(recordings) on it after re-marrying from a power loss shutdown or will it be wiped clean?

(I never got around to checking that out today, but I will try it tomorrow after I've watched what I record tonight and not delete them.)


----------



## keenanSR

A list of verified drives wouldn't be a bad idea.


----------



## lawilson2

As well as enclosures, since that seems to be a big thing. There are some enclosures that don't come with power, with a fan, have sata, firewire, and Usb, or lacking one or the other...

A list would be great of these.


----------



## wdave

lawilson2 said:


> As well as enclosures, since that seems to be a big thing. There are some enclosures that don't come with power, with a fan, have sata, firewire, and Usb, or lacking one or the other...


And some are just SATA, not SATA II.
And some have just a SATA connector on the outside, not eSATA.
And some get their power from the included card that goes in the computer (won't work for us).
And some have what I consider a poor power button design that would seem easy to accidentally trigger a power off when moving things in my AV cabinet.


----------



## greg_burns

keenanSR said:


> If the S3 powers up and the Ext Drv does not, after a power loss for example, will the Ext Drv still have the original data(recordings) on it after re-marrying from a power loss shutdown or will it be wiped clean?
> 
> (I never got around to checking that out today, but I will try it tomorrow after I've watched what I record tonight and not delete them.)


I just tried turning the power off on my Thecus while the S3 was still on. I immedialty couldn't play any of the new shows it had recorded since the upgrade, but could play previously recorded ones.

After rebooting, with the Thecus still off, I got the "Your DVR's second hard drive is not responding" message. Press Thumbs Down 3 times to switch to single-drive mode. Which I went ahead and did. Then got the message shown below...










After about 5 minutes it restarted. All my previously recorded shows are still there. The last two it recorded since adding the drive are gone. YMMV.


----------



## bkdtv

greg_burns said:


> I just tried turning the power off on my Thecus while the S3 was still on. I immedialty couldn't play any of the new shows it had recorded since the upgrade, but could play previously recorded ones.
> 
> After rebooting, with the Thecus still off, I got the "Your DVR's second hard drive is not responding" message. Press Thumbs Down 3 times to switch to single-drive mode. Which I went ahead and did. Then got the message shown below...
> 
> [image snipped]
> 
> After about 5 minutes it restarted. All my previously recorded shows are still there. The last two it recorded since adding the drive are gone. YMMV.


Do those recordings "reappear" when you enable the eSATA drive again?


----------



## greg_burns

bkdtv said:


> Do those recordings "reappear" when you enable the eSATA drive again?


Mine did not after remarrying the drive again. I suspect had I not divorced it (by pressing Thumbs Down 3 times at that screen), they would have still been there after rebooting.

I'll try that next.

Edit: er... wait a minute. I haven't actually had any luck remarrying the drive again. I thought I had, but I guess I really didn't. Tried twice now. 

Third time was the charm. Weird.

The recordings on the new drive are no longer there after a divorce & remarry.


----------



## DCIFRTHS

richsadams said:


> For anyone looking for a dependable fan-cooled eSATA enclosure or complete HDD (currently using Seagate) including cables have a look at the Apricorn options. ...


Apricorn has added a note on the spec page, for their eSATA DVR drives, regarding S3 compatibility 

EDIT: Oops. I see this has been mentioned before.


----------



## gteague

the seagate free agent seems to be the model everyone has on sale currently and amazon has the 750gb model for $249.

has anyone gotten this model to work? i have an s3 with v8.3, although it doesn't look like that matters.

buying from amazon is attractive since i have $4 next-day shipping, no tax, and can rely on their delivery. they do have the other seagate model mentioned--Seagate ST3500601XS-RK 500GB--but the price is not that attractive at $207 since some have mentioned getting it for $16x.00. unfortunately, the 3 compusa's in my neighborhood have closed and driving to frisco or plano is not worth $40!

[later note: i did find this post: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5125647&&#post5125647 saying he got the 750gb free agent to work with the s3]

/guy


----------



## DCIFRTHS

lcann44 said:


> I've got a Maxtor Quickview Expander I just hooked up. TiVo has acknowledge that it is hooked up and my HD hours went from 32 to 71 hours. I do have 8.3, however I'm a bit troubled because the hard drive is flashing an orange light at me 8 times and then it pauses and starts again.
> 
> I can no longer find documentation for this unit on the internet so I have no idea what the 8 flashing lights mean, but I can only assume since the S3 says it's there and acknowledges the space available that it is true.


I have this model, and the literature that came with the drive states that the STATUS light conveys the following:

1 Blink: Light will blink once after product is plugged in.
2 Blinks: The SATA cable is not connected to the set top box.
8 Blinks: There is an internal error. Contact the service provider.

Unfortunately, it sounds like Maxtor is referring to the contacting the cable company if you get 8 blinks, since they are the ones that support the STB. In this case, contacting TiVo is not an option 

I haven't tried my Quickview Expander yet, so I can't tell you if mine is doing the same thing. Is anyone else here using this drive on the S3?


----------



## NOD

greg -- I think I'm not alone when I say please post again w/ the result of your attempt for remarrying the drive.

I have to admit that I'm a little wary that Tivo hasn't mentioned this capability previously, and the possibility exists that the reason it hasn't been announced yet is that there is still some major glitch they haven't solved yet...


----------



## greg_burns

keenanSR said:


> If the S3 powers up and the Ext Drv does not, after a power loss for example, will the Ext Drv still have the original data(recordings) on it after re-marrying from a power loss shutdown or will it be wiped clean?


Apparently there is no way to fully start the S3 w/o the new drive being attached once it is married. If you start up w/o it being seen your only option is to reboot and reattach the drive or divorce it.

I had two recording happening when I just rebooted and detached my new drive. The Tivo gave me the warning about divorcing again. I rebooted w/o doing it this time. Surprisingly those two partitial recording are no where to be found after reattaching the drive. Wonder what happened? Was not expecting that.


----------



## CharlesH

NOD said:


> I have to admit that I'm a little wary that Tivo hasn't mentioned this capability previously, and the possibility exists that the reason it hasn't been announced yet is that there is still some major glitch they haven't solved yet...


Until Cablelabs gave the go-ahead on April 20, TiVo could not "legally" offer this functionality under its CableCard license. Disclaimers notwithstanding, it sure is a coincidence that this jumpstart option became known a few days after the authorization from CableLabs.


----------



## morac

greg_burns said:


> I had two recording happening when I just rebooted and detached my new drive. The Tivo gave me the warning about divorcing again. I rebooted w/o doing it this time. Surprisingly those two partitial recording are no where to be found after reattaching the drive. Wonder what happened? Was not expecting that.


Maybe it's because the recordings were in progress when you rebooted? It might be a good idea to test this again with already finished recordings.

It also might be good to test what happens if the drive is unplugged and then plugged back in without rebooting the TiVo, just to see what happens (does it recover?).

If the TiVo does lose all recordings on the external drive on power failure despite the drive not being divorced then that may be one of the reasons TiVo hasn't released it yet.


----------



## 1283

keenanSR said:


> I didn't think TiVo could retain more than a TB of recordings


1TB per drive.


----------



## jhimmel

ingenue007 said:


> i just ordered: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822152052
> 
> and http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817106097
> 
> should be here by end of the week.


As I mentioned previously, I had one of those Azio enclosures laying around with a 250G drive in it. Not sure if I needed to, but I used Partition Magic to remove the NTFS partition. I followed the S3 eSATA procedure and have now doubled my storage space - using stuff I just had laying around. Cool.

Jim H.


----------



## greg_burns

morac said:


> Maybe it's because the recordings were in progress when you rebooted? It might be a good idea to test this again with already finished recordings.


Ok, I just let Cold Case finish recording. Then I powered off the Thecus. I could play previous recordings, but when I tried to play Cold Case... BOOM! reboot. Not totally unexpected. 

Let the Tivo start up to the divorce screen. Rebooted again w/o divorcing and powered on the Thecus this time. Cold Case is still there. :up: Not sure what happened before.


----------



## keenanSR

greg_burns said:


> Ok, I just let Cold Case finish recording. Then I powered off the Thecus. I could play previous recordings, but when I tried to play Cold Case... BOOM! reboot. Not totally unexpected.
> 
> Let the Tivo start up to the divorce screen. Rebooted again w/o divorcing and powered on the Thecus this time. Cold Case is still there. :up: Not sure what happened before.


Okay, I'll have to re-read your previous posts when I get a bit more time, but, from what I understand, losing power to the Ext Drv is not a big issue, all that needs to be done is to re-marry it and the recordings will still be there?

If you do divorce the Ext Drv, then the recordings will be gone?

So, IOW, if you have a power outage, then it is possible to re-start/re-power everything, and you should be fine, not losing anything(other than what may have been recoding at the time of the outage)

Is that a fair assumption of what you've experienced? If so, the power issue doesn't seem to be a problem at all.


----------



## greg_burns

keenanSR said:


> Is that a fair assumption of what you've experienced? If so, the power issue doesn't seem to be a problem at all.


Sounds right to me. The only problem I see, is if your external drive doesn't power on automatically after power loss. Then it would be stuck at that divorce screen until your intervened.



keenanSR said:


> all that needs to be done is to re-marry it and the recordings will still be there?


Re-marry is probably not the right phrasing. Re-marrying implies it was previously divorced. Once that is done, the recordings are gone.

Simply rebooting with the drive powered up again is all that is needed.


----------



## bkdtv

greg_burns said:


> Sounds right to me. The only problem I see, is if your external drive doesn't power on automatically after power loss. Then it would be stuck at that divorce screen until your intervened.


It sounds like that feature -- automatic power on -- is one you want to have in a eSATA drive for the Series3, especially if you don't use a UPS.


----------



## NOD

That could be quite a limiting requirement (but I agree that it is going to be pretty darn close to a necessity).


----------



## lcann44

greg_burns said:
 

> I just tried turning the power off on my Thecus while the S3 was still on. I immedialty couldn't play any of the new shows it had recorded since the upgrade, but could play previously recorded ones.
> 
> After rebooting, with the Thecus still off, I got the "Your DVR's second hard drive is not responding" message. Press Thumbs Down 3 times to switch to single-drive mode. Which I went ahead and did. Then got the message shown below...
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> After about 5 minutes it restarted. All my previously recorded shows are still there. The last two it recorded since adding the drive are gone. YMMV.


This is really common sense. Anything new you recorded on the eSATA would get wiped in the divorce.

I saw that screen when I pulled my first eSATA off of there. I was a bit worried but I figured it would be like when I took my eSATA off the cable DVR. No content recorded, so nothing loss on that drive.


----------



## wdave

So let me get this straight...

Everything you had before the marriage, you still have after the divorce.
But everything you got during the marriage, you lose in the divorce.

Yup, that sounds about right!


----------



## CharlesH

lcann44 said:


> Yes. Is it true that CableLabs gave the OK for the eSATA on April 20, 2007 as I have seen mentioned here? That would be good on that page as well, if you can verify.


Here (#14 by dt_dc) is the post which suggests this.


----------



## lcann44

CharlesH said:


> Here (#14 by dt_dc) is the post which suggests this.


I saw that on the first page after I made my request. Is there a link to this documentation? dt_dc can you give us a link to this page?


----------



## Justin Thyme

c3 said:


> 1TB per drive.


Using this procedure, I appear to have succeeded in upgrading to a 1.25TB S3 by using a 1TB Thecus external eSata Raid array. Preliminary* results here.

Tomorrow I should have results of an attempt to upgrade with a 1.5TB Thecus. Unless MFS has been seriously messed with for S3 eSata's, this test theoreticaly should fail.

*These are preliminary results because I will want to totally fill these drives with content before being satisfied that the capacity is being fully utilized. This will take a few days recording only HD content, so that test will have to wait until after the dual 750GB thecus overdrive test.


----------



## mikeyts

lcann44 said:


> I saw that on the first page after I made my request. Is there a link to this documentation? dt_dc can you give us a link to this page?


The DFAST host license agreement is here; part of what dt_dc quoted was at the top of PDF page 30.


----------



## lawilson2

wdave said:


> So let me get this straight...
> 
> Everything you had before the marriage, you still have after the divorce.
> But everything you got during the marriage, you lose in the divorce.
> 
> Yup, that sounds about right!


And if you commit adultery with the drive, you lose it all (sorry, couldn't resist).


----------



## keenanSR

greg_burns said:


> Re-marry is probably not the right phrasing. Re-marrying implies it was previously divorced. Once that is done, the recordings are gone.
> 
> Simply rebooting with the drive powered up again is all that is needed.


Right, that makes sense.

Now, once at the divorce screen from a power loss re-start, the S3 needs a thumbs down command before it do anything else. At that point I'm guessing you can pull the power to S3, make sure the Ext Drv is powered up, then power up the S3 and you should be good to go with no loss of recordings, or need to re-add the drive.

In an unattended situation will the S3 just sit at the input required screen, or will it attempt a restart on it's own? I could see where that would cause a problem and you lose recordings and have to re-add the drive...(nevermind, I see you've already answered this question)

I'm just trying to sketch out all the possible scenarios, and what could/will happen. Could be good info to have for a FAQ.


----------



## kaetamer

Soooooooooo

Right now I'm running a 1TB ext raid array attached to the sata plug on the motherboard.

Can I put the original drive back in, add my 1tb raid array to the eSATA, do the kickstart and expect to have the recordings made on the raid array to be maintained?

I'd hate to re-install the orig drive and lose the recordings on the raid.


----------



## 1283

kaetamer said:


> Can I put the original drive back in, add my 1tb raid array to the eSATA, do the kickstart and expect to have the recordings made on the raid array to be maintained?


Extremely unlikely.


----------



## myosh_tino

Just wanted to let people know (like wdave) that recordings while the drives are married will be lost if you divorce the drives. I know this first hand as I have just divorced the external drive because the drive I got, a Maxtor 500 GB drive, was too noisy and it ran kind of hot in its enclosure. I'll probably revisit eSATA in the future but in the mean time, I will install the SATA drive in one of my desktop systems.


----------



## TiivoDog

Has anybody, who has an external drive connected with recorded content attempted the following:

1. Power down Tivo S3 and External Drive

2. Connected their external drive to a PC

3. Attempted to do one/all of the following;

- Browse content

- View recorded content on their PC

- Transfer content to their PC

- Transfer content to their PC that has Tivo-To-Go to determin if the MAK key on the TTG client would allow viewing

- Transfer content to their PC and then to an Tivo S2 machine via TTG

Basically, I am just curious if any of the aforementioned points provide another level of options for the users???? Maybe this could be a 'poor man's' MRV, which I doubt, but who knows????


----------



## andyf

TiivoDog said:


> Has anybody, who has an external drive connected with recorded content attempted the following:
> 
> 1. Power down Tivo S3 and External Drive
> 
> 2. Connected their external drive to a PC
> 
> 3. Attempted to do one/all of the following;
> 
> - Browse content
> 
> - View recorded content on their PC
> 
> - Transfer content to their PC
> 
> - Transfer content to their PC that has Tivo-To-Go to determin if the MAK key on the TTG client would allow viewing
> 
> - Transfer content to their PC and then to an Tivo S2 machine via TTG
> 
> Basically, I am just curious if any of the aforementioned points provide another level of options for the users???? Maybe this could be a 'poor man's' MRV, which I doubt, but who knows????


or transfer on to the internet for all to watch?


----------



## ChrisNJ

Rob Helmerichs said:


> I just ordered one of these...exciting news!
> 
> (About the activation, not my order...)
> 
> (Well, my order is exciting too, but probably more for me than anybody else.)


Hey Rob, I just ordered the same drive from buy.com for 130 shipped using Google Checkout:
http://www.buy.com/prod/cavalry-500...-external-hard-drive/q/loc/101/203268361.html

It also has an additional $10 mail-in rebate, bringing it to $120 if the rebate works out. The case looks different but it's the same model number. Let me know when you get yours and get it hooked up.


----------



## lcann44

My Seagate 500 internal hard drive which I have in an external enclosure started making clicking sounds when I went to the Account and System Info screen. I went back to TiVo and it stopped then went back to that screen and it started but didn't stop this time. Even going to live tv it continue to make this noise. Now I'm worried, I just bought this thing two days ago. Should I take it back to the store since it's still just a few days away from purchase or do you think it might be ok? I've probably got all of last nights recordings on there.


----------



## fritolayguy

ChrisNJ said:


> Hey Rob, I just ordered the same drive from buy.com for 130 shipped using Google Checkout:
> http://www.buy.com/prod/cavalry-500...-external-hard-drive/q/loc/101/203268361.html
> 
> It also has an additional $10 mail-in rebate, bringing it to $120 if the rebate works out. The case looks different but it's the same model number. Let me know when you get yours and get it hooked up.


Thanks for the link to the Cavalry drive. I am going to take the plunge next week when the drive arrives. I'll look forward to reading success stories to help my confidence!


----------



## Hairking

Has anyone experienced a power failure with the eSata attached? 

If so, what would be the recommended power up sequence?


----------



## davezatz

keenanSR said:


> In an unattended situation will the S3 just sit at the input required screen, or will it attempt a restart on it's own?


If it sits at that screen or X hours or days, do you miss out on other recordings? This seems to support getting either a drive that reboots after a power failure or an UPS. The more I think about it, the more I want to just replace my internal drive and not power another device.


----------



## bkdtv

TiivoDog said:


> Has anybody, who has an external drive connected with recorded content attempted the following:
> 
> 1. Power down Tivo S3 and External Drive
> 
> 2. Connected their external drive to a PC
> 
> 3. Attempted to do one/all of the following;
> 
> - Browse content
> 
> - View recorded content on their PC
> 
> - Transfer content to their PC
> 
> - Transfer content to their PC that has Tivo-To-Go to determin if the MAK key on the TTG client would allow viewing
> 
> - Transfer content to their PC and then to an Tivo S2 machine via TTG
> 
> Basically, I am just curious if any of the aforementioned points provide another level of options for the users???? Maybe this could be a 'poor man's' MRV, which I doubt, but who knows????


No, as per CableLabs guidelines, all content is encrypted.


----------



## BlackBetty

This recent development with the S3 has got my trigger finger itching to order myself an S3.


----------



## Bighouse

TiivoDog said:


> Has anybody, who has an external drive connected with recorded content attempted the following:
> 
> 1. Power down Tivo S3 and External Drive
> 
> 2. Connected their external drive to a PC
> 
> ...????


I doubt very much you would be able to do that. It seems to me, based on the prior posts about losing all the recordings that either span the two drives or are recorded entirely on the external one, that the TiVo software essentially removes or erases, somehow, the data on it- or the data is encrypted so that it can't be read once the drive is disconnected. Seems that the S3 box itself somehow must serve as an authenticator key and if disconnected, and then even reconnected won't allow for the retreival of the data on the drive. I suspect that even if you could somehow hotswap the drive with another S3, that data would somehow be made invalid too. I could see why they would want to do that as part of the copy protection system so you can't port recordings to an external computer/internet.

I don't really care about being able to disconnect an eSata drive, but I DO care about hooking one up. I'm waiting for the dust to settle a bit on this issue and hope to hear some official word from TiVo before I go out and plunk down some change for an eSata drive that may, or may not, make some kind of "approved TiVo" eSata drive list.


----------



## rnowicki

All,
I just read through the thread, as I have a Series 3 on the way from Costco. I was thinking about replacing the internal drive with a 750GB Seagate DB35. There is no rush on this as that can be done any time, including transferring the shows already recorded as per the tools at mfslive.com.

Now, it looks like instead of or in addition to that, there is also the possibility of adding an external drive to increase the recording capacity. On the face of it, adding an external drive will probably allow for greater capacity expansion, but then there is that extra piece of hardware sitting next to the S3. The internal drive replacement seems like a cleaner / quieter solution but then you are limited to a maximum of 1TB (?) unless you then add an external drive too. I'm assuming that is an option too?

BTW, this is good news for all users who want extra capacity. I have expanded all my Tivo's since my first SAT-T60 many years ago. Keep the excellent posts coming!

Robert


----------



## NOD

rnowicki -- as of right now, IF YOU EXPAND THE INTERNAL DRIVE, YOU CAN NOT ADD THE ESATA DRIVE.

There are some folks trying to enable eSATA expansion for upgraded internals, but it sounds like the attempted hack would actually end up being a PHYSICAL hack on the internals of the S3, and it may not work. If you plan on using eSATA at all, you need to keep the internal as is until further notice.


----------



## greg_burns

davezatz said:


> If it sits at that screen or X hours or days, do you miss out on other recordings? This seems to support getting either a drive that reboots after a power failure or an UPS. The more I think about it, the more I want to just replace my internal drive and not power another device.


I would say yes you would miss recordings. Doesn't look the full Tivo software has even loaded at that point in the startup process.


----------



## greg_burns

Hairking said:


> Has anyone experienced a power failure with the eSata attached?
> 
> If so, what would be the recommended power up sequence?


Self induced, yes.

Recommended sequence would probably have power on to the eSata prior to the S3. All though I don't think it is critical, since the OS is on the internal drive. Just need to make sure you have power to the external drive prior to the software looking for it during the startup sequence.


----------



## Justin Thyme

It sure would be nice if enough info kind of made its way into the hands of the folks working on MFSTools so that the primary 250GB drive could be upgraded after marrying to an eSata.


----------



## keenanSR

davezatz said:


> If it sits at that screen or X hours or days, do you miss out on other recordings? This seems to support getting either a drive that reboots after a power failure or an UPS. The more I think about it, the more I want to just replace my internal drive and not power another device.


I don't think a UPS is going to be much help as you never know how long the power will be out. Besides, I don't think the TiVo has any programmed shutdown/restart sequence in case of power loss like a computer might have. When the power goes out, it just stops working.

I do think an external drive that has no on/off switch, one that powers up whenever power is applied would be a good idea, in fact I may look at disabling the on/off switch on the drive I'm using so when power returns the drive starts up without any user interaction.


----------



## Bierboy

davezatz said:


> ...The more I think about it, the more I want to just replace my internal drive and not power another device.


That's what I did, Dave, and I don't regret it for a minute. I have no need for an external drive.


----------



## ingenue007

i ordered an ext enclosure that has a switch that is either locked into the on or off position (not a switch where you push it once to turn on and another time to turn off). that way even if power goes off, the until will switch back on.


----------



## NOD

linky?


----------



## ingenue007

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817106097
i bought it w/a samsung 500 gb HD which is supposed to run rather cool.


----------



## NOD

hmm, the reviews are pretty good. The lack of fan is close to a dealbreaker, but I noticed that a few of the reviewers were using it as DVR add-on w/ good success.

_adds bookmark_


----------



## chrishicks

now if a person didn't care about noise and wanted to get an external case with a fan to get the most cooling possible what would be a good case to get?


----------



## sriggins

The Wiebetech case I have for my Mac has no fan and the drive can run backing up for 8 hours and only be lightly warm to the touch. Its all aluminum and acts as a heat sink.


----------



## NOD

Alright, I found this one at newegg. eSATA, w/ a fan. It has no reviews, but the SATA version (also w/ a fan) gets fairly good reviews. It appears to have a power switch such that it can be 'always on' as well.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817332012

Edited to add: this enclosure has no fan, but is one of the few eSATA enclosures that gets uniformly positive reviews, and it also has a power-on switch:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817198003


----------



## Riverdome

My apologies if this is OT but could I use an eSATA such as the link below? It's a two bay enclosure.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816111020


----------



## chrishicks

its a bit pricey but how about this enclosure:

Antec MX-1:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371008

a review of it:
http://www.silentpcreview.com/article728-page1.html

and another:
http://www.xyzcomputing.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=1029

and a small review with many pictures;
http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/Antec_MX-1/index.shtml


----------



## bkdtv

Riverdome said:


> My apologies if this is OT but could I use an eSATA such as the link below? It's a two bay enclosure.
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816111020


You could use that enclosure with a single drive, but there is no way to use two drives in that enclosure.

Other multi-disk enclosures with RAID should work as well to support multiple drives, but remember that the Series3 supports a maximum of 1Tb external expansion.


----------



## NOD

good find, Chris! That looks like it might just fit the bill (and even look pretty good in an AV rack).

I'm willing to pay an extra 30 or 40 bucks for a reliable enclosure.


----------



## bkdtv

chrishicks said:


> its a bit pricey but how about this enclosure:
> 
> Antec MX-1:
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817371008
> 
> a review of it:
> http://www.silentpcreview.com/article728-page1.html
> 
> and another:
> http://www.xyzcomputing.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=1029
> 
> and a small review with many pictures;
> http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/Antec_MX-1/index.shtml


That looks like a nice alternative to the Apricorn EZ Bus DTS, which is only available in silver.

Someone buy one and make sure it works so I can add it to the first post.


----------



## NOD

The Antec's tentatively going to be my choice, but I won't be able to be the guinea pig since I have to wait on the 1TB Hitachi to be delivered in 2 wks.

Sorry.


----------



## morac

I have a question about disconnecting the external drive. From what I've read, if the drive is disconnected while the TiVo is running, the TiVo will continue on it's merry way unless you try to play a recording that was made after the drive was married (in which case it will reboot).

What happens if the TiVo tries to record something while the drive is disconnected (ie: disconnect drive, then have TiVo record something)? Will it reboot or just record to the internal drive?


----------



## gwsat

Bighouse said:


> I don't really care about being able to disconnect an eSata drive, but I DO care about hooking one up. I'm waiting for the dust to settle a bit on this issue and hope to hear some official word from TiVo before I go out and plunk down some change for an eSata drive that may, or may not, make some kind of "approved TiVo" eSata drive list.


Thats what Im thinking, too. I want to learn a lot more about the ins and outs of adding an eSata drive to an S3 before I commit to add one. That said, the developments thus far are promising.


----------



## gwsat

NOD said:


> The Antec's tentatively going to be my choice, but I won't be able to be the guinea pig since I have to wait on the 1TB Hitachi to be delivered in 2 wks.
> 
> Sorry.


Has it been established that you can add a 1TB eSata drive and get your S3 to record on both it and your original internal drive, so that you have a total recording capaticty of 1.25TB? If so, thats really neat.


----------



## NOD

gwsat said:


> Has it been established that you can add a 1TB eSata drive and get your S3 to record on both it and your original internal drive, so that you have a total recording capaticty of 1.25TB? If so, thats really neat.


I had the same concern. So I started this thread, and both Justin Thyme and Greg Burns have shown that the S3 can go over 1TB (total). Justin Thyme's setup was the RAID equivalent of what my setup will (hopefully) be.


----------



## gwsat

NOD said:


> I had the same concern. So I started this thread, and both Justin Thyme and Greg Burns have shown that the S3 can go over 1TB (total). Justin Thyme's setup was the RAID equivalent of what my setup will (hopefully) be.


Great! Thanks for your fast-as-lightning response.


----------



## NJChris

I didn't see it in the thread, but which enclosures or all-in-one (like My Book) will power on automatically after a power outtage?


----------



## NOD

IIRC, my 1TB MyBook usb/FW external powers back on when the power returns after an outage. But I'm not 100% sure.

Obviously, this may not be at all helpful considering mine isn't an SATA/eSATA. But do with it what you will...


----------



## chrishicks

I think I'm going to bite on the Antec case and the 500Gb Samsung HDD that was posted a few pages back but I have one concern that I don't recall seeing mentioned. I'm currently on 8.1. if I install the external drive and then I get 8.3 afterwards will the S3 just reboot and continue as usual with the esata drive connected or could I run into some problem there?


----------



## NOD

I haven't seen any posts that address that issue (but I haven't been looking for them). I have to admit that I'd be a bit surprised if it screwed everything up, as it is enabled on 8.3 as well. 

But it seems to be uncharted territory as far as I can tell.


----------



## Adam1115

NOD said:


> rnowicki -- as of right now, IF YOU EXPAND THE INTERNAL DRIVE, YOU CAN NOT ADD THE ESATA DRIVE.
> 
> There are some folks trying to enable eSATA expansion for upgraded internals, but it sounds like the attempted hack would actually end up being a PHYSICAL hack on the internals of the S3, and it may not work. If you plan on using eSATA at all, you need to keep the internal as is until further notice.


You cannot add an eSATA drive if you've expanded the internal drive USING THE KICKSTART CODE. You can do it manually. "hacking" it involved removing the drive, but not altering the hardware in any way.


----------



## NOD

Adam -- so are you saying there is a way to expand internally w/o using the kickstart code? I honestly have no idea, as I obviously haven't expanded my internal s3 drive yet. 

I have to admit that I am out of my depth on this one. The last time I installed new internal drives was on my old series 1's


----------



## mfrns0123

So does anyone know if this unit has a power "on" by default or am I going to be in trouble if the Tivo reboots or power goes out?

http://www.apricorn.com/product_detail.php?type=family&id=37


----------



## myosh_tino

morac said:


> I have a question about disconnecting the external drive. From what I've read, if the drive is disconnected while the TiVo is running, the TiVo will continue on it's merry way unless you try to play a recording that was made after the drive was married (in which case it will reboot).


When I disconnected the external drive last night (because it was very noisy and running kind of hot), my Series3 rebooted automatically and went to the "divorce" screen prompt.


----------



## greg_burns

morac said:


> I have a question about disconnecting the external drive. From what I've read, if the drive is disconnected while the TiVo is running, the TiVo will continue on it's merry way unless you try to play a recording that was made after the drive was married (in which case it will reboot).


The first time I tried to play a recording that was apparently on the powered down Thecus, it didn't reboot. I just got a 0 length recording. The reboot happened on the second attempt. Seemed kinda random what would happen.



morac said:


> What happens if the TiVo tries to record something while the drive is disconnected (ie: disconnect drive, then have TiVo record something)? Will it reboot or just record to the internal drive?


I don't know the answer to that (yet), but why do you ask? Seems like doing that would not be a good thing. 

Along those lines...

I wonder if you can have more than one drive married at a time. And if so, can you then hot swap em...


----------



## A J Ricaud

I just installed a 500 GB Seagate drive in a Kingwin JT-35EU enclosure (link below) and hooked it up. Everything is working fine, although I was surprised at how long I had to hold down the pause button and get the orange light.

Also, the screen that says that the second drive has been activated was on for a long time before it rebooted.It reports 98 hrs. of HD programming.

http://www.mwave.com/mwave/viewspec.hmx?scriteria=AA67400


----------



## jkovach

greg_burns said:


> I wonder if you can have more than one drive married at a time. And if so, can you then hot swap em...


Polygamist TiVos? I don't think so. That would go against the normal definition of 'marriage'. From what I've read here so far, it sounds like an S3 TiVo can't get remarried without first getting divorced.


----------



## 1283

Hmmmm. What if TiVos can have kids ........


----------



## Rob Helmerichs

jkovach said:


> Polygamist TiVos? I don't think so. That would go against the normal definition of 'marriage'. From what I've read here so far, it sounds like an S3 TiVo can't get remarried without first getting divorced.


One problem, it seems to me, is that with the recordings spread across both drives (which is how it works, right?), the recordings would be trashed every time you swapped SATAs...


----------



## Amnesia

jkovach said:


> Polygamist TiVos? I don't think so. That would go against the normal definition of 'marriage'.


Maybe it only works in Utah...


----------



## Carsten

where u guys getting ur eSata to Sata cable??? I've looked all over town (bestbuy, compusa,circutcity, computer direct)???

HELP!


----------



## lcann44

Rob Helmerichs said:


> One problem, it seems to me, is that with the recordings spread across both drives (which is how it works, right?), the recordings would be trashed every time you swapped SATAs...


It seems to record the same way it did when I had the cable dvr. It records on the drive that has the most space. How do I know this? Well, I returned the Seagate 500gb I purchased on Saturday today because of the loud noised coming from it. When I started the S3 up all of Sunday's recordings were gone. Now that's not to say that when a drive get's full part of a recording won't cross over.

FWIW the new one I installed is working fine. And according to Seagates web site some clicking is normal, but what I heard didn't sound normal at all to me.


----------



## wdave

NOD said:


> Edited to add: this enclosure has no fan, but is one of the few eSATA enclosures that gets uniformly positive reviews, and it also has a power-on switch:
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817198003


This is the enclosure I ordered. I really don't think a fan is necessary. I have a similar no-fan Firewire 800 external enclosure that I've used with my Mac for the last 2 years, and it's only somewhat warm, nowhere near hot, after a continuous 6 hour backup operation.


----------



## Dssturbo1

Riverdome said:


> My apologies if this is OT but could I use an eSATA such as the link below? It's a two bay enclosure.
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816111020


river as BKdtv points out you could use it for 1 drive to your S3. it does not combine the two in a RAID setup.

that promo comes with 2 160gb drives. so you probably would want to put in at least one larger hard drive to really get alot more storage for HD with the S3.

you could use the second drive with a second S3  
or for your computer.


----------



## Dssturbo1

Carsten said:


> where u guys getting ur eSata to Sata cable??? I've looked all over town (bestbuy, compusa,circutcity, computer direct)??? HELP!


might not be easy to find locally here are a couple choices online.
http://www.satacables.com/html/sata...nal_cables.html
or this one gives better pics
http://www.satagear.com/eSATA-100_S...rnal_Cable.html


----------



## larrs

OK, this thread has taken off and has become hard to follow. Did we get definitve answers yet on whether, if you have3 already done an internal upgrade drive, one can go back to their orignial drive and then add on the e-Sata drive? I have the original drive put up in case I ever need it. Why not put it back in and then use the larger drive as an external? I cannot possibly see why this wouldn't work, but I would love someone's explaination why if the answer is "no".


----------



## greg_burns

larrs said:


> OK, this thread has taken off and has become hard to follow. Did we get definitve answers yet on whether, if you have3 already done an internal upgrade drive, one can go back to their orignial drive and then add on the e-Sata drive? I have the original drive put up in case I ever need it. Why not put it back in and then use the larger drive as an external? I cannot possibly see why this wouldn't work, but I would love someone's explaination why if the answer is "no".


Sure you can do that. That is what I did. You are going to loose all your recordings on the upgraded drive. You'll start with only whatever recordings you had when you last removed the original drive.

I would only be concerned if you added Cable Cards after installing the upgraded drive. Your original drive won't know about them and you may have to them reauthorized.


----------



## Fofer

So long as you're going to the trouble, why not just wait for the details to emerge on how to attach an external SATA drive to a TiVo that's already been upgraded? Then you could have the best of both worlds, and not lose any recordings (I'd imagine.)


----------



## morac

lcann44 said:


> It seems to record the same way it did when I had the cable dvr. It records on the drive that has the most space. How do I know this? Well, I returned the Seagate 500gb I purchased on Saturday today because of the loud noised coming from it. When I started the S3 up all of Sunday's recordings were gone. Now that's not to say that when a drive get's full part of a recording won't cross over.


Just a FYI, but your experience doesn't prove that the S3 is using the external drive exclusively. It may be striping the data across both drives.


----------



## rdrrepair

Still, no word from TiVoPony or Steve?


----------



## larrs

Fofer said:


> So long as you're going to the trouble, why not just wait for the details to emerge on how to attach an external SATA drive to a TiVo that's already been upgraded? Then you could have the best of both worlds, and not lose any recordings (I'd imagine.)


Sounds like a better plan, as I have 500 internal now and could add a 750 or 1TB drive to it. However, I do tend to keep that unit fairly empty right now as I record HD content exclusively. Everything in SD goes to the other SD Tivos I have.


----------



## lawilson2

wdave said:


> This is the enclosure I ordered. I really don't think a fan is necessary. I have a similar no-fan Firewire 800 external enclosure that I've used with my Mac for the last 2 years, and it's only somewhat warm, nowhere near hot, after a continuous 6 hour backup operation.


I thought a fan was not needed too, but then I thought about it. Under normal use, even moderate use, a drive SHOULD be ok in an aluminum case without a fan. However, the TiVo's drive(s) never stop spinning; it's always recording. Since that's the case, it's going to get WAY more use than even your computer's hard drive; even that slows down or stops depending on your power config.

So I came to the conclusion that to preserve this 750GB drive, a case with a fan is necessary, which is why I took back my 1st enclosure and paid the extra $10 for one with a fan. I hope that helps a bit.


----------



## lcann44

morac said:


> Just a FYI, but your experience doesn't prove that the S3 is using the external drive exclusively. It may be striping the data across both drives.


Well, I don't know how you come to conclusions but when we discussed this in other forums this is how we figured the SA 8300 worked. It appears to work the same way with this eSATA drive and why wouldn't it?

Your response may very well be true but the way you lay it out is kind of like, "I say so, so therefore it is." If you got some backing on this kindly bring it forward and I'll give your response more credence.


----------



## mattack

That's kind of a shame about the big scary warnings when the drive is removed.

I was hoping that the procedure would be better than the 'married' drive scheme. (That is, have separate filesystems on each drive.. and even if the Tivo had to copy to/from the internal/external drives in the background, that'd be better than this.)

At least that's what I inferred from megazone's original CES description that the recordings would disappear when you removed an external drive... not that you'd have to let it fsck the drive for hours.


----------



## gteague

lawilson2 said:


> I thought a fan was not needed too, but then I thought about it. Under normal use, even moderate use, a drive SHOULD be ok in an aluminum case without a fan. However, the TiVo's drive(s) never stop spinning; it's always recording. Since that's the case, it's going to get WAY more use than even your computer's hard drive; even that slows down or stops depending on your power config.
> 
> So I came to the conclusion that to preserve this 750GB drive, a case with a fan is necessary, which is why I took back my 1st enclosure and paid the extra $10 for one with a fan. I hope that helps a bit.


just got back from fry's. they didn't really have a good price/gb ratio on any of their external drives. they had the free agent 750gb for $310, but you can get that one for $250 elsewhere and i'm not sure that 'touch' switch on that model will allow it to power back up automatically. power probs are a given this time of year in west texas, so that is a concern.

i ended up with a nextstar3 enclosure which has the physical power switch and an activity light. and a 500gb maxtor drive that was onsale. i have the same drive in my mac and i know it to be fast and quiet. i figure this way i can always use the drive as an internal one on my mac if i later replace it with a 750gb for the tivo.

price was $60 + $130: just a little over $200 with tax.

i'll report back once i've put it together.

[later note: everything together and the coolblue light lights up. tight fit. power cable pretty short as is the esata cable.

and i guess i didn't realize this unit didn't have a fan. could be bad news. it is not all that cool in the room to begin with and inside my a/v rack is even warmer. so for now i've put the drive up on top so it can get the benfit of any breezes and i can walk over and hand check the temp.

i'm ready to test, but waiting for the riches to finish recording at 2200. no more recordings until 2300, so that's my window.]

** success **

i found that unplugging not necessary, you can do the menu reset if you're quick on the pause button.

i sort of regret not getting an enclosure with a fan, but i'm glad i got one with a bright activity light. so far the only activity has been when the drive was recognized.

/guy


----------



## morac

lcann44 said:


> Well, I don't know how you come to conclusions but when we discussed this in other forums this is how we figured the SA 8300 worked. It appears to work the same way with this eSATA drive and why wouldn't it?


I haven't come to any conclusion. I was just pointing out a logical fallacy in your statement that "It records on the drive that has the most space" because "all of Sunday's recordings were gone" when the drive was removed. Just because "all of Sunday's recordings were gone" does not necessarily mean that "It records on the drive that has the most space". It may or it may not, but one does not lead to the other. It could record only to the external drive or it might record to both drives.

Also how the SA 8300 works is irrelevant since it doesn't run the same software as TiVo.

As for why it might record to both drives? It would make it impossible to extract shows off the drives (assuming the encryption could be broken).


----------



## msu2k

For a 500GB drive, this seems like a great deal, and no need to mess with an enclosure. Does anyone see any negatives about this Seagate eSATA for $148.99 with free delivery? Seems like a great solution with minimum hassle and a great price.

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=202636811&adid=17662

Amazon.com has it for $156.43...

http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-ST3500601XS-RK-500GB-eSATA-External/dp/B000FOL7Q2


----------



## spike2k5

msu2k said:


> For a 500GB drive, this seems like a great deal, and no need to mess with an enclosure. Does anyone see any negatives about this Seagate eSATA for $148.99 with free delivery? Seems like a great solution with minimum hassle and a great price.
> 
> http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=202636811&adid=17662


Make sure it powers on by itself after power loss. Some drives require you to push a button to power on. Otherwise, your TiVo will be stuck at divorce screen.
Any one got this drive?


----------



## msu2k

spike2k5 said:


> Make sure it powers on by itself after power loss. Some drives require you to push a button to power on. Otherwise, your TiVo will be stuck at divorce screen.
> Any one got this drive?


Good question. It looks like a couple of other people on the Underground forums have ordered it but I don't know if they've received it yet. Reading on Amazon, it looks like it does have a fan, which is a plus, and it reportedly runs "flawlessly" on SA8300HD DVRs. So at least we know other DVR owners are using it with success.

Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr...........from an Amazon review... 



> The power switch automatically resets to the default "OFF" position when the mains power to the drive is cut. This switch must then be pressed (and held for a few seconds) when attempting to power the drive up again, and is successful only AFTER the computer has reached some (as yet to me unclear) point in bootup.


Sigh...


----------



## stluser

msu2k said:


> Good question. It looks like a couple of other people on the Underground forums have ordered it but I don't know if they've received it yet. Reading on Amazon, it looks like it does have a fan, which is a plus, and it reportedly runs "flawlessly" on SA8300HD DVRs. So at least we know other DVR owners are using it with success.
> 
> Grrrrrrrrrrrrrr...........from an Amazon review...
> 
> Sigh...


Hmmmm...just bought this drive yesterday and am waiting on shipment. Perhaps there is a way to keep the power button pressed all the time. Glue? tape?


----------



## sfhub

Re: ST3500601XS-RK

According to the review from Nov 9th, the power switch is less than ideal (sometimes there are different versions/revisions of the product, so take the comments with a grain of salt):
http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-ST3500601XS-RK-500GB-eSATA-External/dp/B000FOL7Q2


> The other negative is the power switch.
> 
> The power switch automatically resets to the default "OFF" position when the mains power to the drive is cut. This switch must then be pressed (and held for a few seconds) when attempting to power the drive up again, and is successful only AFTER the computer has reached some (as yet to me unclear) point in bootup.
> 
> This might seem minor. However, I have two computers that I use as one - controlled by a KVM switch. Between them they have 10 external hard drives variously connected (video, and photography). If I had to restart each of these drives when starting my system it would take a significant amount of time to simply get the drives spinning. The other nine start when power is restored, this one does not: it just sits there cold, dead, unnoticed.
> 
> I have never seen such a needless "feature."
> 
> Almost invariably I forget to turn the drive on until I need it, for it is used only for backup of in-process videos/images. By then, if I have stuck in a USB keydrive, the drive letter assignment has changed (XPP does not seem able to actually reserve the letter I assign to the eSATA drive if a new keydrive is inserted) so then have to go and change the drive letter assignments so that my batch files will work.
> 
> Frustrating and needless interruption of workflow!
> 
> The power switch should simply stay in whatever position the user leaves it in. This irritates me almost enough to give the drive THREE stars, but it is better than that.


----------



## keenanSR

spike2k5 said:


> Make sure it powers on by itself after power loss. Some drives require you to push a button to power on. Otherwise, your TiVo will be stuck at divorce screen.
> Any one got this drive?


I have it, it's ultra quiet, and doesn't seem to get too warm at all.

The power switch issue is something I'm going to look into though, if I can get the case open, I'm going to hardwire the power.

I just tried to open the case, and there is no visible means of doing so, it appears to be snapped together, and without knowing exactly how it's snapped together I'm afraid the case will break.

So I wouldn't recommend this model if auto-power-on after a power loss is a requirement. I'll probably just keep it, maybe crack it open and put in another case in the future, the thing sure is quiet though, I definitely like that about it. Or, get a new setup and use this for backup on my computer, something I've been needing to get anyways.


----------



## skweaz

spike2k5 said:


> Make sure it powers on by itself after power loss. Some drives require you to push a button to power on. Otherwise, your TiVo will be stuck at divorce screen.
> Any one got this drive?


I also have this drive. I agree with keenanSR, it is super quiet. I have it on a UPS right now so the power switch isn't that much of a concern and we rarely have extended power failures anyway.


----------



## Steve Richards

skweaz said:


> I also have this drive. I agree with keenanSR, it is super quiet. I have it on a UPS right now so the power switch isn't that much of a concern and we rarely have extended power failures anyway.


I also have this drive. Unfortunately I paid about $60 more than the Amazon price but it is very quiet, and the power switch is not a big deal if you have a UPS.

If it becomes a problem I will also look into hardwiring, but for now I think the UPS will be sufficient.

It took all of about 10 minutes to add the drive and get it up and running. Thanks to forum posters for the info !


----------



## lcann44

morac said:


> I haven't come to any conclusion. I was just pointing out a logical fallacy in your statement that "It records on the drive that has the most space" because "all of Sunday's recordings were gone" when the drive was removed. Just because "all of Sunday's recordings were gone" does not necessarily mean that "It records on the drive that has the most space". It may or it may not, but one does not lead to the other. It could record only to the external drive or it might record to both drives.
> 
> Also how the SA 8300 works is irrelevant since it doesn't run the same software as TiVo.
> 
> As for why it might record to both drives? It would make it impossible to extract shows off the drives (assuming the encryption could be broken).


Thanks for taking the time to expand upon your thought. You offer some good arguments and you may be correct.

I however still feel it records on the drive with the most space. I will grant that I could be wrong in this theory.


----------



## lcann44

spike2k5 said:


> Make sure it powers on by itself after power loss. Some drives require you to push a button to power on. Otherwise, your TiVo will be stuck at divorce screen.
> Any one got this drive?


Just an FYI being a brave and sometimes stupid individual I decided to see what happens when you turn the drive off with the switch in the back. It takes a couple of seconds but TiVo reboots. I turned the drive back on and it went through the normal reboot process.

Of course if I hadn't turned the eSATA drive back on I would have gotten the divorce screen. I think it's a good idea to use a UPS just for this situation.


----------



## ingenue007

i think you guys are worrying about the HD temp too much. i had a computer where i ran RAID 0, stacked a couple of other HDs around it and ran it for 24/7 for 5+ years. there were no fans around the HDs and everything was caked in dust. never had a HD failure...


----------



## ah30k

ingenue007 said:


> i think you guys are worrying about the HD temp too much. i had a computer where i ran RAID 0, stacked a couple of other HDs around it and ran it for 24/7 for 5+ years. there were no fans around the HDs and everything was caked in dust. never had a HD failure...


I hope this is true. I have a raid chassis in my old pc (now used as a file server) that stacks three hard disks in what was originally spaced for two. They are stacked so close that there is very little room for air flow around them. It gets pretty hot. So far they have not failed, but I get worried once in a while.

Something like this
http://cgi.ebay.com/Promise-SuperSw...7QQihZ004QQcategoryZ11209QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem


----------



## Bighouse

rdrrepair said:


> Still, no word from TiVoPony or Steve?


Yeah....that's what I'm REALLY waiting for. Or something on Tivo.com...


----------



## Globular

I don't suppose anyone has tried this with a USB external drive? On an S2 TiVo?


----------



## larrs

ingenue007 said:


> i think you guys are worrying about the HD temp too much. i had a computer where i ran RAID 0, stacked a couple of other HDs around it and ran it for 24/7 for 5+ years. there were no fans around the HDs and everything was caked in dust. never had a HD failure...


 But, those didn't do seeks and writes 24/7 like the Tivo drives.


----------



## NJChris

Bighouse said:


> Yeah....that's what I'm REALLY waiting for. Or something on Tivo.com...


I would really HOPE that pony or someone would post not to do this if they were planning to take it down. People are spending money on external drives. If they let people do that and didn't say "wait, we might be removing that", I think they would probably anger a lot of their customers, which could hurt future loyalty.


----------



## lcann44

I don't for one minute at this point think TiVo is going to pull the plug on this. First, it's use is permited in the agreement they made with CableLabs on 4/20/07(see thread on page 1). Second as NJChris pointed out this has been going on since Saturday and it's not only in this forum, it's in the AVS forum, and engadget and probably a whole bunch of other places. TiVo would have said something by now. The only reason TiVo would have to pull the plug is if it was not allowed by CableLabs.

I know some of you will think this is really far fetched but sometimes I think TiVo likes to keep things kind of a secret but it's ok if you find out. It's kind of like the "hidden track" on a CD. Think of all the codes there are out there for TiVo. They are like a bunch of easter eggs. It wouldn't surprise me at all if TiVo saw this in that manner.

Also about the heat thing on the External Hard Drives. Having a Maxtor Quickview on my old SA 8300 I can tell you that they can get pretty warm in the enclosures and it's not a bad idea to have a fan but if you have a house with AC I don't see any reason to worry. They really don't design the enclosures with the idea that they want to kill your hard drive.


----------



## bkdtv

Globular said:


> I don't suppose anyone has tried this with a USB external drive? On an S2 TiVo?


No, USB drives are not supported.


----------



## tedler

Yawn... Wake me when I can *stream* any video from my PC to the S3 (not copy & play).


----------



## slimoli

Pony is back, he posted in another thread but so far no comments on the e-Sata deal.

Pony, where are you? I'm waiting for your endorsement to pull the trigger and get a 500GB disk.

Sergio


----------



## jagz27

tedler said:


> Yawn... Wake me when I can *stream* any video from my PC to the S3 (not copy & play).


i think most of us would even settle for copy and play at this point... i know i would...


----------



## A J Ricaud

msu2k said:


> For a 500GB drive, this seems like a great deal, and no need to mess with an enclosure. Does anyone see any negatives about this Seagate eSATA for $148.99 with free delivery? Seems like a great solution with minimum hassle and a great price.
> 
> http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=202636811&adid=17662
> 
> Amazon.com has it for $156.43...
> 
> http://www.amazon.com/Seagate-ST3500601XS-RK-500GB-eSATA-External/dp/B000FOL7Q2


One possible drawback is that it has only a 1 yr. warranty.
Mwave.com has it for $151. They are a good source for computer products.


----------



## TerpBE

Anybody know if this one would work?

http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=203268361&adid=17653&dcaid=17653


----------



## blacknoi

TerpBE said:


> Anybody know if this one would work?
> 
> http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=203268361&adid=17653&dcaid=17653


I bought this unit for my mom for her Scientific Atlanta 8300HD box.

Not sure if the tivo will like it, but purely on specs, it should.

I can tell you it has a REAL hard-on/off switch, so in a power outage, it powers back up itself automatically.

It also has a cooling fan that you can choose to be on or off (I guess if its too loud for you, turn it off, at the expense of losing the cooler operating temp).


----------



## mikeyts

slimoli said:


> Pony is back, he posted in another thread but so far no comments on the e-Sata deal.
> 
> Pony, where are you? I'm waiting for your endorsement to pull the trigger and get a 500GB disk.
> 
> Sergio


Poniatowski can't comment on this. They need to maintain plausible deniability for CableLabs .


----------



## NJChris

TerpBE said:


> Anybody know if this one would work?
> 
> http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=203268361&adid=17653&dcaid=17653


 I ordered that one also and should be getting it shortly. I don't see a reason why it wouldn't work. I liked the price.  It's possible I may need to open it to fix a jumper to enable SATA II (3gb speed). Is the Tivo port SATA II or I?


----------



## kylen

NJChris said:


> I ordered that one also and should be getting it shortly. I don't see a reason why it wouldn't work. I liked the price.  It's possible I may need to open it to fix a jumper to enable SATA II (3gb speed). Is the Tivo port SATA II or I?


I also ordered this drive--do I need to remove the NTFS partition before trying this upgrade?


----------



## lcann44

NJChris said:


> I Is the Tivo port SATA II or I?


SATA II.


----------



## msu2k

TerpBE said:


> Anybody know if this one would work?
> 
> http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=203268361&adid=17653&dcaid=17653


I ordered one of these as well. Love the price. If it turns out it won't work the S3, back to newegg it goes.



NJChris said:


> I ordered that one also and should be getting it shortly. I don't see a reason why it wouldn't work. I liked the price.  It's possible I may need to open it to fix a jumper to enable SATA II (3gb speed). Is the Tivo port SATA II or I?


Chris, if you do end up having to open it up to change a jumper, please post info. here. I'm hoping this just works right out of the box.


----------



## TerpBE

NJChris said:


> I ordered that one also and should be getting it shortly. I don't see a reason why it wouldn't work. I liked the price.


Could you keep us updated on how it works out?


----------



## 1283

NJChris said:


> It's possible I may need to open it to fix a jumper to enable SATA II (3gb speed). Is the Tivo port SATA II or I?


SATA II is a functionality spec, not speed. Unless I have missed the discussion on TiVo's SATA speed, I think it's only 1.5Gb, not 3Gb.


----------



## mikeyts

c3 said:


> SATA II is a functionality spec, not speed. Unless I have missed the discussion on TiVo's SATA speed, I think it's only 1.5Gb, not 3Gb.


And it can't possibly ever come close to needing any more than a minor fraction of that. Recording two 19 Mbps streams while playing back a third is moving data around at a palty 57 Mbps.


----------



## bkdtv

mikeyts said:


> And it can't possibly ever come close to needing any more than a minor fraction of that. Recording two 19 Mbps streams while playing back a third is moving data around at a palty 57 Mbps.


It's not clear to me what impact fast forward and rewind (say, at 60x) has on required throughput. The throughput required to record two different high-definition shows doesn't account for program searches, etc. We've all heard the disk mashing that occurs when you do Search by title, so the disk has to be able to maintain its throughput during those reads.

A drive's burst transfer rate would presumably have some impact on guide and search responsiveness. Have we confirmed yet whether the the Series3 continues to store all guide and indexing information on the internal drive? Or does that information get split between the internal and external drives after awhile?


----------



## spike2k5

bkdtv said:


> It's also not clear to me impact fast forward and rewind (say, at 60x) has on required throughput. The throughput required to record two different high-definition shows doesn't account for program searches, etc. We've all heard the disk mashing that occurs when you do Search by title.
> 
> A drive's burst transfer rate would presumably have some impact on guide and search responsiveness. Have we confirmed yet whether the the Series3 continues to store all guide and indexing information on the internal drive? Or does that information get split between the internal and external drives after awhile?


Guide and indexing will always stay on the internal drive.
eSATA drive will just have recordings and house keeping stuff for the recordings.


----------



## 1283

Today's 7200rpm drive can sustain about 70MB/s with sequential access. That's about half of what a 1.5Gbps (150MB/s) interface can handle. With random access, most of the time is spent on seeking, so the transfer rate drops way down. Limitation is on the hard drive, not on the interface.


----------



## rdrrepair

They made it a sticky now. Maybe they will release it as supported soon.


----------



## greg_burns

rdrrepair said:


> They made it a sticky now. Maybe they will release it as supported soon.


This site is not owned nor run by Tivo.


----------



## rdrrepair

greg_burns said:


> This site is not owned nor run by Tivo.


yeah, I know. I think they are trying to get the other threads to die down and lump it into one posting.

It sure looks like a feeding frenzy, can't wait for the Pony to fall in. :up: He might be afraid we'll chew him up.


----------



## morac

lcann44 said:


> I think it's a good idea to use a UPS just for this situation.


A UPS is a good idea, but it isn't fool proof. If you have a prolonged power outage you'll still run into a problem if the external HD doesn't power itself on.


----------



## lcann44

morac said:


> A UPS is a good idea, but it isn't fool proof. If you have a prolonged power outage you'll still run into a problem if the external HD doesn't power itself on.


Mine pretty much is. I forgot to mention I have a natural gas generator as well.


----------



## JoJetSki

keenanSR said:


> I have it, it's ultra quiet, and doesn't seem to get too warm at all.
> 
> The power switch issue is something I'm going to look into though, if I can get the case open, I'm going to hardwire the power.
> 
> I just tried to open the case, and there is no visible means of doing so, it appears to be snapped together, and without knowing exactly how it's snapped together I'm afraid the case will break.
> 
> So I wouldn't recommend this model if auto-power-on after a power loss is a requirement. I'll probably just keep it, maybe crack it open and put in another case in the future, the thing sure is quiet though, I definitely like that about it. Or, get a new setup and use this for backup on my computer, something I've been needing to get anyways.


Most manufactureres hide the screw holes under the rubber feet.


----------



## yunlin12

Been seeing people saying that external eSATA can be used with a RAID to provide fault tolerance, but the whole setup is still limited by the risk of the internal drive dying.

There were also reports that people have been using RAID connected to the SATA port on the motherboard in the S3, although one has to leave the case off to do this.

Question is can the S3 still work, with a RAID containing the Tivo software hooked up to the external eSATA port byitself, without a HDD connected to the SATA port on the motherboard.

If yes, this would seem to be ideal to provide fault tolerance without having to leave the S3 case off all the time.


----------



## rainwater

morac said:


> A UPS is a good idea, but it isn't fool proof. If you have a prolonged power outage you'll still run into a problem if the external HD doesn't power itself on.


Of course if you have a prolonged outage you will probably be missing recordings anyways (unless its a very localized outage). My UPS will run my TiVo for about an hour and 20 minutes. If I have a outage longer than that, then lost recordings are the least of my concerns.


----------



## rainwater

yunlin12 said:


> Been seeing people saying that external eSATA can be used with a RAID to provide fault tolerance, but the whole setup is still limited by the risk of the internal drive dying.


With the size of the video files that will be stored on the external drive, I really don't see the point of a raid system. That seems like overkill when you can only max out at 1TB atm.


----------



## greg_burns

rainwater said:


> With the size of the video files that will be stored on the external drive, I really don't see the point of a raid system. That seems like overkill when you can only max out at 1TB atm.


ACK

But for those interested, I just tested my CoolGear SataVault (aka Sans Digital MS2UT). Works fine. Has two fans and metal case (better cooling). And a hard on/off switch.


----------



## sfhub

dt_dc said:


> BTW, I find it interesting that this 'hack' magically surfaced right after CableLabs released their revised license agreement which allows for external drives ... me-thinks someone from Tivo dropped the dime themselves.


From what I've seen posted, there were references to kickstart 62 and esata way back in february but apparently nobody bothered to try it out (or if they did, they didn't post the results)

spike2k5 has said that the posting of the CableLABs new guidelines did influence when he decided to post information about the success, however the 8.1 code has been out there for a while and the kickstart 62 was posted about back in February, so theoretically someone could have tried it back then and had success.


----------



## sfhub

yunlin12 said:


> Been seeing people saying that external eSATA can be used with a RAID to provide fault tolerance, but the whole setup is still limited by the risk of the internal drive dying.


It roughly gives you stability of a 2-drive system even though you have a 5 drive system, 1 internal + 4 RAID5.

I think TiVo should consider fixing the 1TiB volume limitation and shipping S3s with 1GB flashdisks. End-user then justs adds whatever size external disk they want, RAID or not.


----------



## keenanSR

JoJetSki said:


> Most manufactureres hide the screw holes under the rubber feet.


Yes, and some put them under a label, but this drive no externally accessible screws. As far as I can tell, there might be a release latch located inside the case to release the four connection points, but if it's there I can't see it.


----------



## spike2k5

yunlin12 said:


> Question is can the S3 still work, with a RAID containing the Tivo software hooked up to the external eSATA port byitself, without a HDD connected to the SATA port on the motherboard.
> If yes, this would seem to be ideal to provide fault tolerance without having to leave the S3 case off all the time.


Unfortunately, Tivo software is hard coded to start from the internal hdd, so it's not possible on unmodified system.


----------



## sfhub

I tested the following eSATA/USB2 enclosure with Seagate 7200.9 ST3500641AS 500GB SATA drive and it works fine. It comes with eSATA and USB cables.



Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]     [u]Bridge chip?[/u]     [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]
Adaptec          ACS-300             No        Yes              Yes

If you've upgraded your Series3, and what you used isn't listed here, please post
or pm what you used.


----------



## kylen

sfhub said:


> I tested the following eSATA/USB2 enclosure with Seagate 7200.9 ST3500641AS 500GB SATA drive and it works fine. It comes with eSATA and USB cables.


How do I know if my cable is eSATA or SATA--it came with my Cavalry eSATA drive and the connectors fit--is it safe to assume it is an eSATA cable? (I'm not seeing the second drive messages while following the procedure--so didn't know if this could be the cause)

-Kyle


----------



## sfhub

kylen said:


> it came with my Cavalry eSATA drive and the connectors fit--is it safe to assume it is an eSATA cable?


The SATA cables (ie internal SATA cables) and eSATA cables (ie external SATA cables) have different connectors. If they fit in the S3 external storage receptacle, then you have the right cable.


----------



## alee

greg_burns said:


> But for those interested, I just tested my CoolGear SataVault (aka Sans Digital MS2UT). Works fine. Has two fans and metal case (better cooling). And a hard on/off switch.


How noisy do you think it'll be sitting in a ventilated media center?


----------



## Jack D

hiker said:


> I haven't tried a eSATA drive yet but try making sure your S3 remote to set to IR ID 0. Press and hold the PAUSE and TiVo buttons simultaneously until the red light at the end of the remote control comes on, remains steady, and then stays on when you release the buttons. Then press 0 and the red light should blink 3 times. Then try the eSATA procedure again.


Dude I don't know you but I LOVE YOU!!! 

I was too lazy to do what you suggested but you got me to thinking about the remote. I normally don't use the TIVO remote. I use a Harmony 890. So I tried the process using the Harmony and it worked!

I think you must have been on to something that probably the TIVO remote is not set to IR ID 0. I don't know why that would be as I didn't do anything consciously to change it and I assume that is the default setting. The only other thing I can think is that somehow having the Harmony hooked up (I control the TIVO via an RF extender) interfered with the TIVO remote (although basic functions can be controlled just fine with the TIVO remote).

In any case, muchas gracias amigo. Good call. :up:

Just for the record, I have FW 8.3 and to remind all I am using the Seagate FreeAgentPro 750gb drive.


----------



## greg_burns

alee said:


> How noisy do you think it'll be sitting in a ventilated media center?


Noisy. Mine is behind glass and it bugs me. In fact, using either my Thecus or the SataVault is so distracting I am probably not going to use either long term. 

Having two drives isn't helping with the sound level obviously.


----------



## greg_burns

Jack D said:


> I think you must have been on to something that probably the TIVO remote is not set to IR ID 0.


My Tivo remote is not currently set to IR ID 0 and seems to work with Kickstart.


----------



## bkdtv

Jack D said:


> Just for the record, I have FW 8.3 and to remind all I am using the Seagate FreeAgentPro 750gb drive.


Does this unit have a fan?



sfhub said:


> I tested the following eSATA/USB2 enclosure with Seagate 7200.9 ST3500641AS 500GB SATA drive and it works fine. It comes with eSATA and USB cables.


Thanks sfhub. First post updated. Here's the current list for those that haven't checked the first post recently:

What eSATA solutions (drive+enclosure) are confirmed to work?


Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]  [u]Capacity     [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]       [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]
Apricorn         EZ Bus DTS        250-750Gb        Yes         No
Cavalry          CAXM37500         500Gb            Yes         Yes
Seagate          ST3500601XS-RK    500Gb            No          No
Seagate          Free Agent        250-500Gb        No          No
Seagate          Free Agent Pro    320-750Gb        No          No
Western Digital  WD5000F032        500GB            No          Yes

What eSATA enclosures are confirmed to work with a user-supplied SATA drive?


Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]     [u]Bridge chip?[/u]     [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]
Adaptec          ACS-300             No        Yes              Yes
Apricorn         EZ Bus DTS          Yes       Yes              No
CoolGear         SataVault           Yes(2)    Yes              Yes
Icy Dock         MB559               No        Yes              Yes
Kingwin          JT-35EU             Yes       Yes              No
Sans Digital     MS2UT               Yes(2)    Yes              Yes
Thecus           N2050               Yes       Yes              No
Vantec           NexStar3            No        Yes              Yes

If you're using something else, please send me a private message.


----------



## keenanSR

[*] *What eSATA solutions (drive+enclosure) are confirmed to work?*


Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]  [u]Capacity     [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]       [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]

Seagate          ST3500601XS-RK    500Gb            No          No

Confirmed no fan and no hard power switch


----------



## demon

Success! I've upgraded my TiVo Series3 with a WD MyBook Premium ES 500 GB drive. Unfortunately my patience initially wasn't good enough, and I think it would've worked if I had just waited; after a few tries, I unplugged the drive, plugged it back in, and turned the TiVo back on with the eSATA drive powered off. After that, then doing a "kickstart 6 2", it hesitated for a moment, and then told me my new drive was activated. Consider this another recommendation to anyone who hasn't already tried it - it's well worth it.



Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]  [u]Capacity     [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]       [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]

Western Digital  WD5000F032        500GB            No          Yes


----------



## Rob Helmerichs

[*] *What eSATA solutions (drive+enclosure) are confirmed to work?*


Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]  [u]Capacity     [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]       [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]

Cavalry          CAXM37500         500Gb            Yes         Yes

...I haven't tested what happens when you pull the plug and start it up again, but the on/off button clicks in when it's on and out when it's off.


----------



## kylen

demon said:


> after a few tries, I unplugged the drive, plugged it back in, and turned the TiVo back on with the eSATA drive powered off. After that, then doing a "kickstart 6 2", it hesitated for a moment, and then told me my new drive was activated. Consider this another recommendation to anyone who hasn't already tried it - it's well worth it.


Are you saying you got this to work with the drive OFF?


----------



## demon

kylen said:


> Are you saying you got this to work with the drive OFF?


No, the drive automatically powered itself on when the TiVo was powered on. I didn't fully understand that from the drive's documentation (and it claimed it wouldn't automatically power on via eSATA - it did though).


----------



## Jack D

bkdtv said:


> Does this unit have a fan?


No fan.


----------



## Jack D

greg_burns said:


> My Tivo remote is not currently set to IR ID 0 and seems to work with Kickstart.


Hmm. well maybe it had something to do with my Harmony remote?


----------



## msu2k

Rob Helmerichs said:


> [*] *What eSATA solutions (drive+enclosure) are confirmed to work?*
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> [b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]  [u]Capacity     [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]       [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]
> 
> Cavalry          CAXM37500         500Gb            Yes         Yes
> 
> ...I haven't tested what happens when you pull the plug and start it up again, but the on/off button clicks in when it's on and out when it's off.


Rob, I have that same Cavalry drive on order. Very happy to see it works. Did it work right out of the box or did you have to format it or something?


----------



## Mikial007

I was tring to set up a Free Agent Pro 750, and could not get the drive recognized. After playing with cables and repeating the setup proceedure about 10 times, I was ready to give up entirely.

On a whim, I replaced the remote batteries with new ones. 

With new batteries, the TiVo recognized the drive first time around. May be coincidence, but may be worth a try to those having difficulties.


----------



## wdave

bkdtv said:


> What eSATA enclosures are confirmed to work with a user-supplied SATA drive?





Code:


[b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]     [u]Bridge chip?[/u]     [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]
ICY DOCK         MB559               No        Yes              Yes

Worked great. Easy to install the drive on the sled. Solid and well built. It's this one from newegg:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16817198003


----------



## tase2

Not being a computer whiz, I have a question of which I think I know the answer, but want to be sure.

Say I have a 750Gb upgrade internal drive from one of the upgrade companies.
And say I have a new S3 on the way.
This particular drive has months worth of recording on it already.

Is there anyway to make this work as a eSATA drive?

Actually it sound pretty dumb now that I have reread my question, but what the heck.


----------



## rjom

Rob Helmerichs said:


> [*] *What eSATA solutions (drive+enclosure) are confirmed to work?*
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> [b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]  [u]Capacity     [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]       [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]
> 
> Cavalry          CAXM37500         500Gb            Yes         Yes
> 
> ...I haven't tested what happens when you pull the plug and start it up again, but the on/off button clicks in when it's on and out when it's off.


Bought this off Buy.com, but had trouble getting the "Rebate Request #" required for the rebate from the Calvary site. Anyone else have this problem? Also, would be interested to know if people had to open up to change jumper...Saw this problem on reviews on various sites. Glad to know about this potential problem. Thanks. RJOM


----------



## Jack D

tase2 said:


> Not being a computer whiz, I have a question of which I think I know the answer, but want to be sure.
> 
> Say I have a 750Gb upgrade internal drive from one of the upgrade companies.
> And say I have a new S3 on the way.
> This particular drive has months worth of recording on it already.
> 
> Is there anyway to make this work as a eSATA drive?
> 
> Actually it sound pretty dumb now that I have reread my question, but what the heck.


You can make it work as an eSata drvie but you can't save the data that is already on there because the TIVO deletes the basic disc partition on the eSata drive in the process of activating it.


----------



## arno

Mikial007 said:


> On a whim, I replaced the remote batteries with new ones.
> 
> With new batteries, the TiVo recognized the drive first time around. May be coincidence, but may be worth a try to those having difficulties.


 When I first saw the procedure to add an ESATA the first thing that
came to mind was I'd better be sure the remote has new batteries. My
500gb seagate is coming today, the remote is waiting with fresh
batteries installed.

a'


----------



## moxie1617

alee said:


> How noisy do you think it'll be sitting in a ventilated media center?


From a review at the newgg.com site re the Sans Digital MS2UT.

Cons: Fan is too noisy for placement near entertainment area--it makes dialog hard to hear for us middle-aged boomers. 
Other Thoughts: I bought this to use as an external hard drive with the SA8300 DVR. Setup was easy with the included eSATA cable. The SA8300 DVR sees this RAID array as one drive, which is as it should be. However, I set this up near the bedroom TV, and it's too noisy for this application. I'll have to find alternate cooling, or move it out of the room


----------



## cwoody222

I'm not sure I need this but if it's easy and cheap, what the heck.

What I REALLY need is more space on my PC (iMac). Could I connect the eSATA to the TiVo and - simultaneously - to my computer via USB to solve both my needs?


----------



## demon

cwoody222 said:


> I'm not sure I need this but if it's easy and cheap, what the heck.
> 
> What I REALLY need is more space on my PC (iMac). Could I connect the eSATA to the TiVo and - simultaneously - to my computer via USB to solve both my needs?


The controllers in most enclosures will only work with one interface at a time. That said, even if it did work, you couldn't do that - the TiVo puts on a Mac partition table and makes an MFS partition covering the whole disk, so you can't just split the drive up. (Even if you could, the performance would probably be pretty terrible.)

Maybe just get a smaller drive for the TiVo, and use the remaining money to get a separate drive for your Mac?


----------



## Bighouse

Has anyone gotten ahold of and tried the Antec MX-1 enclosure yet?

I want a TCF user review!


----------



## lcann44

I know this isn't a heck of a lot to go on but I believe we do have an acknowledgement from TiVoPony that they are aware of the eSATA situation. Take a look here and you see him mention it.

I have of course tried to see if I can't pull more info out. I'll probably not get a response but at least it was worth a try.


----------



## bkdtv

Could someone state the capacity reported on the Tivo's system information screen with 250Gb, 500Gb, 750Gb, and 1Gb eSATA drives?

The FAQ currently lists minimum (i.e. worst case) recording times based on full ATSC bitrates, but the Tivo number is meant to be an indicator of real world use with a variety of content.


----------



## rdrrepair

Here's a question. What happens to the show that was watched and then deleted? When you remove the Esata, is the deleted program still showing up on the original drive in the garbage can as a recently deleted item? Can it be retrieved then?

I would think no, but, I don't have it so I can't try it.


----------



## Dajad

Thanks for all the info bkdtv.

I have a suggestion for the FAQ. Rather than the column saying whether it has a power on/off switch, can you add a column that indicates if the unit will turn itself on automatically after a power failure. That is the relevant question isn't it? We don't want an eSata that isn't turned on after a power failure ends. I don't think the on/off switch question gives the needed info. For example, a unit that doesn't have an on/off switch may very well boot up as soon as it gets power again - or it might not. And, it may be that a unit with a power switch will switch off even if the switch is on after a power failure. Or am I missing something?

Like many others, I'm waiting for official TiVo comment before I do this. I don't want a software "upgrade" to knock out potentially more than a hundred hours of recordings in a couple months.

FOR THE CANADIANS OUT THERE:

I'm finding a number of the discussed eSata drives discussed in this thread can be found through the PriceCanada.com website for some decent prices:

http://www.pricecanada.com/

Also TigerDirect.ca has some of them.

Unfortunately virtually every U.S. retailer discussed in this thread doesn't ship to Canada and the major big box stores in Canada (Future Shop and Best Buy) don't carry ANY eSATA drives.

Thanks to all involved with this. I'm quite keen on expanding my S3 - now if only TiVo would provide me with the ATSC guide data that my Buffalo friends just 50 miles away already have!! 

...Dale


----------



## greg_burns

bkdtv said:


> Could someone state the capacity reported on the Tivo's system information screen with 250Gb, 500Gb, 750Gb, and 1Gb eSATA drives?


stock = 32 hrs
add 250GB = 65 hrs (educated guess)
add 500GB = 98 hrs
add 750GB = 131 hrs
add 800GB = 138 hrs
add 1TB = 165 hrs


----------



## Bighouse

Dajad said:


> ....
> 
> Unfortunately virtually every U.S. retailer discussed in this thread doesn't ship to Canada and the major big box stores in Canada (Future Shop and Best Buy) don't carry ANY eSATA drives.
> 
> ...Dale


Yeah, well at least you aren't surrounded by gun-toters...


----------



## jwehman

greg_burns said:


> stock = 32 hrs
> add 250GB = 65 hrs (educated guess)
> add 500GB = 98 hrs
> add 750GB = 131 hrs
> add 800GB = 138 hrs
> add 1TB = 165 hrs


750GB internal + 750GB E-sata (1.5TB total) = 198HD hours, as reported by the S3 information screen.


----------



## Fofer

jwehman said:


> 750GB internal + 750GB E-sata (1.5TB total) = 198HD hours, as reported by the S3 information screen.


Can you elaborate please on the method you used to attach a E-SATA drive to a S3 with an already upgraded hard drive?


----------



## greg_burns

Fofer said:


> Can you elaborate please on the method you used to attach a E-SATA drive to a S3 with an already upgraded hard drive?


Do tell.


----------



## blacknoi

I'm really hoping that once this goes "official" by Tivo, that it will just take us to 

1) plug in the external drive and power it on
2) power cycle our S3's


And when the S3 comes back up, it'll auto-detect the drive.... None of this kickstart my heart jazz (man).


----------



## jwehman

Fofer said:


> Can you elaborate please on the method you used to attach a E-SATA drive to a S3 with an already upgraded hard drive?


Not without permission from the orginator of the method. It has been discussed around here several times that there are ways to do it, and there are.


----------



## ingenue007

confirmed to work. just did it during lunch:

SAMSUNG SpinPoint T Series HD501LJ 500GB 7200 RPM SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
AZiO ENC311SU41 3.5" eSATA + USB 2.0 External Enclosure - Retail


----------



## hddude55

jwehman said:


> Not without permission from the orginator of the method. It has been discussed around here several times that there are ways to do it, and there are.


 Does the person have a patent on the technique? This is supposed to be a forum where we share information -- as well as to brag about how clever we are. Help the poor guy out.


----------



## bsather

hddude55 said:


> Does the person have a patent on the technique? This is supposed to be a forum where we share information. Help the poor guy out.


Everybody relax....it's being tested. Do you want it right now....or right?


----------



## mikeyts

I added a 300GB eSATA and got a System Information estimate of "Variable, up to 71 HD hours or 673 SD hours.". That would seem to assume an average HD bit rate of 17.21 Mbps.


lcann44 said:


> I know this isn't a heck of a lot to go on but I believe we do have an acknowledgement from TiVoPony that they are aware of the eSATA situation. Take a look here and you see him mention it.
> 
> I have of course tried to see if I can't pull more info out. I'll probably not get a response but at least it was worth a try.


He didn't actually "mention" it; he just responded to a reference to it.

I've been told by a friend who works at TiVo (on the dread advertising features) that, while they are forbidden to post here unless requested to do so by the company, they are all strongly encouraged to read these forums. There's no way that they didn't know what was going on.


----------



## jwehman

hddude55 said:


> Does the person have a patent on the technique? This is supposed to be a forum where we share information -- as well as to brag about how clever we are. Help the poor guy out.


Just read this original post here: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=350491

and particularly method #2.


----------



## mikeyts

blacknoi said:


> And when the S3 comes back up, it'll auto-detect the drive.... None of this kickstart my heart jazz (man).


If the drive is powered up, the S3 does detect it when it reboots. I wish it would handle the drive being powered down more elegantly. The SA8300HD running SARA simply removes the files on the external drive from its equivalent of the "Now Playing" list; when the drive is seen again at boot, the recordings are returned to the list.


----------



## sommerfeld

blacknoi said:


> I'm really hoping that once this goes "official" by Tivo, that it will just take us to
> 
> 1) plug in the external drive and power it on
> 2) power cycle our S3's


Bah. Requiring a power cycle to notice new hardware is so 90's.

Fortunately, tivo handles hotplug and hotunplug of usb network adapters so there's at least some evidence that they have a clue about such matters..

I have at least some hope they'll handle hot insertion of ESATA. Unplug is another matter, though (would be nice if the OS and UI didn't crash when you did that, though I would expect it to mess up recordings or playback in progress).


----------



## sfhub

bkdtv said:


> [*] *What happens when I disconnect the eSATA drive?*
> 
> When you disconnect or power off the eSATA drive, while the Series3 is on, you lose the ability to view recordings made since the drive was connected, but you can still view recordings made before the drive was connected.
> 
> If the eSATA drive is off when you power up the Series3, the Tivo will give you two options. You can 1) reboot and reattach the drive *or* 2) switch the Series3 back to "single-drive mode" which deletes the recordings made since the drive was added.
> 
> *If you decide to switch to single-drive mode -- by pressing Thumbs Down three times --- the Series3 will delete the recordings made since the drive was connected. Recordings made before the drive was connected are still available.*
> ...
> 
> [*] *Can I swap eSATA drives to add even more capacity?*
> 
> No. The external eSATA drive is "married" to the Tivo's internal hard drive. You can "divorce" an eSATA drive -- to replace it with another --- as per the instructions in #12, *but then you lose access to the recordings made since that eSATA drive was connected.*


I don't think it is necessarily true that if you divorce the esata drive the recordings made after the esata drive was married will be lost. However I do think it is not easily predictable which drive a show ends up being recorded on.

I performed the following experiment:
1) married 500GB esata to 250GB drive A
2) performed clear and delete everything + initial setup (BTW married esata drives survive clear and delete everything)
3) recorded 2 shows simultaneously to exercise both tuners (I noticed the red light indicating writes on the esata enclosure was hardly blinking at all)
4) played back both shows
5) rebooted with esata turned off
6) divorced esata
7) brought up now playing and saw both shows were visible and playable

Given what I saw, I think whether a show is visible or not depends more on where the S3 decided to record than on whether it was recorded before or after the marriage.

Possible caveats:
I was recording using the analog tuner at highest quality so I didn't test the behavior for non-zero CCI flags on copy-protected digital recordings.

I only recorded 5 minute segments. Longer recordings might behave differently but I think that is unlikely.

I also cannot verify the theory that the shows are split in some manner between the esata drive and the internal drive, as it appears for my case, everything was recorded on the internal drive. The behavior might or might not be different if the S3 had chosen to record on the esata drive, but since my recordings didn't happen to get placed on the esata drive I can make no comment on that.

Also please don't confuse my results as disputing earlier results regarding shows recorded on the *esata* drive and what happens after divorce and remarriage. In that case the earlier results indicated that the shows on the esata drive are lost and nothing I've written disputes that.


----------



## pinballfan

Can anyone confirm if the Free Agent Pro has to be manually powered on after a power outage? 

It seems to be the cheapest option out there (at least at 750gb), but I'd really like something that would come back on automatically after a power failure.


----------



## hddude55

mikeyts said:


> I added a 300GB eSATA and got a System Information estimate of "Variable, up to 71 HD hours or 673 SD hours.". That would seem to assume an average HD bit rate of 17.21 Mbps.
> He didn't actually "mention" it; he just responded to a reference to it.
> 
> I've been told by a friend who works at TiVo (on the dread advertising features) that, while they are forbidden to post here unless requested to do so by the company, they are all strongly encouraged to read these forums. There's no way that they didn't know what was going on.


I would be shocked if TiVo didn't carefully monitor this forum since they direct people to it from their support pages. That's what makes this fear about TiVo suddenly slamming the door on the eSATA "hack" seem absurd. Obviously TiVo is well aware of the hundreds of people who are adding eSATA drives. It would be unconscionable for them to sit mute and then slam the door weeks later, when this is happening on a forum they have endorsed. I do realize this forum isn't owned or controlled by TiVo, but as long as they direct customers to it on their support pages, they certainly should feel some responsibility to protect their customers if something like this eSATA issue is going to cause big headaches for hundreds of customers later. I am taking their silence as an "endorsement" of what's happening.


----------



## bkdtv

sfhub said:


> Also please don't confuse my results as disputing earlier results regarding shows recorded on the *esata* drive and what happens after divorce and remarriage. In that case the earlier results indicated that the shows on the esata drive are lost and nothing I've written disputes that.


Thanks. Based on your tests, it sounds like the Series3 decides randomly whether to record new content to the internet or external drive. I'll update the FAQ to reflect that.


----------



## Adam1115

hddude55 said:


> Does the person have a patent on the technique? This is supposed to be a forum where we share information -- as well as to brag about how clever we are. Help the poor guy out.


THIS forum tends to house a number of people who complain (loudly) when it isn't a neatly packaged solution or one that THEY can't figure out.

The OTHER forum is a forum where information is shared, and people read and learn and figure things out for themselves.

I think the issue with it isn't so much what commands you use (because the mfs commands are pretty standard..) but that the person in question has spent a lot of time developing a neatly compiled MFS CD that works well with SATA and the Series 3. It should be up to him to release his findings and software.

But anyone is free to compile their own MFS tools disks and experiment with partitions on the S3...


----------



## Fofer

One thing I missed in the discussion here...

If the external drive isn't plugged in, or turned off, and it causes a "divorce," I understand that many, if not all, of the newer recordings will no longer be accessible, but the TiVo will chug along with it's reduced space. That's fine.

But what happens when you plug the drive back in, and attempt to "remarry?" Does the TiVo resume where it was with the expanded space, and do those recordings become accessible once again?


----------



## bkdtv

Fofer said:


> If the external drive isn't plugged in, or turned off, and it causes a "divorce," I understand that many, if not all, of the newer recordings will no longer be accessible, but the TiVo will chug along with it's reduced space. That's fine.


The Tivo Series3 won't divorce on its own. You've got to hit the Thumbs Down button three times. However, if the drive isn't on or connected during startup, the Tivo will sit at the 'reconnect the drive or divorce' screen until you do something, which means any programs you have scheduled do not get recorded. That's why it's important to have a drive that will auto-power-on in the event of a power outage (if you don't have a UPS).



Fofer said:


> But what happens when you plug the drive back in, and attempt to "remarry?" Does the TiVo resume where it was with the expanded space, and do those recordings become accessible once again?


Previous comments indicate that remarrying deletes any recordings on the eSATA drive. That's why you can't switch between multiple eSATA drives.


----------



## sfhub

Fofer said:


> But what happens when you plug the drive back in, and attempt to "remarry?" Does the TiVo resume where it was with the expanded space, and do those recordings become accessible once again?


Re-Marrying performs the blessdisk operation again, which appears to reset the esata disk and as a result the content is no longer visible.


----------



## bkdtv

Could someone fill in the rest of this table?



Code:


[b]Tivo System Information: Variable Recording Capacity, Hours[/b]

[b][u]eSATA[/u]            [u]  HD[/u]        [u]  SD[/u][/b]
None               32         303   
250Gb              65*          ?     
300Gb              71         673        
500GB              98           ?
750GB             131           ?
800Gb             138           ?
1 TB              165           ?

[SIZE=1]* Projected[/SIZE]


----------



## jwehman

pinballfan said:


> Can anyone confirm if the Free Agent Pro has to be manually powered on after a power outage?
> 
> It seems to be the cheapest option out there (at least at 750gb), but I'd really like something that would come back on automatically after a power failure.


My quick tests indicated it needed to be powered back on after power-loss. It has a soft-power button (so soft, you barely need to touch it to power it on).


----------



## DiGNAN17

I've been very excited about the eSATA news. I've been thinking over how I would implement it.

At the moment, the case that's the most attractive to me is the Antec MX-1. I have one question, though:

Why is it that almost all external enclosures claim support for drives up to 750GB? Is there a technical reason for this, or is it merely because at the time the literature was written up for most of these products, 1TB drives didn't exist? Does anyone think I'd have problems hooking up a 1TB drive to the MX-1?


----------



## lcann44

mikeyts said:


> He didn't actually "mention" it; he just responded to a reference to it.
> 
> I've been told by a friend who works at TiVo (on the dread advertising features) that, while they are forbidden to post here unless requested to do so by the company, they are all strongly encouraged to read these forums. There's no way that they didn't know what was going on.


Your right, but he did acknowledge that he was aware of the other thread by what he said.

And thank you for that other info. I'm quite sure TiVo knows all about this.


----------



## keenanSR

bkdtv said:


> Could someone fill in the rest of this table?
> 
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> [b]Tivo System Information: Variable Recording Capacity, Hours[/b]
> 
> [b][u]eSATA[/u]            [u]  HD[/u]        [u]  SD[/u][/b]
> None               32         303
> 250Gb              65*          ?
> 300Gb              71         673
> 500GB              98           ?
> 750GB             131           ?
> 800Gb             138           ?
> 1 TB              165           ?
> 
> [SIZE=1]* Projected[/SIZE]


For the 500GB drive I have a reading of 927 SD hours(could have sworn it said 997 when I first hooked it up but the HD hours shows the same so I must have misread it).


----------



## keenanSR

Bighouse said:


> Has anyone gotten ahold of and tried the Antec MX-1 enclosure yet?
> 
> I want a TCF user review!


I ordered one today from Newegg along with a 750GB Seagate. I expedited the shipping so hopefully I'll have it by Friday.

Another poster here ordered one a day or so ago I believe, I think it was NVOD(not sure on the name)?


----------



## bkdtv

DiGNAN17 said:


> hy is it that almost all external enclosures claim support for drives up to 750GB? Is there a technical reason for this, or is it merely because at the time the literature was written up for most of these products, 1TB drives didn't exist? Does anyone think I'd have problems hooking up a 1TB drive to the MX-1?


Manufacturers only claim to support what they have tested. The 1TB drives are very new, so manufacturers have not tested them with their enclosures.


----------



## budgreen

Bighouse said:


> Has anyone gotten ahold of and tried the Antec MX-1 enclosure yet?


I just added a Seagate Barracuda 750 with the MX-1 enclosure to my S3. Worked like a charm.

Any noise is barely noticable (you have to get real close).

Picked both up at MicroCenter for $259 (HDD) and $69 (MX-1) - less mail in rebate on the Seagate - $60.


----------



## lcann44

budgreen said:


> Picked both up at MicroCenter for $259 (HDD) and $69 (MX-1) - less mail in rebate on the Seagate - $60.


I got mine at Micro Center too. I never heard of the store until last Saturday.

I got a Seagate ST3500641AS 500gb and enclosure. I had no idea what I was buying. While it works fine I have to admit it is a bit noisy, but according to the website what I'm hearing is normal. I paid 198.85 for both.


----------



## Justin Thyme

bkdtv said:


> Previous comments indicate that remarrying deletes any recordings on the eSATA drive. That's why you can't switch between multiple eSATA drives.


In response to Fofer's query, I checked it on my setup. Most recordings made since the upgrade were lost. The few of the new recordings that survived I presume were stored on the primary 250GB drive- as has been conjectured earlier.

I don't know about the actions of the blessing operation, but Spike specifically stated the remarrying does a "Tivo quick format".

It makes sense they would not attempt to implement what amounts to a database recovery operation in a 1.0 version of a feature.

Regarding capacities table. My 250GB primary, 1TB eSata yields 1561 SD hours as reported by System information screen.


----------



## Nalez

jwehman said:


> 750GB internal + 750GB E-sata (1.5TB total) = 198HD hours, as reported by the S3 information screen.


Still waiting to see the first 2tb tivo.
Should end up being about 264 hours of HD, so if you wanted to record HDNET for 11 days straight...


----------



## Justin Thyme

Using a Sata to eSata cable, it would be possible to take a Primary 1TB drive external as well.

Placed in a dual eSata enclosure such as this one or a fancier version (see eSata option), it would be possible to power down the Tivo and reboot to a new 2TB pair.

This effectively would make the S3 limitless in capacity.










Why? Asking why someone would want to have more video than they ever could watch is like asking why someone would want an encyclopedia with more articles than they would ever read.


----------



## Boot

OK, I can't get this to work.

I'm using the Vantec Nexstar 3 enclosure and a Maxtor 250GB SATA drive. I get the orange light, and type the code, and get an "almost there" screen, but then the system seems to reboot and go back to "powering on". It then comes up normally, without incorporating the extra drive.

As far as I can tell, TiVo isn't spinning up the drive. I connected it to my PC via USB, and it spun up just fine. It wasn't formatted at all, so I formatted it with NTFS (the only option in XP). Back to the TiVo - no change in behavior.

I read the NTFS concerns in this thread, but if it's not even spinning up the drive, NTFS is irrelevant.

Edit: OK, I forced the spinup by:
- disconnecting the esata
- connecting it to my PC via USB
- listening for spinup
- connecting the esata
- disconnecting the USB

Then I power cycled the TiVo and kickstarted. No behavior change, except for the now spinning drive.


----------



## Jack D

Boot said:


> OK, I can't get this to work.
> 
> I'm using the Vantec Nexstar 3 enclosure and a Maxtor 250GB SATA drive. I get the orange light, and type the code, and get an "almost there" screen, but then the system seems to reboot and go back to "powering on". It then comes up normally, without incorporating the extra drive.
> 
> As far as I can tell, TiVo isn't spinning up the drive. I connected it to my PC via USB, and it spun up just fine. It wasn't formatted at all, so I formatted it with NTFS (the only option in XP). Back to the TiVo - no change in behavior.
> 
> I read the NTFS concerns in this thread, but if it's not even spinning up the drive, NTFS is irrelevant.
> 
> Edit: OK, I forced the spinup by:
> - disconnecting the esata
> - connecting it to my PC via USB
> - listening for spinup
> - connecting the esata
> - disconnecting the USB
> 
> Then I power cycled the TiVo and kickstarted. No behavior change, except for the now spinning drive.


Does the orange light stay on until you push "62?" If not, then the TIVO has not recognized the external drive. Check your remote batteries.


----------



## Boot

Jack D said:


> Does the orange light stay on until you push "62?" If not, then the TIVO has not recognized the external drive. Check your remote batteries.


Yes, the lights all go out, the orange light comes on, stays on through the "6", and goes out with the "2". I think that's correct behavior.


----------



## Uday

FYI -- Frys.com has a 500GB SATA HD (Maxtor) for $110
http://shop1.outpost.com/product/4551377


----------



## bkdtv

Boot said:


> Yes, the lights all go out, the orange light comes on, stays on through the "6", and goes out with the "2". I think that's correct behavior.


The Vantec splits the SATA signal before it runs to the bridge chip, right? On AVS, others have suggested that splitting the signal in that way could produce an out-of-spec signal. The issue may affect some drives more than others, because the Vantec evidently works with the SA8300HD when paired with some drives, while not others.

Of course, it's also possible the Vantec is defective.


----------



## HDTiVo

Justin Thyme said:


> Using a Sata to eSata cable, it would be possible to take a Primary 1TB drive external as well.
> 
> Placed in a dual eSata enclosure such as this one or a fancier version (see eSata option), it would be possible to power down the Tivo and reboot to a new 2TB pair.
> 
> This effectively would make the S3 limitless in capacity.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Why? Asking why someone would want to have more video than they ever could watch is like asking why someone would want an encyclopedia with more articles than they would ever read.


Could you put up links to the actual product?


----------



## Boot

bkdtv said:


> The Vantec splits the SATA signal before it runs to the bridge chip, right? On AVS, others have suggested that splitting the signal in that way could produce an out-of-spec signal. The issue may affect some drives more than others, because the Vantec evidently works with the SA8300HD when paired with some drives, while not others.
> 
> Of course, it's also possible the Vantec is defective.


The SATA cable goes straight to the eSATA port, and from there to the bridge chip, but electrically that's no different from a Y that goes to both the chip and the eSATA. I'm not sure how that would affect the signal.


----------



## DCIFRTHS

Boot said:


> The SATA cable goes straight to the eSATA port, and from there to the bridge chip, but electrically that's no different from a Y that goes to both the chip and the eSATA. I'm not sure how that would affect the signal.


Depending on the way the "Y" is implemented, it could introduce noise.

Personally, I think that too much is being made of the bridge chip issue. All Maxtor drives, and most (all?) Western Digital drives used bridge chips when SATA was first brought to market. It took them a long time before they had native SATA interfaces. Early on, Seagate used a native SATA interface, and they made sure everyone knew it...

From what I remember of the performance tests, there wasn't much, if any, difference between the bridge chip drives, and the native SATA drives. I'm sure someone will dig up something to prove me wrong though  With that said, I would still prefer to have a native interface as opposed to one that was translating.

Oh yeah. When PCIe first hit the streets, many video cards used bridge chips too. ATI was the first to have a native PCIe interface. Back to our regularly scheduled programminig


----------



## Boot

To be clear, the Vantec enclosure isn't doing any translating when you use the eSATA port. There's a physical cable that runs from the drive's SATA connector to the enclosure's eSATA connector. The bridge chip (essentially) also ties into that cable, but it's not in the path of straight SATA/eSATA communication. 

The bridge chip should be nonfunctional if there's no USB cable attached. In eSATA mode, the enclosure isn't "using" the bridge chip. However, there's still a concern that just having the chip tied to the SATA wires is enough to screw up the signal integrity.


----------



## jkovach

Justin Thyme said:


> Using a Sata to eSata cable, it would be possible to take a Primary 1TB drive external as well.
> 
> Placed in a dual eSata enclosure such as this one or a fancier version (see eSata option), it would be possible to power down the Tivo and reboot to a new 2TB pair.
> 
> This effectively would make the S3 limitless in capacity.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> Why? Asking why someone would want to have more video than they ever could watch is like asking why someone would want an encyclopedia with more articles than they would ever read.


I was really excited about this... for about 2 minutes. Then I got to thinking, when I switch from one set of drives to the other, how will the Tivo know what to record, unless I keep the Todo List in synch on the 2 sets of drives... Not my idea of fun. The only way I see this being viable would be to do this with a 'spare' S3, and MRV would need to be working so that you could off-load programs from the primary S3 that does most recording to the 2nd S3 with multiple drive sets.

Or am I missing something?


----------



## Justin Thyme

When I created my new primary, I personally would copy over the wishlists, etc from the original primary.

Sorry HD, I messed up and copied the picture link instead of the product link. Note that for this unit, you have to order the eSata out version which costs 14 dollars more. The main version is USB only. The earlier link is a single fan non removable unit which is so low cost it is tempting. The removable unit would be prone to user error (placing the wrong drive in the primary slot), but I like the pusher fans on each drive plus the third main exhaust fan. Also I can monitor temps on hot days.


----------



## lcann44

I don't know if anyone is interested but I thought I would put a link in to show the enclosure I got from Micro Center for 24.99. Notice the "screen" in the front that allows for cooling.

http://www.microcenter.com/byos/byos_single_product_results.phtml?product_id=239855


----------



## 1283

Boot said:


> To be clear, the Vantec enclosure isn't doing any translating when you use the eSATA port. There's a physical cable that runs from the drive's SATA connector to the enclosure's eSATA connector. The bridge chip (essentially) also ties into that cable, but it's not in the path of straight SATA/eSATA communication.
> 
> The bridge chip should be nonfunctional if there's no USB cable attached. In eSATA mode, the enclosure isn't "using" the bridge chip. However, there's still a concern that just having the chip tied to the SATA wires is enough to screw up the signal integrity.


The SATA interface is supposed to have one transmitter and one receiver, not supposed to be tapped/split. A real bridge that sits between the drive and the external USB and eSATA connectors is better electrically, but the cost is likely to be higher.


----------



## jschmidt

Just want to report that I was able to get this to work. Went with the IcyDock enclosure (in black, of course) and a Seagate 750GB ES drive. The ES is supposed to be more durable in high-availability conditions.

It took me a couple of tries to do the kickstart-6-2, though. It might have worked on the first try, but perhaps I just wasn't patient enough. Not sure what happened, but it did work for me.

Now reporting 131HD and 12xx SD hours.

Here are the links:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16822148152

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16817198008

Total cost without shipping was $354.98. Not too bad. I like the no-fan enclosure.

The only gripe I have is that the drive access noise is fairly noticeable. I can't really hear the drive spinning, but I can hear the drive access (ticking). I may move the drive behind the TiVo to hopefully block it out. Other than that, is is awesome.


----------



## phronimos

Boot said:


> OK, I can't get this to work.
> 
> ... I get the orange light, and type the code, and get an "almost there" screen, but then the system seems to reboot and go back to "powering on". It then comes up normally, without incorporating the extra drive. ....


I'm having exactly the same problem. I'm using a WD Caviar SE16 320GB drive (OEM) inside a Thermaltake Max 4 eSATA/USB 2.0 enclosure:

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16817145029

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16822136074

Any reason why this combo shouldn't work? I have no problem getting the drive to show up on my Mac desktop via USB 2.0.


----------



## TiivoDog

I was able to successfully add an external 750 GB drive to my OEM internal drive on software 8.3.1, which has now boosted my recording capacity to 131 HD hours and a whopping 1,244 SD hours!! Also, I have provided my hardware configuration for those, who think this upgrade can not be done on the cheap:

Hard Drive

750 GB - Seagate ST3750640AS ($220)
500 GB drives can be purchased for approx ($100 - $125)

HDD Enclosure ($30)

http://www.satasite.com/sata-usb-drive-enclosure-sata-ide.htm

Cable ($10)

http://www.coolgear.com/usbgear/eSATA-100.html

Endless hours of Tivo pleasure (Priceless!!!!!)


----------



## Gregor

TiivoDog said:


> I was able to successfully add an external 750 GB drive to my OEM internal drive on software 8.3.1, which has now boosted my recording capacity to 131 HD hours and a whopping 1,244 SD hours!! Also, I have provided my hardware configuration for those, who think this upgrade can not be done on the cheap:
> 
> Hard Drive
> 
> 750 GB - Seagate ST3750640AS ($220)
> 500 GB drives can be purchased for approx ($100 - $125)
> 
> HDD Enclosure ($30)
> 
> http://www.satasite.com/sata-usb-dr...re-sata-ide.htm
> 
> Cable ($10)
> 
> http://www.coolgear.com/productdeta...=&catid=741,736
> 
> Endless hours of Tivo pleasure (Priceless!!!!!)


Your links are broken.


----------



## TracyMiller

TerpBE said:


> Anybody know if this one would work?
> 
> http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=203268361&adid=17653&dcaid=17653


Yes, this one works, at least for me. I bought it from newegg, though, not buy.com, but it's the same drive. It has a fan (which has an on/off switch, which is a nice touch). It also has a power button on the front, but you apparently do not need to manually press it to start the drive. I tested this as soon as I received the unit, by plugging it and unplugging it. Upon connecting the power, the drive spins up and starts working, which is good news in case of power failure.

My first attempt at the "marriage" steps did not work, but it worked liked a charm the second time around. Aside from a couple of random reboots, all is well here after three days of testing. I now show the expected 98 HD hours and 927 SD hours, and the access times seem about the same as before.


----------



## jschmidt

phronimos said:


> Any reason why this combo shouldn't work? I have no problem getting the drive to show up on my Mac desktop via USB 2.0.


I also have a SE16 drive OEM 750GB, but in a IceDock. Try doing the kickstart-6-2 several times. When I did it, it took several tries in a row, but it worked eventually.

Also, one thing to look out for is when you do it, the hard drive activity light should flicker a little bit even before it adds the drive. I'm assuming it is reading the partition table or some such thing. When you do the kickstart, if you have 0 HD, activity, I don't know what could be wrong...


----------



## jschmidt

TiivoDog said:


> Hard Drive
> 
> 750 GB - Seagate ST3750640AS ($220)
> 500 GB drives can be purchased for approx ($100 - $125)


Just a note about the AS series drive. This is Seagate's standard desktop drive. The ES series drives ST3750640NS are built to higher specifications. They are supposedly built for datacenters and are Seagate's RAID-approved drives. They cost a little more, but should also be more reliable than the AS drives. For me, it was worth the extra money to hopefully get a greater longevity.

Just like women, if you are too much of a cheapskate, you might be headed for an early divorce...


----------



## TiivoDog

Good information!! I was not aware, which is also kind of like getting married as we don't often get a heads up from our wive's ex-boyfriend before we take the plunge.... Guess I will just hope it holds up, but given the usage these drives take, I'll probably be wishing I purchased the business grade model


----------



## Boot

Boot said:


> OK, I can't get this to work.
> 
> I'm using the Vantec Nexstar 3 enclosure and a Maxtor 250GB SATA drive. I get the orange light, and type the code, and get an "almost there" screen, but then the system seems to reboot and go back to "powering on". It then comes up normally, without incorporating the extra drive.
> 
> As far as I can tell, TiVo isn't spinning up the drive. I connected it to my PC via USB, and it spun up just fine. It wasn't formatted at all, so I formatted it with NTFS (the only option in XP). Back to the TiVo - no change in behavior.
> 
> I read the NTFS concerns in this thread, but if it's not even spinning up the drive, NTFS is irrelevant.
> 
> Edit: OK, I forced the spinup by:
> - disconnecting the esata
> - connecting it to my PC via USB
> - listening for spinup
> - connecting the esata
> - disconnecting the USB
> 
> Then I power cycled the TiVo and kickstarted. No behavior change, except for the now spinning drive.


I've managed to have some limited success with this upgrade. I took the drive out of the Vantec enclosure, applied direct power, and ran a SATA to eSATA cable straight to the S3. This time the S3 recognized the drive, and reported 65 hours of HD space.

I then put the drive back in the enclosure, and this time when I powered up the S3, I got the "drive not responding" error message.

Since I was only borrowing the eSATA to SATA cable, I went ahead and "divorced" the drive for now.

This rules out the S3 and the drive itself as sources of the failure. I have nothing left to blame but the enclosure, or the eSATA cable (which came with the enclosure).


----------



## TiivoDog

Before you send it back, you might want to sure your connectors are really snug - maybe the data connector became ajar inside the enclsoure, when you closed it up??? Just a thought, but it certainly appears to be the enclosure itself - good luck and hope it works out!


----------



## Boot

TiivoDog said:


> Before you send it back, you might want to sure your connectors are really snug - maybe the data connector became ajar inside the enclsoure, when you closed it up??? Just a thought, but it certainly appears to be the enclosure itself - good luck and hope it works out!


Good thought... but I ran the enclosure once with the outer cover off, so I could verify everything was connected properly. And I've disassembled and reassembled the enclosure setup 3 times now, so it would have to have come loose all 3 times.


----------



## bown

pinballfan said:


> Can anyone confirm if the Free Agent Pro has to be manually powered on after a power outage?
> 
> It seems to be the cheapest option out there (at least at 750gb), but I'd really like something that would come back on automatically after a power failure.


Just a confirmation, the drive WILL auto power on if any source (tivo, computer, anything) is connected and power is restored.

I added the 750GB drive, everything went smooth, and I think it is a great drive so far. It is very quiet.


----------



## bown

Also, just a quick note, there doesn't seem to be any issues if you hook up an esata drive for the first time, and on reboot the tivo also updates its software.

I hooked up my drive, the screen said new drive enabled, then it went to the software install screen. Everything went fine though and I finally have 8.3 and a 750GB drive.


----------



## jtreid

I got my 750GB seagate freeagent pro today. Stupid thing doesn't come with an esata cable!!!! I shoulda read better, but the 500GB does. I found one at a local media store. It took me three trys. The first two, I'm not sure I held the pause down long enough, but the tivo and remote were on mode 2. The orange LED came on by itself in both cases and went out when I hit the 2 in 62, but after waiting on the tivo to come up, no joy.

On the third try, I switched the tivo to mode 0 and also held the pause button down until ONLY the orange LED was on (maybe up to 3 minutes). I hit 6,2 and, other than the orange LED going off, the unit did nothing. I waited for maybe 30 seconds and the unit rebooted. That tells you it took. It rebooted as normal, went to the almost there screen and then eventually told me my second drive had been activated. 

131HRS OF HD BABY!!!!

Lessons learned...

1. Whether it is necessary or not, make sure the tivo is set to mode 0 (not set) remote code. I changed two variables so I am not sure this is absolutely necessary, but it may be from previous reports.

2. HOLD THE PAUSE KEY DOWN UNTIL !!!ONLY!!! THE ORAGE LED IS LIT. Yes it takes a while, but DO IT!

3. Read this and the prior reports and do what it says. 

Have fun!!!


----------



## pinballfan

bown said:


> Just a confirmation, the drive WILL auto power on if any source (tivo, computer, anything) is connected and power is restored.


Great! Thanks!! Time to visit amazon...


----------



## msu2k

I just got this drive to work, it's already added to the list on the first page of this thread, but hey, I was happy about the price and excited it worked. 
*Cavalry Pre-Formatted CAXM37500 500GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache USB 2.0 / eSATA External Hard Drive*

It was $128 from newegg.com not including shipping and I didn't need to buy an enclosure or anything else with it. It was a one-stop solution. Very quiet with its fan on. :up:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822101030


----------



## pinballfan

In case others were looking for it...

The Segate Free Agent Pro 750GB drive must have just run out of stock today at Amazon. They are still showing it as in stock until you are about to complete the order. Then the estimated shipping date changes to July 10! 

Fortunately the drive is available from PC Connection at the same price and they are still showing it in stock for shipment today... (fingers crossed)

http://www.pcconnection.com/ProductDetail?sku=7468597


----------



## bown

pinballfan said:


> In case others were looking for it...
> 
> The Segate Free Agent Pro 750GB drive must have just run out of stock today at Amazon. They are still showing it as in stock until you are about to complete the order. Then the estimated shipping date changes to July 10!
> 
> Fortunately the drive is available from PC Connection at the same price and they are still showing it in stock for shipment today... (fingers crossed)
> 
> http://www.pcconnection.com/ProductDetail?sku=7468597


buy.com also has it for the same price.
http://www.buy.com/prod/seagate-fre...-external-hard-drive/q/loc/101/204110105.html

They ship fast and don't charge tax.


----------



## Adam1115

msu2k said:


> I just got this drive to work, it's already added to the list on the first page of this thread, but hey, I was happy about the price and excited it worked.
> *Cavalry Pre-Formatted CAXM37500 500GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache USB 2.0 / eSATA External Hard Drive*
> 
> It was $128 from newegg.com not including shipping and I didn't need to buy an enclosure or anything else with it. It was a one-stop solution. Very quiet with its fan on. :up:
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822101030


Bought the same drive.

VERY good, stays on after a power failure.

Now running 500 Gig internal and 500 gig external, 1244 SD Hours, 131 HD Hours.

:up: :up: :up:

I should add, I bought a Sata to Esata cable, but didn't need it. The drive ships with an esata cable and an internal dongle that connects to the sata controller on the motherboard.


----------



## gteague

bown said:


> buy.com also has it for the same price.
> http://www.buy.com/prod/seagate-fre...-external-hard-drive/q/loc/101/204110105.html
> 
> They ship fast and don't charge tax.


newegg has it for $245 but i've found with them you usually have to pay the $2.99 'quickship' fee to get quicker shipping.

btw, newegg seems to have run out of the antec enclosures. you guys must have mobbed 'em!

/guy


----------



## richsadams

bown said:


> Also, just a quick note, there doesn't seem to be any issues if you hook up an esata drive for the first time, and on reboot the tivo also updates its software.
> 
> I hooked up my drive, the screen said new drive enabled, then it went to the software install screen. Everything went fine though and I finally have 8.3 and a 750GB drive.


 Thanks for that...peace of mind. :up: Our S3 is still on 8.1x and I'm just about to connect a new eSATA drive. I can tell that little voice in the back of my mind to be quiet now!


----------



## susani8

TerpBE said:


> Could you keep us updated on how it works out?


I got my Cavalry drive (same model - 500 gb) yesterday. It installed like a breeze, I followed the instructions on page 1 (took me 3 times to figure out the "orange light" thing, but once I did it went slicker than slick). Total time from unpack to 98 hours was 15 minutes! It's been running for 24 hours now and is only slightly warm. It's a little noisy, but since it's in my family room I could care less! I'm totally tickled with it right now...


----------



## bonnie_raitt

Bought Seagate 750 GB drive and Icy Dock enclosure. Installation went fine with stock S3. If you are reluctant, I'd say go for it. Thanks for the help discovering this technique. I was losing shows the last few weeks. Now I don't have to worry anymore


----------



## lcann44

bonnie_raitt said:


> Bought Seagate 750 GB drive and Icy Dock enclosure. Installation went fine with stock S3. If you are reluctant, I'd say go for it. Thanks for the help discovering this technique. I was losing shows the last few weeks. Now I don't have to worry anymore


It's just so cool. Freedom, not to have to worry about going through everything. And now with 8.3 you can search for HD shows like concerts, movies all kinds of stuff. This is TiVo heaven.


----------



## gteague

lcann44 said:


> It's just so cool. Freedom, not to have to worry about going through everything. And now with 8.3 you can search for HD shows like concerts, movies all kinds of stuff. This is TiVo heaven.


hell: buying tivo s3 30 days before the price dropped $300

purgatory: 26 hours on the phone with comcast and 7 days before cable cards worked

limbo: suffering through what seemed like 48hrs of indexing where any button i pushed incurred a 20 minute delay

paradise-light: when i could filter hd content. external storage

heaven: when i can move shows from my tivo to my mac. when my roxio toast tivo program starts doing more than just recognizing there's a tivo out on my network. when i can stream movies back to the tivo from my mac. and when i can display my photos in hi-def. c'mon tivo--what's up with that limitation?

/guy


----------



## 1283

gteague said:


> hell: buying tivo s3 30 days before the price dropped $300


The lowest has been $500. Before that, it was pretty easy to get it for $600-$650.


----------



## jschmidt

Has anyone tried this with a DB35 drive? I'm assuming it would work. I'm thinking of getting a drive for the bedroom.


----------



## RaviChopra

jschmidt said:


> Has anyone tried this with a DB35 drive? I'm assuming it would work. I'm thinking of getting a drive for the bedroom.


Yup. I'd bought a 750GB DB35 to replace my internal drive just before this came out. Slipped it into an eSATA enclosure, followed the directions, result - 1 TB heaven.

-Ravi


----------



## gteague

for those still on the fence, the weekly fry's ad shows the 750gb freeagent esata/usb drive at $239 today through tuesday.

it figures, i was just there two days ago and it was $309 so i went with a drive + enclosure. and even the drive i bought dropped $20 the very next day--but perhaps i can get them to refund that.

i had the same luck paying hundreds more for my tivo s3 right before the price dropped. if you ever need a price drop on some item, just send me in to buy one a couple of days in advance. [g]

/guy


----------



## apb1978

Well I went out and bought a 750GB Free Agent Pro drive and performed the kickstart 62 as detailed. All indications were that it was going through the process, the orange light stayed on until after I hit 62. Tivo rebooted a couple times, and then it finally came up without mounting the external hard drive. I went ahead and tested the hard drive on my laptop afterwards to make sure the drive itself was working, and had no problems there testing it over USB. 

I then tried an old Bytecc ME-740 SATA to IDE enclosure I had (this requires a SATA type 1 to SATA type 2 cable) with a 7200 RPM 300GB Seagate IDE drive. That mounted without any problems. I then tested the Free Agent Pro drive again and still no luck. 

About the only thing I haven't been able to verify is that the eSATA port on the Free Agent is actually working. But at least through the USB port everything seems fine. Not sure what else I can do at this point. I think I am stuck with my 300GB drive until Tivo supports this. I don't get any error messages. It seems like it goes through all the motions and takes about 5 minutes doing so. But then I never get the 'Your second hard drive is activated' screen. It would be helpful if they could at least give you some kind of error message, but I realize this wasn't intended for mass use right now. 


-Andy


----------



## Rob Helmerichs

OK, problem with the Cavalry drive. I hooked it up on Tuesday, and it worked fine for the local news. Later in the evening, I went to watch Veronica Mars (still recording), and all I got was a blank green TiVo program information screen. Tried Law & Order (also still recording), same thing. Went to the network news (show over), and it gave me a show not recorded because of no signal message.

At this point, I pulled the plug, disconnected the drive, rebooted the TiVo as a one-drive box, and drove to Michigan (I didn't want to risk missing a week's worth of shows while I'm gone). So...has anybody else experienced anything like this?


----------



## popcult

I just took the plunge, too. Decided on a Seagate ES ST3750640NS 750GB and paired the drive with a Vantec NexStar 3. Total: $300 shipped. I also considered the less expensive Freeagent drive but decided to spend the extra money because I hear this Seagate ES drive is a heavy duty "Enterprise" model. Since this thing will be powered on and spinning almost all day 24-7 I didn't want to mess around. The way I look at it, I only get one shot at pairing a drive with my S3-it's not like I can upgrade or replace it 2 years from now (unless I want to lose all the programming on the existing drive.) I also reasoned that the cost difference between the two wasn't that big considering an eSata cable comes with the Vantec enclosure but the Freeagent doesn't.


----------



## TiivoDog

popcult said:


> I just took the plunge, too. Decided on a Seagate ES ST3750640NS 750GB and paired the drive with a Vantec NexStar 3. Total: $300 shipped. I also considered the less expensive Freeagent drive but decided to spend the extra money because I hear this Seagate ES drive is a heavy duty "Enterprise" model. Since this thing will be powered on and spinning almost all day 24-7 I didn't want to mess around. The way I look at it, I only get one shot at pairing a drive with my S3-it's not like I can upgrade or replace it 2 years from now (unless I want to lose all the programming on the existing drive.) I also reasoned that the cost difference between the two wasn't that big considering an eSata cable comes with the Vantec enclosure but the Freeagent doesn't.


Be sure the cable you will be getting is a Type I on one end and a Type L on the other end like the cable below - I had to buy that one as the cable that came with my enclosure was the same on both ends and would not fit the Tivo eSATA slot:

http://www.coolgear.com/usbgear/eSATA-100.html


----------



## wdave

Careful. Depends on the enclosure. Some enclosures have a SATA port on them, and others (most?) have an eSATA port.


----------



## hddude55

jschmidt said:


> Just a note about the AS series drive. This is Seagate's standard desktop drive. The ES series drives ST3750640NS are built to higher specifications. They are supposedly built for datacenters and are Seagate's RAID-approved drives. They cost a little more, but should also be more reliable than the AS drives. For me, it was worth the extra money to hopefully get a greater longevity.
> 
> Just like women, if you are too much of a cheapskate, you might be headed for an early divorce...


 On Newegg, I looked at user reviews and one user noted that the NS versions are much noisier and suggested consumers would be happier with the AS consumer series. A data administrator reported that he had purchased over 100 of the AS version and was very happy with their reliability, so your comments about the AS seem to be pure BS.


----------



## TracyMiller

Rob Helmerichs said:


> OK, problem with the Cavalry drive. I hooked it up on Tuesday, and it worked fine for the local news. Later in the evening, I went to watch Veronica Mars (still recording), and all I got was a blank green TiVo program information screen. Tried Law & Order (also still recording), same thing. Went to the network news (show over), and it gave me a show not recorded because of no signal message.
> 
> At this point, I pulled the plug, disconnected the drive, rebooted the TiVo as a one-drive box, and drove to Michigan (I didn't want to risk missing a week's worth of shows while I'm gone). So...has anybody else experienced anything like this?


Yes. My Cavalry 500GB drive worked fine for a few days. Now I'm having random reboots. I've also started having the same trouble you noticed. Yesterday I tried to play something from the NPL and TIVO froze, followed by a reboot and the "Green Screen of Death". It rebooted within a few minutes and worked fine thereafter. Today, I try to play some things from my NPL that were recorded last night, and I get the "show not recorded because of no signal..." message that you also got. I'm trying to reboot now.

Very annoying.


----------



## popcult

TiivoDog said:


> Be sure the cable you will be getting is a Type I on one end and a Type L on the other end like the cable below - I had to buy that one as the cable that came with my enclosure was the same on both ends and would not fit the Tivo eSATA slot:
> 
> http://www.coolgear.com/usbgear/eSATA-100.html


Good advice. The cable you mentioned has an eSATA plug on one end and a SATA plug on the other end, right? Are you sure that's what I need? The port on the back of the TiVo is an eSATA port. And if you look at the back of the Vantec enclosure I bought:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowI...++USB2.0+Aluminum+External+Enclosure+-+Retail

it also looks like there's an eSata port. So wouldn't I just need an eSATA to eSATA cable (one with the same plugs on each end?)


----------



## msu2k

Rob Helmerichs said:


> OK, problem with the Cavalry drive. I hooked it up on Tuesday, and it worked fine for the local news. Later in the evening, I went to watch Veronica Mars (still recording), and all I got was a blank green TiVo program information screen. Tried Law & Order (also still recording), same thing. Went to the network news (show over), and it gave me a show not recorded because of no signal message.
> 
> At this point, I pulled the plug, disconnected the drive, rebooted the TiVo as a one-drive box, and drove to Michigan (I didn't want to risk missing a week's worth of shows while I'm gone). So...has anybody else experienced anything like this?


Just installed mine last night. I'll post if I'm having the same issues.


----------



## bkdtv

Until the problems with Cavalry drives get sorted out, I have removed them from the list of compatible drives.


----------



## msu2k

TracyMiller said:


> Yes. My Cavalry 500GB drive worked fine for a few days. Now I'm having random reboots. I've also started having the same trouble you noticed. Yesterday I tried to play something from the NPL and TIVO froze, followed by a reboot and the "Green Screen of Death". It rebooted within a few minutes and worked fine thereafter. Today, I try to play some things from my NPL that were recorded last night, and I get the "show not recorded because of no signal..." message that you also got. I'm trying to reboot now.
> 
> Very annoying.


Oh man, that sucks. One person having issues with the Cavalry is one thing, but two people, that's not good news. Looks like I should start preparing to return mine. I was just about to call Comcast this morning to sign up too. I was waiting until I could expand my storage for a reasonable amount and have just been using the S3 for OTA.


----------



## hddude55

TracyMiller said:


> Yes. My Cavalry 500GB drive worked fine for a few days. Now I'm having random reboots. I've also started having the same trouble you noticed. Yesterday I tried to play something from the NPL and TIVO froze, followed by a reboot and the "Green Screen of Death". It rebooted within a few minutes and worked fine thereafter. Today, I try to play some things from my NPL that were recorded last night, and I get the "show not recorded because of no signal..." message that you also got. I'm trying to reboot now.
> 
> Very annoying.


These reports are very alarming, enough to make me wonder if I should wait a few weeks and see how this shakes out before hooking up my eSATA drive. I don't have the Cavalry drive but I wouldn't think these issues are limited to that one drive.


----------



## msu2k

hddude55 said:


> These reports are very alarming, enough to make me wonder if I should wait a few weeks and see how this shakes out before hooking up my eSATA drive. I don't have the Cavalry drive but I wouldn't think these issues are limited to that one drive.


Let's hope this is just isolated for the Cavalry drives. (despite the fact that I own one)


----------



## Bighouse

bkdtv said:


> Until the problems with Cavalry drives get sorted out, I have removed them from the list of compatible drives.


It's starting to make a lot more sense to me. TiVo hasn't made any kind of public acknowledgement of the ability to hook up eSata drives- they're waiting until we've all tried the different drives and you make your list public so they can then copyclip it into their "approved and tested" drive list. 

If they didn't come out with a list of compatible drives, and people just went out and bought any eSata drive, they'd hav egg (or is it newegg?) on their faces and alot of upset owners because they didn't make an suggestions about approved and tested drives.


----------



## hddude55

Bighouse said:


> It's starting to make a lot more sense to me. TiVo hasn't made any kind of public acknowledgement of the ability to hook up eSata drives- they're waiting until we've all tried the different drives and you make your list public so they can then copyclip it into their "approved and tested" drive list.
> 
> If they didn't come out with a list of compatible drives, and people just went out and bought any eSata drive, they'd hav egg (or is it newegg?) on their faces and alot of upset owners because they didn't make an suggestions about approved and tested drives.


Well this is certainly the glass is half full theory. Another possibility is after a few weeks of war stories we will realize we all made a mistake by jumping the gun.


----------



## susani8

TracyMiller said:


> Yes. My Cavalry 500GB drive worked fine for a few days. Now I'm having random reboots. I've also started having the same trouble you noticed. Yesterday I tried to play something from the NPL and TIVO froze, followed by a reboot and the "Green Screen of Death". It rebooted within a few minutes and worked fine thereafter. Today, I try to play some things from my NPL that were recorded last night, and I get the "show not recorded because of no signal..." message that you also got. I'm trying to reboot now.
> 
> Very annoying.


After reading your experience with the Cavalry I was more than a little worried, I've had it recording for 2 days and have been too busy to check it. I just did. Everything worked perfectly. I was even updated to 8.3 last night (yea!) and still everything seems to be just as it should. I've passed the original capacity marker of 35 HD hours (plus 25 SD hours - High, not Best, quality) so I know at least a part of the last 6 or 7 shows recorded in the last 2 days must be on the Cavalry drive.

No rebooting issues, no green screen of death. Maybe, since it's a fairly cheap drive, the quality is inconsistent? hmmm ... I just got lucky I guess


----------



## generaltso

hddude55 said:


> On Newegg, I looked at user reviews and one user noted that the NS versions are much noisier and suggested consumers would be happier with the AS consumer series. A data administrator reported that he had purchased over 100 of the AS version and was very happy with their reliability, so your comments about the AS seem to be pure BS.


If you're going to spend a little extra on a drive, you should get the DB35 over the ES. The DB35 is specifically made for DVR applications and is very quiet. The ES drive is made to run in data centers where noise is not an issue.


----------



## msu2k

hddude55 said:


> Well this is certainly the glass is half full theory. Another possibility is after a few weeks of war stories we will realize we all made a mistake by jumping the gun.


That would really suck if Tivo knew all our efforts were pointless and they didn't even hint at it. It's obviously unsupported at this point, but if it turns out none of these drives will work long term, and they knew it, they should at least post a gentle :down: to let us know.

I'm hoping that in actuality many of these drives will work fine. I guess we need to wait a couple of weeks to see which ones will and which won't.


----------



## TiivoDog

popcult said:


> Good advice. The cable you mentioned has an eSATA plug on one end and a SATA plug on the other end, right? Are you sure that's what I need? The port on the back of the TiVo is an eSATA port. And if you look at the back of the Vantec enclosure I bought:
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/ShowI...++USB2.0+Aluminum+External+Enclosure+-+Retail
> 
> it also looks like there's an eSata port. So wouldn't I just need an eSATA to eSATA cable (one with the same plugs on each end?)


The enclosure I purchased is below, and it has an SATA port on it and the Tivo is an eSATA port, which is why I bought the cable I referenced as I saw an earlier post that it was needed.

http://www.satasite.com/sata-usb-drive-enclosure-sata-ide.htm

That cable works, however I just now realized my enclosure came with an SATA to eSATA adapter that I could have used  But, it is about 6 inches shorter with the adapter and I needed every inch of the cable I purchased with where I situated my unit.

Based on the link you provided, you should not need any other cable as the port on that enclosure is eSATA and the port on the Tivo is eSATA, so you should be good to go. Sorry for alarming you!!


----------



## Bighouse

hddude55 said:


> Well this is certainly the glass is half full theory. Another possibility is after a few weeks of war stories we will realize we all made a mistake by jumping the gun.


Well, not all of us have jumped the gun. I have to confess, I've priced out and looked at the drive and enclosure I'll be getting, but I've yet to order it until I know for sure the TiVo mothership has granted us approval for doing so officially. When I do, it'll be the Antec MX-1 and the Seagate D35 750GB.

I'm still waiting for someone with that drive and enclosure to give us an official review/opinion on how well it works.


----------



## TracyMiller

TracyMiller said:


> Yes. My Cavalry 500GB drive worked fine for a few days. Now I'm having random reboots. I've also started having the same trouble you noticed. Yesterday I tried to play something from the NPL and TIVO froze, followed by a reboot and the "Green Screen of Death". It rebooted within a few minutes and worked fine thereafter. Today, I try to play some things from my NPL that were recorded last night, and I get the "show not recorded because of no signal..." message that you also got. I'm trying to reboot now.
> 
> Very annoying.


OK...to continue my own story...I just finished rebooting, and it applied the new service update, 8.3. I've been looking forward to this update. Now that it has rebooted, I checked those programs I previously tried (the ones that I got the "show not recorded because of no signal..." message), and now, miraculously, they play! I have no idea why. Could it be related to the new update? It doesn't seem like it should.

Oh, well, I'll keep an eye on the TIVO and see if I have any more problems. I love the new features 8.3 added, especially the new "HD" category.

I hope the problems with the Cavalry drive were just random issues that will sort themselves out, but I'll be watching closely.

BTW, this forum is great.


----------



## Bighouse

msu2k said:


> That would really suck if Tivo knew all our efforts were pointless and they didn't even hint at it. It's obviously unsupported at this point, but if it turns out none of these drives will work long term, and the knew it, they should at least post a gentle :down: to let us know.
> 
> I'm hoping that in actuality many of these drives will work fine. I guess we need to wait a couple of weeks to see which ones will and which won't.


I seem to remember an odd comment in Pony's reply when hinting about it...and it had a tone of foreboding to it...I'll see if I can hunt up the actual quote and explain why I felt that.


----------



## generaltso

Bighouse said:


> Well, not all of us have jumped the gun. I have to confess, I've priced out and looked at the drive and enclosure I'll be getting, but I've yet to order it until I know for sure the TiVo mothership has granted us approval for doing so officially. When I do, it'll be the Antec MX-1 and the Seagate D35 750GB.
> 
> I'm still waiting for someone with that drive and enclosure to give us an official review/opinion on how well it works.


I have a DB35 750GB drive in an Apricorn enclosure. It works great, and the fan is very quiet. I had intended to get an MX-1 enclosure, but I already had the Apricorn on hand. If I can find a good deal on an MX-1, I may swap the drive over to that at some point.


----------



## moxie1617

Bighouse said:


> Well, not all of us have jumped the gun. I have to confess, I've priced out and looked at the drive and enclosure I'll be getting, but I've yet to order it until I know for sure the TiVo mothership has granted us approval for doing so officially. When I do, it'll be the Antec MX-1 and the Seagate D35 750GB.
> 
> I'm still waiting for someone with that drive and enclosure to give us an official review/opinion on how well it works.


I also plan to use the DB35 drive. If it doesn't work as an external drive(which I doubt) at least I'll have a drive suitable for replacing the internal 250GB drive.


----------



## generaltso

moxie1617 said:


> I also plan to use the DB35 drive. If it doesn't work as an external drive(which I doubt) at least I'll have a drive suitable for replacing the internal 250GB drive.


It works fine as an external drive.


----------



## hiker

Anybody have a good low price source for DB35?


----------



## moxie1617

the lowest I've seen is from Beach Audio. About $300 with shipping.


----------



## mattyx

I noticed last night that I got 8.3, but I also noticed that my Tivo stopped recognizing my Seagate 500gb eSATA. Could this be because of the reboot associated with getting 8.3? Should I expect that anytime the unit reboots, I will have to kickstart 62 again to get the external to re-mount? Anyone else noticed their externals "disappearing"?

Thanks,

/m/


----------



## jschmidt

generaltso said:


> If you're going to spend a little extra on a drive, you should get the DB35 over the ES. The DB35 is specifically made for DVR applications and is very quiet. The ES drive is made to run in data centers where noise is not an issue.


I know... if I had thought of it, I would have bought the DB35 for my family room. I just didn't want to go with the standard AS desktop-class drive. But, the NS drive is still very quiet. I can't hear the platter spinning at all and could only hear the drive access. However, I moved the drive behind the cabinet (still well ventilated) and now I can't hear it at all.

I'll be buying the DB35 for the bedroom, though.


----------



## bremmma

generaltso said:


> If you're going to spend a little extra on a drive, you should get the DB35 over the ES. The DB35 is specifically made for DVR applications and is very quiet. The ES drive is made to run in data centers where noise is not an issue.


Is there any way to quantify the noise difference between the ES and the DB35? Are we talking about the difference between a freight train vs. hearing a pin drop? Or are they both quiet drives, but the DB is a little quieter?

I ordered an ES (didn't realize the DB was even an option) and now I'm trying to decide if I will need to cancel the order or return it. I can live with a _little_ bit more noise as long as the drive is still reliable. But I'm trying to figure out how much of a difference it might be.


----------



## jschmidt

hddude55 said:


> On Newegg, I looked at user reviews and one user noted that the NS versions are much noisier and suggested consumers would be happier with the AS consumer series. A data administrator reported that he had purchased over 100 of the AS version and was very happy with their reliability, so your comments about the AS seem to be pure BS.


It's not BS, it's a fact that the NS drives are better engineered and are built to last longer than standard desktop drives. Try doing a little research before slamming another member's post. They may not be as quiet as the AS, but they are still quiet. I could only hear the drive access on mine, but in the enclosure behind the cabinet, I can't hear it at all. Just because the administrator did not have any problems with the AS, doesn't mean that the AS is a better drive than the NS. It's all a matter of perspective. For me, reliability/longevity is paramount.

The point of my post was to partially make a joke and partially to make sure that others on this forum don't just focus on getting the cheapest external drive enclosure. There are more factors involved than just price.

That said, I have ordered a 750 DB35 drive and Ice Dock enclosure for the bedroom. They are also built to higher specifications than the AS drives. They are built for AV and are quieter.


----------



## moxie1617

bremmma said:


> Is there any way to quantify the noise difference between the ES and the DB35? Are we talking about the difference between a freight train vs. hearing a pin drop? Or are they both quiet drives, but the DB is a little quieter?
> 
> I ordered an ES (didn't realize the DB was even an option) and now I'm trying to decide if I will need to cancel the order or return it. I can live with a _little_ bit more noise as long as the drive is still reliable. But I'm trying to figure out how much of a difference it might be.


Seagates acoustic spec for the DB35's are 2.8 bels Idle and 3.0 bels Seek with a claim for as low as 2.7bels.

For the NS series it's 2.7 bels Idle and 3.2 bels Seek

Unfortunaltely, I've no clue what a difference of .2 bels means.


----------



## jschmidt

bremmma said:


> Is there any way to quantify the noise difference between the ES and the DB35? Are we talking about the difference between a freight train vs. hearing a pin drop? Or are they both quiet drives, but the DB is a little quieter?
> 
> I ordered an ES (didn't realize the DB was even an option) and now I'm trying to decide if I will need to cancel the order or return it. I can live with a _little_ bit more noise as long as the drive is still reliable. But I'm trying to figure out how much of a difference it might be.


That's a hard question to answer. Yes, the DB35 drives are quieter than the ES, but it is not a train vs. pin drop scenario. With the ES drive, you cannot hear it at all while it is just running. The only time you can hear it is when the drive is being accessed. But, even then it isn't too bad. From across the room, it was hardly noticeable. That said, I did notice it, but I just hid it behind the cabinet and now there is no noise at all.

No question that the DB35 will be quieter, on the order of silent. But, the ES drive shouldn't be too bad. I am completely happy with my setup.


----------



## Dajad

bkdtv:

I notice your new footnote in the tables:

"* The Physical on/off switch column denotes whether a drive will turn itself back on after a power outage."

I still don't understand this. If the answer is YES in that column, I presume I can assume because it has a physical switch, and assuming the switch is on, after a power failure the unit will restart without human intervention. Is this correct?

What if the column says "No". Does this mean it WON'T turn back on after a power failure because there is no switch to be left turned on, or you simply don't know whether or not it will turn on after a power failure. 

I still suggest the column be a yes/no answer to the question, Does it turn itself back on after a power failure when plugged into the TiVo.

Cheers.

...Dale


----------



## bkdtv

Dajad said:


> I still don't understand this. If the answer is YES in that column, I presume I can assume because it has a physical switch, and assuming the switch is on, after a power failure the unit will restart without human intervention. Is this correct?


Yes.



> What if the column says "No". Does this mean it WON'T turn back on after a power failure because there is no switch to be left turned on, or you simply don't know whether or not it will turn on after a power failure.


That is correct. Initially, I thought that products without a switch had to be manually turned on, but I see some people now report that their drive will power on when they detect the host device with power (for example, when the Series3 powers up).

Could someone clarify how this works with their Seagate Free Agent / Free Agent Pro? When you pull the plug on the Series3 and Free Agent, do both power up at the same time _automatically_ when you restore power? Or does the Series3 display the "reconnect the drive" screen?


----------



## popcult

jschmidt said:


> That's a hard question to answer. Yes, the DB35 drives are quieter than the ES, but it is not a train vs. pin drop scenario. With the ES drive, you cannot hear it at all while it is just running. The only time you can hear it is when the drive is being accessed. But, even then it isn't too bad. From across the room, it was hardly noticeable. That said, I did notice it, but I just hid it behind the cabinet and now there is no noise at all.
> 
> No question that the DB35 will be quieter, on the order of silent. But, the ES drive shouldn't be too bad. I am completely happy with my setup.


Now I can't decide which drive to get: I canceled my order for the Seagate NS 750GB drive because I also read one of the comments on Newegg's site about the noise level being greater than the AS version. It comes down to how much extra noise does the NS make than the AS (if any), and is the additional durability/reliability you get (if any?) with the NS worth dealing w/ the extra noise? My gut feeling is we're splitting hairs here and it really doesn't matter.


----------



## bkdtv

In another thread, someone posted that the 8.1.x -> 8.3.x divorced their eSATA drive. They evidently had to re-marry the eSATA drive after the upgrade.

Did that happen to anyone else? Or did anyone else upgrade from 8.1.x -> 8.3.x without any interruption to their eSATA connection?


----------



## bremmma

jschmidt said:


> That's a hard question to answer. Yes, the DB35 drives are quieter than the ES, but it is not a train vs. pin drop scenario. With the ES drive, you cannot hear it at all while it is just running. The only time you can hear it is when the drive is being accessed. But, even then it isn't too bad. From across the room, it was hardly noticeable. That said, I did notice it, but I just hid it behind the cabinet and now there is no noise at all.


Is there any difference in reliability for the two or do you think the DB would be as reliable as the ES?

Also, how often is the TiVo "accessing" the drive? Percentage wise, how often is the drive accessing vs. running?

Sorry for the questions, just trying to figure out the difference is between the two drive states.


----------



## jschmidt

bremmma said:


> Is there any difference in reliability for the two or do you think the DB would be as reliable as the ES?
> 
> Also, how often is the TiVo "accessing" the drive? Percentage wise, how often is the drive accessing vs. running?
> 
> Sorry for the questions, just trying to figure out the difference is between the two drive states.


I have not seen any reliability information on the ES vs the DB35. The ES is designed for datacenters and 24/7 operation. The DB35 is designed specifically for AV applications such as DVRs, which is also 24/7 operation. So, I think either one would work.

As for the accessing noise, you will not notice it all the time, only when TiVo is recording something. Even then, the drive makes a "ticking" sound about once per second. If your setup is such that you are close to the drive, I can see how this would be annoying, but from across the room, it is barely noticable. Even still, I could hear it a little so I moved it behind the cabinet and now I can't hear it at all.

Hope this helps.


----------



## bkdtv

popcult said:


> Now I can't decide which drive to get: I canceled my order for the Seagate NS 750GB drive because I also read one of the comments on Newegg's site about the noise level being greater than the AS version. It comes down to how much extra noise does the NS make than the AS (if any), and is the additional durability/reliability you get (if any?) with the NS worth dealing w/ the extra noise? My gut feeling is we're splitting hairs here and it really doesn't matter.


From Anandtech's first review:


>


The Wasn't Weaknees was able to upgrade their original Seagate 750Gb drives with a DB35 firmware?.


----------



## msu2k

bkdtv said:


> In another thread, someone posted that the 8.1.x -> 8.3.x divorced their eSATA drive. They evidently had to re-marry the eSATA drive after the upgrade.
> 
> Did that happen to anyone else? Or did anyone else upgrade from 8.1.x -> 8.3.x without any interruption to their eSATA connection?


Ironically when I installed my Cavalry last night, it was the first time my system had loaded 8.3. So my S3 had downloaded the 8.3 update during the day, unbeknownst to me. I guess I was really playing with fire and didn't even realize it by trying to install 8.3 and kickstart 62 simultaneously. I'm guessing that's why it took a few tries to get kickstart 62 to work. So far so good with the Cavalry drive and 8.3 this morning.


----------



## popcult

bkdtv said:


> From Anandtech's first review:The Wasn't Weaknees was able to upgrade their original Seagate 750Gb drives with a DB35 firmware?.


So what conclusion can you draw from these charts? The 7200.10 (which is the Seagate AS drive) is pretty quiet at idle but pretty noisy when reading/writing? These charts make no mention of the ES drive, right?


----------



## Nate Finch

popcult said:


> So what conclusion can you draw from these charts? The 7200.10 (which is the Seagate AS drive) is pretty quiet at idle but pretty noisy when reading/writing?


I have the 750GB Seagate AS in an Icy Dock (fanless) enclosure just sitting on my TiVo about 6 feet from my seating position on an open-air shelf. When it's quiet, you can hear an occasional ticking while recording, but it's really barely noticeable. I'm very happy with it.

-Nate


----------



## gargoyle999

hiker said:


> Anybody have a good low price source for DB35?


Here's where I got mine...on the FedEx truck for delivery today!! $288.71 with shipping.

http://www.excaliberpc.com/Seagate_DB35_7200.3_Hard_drive/ST3750840SCE/partinfo-id-574243.html


----------



## susani8

bkdtv said:


> In another thread, someone posted that the 8.1.x -> 8.3.x divorced their eSATA drive. They evidently had to re-marry the eSATA drive after the upgrade.
> 
> Did that happen to anyone else? Or did anyone else upgrade from 8.1.x -> 8.3.x without any interruption to their eSATA connection?


I hooked up my new esata (Cavalry) on Wednesday and was upgraded to 8.3 last night - no divorce screen, no reboot issue, all went completely smoothly!


----------



## generaltso

bremmma said:


> Is there any way to quantify the noise difference between the ES and the DB35? Are we talking about the difference between a freight train vs. hearing a pin drop? Or are they both quiet drives, but the DB is a little quieter?
> 
> I ordered an ES (didn't realize the DB was even an option) and now I'm trying to decide if I will need to cancel the order or return it. I can live with a _little_ bit more noise as long as the drive is still reliable. But I'm trying to figure out how much of a difference it might be.


Before the DB35 drives were released, I used a 750GB AS drive in my S3. It was in an enclosed AV rack, and the seek noise was still VERY loud. I tried it in the S3 in the bedroom, and that only lasted one night. It was so loud that I had to take the drive out and put a smaller, quieter drive in it's place. When the DB35 drives were released, I used them to replace the drives in all of my TiVos. The difference in seek noise is night and day. These things are as close to silent as drives can get.

That being said, I'm not sure how much seeking an external drive has to do since the OS and the indexing is all happening on the internal drive. But I would think that fast forwarding through a show recorded on the external drive would produce some prominent clicks.


----------



## hddude55

jschmidt said:


> It's not BS, it's a fact that the NS drives are better engineered and are built to last longer than standard desktop drives. Try doing a little research before slamming another member's post. They may not be as quiet as the AS, but they are still quiet. .


 I'll flip that research challenge back to you since you were the one who made the crack about cheapskates. I'm one of the "cheapskates" who bought the AS version, as you probably figured out by now. If I made a bad choice and should return it, I'd like data to convince me, or at least you could establish your expertise to make this judgment. Otherwise I'll assume I'm a wise consumer and you're just some guy spouting off. As for lasting longer, I could probably find a $5000 drive that would outlast either of these two cheapies but why would I do that when I can replace this drive inexpensively if and when it fails? If it lasts two or three years I'll have no complaints and it has a five-year warranty just like the NS.


----------



## XBR

jschmidt said:


> I have not seen any reliability information on the ES vs the DB35. The ES is designed for datacenters and 24/7 operation. The DB35 is designed specifically for AV applications such as DVRs, which is also 24/7 operation. So, I think either one would work.
> 
> As for the accessing noise, you will not notice it all the time, only when TiVo is recording something. Even then, the drive makes a "ticking" sound about once per second. If your setup is such that you are close to the drive, I can see how this would be annoying, but from across the room, it is barely noticable. Even still, I could hear it a little so I moved it behind the cabinet and now I can't hear it at all.
> 
> Hope this helps.


The guys over at Silent PC Review use the Hitachi Feature Tool to enable acoustic management seek profiles, even in non-Hitachi drives ("works with most drives"). For those of you where seek noise is a concern, it might be worth investigating...


----------



## smc

Just a FYI, Fry's has the Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB for $239.99.

I just picked one up!


----------



## phronimos

I reported above that I was having trouble getting TiVo to recognize my WD SE16 Caviar 320GB drive in a Thermaltake enclosure:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5140541#post5140541

Couldn't get it to work despite multiple attempts. Today, I picked up this cheap 500GB Seagate eSATA drive (ST3500601XS-RK) from CompUSA:

http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=341441&pfp=SEARCH

TiVo recognized it on the very first try.

Since someone earlier in this thread reported success using a WD SE16 Caviar drive, it looks like maybe the Thermaltake Max 4 eSATA/USB 2.0 enclosure is NOT compatible.


----------



## rodalpho

Add my successful upgrade to the list. The upgrade was very smooth, no problems.

It's very quiet, the fan almost never comes on, but it does default to "off" when power is interrupted. I have it and my S3 on a UPS so that doesn't bother me one bit.



Code:


Make             Model             Capacity         Fan?        Physical on/off switch*
Seagate          ST3500601XS-RK    500GB            Yes         no

Edit: Hey, it's the same drive as phronimos, immediately above my post. Neat.


----------



## bkdtv

popcult said:


> So what conclusion can you draw from these charts? The 7200.10 (which is the Seagate AS drive) is pretty quiet at idle but pretty noisy when reading/writing? These charts make no mention of the ES drive, right?


Looks that way.

Aren't the acoustics of the 7200.10 (AS) and ES pretty much identical? I was under the impression you had to step up to the DB35 to see an improvement. Still, at least that chart gives you an idea of how different drives compare, to say, the Seagate Free Agent and Free Agent Pro, which use the 7200.10 series.


----------



## XBR

popcult said:


> So what conclusion can you draw from these charts? The 7200.10 (which is the Seagate AS drive) is pretty quiet at idle but pretty noisy when reading/writing? These charts make no mention of the ES drive, right?


According to the Seagate data sheet, the 750GB ES is rated at 2.7 bels idle and 3.2 bels during seeks. By way of comparison, the DB35 is rated at 2.8 and 3.0 (to derive decibels, multiply bels by 10). Obviously, for max performance in an enterprise environment the ES does max performance seeks...<hope for reducing Seagate seek noise deleted>

Note: dBA are "A-weighted" decibels, where low frequencies (below 1 KHz) have less weight to correspond with lower human ear sensitivity to low frequencies; the data sheets I've seen do not specify if the bels are A-weighted, so there's an assumption here...which could be interesting because 7200 RPM = 120 Hz...


----------



## ChrisNJ

Looks like a lot of people are using the 500GB Cavalry drive. I just got mine today and hooked it up. The code worked the first try. I was also upgraded to 8.3 yesterday.


----------



## Joe3

XBR said:


> According to the Seagate data sheet, the 750GB ES is rated at 2.7 bels idle and 3.2 bels during seeks. By way of comparison, the DB35 is rated at 2.8 and 3.0 (to derive decibels, multiply bels by 10). Obviously, for max performance in an enterprise environment the ES does max performance seeks, but if the ES supports AAM, maybe it can be brought in line with the DB35 during seeks...(who knows, maybe a DB35 is basically an ES for durability, but with an AAM profile).
> 
> Note: dBA are "A-weighted" decibels, where low frequencies (below 1 KHz) have less weight to correspond with lower human ear sensitivity to low frequencies; the data sheets I've seen do not specify if the bels are A-weighted, so there's an assumption here...which could be interesting because 7200 RPM = 120 Hz...


Soooo

I get it.

Just keep your receipt

Right?


----------



## generaltso

XBR said:


> The guys over at Silent PC Review use the Hitachi Feature Tool to enable acoustic management seek profiles, even in non-Hitachi drives ("works with most drives"). For those of you where seek noise is a concern, it might be worth investigating...


Seagate drives do NOT support AAM, so you will not be able to use the Hitachi tool or any other tool to make them quieter. If you want a quiet drive, go with the DB35.


----------



## XBR

generaltso said:


> Seagate drives do NOT support AAM, so you will not be able to use the Hitachi tool or any other tool to make them quieter. If you want a quiet drive, go with the DB35.


Oop--that happened after the Barracuda IV didn't it. Sorry I forgot about that folks!


----------



## bkdtv

generaltso said:


> Seagate drives do NOT support AAM, so you will not be able to use the Hitachi tool or any other tool to make them quieter. If you want a quiet drive, go with the DB35.


Seagate doesn't support AAM, but they have their own implementation of that technology, which they only offer with firmwares in different models (such as the DB35).


----------



## bremmma

So, after all the DB35 vs. ES debate I'm still a little confused, so let me ask those of you who have used the drives your opinion.

My couch is ~10 feet from the S3. I have a surround system and I usually turn the volume up to a decent level. I have the S3 in an open audio rack from Sanus (pic) so there's not a ton of noise buffer, but I could also run a wire and keep the extra drive semi-hidden behind the rack or behind the TV.

Do you think the ES will be ok? Am I going to drive myself crazy hearing the drive all the time? Or is it just personal preference?


----------



## generaltso

bremmma said:


> So, after all the DB35 vs. ES debate I'm still a little confused, so let me ask those of you who have used the drives your opinion.
> 
> My couch is ~10 feet from the S3. I have a surround system and I usually turn the volume up to a decent level. I have the S3 in an open audio rack from Sanus (pic) so there's not a ton of noise buffer, but I could also run a wire and keep the extra drive semi-hidden behind the rack or behind the TV.
> 
> Do you think the ES will be ok? Am I going to drive myself crazy hearing the drive all the time? Or is it just personal preference?


My opinion is that you should go with the DB35 drive. Why deal with potential noise issues if you don't have to?

DB35 drives were specifically designed to be used in DVR applications.


----------



## popcult

bremmma said:


> So, after all the DB35 vs. ES debate I'm still a little confused, so let me ask those of you who have used the drives your opinion.
> 
> My couch is ~10 feet from the S3. I have a surround system and I usually turn the volume up to a decent level. I have the S3 in an open audio rack from Sanus (pic) so there's not a ton of noise buffer, but I could also run a wire and keep the extra drive semi-hidden behind the rack or behind the TV.
> 
> Do you think the ES will be ok? Am I going to drive myself crazy hearing the drive all the time? Or is it just personal preference?


After giving it some thought, I just ordered the DB35 drive. I'll end up paying about $50 more than if I had gone with the ES ($70 if I had gotten the AS) but at least this way I won't be second-guessing myself about this noise issue.


----------



## generaltso

popcult said:


> After giving it some thought, I just ordered the DB35 drive. I'll end up paying about $50 more than if I had gone with the ES ($70 if I had gotten the AS) but at least this way I won't be second-guessing myself about this noise issue.


When I purchased the DB35 drives right after they came out, they were about $140 more than the equivalent AS drives. After using both the AS and DB35 drives, I have no concerns that the extra money wasn't well spent.


----------



## bown

bkdtv said:


> Yes.
> 
> That is correct. Initially, I thought that products without a switch had to be manually turned on, but I see some people now report that their drive will power on when they detect the host device with power (for example, when the Series3 powers up).
> 
> Could someone clarify how this works with their Seagate Free Agent / Free Agent Pro? When you pull the plug on the Series3 and Free Agent, do both power up at the same time _automatically_ when you restore power? Or does the Series3 display the "reconnect the drive" screen?


If the power is pulled on both at the same time, and both are plugged back in at the same time (or close to it), the drive instantly turns on, and the tivo boots normally and doesn't detect that anything has changed with its external drive.

If for some reason, the power only went out on the tivo, the drive would automatically turn off. It would turn on again automatically when power was restored to the tivo.

I tested this when I first hooked up my Seagate Freeagent pro 750. If there was any issues with auto-power on, I was going to return the drive.


----------



## smoknyreyz

smc said:


> Just a FYI, Fry's has the Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB for $239.99.
> 
> I just picked one up!


Thanks for the heads up! I just ordered one too. Also - to those interested in the FreeAgent Pro drives *THEY DO NOT COME WITH THE ESATA CABLE*

The only cable in the box is the power cable and a usb cable. I picked up the 500gb drive at Best Buy today only to find that there was no esata cable in the box - and of course BB doesn't sell the cables (nor any other retailer around here apparently) No big deal though - Since seeing this post about the 750GB drive from frys for the same price I paid retail at BB I am returning the 500GB drive on my way home from work today and will await the 750 from Fry's tomorrow along with the $6.99 esata cable.


----------



## keenanSR

bkdtv said:


> [*] *What eSATA solutions (drive+enclosure) are confirmed to work?*
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> [b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]  [u]Capacity     [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]       [u]Physical on/off switch*[/u][/b]
> 
> Seagate          ST3500601XS-RK    500Gb            No          No
> 
> 
> Seagate          ST3500601XS-RK    500GB            Yes         no
> 
> Most other drives should work too, they're just not confirmed here yet.
> 
> If you've upgraded your Series3, and what you used isn't listed here, please post
> or pm what you used.


I noticed the above drive is listed twice, once with a fan and once without. I'll admit that I did not take apart the enclosure, no way to do so, so I couldn't 100% verify that it does not have a fan. But listening to it, and looking through the vents, I couldn't hear or see a fan.

If it truly does have a fan I suppose one of those listings should be removed.


----------



## msu2k

smoknyreyz said:


> Thanks for the heads up! I just ordered one too. Also - to those interested in the FreeAgent Pro drives *THEY DO NOT COME WITH THE ESATA CABLE*
> 
> The only cable in the box is the power cable and a usb cable. I picked up the 500gb drive at Best Buy today only to find that there was no esata cable in the box - and of course BB doesn't sell the cables (nor any other retailer around here apparently) No big deal though - Since seeing this post about the 750GB drive from frys for the same price I paid retail at BB I am returning the 500GB drive on my way home from work today and will await the 750 from Fry's tomorrow along with the $6.99 esata cable.


Thanks for the heads up. I think I'm going to use this as my backup plan if the Cavalry drive I installed doesn't work out.


----------



## generaltso

The listing for the Apricorn enclosure isn't entirely correct:

Make Model Fan? Bridge chip? Physical on/off switch*
Apricorn EZ Bus DTS Yes Yes No


It actually does have a physical on/off switch. It's just that it's a push button switch instead of a rocker switch. It is a hard switch though and remains in the on position through a power failure.


----------



## bkdtv

generaltso said:


> The listing for the Apricorn enclosure isn't entirely correct:
> 
> Make Model Fan? Bridge chip? Physical on/off switch*
> Apricorn EZ Bus DTS Yes Yes No
> 
> It actually does have a physical on/off switch. It's just that it's a push button switch instead of a rocker switch. It is a hard switch though and remains in the on position through a power failure.


Thanks for that clarification. Fixed.



keenanSR said:


> I noticed the above drive is listed twice, once with a fan and once without. I'll admit that I did not take apart the enclosure, no way to do so, so I couldn't 100% verify that it does not have a fan. But listening to it, and looking through the vents, I couldn't hear or see a fan.
> 
> If it truly does have a fan I suppose one of those listings should be removed.


One person reported it with a fan and another reported it without. I removed the entry with the fan.


----------



## keenanSR

bkdtv said:


> Thanks for that clarification. Fixed.
> 
> One person reported it with a fan and another reported it without. I removed the entry with the fan.


Well, like I said, I can't hear a fan, but that doesn't mean there isn't one. I suppose some more input is needed unless the other user can confirm it to be a fact. I tested it with a stick of incense, and it didn't blow the smoke nor did it suck it in, so I deduced that there was no fan.

In any case, it's not a desirable solution in my opinion due to the power switch issue.


----------



## rodalpho

keenanSR said:


> If it truly does have a fan I suppose one of those listings should be removed.


I believe I'm the entry with the fan. I must admit that I couldn't find or hear one either, but a couple reviews said it had one. They could of course be wrong. I have it on a UPS so the power button isn't a problem for me.


----------



## keenanSR

rodalpho said:


> I believe I'm the entry with the fan. I must admit that I couldn't find or hear one either, but a couple reviews said it had one. They could of course be wrong. I have it on a UPS so the power button isn't a problem for me.


Okay, I didn't see the reviews, I would guess they're probably right about the fan.


----------



## sriggins

I've added my Seagate and Wiebetech case!

http://www.geeksrus.com/2007/05/11/i-have-tripled-my-tivo-series-3-hard-disk-space/

Following [the directions on TiVocommunity.com](http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=350491) I have successfully added 500gb external storage to my TiVo series 3!

I bought a Seagate ST3500641AS 500gb drive from Frys for $119 a couple weeks back for MacPro use, but since I have decided to wait on that, I decided to take a chance with the unreleased eSata support in the Series 3.

eSata is "External Serial ATA". I bought a case/Express32 card combo from [WiebeTech](http://wiebetech.com/products/toughtech.php) (TTE-0, but I got TTE-BND-0) for $114 which included an eSata **only** case and a MacBook Pro expressSlot32 eSata adaptor.

You want eSata only because firewire/usb bridge chips will slow the throughput down. This case has a cable that connects the drive directly to the eSata port on the back.

The case also has shock absorbing/dampending, which are silicon grommets that you screw through into the drive. The case came with a screwdriver, very nice plated screws, an external brick (which is corded, does not need a huge power slot) and is very very quiet.

I first plugged the card and drive into the Mac, but nothing mounted. So I installed their drivers (very geeky, poorly distributed) and that locked the entire Mac up. After a forced reboot, I **removed the card, then installed the drivers** and that worked fine. I slid the card in, the drive asked to be initialized and then I did a file copy from the internal 7200 100gb drive to the Seagate and got a **whopping 40mb/s** via PathFinder. Nice.

Next I used the "Card Menu" that shows up (it looks like a little address card) to power off the card after I had ejected the drive from the desktop.

I powered down the TiVo, plugged the drive into my UPS (Uninterruptible power supply, **which is very important if the power goes out**), connected the included cable to the TiVo and powered on the TiVo.

As soon as the red lights went out, I held down Pause. When the orange light showed (about 2 seconds) I entered '62' The lights on the TiVo went out and in a minute or so it rebooted. After powering up, it told me that my second drive had been added. A few minutes later I was back at the TiVo menu!

Before adding the external 500gb, the internal 250gb supported 35 hours of HD programming, 330 hours of SD. Now I get **98 hours of HD or 927 hours of SD**

If I ever decide to use the drive elsewhere, I just power down the TiVo, unplug the drive and power the TiVo up. The TiVo will warn me that I am about to divorce the drive, and **any content on the drive is lost forever** Plugging the drive back in after a divorce will erase the drive. If you see the divorce screen and don't want to lose yoru content (say the drive got unplugged by accident), **do not consent to the divorce.** If you get divorced, you lose your stuff - Kinda like real life.

I'll report later if I run into any issues or bugs, as this is **an unsupported TiVo feature**. Sure beats opening up the box though!


----------



## sharp1

Thanks for the Fry's tip. I also bought the 500 from Best Buy, and was also disappointed to find that not only did it not include the cable, but apparently there was no where nearby that did either. The 500 will go back to Best Buy Monday.

Sp for about $20 more than I paid Best Buy, I am getting an extra 250 GB. Not too shabby. Now we play the waiting game...


----------



## richsadams

I'm more than happy to report the successful installation of a 500GB Apricorn DVR Xpander eSATA drive on our un-modded S3! 

We followed the original eSATA installation directions and our S3 recognized it the very first attempt and everything is working fine. Note that our remote was set to "DVR 1" (not "0") as we have two TiVo's in the same room...and the S3 had no problem recognizing the pause, 6-2 entries.

Apricorn external drives cost a little more than some others, but I've used them for a couple of years now and not one has failed. The drive is of very solid construction and includes a fan (as it will be in a closed interior cabinet). The drive has a on/off push button switch which remains in the on position if power is lost as recommended (tested it out). The fan has a mild hum and might bother some if it were exposed and they were within ear shot, but it certainly keeps the drive cool!

This was a great, fast, "turn key" option for adding a LOT of additional space. Thanks to everyone for posting their experiences and tips. :up:

We also received the 8.3 update last night, so we're happy campers. Now if the TiVo folks will just get to work on the MRV/TivoToGo option we'd be ever so grateful!


----------



## rjom

msu2k said:


> Oh man, that sucks. One person having issues with the Cavalry is one thing, but two people, that's not good news. Looks like I should start preparing to return mine. I was just about to call Comcast this morning to sign up too. I was waiting until I could expand my storage for a reasonable amount and have just been using the S3 for OTA.


My Cavalry drive was dead out of the box. Could not get the computer to recognize it thru USB either. No recognition on any machine. Overnight shipping wasted!!


----------



## msu2k

rjom said:


> My Cavalry drive was dead out of the box. Could not get the computer to recognize it thru USB either. No recognition on any machine. Overnight shipping wasted!!


No problems with my Cavalry drive and it's filling up fast. However I'm starting to feel that I won't be able to trust it longterm based on what everyone else is saying. Probably sending mine back next week. :down:


----------



## pablop

I got it to work today. Seagate 750GB Free Agent Pro from Fry's for $239. S3 with 8.3.1. 

At first it would not work at all - I tried 4 or 5 times. Then, I moved the drive to the PC, hooked it up via USB to make sure it was OK. While there, I removed the single partition it had. Moved it back to the S3 and tried again. This time it worked. I noticed an early indication that it was doing something different - you know how there is an ugly, green "powering up" screen that normally stays up for just a few seconds and gets replaced by a prettier one? Well, when rebooting after entering the 62 code succesfully, the Tivo stayed on the ugly "powering up" screen for much longer than usual.

Now, it reads 131 hours of HD.


----------



## XBR

Seagate 750GB Free Agent Pro owners: how would you rate their quietness? Does it seem like the enclosure dampens the noises the drive makes at all? Is is any louder than the Series3 itself?


----------



## kdmorse

For those having problems - I have noticed that there are some crappily made eSata cables out there. If your unit is acting like it just isn't connected to an external drive - it's entirely possibly that it's not.

I have in my hands two grey eSata cables made by Cables Unlimited. They *look* like they fit properly, but they're actually not deep enough to make good electrical contract. If I insert them, push them in hard, and *hold them in* - they will make contact as long as I continue to apply pressure. But the minute I let go, the drive can no longer be seen.

I have in my hand a red eSata cable made by.... Cables Unlimited. The heads are noticeably longer, and just look like they'll make obviously better contact. They work perfectly - 100% - no futzing required.

So... I took the bad cable, and a knife, and cut away the rubber boot from the connector at both ends so it could slide farther in to the port. It now inserts farther, makes good contact, and works perfectly.

Looking on the shelves, I see several esata cables that look like they'd have the exact same problem. If you're having problems, a simple pocket knife may be the solution...

-Ken


----------



## msu2k

smc said:


> Just a FYI, Fry's has the Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB for $239.99.
> 
> I just picked one up!


Looks like these are backordered.  Doesn't show it on the item page, but on my order status. Amazon has it for $249.99 though.


----------



## kdmorse

I wonder if someone at Amazon or NewEgg are sitting there wondering WTF? Why the sudden rush on large eSata drives? 

-Ken


----------



## msu2k

kdmorse said:


> I wonder if someone at Amazon or NewEgg are sitting there wondering WTF? Why the sudden rush on large eSata drives?
> 
> -Ken


The other day I noticed the price of one drive at buy.com went up $40 in a few hours time after several people here mentioned it. 

Makes me not want to buy from them again.


----------



## 1283

msu2k said:


> The other day I noticed the price of one drive at buy.com went up $40 in a few hours time after several people here mentioned it.
> 
> Makes me not want to buy from them again.


That's what Amazon does as well. Demand drives prices up.


----------



## hunts

c3 said:


> That's what Amazon does as well. Demand drives prices up.


This is one reason why I do not plan on picking up a drive until AFTER the summer. This way there will be shows that are worth while to record AND the prices should drop too!


----------



## blakejsmith

First off I know the theoretical 1tb internal 1tb external limit for S3. I do have two questions. 

What basis is this theory on. 

Has anyone tried a larger array of external drives?

From .engadget "Apparentlythis technique has been verified up to 1TB total storage -- anyone with a massive eSATA array want to take the plunge and see if we can get a few terabytes of TiVo going on up in here? Leave it in comments."

Has anyone tried this?

Wondering if its possiable to string an array of say three 1 TB drives together >Insert Evil Laugh Here<

Thanks for your help.

Blake


----------



## greg_burns

blakejsmith said:


> First off I know the theoretical 1tb internal 1tb external limit for S3. I do have two questions.
> 
> What basis is this theory on.
> 
> Has anyone tried a larger array of external drives?


http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5130373&&#post5130373


----------



## rjom

phronimos said:


> I reported above that I was having trouble getting TiVo to recognize my WD SE16 Caviar 320GB drive in a Thermaltake enclosure:
> 
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5140541#post5140541
> 
> Couldn't get it to work despite multiple attempts. Today, I picked up this cheap 500GB Seagate eSATA drive (ST3500601XS-RK) from CompUSA:
> 
> http://www.compusa.com/products/product_info.asp?product_code=341441&pfp=SEARCH
> 
> TiVo recognized it on the very first try.
> 
> Since someone earlier in this thread reported success using a WD SE16 Caviar drive, it looks like maybe the Thermaltake Max 4 eSATA/USB 2.0 enclosure is NOT compatible.


Does this (500GB Seagate eSATA drive (ST3500601XS-RK)) power up automatically on power failure?


----------



## darthblond

Supposedly this can work with a Sata enclosure and a Sata to eSata cable. Has it worked for anybody? I tried but it didn't work. Not sure if it's the cable, the drive, or some other issue. Tivo Software is version 8.1.1-01.2.648 which shouldn't be an issue.

I used the following :
- 500GB WD Caviar SE16 (Model WD5000AAKS-65TMA0)
- Metal Gear Box Powered Sata Enclosure 
- Sata to eSata cable

Does anyone have any ideas?


----------



## jschmidt

hddude55 said:


> I'll flip that research challenge back to you since you were the one who made the crack about cheapskates. I'm one of the "cheapskates" who bought the AS version, as you probably figured out by now. If I made a bad choice and should return it, I'd like data to convince me, or at least you could establish your expertise to make this judgment. Otherwise I'll assume I'm a wise consumer and you're just some guy spouting off. As for lasting longer, I could probably find a $5000 drive that would outlast either of these two cheapies but why would I do that when I can replace this drive inexpensively if and when it fails? If it lasts two or three years I'll have no complaints and it has a five-year warranty just like the NS.


The cheapskate remark was a joke. If you can't take a joke, that's your problem, not mine.

I don't care one way or the other which drive you or anyone else buys. It's not my job to do all the research and report it to everyone on the forum. That takes time that I don't usually have. I merely wanted to point out the potential for a problem and you can take the advice or leave it. Just don't call something BS before you actually look into it.

That said, for your information,

The "AS" models have a duty cycle of 8 hours per day, 5 days per week.

The "NS" models have a duty cycle of 24 hours per day, 7 days per week.

Here are some links for your perusal...

http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/marketing/po_barracuda_es.pdf

http://www.techarp.com/showarticle.aspx?artno=388

http://www.hothardware.com/printarticle.aspx?articleid=881

Check out the stats at the bottom of the page on the last link concerning vibration. These are some of the tollerances of the drive. Every drive spindle vibrates to some degree. This vibration causes wear and tear on the motor and other parts of the drive. As you can see from the last link, the ES drive is build to handle greater vibration. Pretty much anywhere you look regarding the ES drives versus the AS drives indicate the differences. It's not hard to perform a Google search to find this and other information.

I recognize that both drives have a 5 year warranty, but assuming the AS drive will crap out before the ES drive, it's still worth it to me to spend the few extra dollars to increase the probability and longevity for the purpose of saving my TiVo programs. The cost difference isn't that much for the extra piece of mind. That said, I will be spending even more money on a DB35 drive because noise level is of the utmost importance in my bedroom. DB35 drives are also engineered for 24/7 operation and are made specifically for DVR applications.

I hope this satisfies your request for information. This is not an exhaustive list of the sources I read, however. I am not an expert on hard drives and have not performed my own tests. Who has time for that? However, I am not spouting off because I researched the topic. To do this research, I rely on the information from other sources in order to draw my own conclusions. As a part of that research, I evaluate whether or not I believe the source is credible. You are free to do the same with this post.


----------



## rjom

rjom said:


> My Cavalry drive was dead out of the box. Could not get the computer to recognize it thru USB either. No recognition on any machine. Overnight shipping wasted!!


Beware of buying this from Buy.com. Mine is defective but when returning I got this: *Opened/Defective hardware may only be returned for replacement.

Of course the replacement period is well over 2 weeks. I was able to get a refund, but had to order another one, and they will credit my account when my defective one arrives. There was no mention of having to take a replacement. I am now stuck with the Calvary drive. Hope the next one works... I am not at all thrilled with Buy.com and would not order this product from them, as you will be stuck with it, for better or worse. Since I have seen nothing comparable regarding the features (comes with esata cable, has fan, powers up on power failure, I will try to stay optimistic). There does not seem to be anything out there to go and get at a store, that comes with cable etc. Hopefully this next one will work.


----------



## greg_burns

rjom said:


> Beware of buying this from Buy.com. Mine is defective but when returning I got this: *Opened/Defective hardware may only be returned for replacement.


Here is my Buy.com story...
http://tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=4816950&&#post4816950

Took awhile, but I was able to return a defective item for store credit. They don't allow that anymore when filling out the RMA?

http://www.buy.com/corp/support/returns/default.asp?what=returns


> Defective Products
>  Defective products can only be returned in exchange for the exact same product, or at the sole discretion of Buy.com, the purchase price will be credited to the credit card used for the original purchase (or, if possible, through the original payment method such as PayPal or Google Checkout). Defective products may only be returned within 14 days of the date your product left the warehouse (regardless of when you actually took delivery of the product).


----------



## phronimos

rjom said:


> Does this (500GB Seagate eSATA drive (ST3500601XS-RK)) power up automatically on power failure?


Unfortunately, it does not power up automatically. (And we just had an outage last night, so I speak from experience!)


----------



## RoanokeHokie

darthblond said:


> Has it worked for anybody? ... Does anyone have any ideas?


Personally, I tried to follow the kickstart directions as given at first, but it seemed that my code entry never 'took'. So instead of holding PAUSE from power-on to orange LED, I waited for the display to go blank, and then I pressed PAUSE once.

I noticed that if you don't touch the remote at all, the TiVo's boot sequence is: all 4 front panel LEDs on (two red on left, blue and orange on right), then all 4 LEDs off, orange LED on for 1 (maybe 2) seconds, then all 4 LEDs off again.

If, during the first "all 4 LEDs off" period, you hit PAUSE and then see the orange LED stay for 3 seconds, it's waiting for the kickstart code. Don't wait too long to enter, though, because my TiVo appeared to "give up" after about 5 seconds of the orange LED.

It took me 5 attempts to get it right, but I eventually got the "second drive activated" screen. While those five attempts were a mix of 'proper' reboots (through the menus) of the TiVo and from yank-the-power reboots, my successful attempt came from a yank-the-power reboot.

I picked up a LaCie D2 eSATA drive, 500GB. My review so far: enclosure doesn't automatically turn on after power failure, noticable drive seek noise. My Series 3 is on a UPS, though, so I've put the drive on the UPS as well. LaCie's included "eSATA" cable was an I-type to L-type, aka interal to external, so I still had to buy an eSATA (I-I) cable.


----------



## keenanSR

phronimos said:


> Unfortunately, it does not power up automatically. (And we just had an outage last night, so I speak from experience!)


I can confirm this as well. I pulled the power cord from the unit and upon re-attaching, it would not power up, the switch has to be pressed for the unit to power up again.


----------



## Jim Cook

It seems this FreeAgent Pro 750GB (yes from Fry's - $239) has the biggest issues on this board on "getting it to work".

I'm on my like 20th attempt. Have read all these posts and tried everything meticulously:

My experience exactly duplicated Jack D's experience (
This is my 2nd FreeAgent Drive - returned the 1st one - it's not the drive
My 2nd eSata cable - it's not the cable
 Yes, new batteries in the remote
 Yes, both drives worked on my PC...removed the partition on both

Everything goes fine on the sequence...orange light goes out after the "2" is pushed in the 62 sequence...reboots...but every time it never gets to the 2nd screen and instead REBOOTS AGAIN..I don't see others mentioning this failing 2nd reboot screen?

I'm at a complete loss. My only conclusion is a software conflict inside the S3 itself. So I wonder if the code is conflicting with Amazon Unbox. Anyone else have that and gotten their FreeAgent Pro to work.

Any other advice...I do notice that several posts here take "4 or 5 attempts" to get it to work...I wonder why the FreeAgent Pro has so many issues that others don't seem to have?


----------



## greg_burns

Jim Cook said:


> Everything goes fine on the sequence...orange light goes out after the "2" is pushed in the 62 sequence...reboots...but every time it never gets to the 2nd screen and instead REBOOTS AGAIN..I don't see others mentioning this failing 2nd reboot screen?


The couple times I did toying around it always rebooted again before getting to the 2nd screen about "Your second hard drive has been activated." I didn't noticed anybody commenting on this either, but I believe it to be normal.

It did work the very first attempt I made with my Thecus. Later it seemed to take a couple tries before it took again (after intentionally divorcing). Not sure what was up with that.


----------



## bkdtv

Jim Cook said:


> It seems this FreeAgent Pro 750GB (yes from Fry's - $239) has the biggest issues on this board on "getting it to work".
> 
> I'm on my like 20th attempt. Have read all these posts and tried everything meticulously:


If you have a plasma, you might want to turn it off to perform the sequence, as some plasmas interfere with the IR signals on the Tivo. The same is also true for certain types of room lighting.


----------



## spike2k5

Jim Cook said:


> It seems this FreeAgent Pro 750GB (yes from Fry's - $239) has the biggest issues on this board on "getting it to work".


I had an issue with this drive as well. Drive works when connected to USB port on PC but seems to have problem when connected to eSATA port.

One that I tested never got recognized by S3 TiVo. So if that happens, Tivo takes the Kickstart code and everything appears to work but you will never get the "2nd drive added screen".



Jim Cook said:


> Any other advice...I do notice that several posts here take "4 or 5 attempts" to get it to work...I wonder why the FreeAgent Pro has so many issues that others don't seem to have?


I'm suspecting there might be different revisions of this drive.
I would return and get a new one and take your chances or try eSATA enclosure + bare drive combination.


----------



## hddude55

jschmidt said:


> The cheapskate remark was a joke. If you can't take a joke, that's your problem, not mine.
> 
> I don't care one way or the other which drive you or anyone else buys.  It's not my job to do all the research and report it to everyone on the forum. That takes time that I don't usually have. I merely wanted to point out the potential for a problem and you can take the advice or leave it. Just don't call something BS before you actually look into it.
> 
> That said, for your information,
> 
> The "AS" models have a duty cycle of 8 hours per day, 5 days per week.
> 
> The "NS" models have a duty cycle of 24 hours per day, 7 days per week.


 Thanks for the reassuring data. Since my external drive won't be running more than 8 hours a day, it appears my thrifty decision was a good one.


----------



## greg_burns

hddude55 said:


> Thanks for the reassuring data. Since my external drive won't be running more than 8 hours a day, it appears my thrifty decision was a good one.


Uh, what? How are you going to manage that?


----------



## CFL Bill

Successfully upgraded my S3 with a Seagate 500GB (AS Type) and a cheapie eSata enclosure from Monoprice (aluminum without a fan) and it took me three tries before achieving success. Turned out that the drive was not powering up for some strange reason. Don't know exactly what I did, but the drive finally powered up and the install procedure went smoothly. Have had the drive running for about 15 hours now and it is slightly warm to the touch. I have the external drive sitting on top of the S3. So for less that $170.00 I now have 98 hours of HD recording or 927 hours of SD recording. For those having problems installing, take it slow and be patient. Also, noise level so far is not an issue, you can certainly hear the read/write heads when recording but the drive spinning is not noticeable at all. If anyone else has purchased the monoprice eSata enclosure, be warned that the whole front panel light is blue and is quite bright, I disabled this so it would not be a distraction. Great forum and great people sharing valuable information. I've learned a lot by lerking here all these many months. Thank You all.

Bill


----------



## Jack D

Jim Cook said:


> It seems this FreeAgent Pro 750GB (yes from Fry's - $239) has the biggest issues on this board on "getting it to work".
> 
> I'm on my like 20th attempt. Have read all these posts and tried everything meticulously:
> 
> My experience exactly duplicated Jack D's experience (
> This is my 2nd FreeAgent Drive - returned the 1st one - it's not the drive
> My 2nd eSata cable - it's not the cable
> Yes, new batteries in the remote
> Yes, both drives worked on my PC...removed the partition on both
> 
> Everything goes fine on the sequence...orange light goes out after the "2" is pushed in the 62 sequence...reboots...but every time it never gets to the 2nd screen and instead REBOOTS AGAIN..I don't see others mentioning this failing 2nd reboot screen?
> 
> I'm at a complete loss. My only conclusion is a software conflict inside the S3 itself. So I wonder if the code is conflicting with Amazon Unbox. Anyone else have that and gotten their FreeAgent Pro to work.
> 
> Any other advice...I do notice that several posts here take "4 or 5 attempts" to get it to work...I wonder why the FreeAgent Pro has so many issues that others don't seem to have?


Yes the second reboot happened to me and I thoguht that it had failed but I waited and after the second reboot I got to the holy grail screen that said the second drive had been activated. Did you unplug the TIVO and the drive and let them sit for a minute or so before retrying? I did that before my final and successful attempt. Sorry but I don't have any other ideas.

It seems to me that there are several reports here of people who had no problem with the FAP drive. As you know, I had a lot of problems but it was my remote not the drive.


----------



## Dajad

bown said:


> If the power is pulled on both at the same time, and both are plugged back in at the same time (or close to it), the drive instantly turns on, and the tivo boots normally and doesn't detect that anything has changed with its external drive.
> 
> If for some reason, the power only went out on the tivo, the drive would automatically turn off. It would turn on again automatically when power was restored to the tivo.
> 
> I tested this when I first hooked up my Seagate Freeagent pro 750. If there was any issues with auto-power on, I was going to return the drive.


EXCELLENT, bddtv, this was exactly what I had in mind. The column has a No in answer to the on-off switch but, according to bown, it still comes on fine after a power outage. So the REAL question I think most want answered with the column is not whether there is an on-off switch but whether the unit self-powers back on after an outage without a UPS.

I suggest adding a new column for this. Beside the Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750 the answer would be "Yes" despite a "No" to the Power Switch qusetion.

Thanks bown!

This unit (the 500GB Seagate eSATA drive (ST3500601XS-RK ) should have a "No" in both columns:



phronimos said:


> Unfortunately, it does not power up automatically. (And we just had an outage last night, so I speak from experience!)


Thanks Phronimos

On the flip-side, as we see below, the LaCie D2, *despite having a power switch*, does not turn on automatically after a power failure so the entries in th e two columns would be "Yes" followed by ""No".


RoanokeHokie said:


> I picked up a LaCie D2 eSATA drive, 500GB. My review so far: enclosure doesn't automatically turn on after power failure


Thanks RoanokeHohkie

So, going forward, I think we need to have the new question answered in a new column for all units/cases whether or not they have a power switch. Many, and I presume most, of us will never have a UPS.

...Dale


----------



## richsadams

hddude55 said:


> Thanks for the reassuring data. Since my external drive won't be running more than 8 hours a day, it appears my thrifty decision was a good one.


 Sounds like you're talking about HDD activity (recording/programming/access)?

As with TiVo S3's A drive, an eSATA drive will run 24/7 and never spin down as it might if it were hooked up to a computer (with the appropriate programming).


----------



## jschmidt

hddude55 said:


> Thanks for the reassuring data. Since my external drive won't be running more than 8 hours a day, it appears my thrifty decision was a good one.


Unless you are planning to power down your TiVo (unplugging it from the wall), your TiVo, as well as the external drive, will be operating 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Even when you TiVo isn't recording anything to the external drive, the external drive is still on and spinning constantly. If you turn off the external drive, your TiVo will reboot and notify you that your drive is no longer connected. It will then sit at that screen until you either reconnect the drive or divorce the external drive. In either case, your TiVo is not recording anything in the meantime. I know this from personal experience and testing.


----------



## Hystyk28

pablop said:


> While there, I removed the single partition it had.


So I should delete the NTFS partition?

Also, how do you "power down" the Tivo? Do I just unplug the power?

thanks, from this obvious noob!


----------



## jschmidt

Hystyk28 said:


> So I should delete the NTFS partition?
> 
> Also, how do you "power down" the Tivo? Do I just unplug the power?
> 
> thanks, from this obvious noob!


From what I understand, there have been mixed reports regarding the need to remove the existing partition on the drive. You may want to connect it to your desktop/laptop and use fdisk to remove the partiaion just in case.

In order to marry the drive to your TiVo, it is not necessary to power down the TiVo. Just connect the drive and power it up. Then, go to the Settings menu and perform a Reset. Immediately hold down the pause button and go through the rest of the instructions. Works like a charm.


----------



## greg_burns

Hystyk28 said:


> So I should delete the NTFS partition?
> 
> Also, how do you "power down" the Tivo? Do I just unplug the power?
> 
> thanks, from this obvious noob!


If you don't have fdisk lying around on a floppy, you can delete partition from XP also.

Control Panel->Administrative Tools->Computer Management->Disk Management

Although, I never deleted my NTFS partition before hooking it up and didn't have a problem.


----------



## richsadams

We had a successful installation of a 500GB Apricorn DVR Xpander eSATA drive on our un-modded S3. It was recognized on the first try. :up:

I noted that a couple of others were having problems (with other types of drives) being recognized. I don't know if this will help but in our case we:

1. Unplugged TiVo completely.
2. Connected the eSATA cable from the new drive to TiVo.
3. Powered the new drive on.
4. Plugged TiVo back in.
5. While pointing the remote at TiVo, held the pause button down until all of the lights went out on the front panel. (Note: We also have an S2 in the same room and our S3's remote is set to DVR 1, not 0 and it did not make any difference.)
6. When the single orange LED light on the front panel came on I immediately pressed 6 - 2 and the light went out.
7. After a minute or so TiVo rebooted once more and the "Your second hard drive has been activated" screen came on.
8. TiVo went through it's normal reboot cycle and that was it.

The drive itself seems to be of good quality, is cooled by a fan and automatically comes back on after a power failure. (It was designed to be used with SA DVR's but works just as well with TiVo S3's as far as we can tell.)

Hope that helps anyone struggling with this!


----------



## Dajad

hddude55 said:


> Thanks for the reassuring data. Since my external drive won't be running more than 8 hours a day, it appears my thrifty decision was a good one.


Don't feed the trolls!

jschmidt, thanks for your very helpful advice and research! The trolls may strike but the rest of us really appreciate it.

...Dale


----------



## TiivoDog

jschmidt said:


> The cheapskate remark was a joke. If you can't take a joke, that's your problem, not mine.
> 
> I don't care one way or the other which drive you or anyone else buys. It's not my job to do all the research and report it to everyone on the forum. That takes time that I don't usually have. I merely wanted to point out the potential for a problem and you can take the advice or leave it. Just don't call something BS before you actually look into it.
> .


Regarding the thread abovel, I believe the original Cheapskate comment was directed toward the post I made regarding the Seagate AS drive that I had purchased - jshmidt did shed some valuable light on the fact I should have considered the NS or even the DB35. However, my issue with not only his post, but many in this thread is regarding the umpteen hundred or thousand or so folks that are buying self contained units (i.e. Seagate Free Agent Pro among others). Where are the comments regarding those storage options??? I am sure the usage ratings are inferiro to the AS or other 'desktop' designed hard drives, eh?

Anyways, I do wish I would have been aware of the NS or DB35, but I made a choice and it is what it is. Mine might be good for 10 years and those who purchased NS or DB35 drives, my take a lightning strike and be SOL, so who knows what will happen??? Also, Tivo might come out with some application to move content in some manner via MRV from another unit's eSATA drive???

Just enjoy the fact we now have this option!!


----------



## Hystyk28

greg_burns said:


> If you don't have fdisk lying around on a floppy, you can delete partition from XP also.
> 
> Control Panel->Administrative Tools->Computer Management->Disk Management
> 
> Although, I never deleted my NTFS partition before hooking it up and didn't have a problem.


First, I love the fast response guys, I lurk often and really appreciate the quick help. Thanks a ton.

Secondly, I did use admin tools to remove the partition.

And lastly, I have the wrong esata cable. That really stinks. I must have ordered the wrong one in all my excitement. I got one end with an "L". What is the proper cable for the Free Agent Pro, just so I know I got the right one.

Will this cable work? Comp Usa Cable 
thanks again


----------



## rickeame

demon said:


> Success! I've upgraded my TiVo Series3 with a WD MyBook Premium ES 500 GB drive. Unfortunately my patience initially wasn't good enough, and I think it would've worked if I had just waited; after a few tries, I unplugged the drive, plugged it back in, and turned the TiVo back on with the eSATA drive powered off. After that, then doing a "kickstart 6 2", it hesitated for a moment, and then told me my new drive was activated. Consider this another recommendation to anyone who hasn't already tried it - it's well worth it.
> 
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> [b][u]Make           [/u]  [u]Model           [/u]  [u]Capacity     [/u]    [u]Fan? [/u]       [u]Physical on/off switch?[/u][/b]
> 
> Western Digital  WD5000F032        500GB            No          Yes


So I bought this after reading this recommendation -- What I can't find confirmation of is does this drive stay "alive" after the power goes off and comes back on as the power button appears to be a "soft" one. Also, did you have to reformat it to get it to work, or does the Tivo automatically wipe it for you?


----------



## hddude55

Dajad said:


> Don't feed the trolls!
> 
> jschmidt, thanks for your very helpful advice and research! The trolls may strike but the rest of us really appreciate it.
> 
> ...Dale


 Troll, huh? Why don't you keep the name calling out of here. Only people lacking in intelligence resort to it.

I made a smart purchase and I don't need some self-annointed expert on hard drive performance who knows how to read magazines to tell me otherwise. The drive I bought is used in tens of thousands of PCs -- and works great in them as far as any of us knows, including you -- and I'll bet many of them are running more than 8 hours a day for 5 days a week notwithstanding what the guy read in a magazine about their specs.

Some of you guys need to stop patting yourselves on the back. Of course I realize many of you are high school or college kids who pretty much know everything there is to know, and can't stand it if anyone disagrees with you.


----------



## Fofer

OMG, some of you people really need to get outside and breathe some fresh air. Seriously.

We're talking about hard drive storage expansion. For your TiVo. 

Get a grip.


----------



## hddude55

Fofer said:


> OMG, some of you people really need to get outside and breathe some fresh air. Seriously.
> 
> We're talking about hard drive storage expansion. For your TiVo.
> 
> Get a grip.


Seriously?


----------



## jschmidt

TiivoDog said:


> Mine might be good for 10 years and those who purchased NS or DB35 drives, my take a lightning strike and be SOL, so who knows what will happen??? Also, Tivo might come out with some application to move content in some manner via MRV from another unit's eSATA drive???


Good point! Chance also plays a part in all this discussion regarding reliability. I hope you didn't take offense at the cheapskate remark. I was trying to make a play on words regarding marriage. I guess it backfired... 

About the external, packaged drives, those will have the same or similar reliability issues/questions/concerns. Inside, they will more than likely be using some of the same drives we have been talking about here. The only way to know which make and model drive they are using is for someone to open them up and see. I would guess at the price point, they are probably standard desktop drives, but who knows. If anyone is brave enough to open up their FreeAgent or other pre-packaged external drive, that would be interesting information to add to the mix.


----------



## jschmidt

hddude55 said:


> Troll, huh? Why don't you keep the name calling out of here. Only people lacking in intelligence resort to it.
> 
> . . .
> 
> Of course I realize many of you are high school or college kids who pretty much know everything there is to know, and can't stand it if anyone disagrees with you.


Okay, who is calling people names here? I'll have you know, there are many intelligent people in the board. I consider myself among them. I've been working with computers for 25 years. I have 12 years of professional experience in IT. I have a BA, a JD, and part way through an MBA. You'll find that many others here are very well educated as well.

If you don't like the advice, you are free to disagree, but don't hijack the thread and make it into something personal.

FYI...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Troll_(internet)


----------



## Fofer

hddude55 said:


> Seriously?


Yes, seriously.


----------



## bkdtv

rickeame said:


> So I bought this after reading this recommendation -- What I can't find confirmation of is does this drive stay "alive" after the power goes off and comes back on as the power button appears to be a "soft" one. Also, did you have to reformat it to get it to work, or does the Tivo automatically wipe it for you?


That WD5000F032 has a soft button? A previous owner said it had a hard button. I'll change that.

It looks like some people don't understand the description, because that's the second time someone has claimed a "hard" on/off power switch for a device that evidently did not have one.

I have renamed the column to "Fixed On/Off toggle switch?" Hopefully, that will provide more clarity. No product in this column should have a "yes" unless it has a switch that can be moved from the "off" to "on" position, and remain there, until it is physically moved again. This is typically implemented as an on/off rocker switch on the back of the enclosure, but it can also be implemented as a button that stays depressed.



rickeame said:


> Also, did you have to reformat it to get it to work, or does the Tivo automatically wipe it for you?


No disk preparation is required. See FAQ questions #9 and #10.


----------



## TiivoDog

jschmidt said:


> Good point! Chance also plays a part in all this discussion regarding reliability. I hope you didn't take offense at the cheapskate remark. I was trying to make a play on words regarding marriage. I guess it backfired...
> 
> About the external, packaged drives, those will have the same or similar reliability issues/questions/concerns. Inside, they will more than likely be using some of the same drives we have been talking about here. The only way to know which make and model drive they are using is for someone to open them up and see. I would guess at the price point, they are probably standard desktop drives, but who knows. If anyone is brave enough to open up their FreeAgent or other pre-packaged external drive, that would be interesting information to add to the mix.


No - I am not offended at all and just wish I had the oppotunity to buy one of the more reliable ones before I did.... Thx for the insight on the external units - misery or (dissapointment in this case) loves company


----------



## Jack D

XBR said:


> Seagate 750GB Free Agent Pro owners: how would you rate their quietness? Does it seem like the enclosure dampens the noises the drive makes at all? Is is any louder than the Series3 itself?


Pretty quiet. Not noisier than the TIVO. I have to say, however, that I probably have a significant amount of "ambient" noise in my room and it's a big room so the subtle noise from the external drive or the TIVO internal drive would not make much difference to me anyway.


----------



## Jack D

Hystyk28 said:


> First, I love the fast response guys, I lurk often and really appreciate the quick help. Thanks a ton.
> 
> Secondly, I did use admin tools to remove the partition.
> 
> And lastly, I have the wrong esata cable. That really stinks. I must have ordered the wrong one in all my excitement. I got one end with an "L". What is the proper cable for the Free Agent Pro, just so I know I got the right one.
> 
> Will this cable work? Comp Usa Cable
> thanks again


Just make sure it is an "eSata" cable. I think the one in your link will work but it doesn't specifically say "eSata." It does, however, look like the one I have that works.


----------



## richsadams

bkdtv said:


> No product in this column should have a "yes" unless it has a switch that can be moved from the "off" to "on" position, and remain there, until it is physically moved again. This is typically implemented as an on/off rocker switch on the back of the enclosure, but it can also be implemented as a button that stays depressed.


 A quick FYI: Our Apricorn DVR Xpander eSATA drive has a "push button" power switch on the front of the unit. The button does not remain in a depressed position...push it once to turn the unit on, push it again to turn it off. The unit remains on after a power failure (assuming it was on prior). I suppose this could be categorized as a "toggle switch" as well?

Many of Apricorn's other external drives and enclosures have the same feature.


----------



## slimm

richsadams said:


> Apricorn external drives cost a little more than some others, but I've used them for a couple of years now and not one has failed. The drive is of very solid construction and includes a fan (as it will be in a closed interior cabinet). The drive has a on/off push button switch which remains in the on position if power is lost as recommended (tested it out). The fan has a mild hum and might bother some if it were exposed and they were within ear shot, but it certainly keeps the drive cool!


I'm using the Apricorn external enclosure with a 750GB DB35 drive and agree with your comments. Mine is behind an audio cabinet with a glass front door and I can't hear the hum or the drive at all.


----------



## jlib

Just a quick data point regarding cables. Those who are resurrecting older SATA external enclosures with a SATA-to-ESATA cable make sure to follow the least common denominator rule as far as specs go. Max cable length for SATA spec is 1 meter but there are longer out-of-spec SATA-to-ESATA cables out there. But most people buying new gear will be going ESATA-to-ESATA which has a 3 meter maximum.

As far as removing existing partitions goes I think I would if it is a Mac partition. I only say that because somewhere (was it Engadget?) I saw posted a screen shot of a partition table after removal from the ESATA connection to the S3 and it showed the original Mac partitions and the new MFS ones.

Keep up the good work documenting which drive/enclosure combinations work. I was a little saddened that it seems a bit of a crap shoot at this time. I guess that is why it is called the "bleeding edge." I am anxious for everyone to join the Terabyte Tivo club and the stock 250GB with an external 750GB ESATA seems the most elegant solution or at least the one most have been waiting for.

I am also anxiously awaiting the result of spike2k5's investigations into appending to an already expanded S3.


----------



## Nalez

msu2k said:


> The other day I noticed the price of one drive at buy.com went up $40 in a few hours time after several people here mentioned it.
> 
> Makes me not want to buy from them again.


I would not be suprised if their order system has logic built in to automaticly adjust prices as demand warrants.


----------



## smoknyreyz

Just a follow up on the 750GB Free Agent Pro I ordered from Fry's yesterday for $239. The drive arrived today as expected. I had no problems with the setup. Worked the first time around - TiVo rebooted and I got the drive added message. From the time I signed for the package to the time I was enjoying 131 hours of HD bliss was approximately 20 minutes.

I don't notice any noise at all from the drive. It's definitely not any louder than the Series 3 itself.

I didn't do anything extra to the drive (hook up to computer and delete partition, etc).
I just pulled it from the box - connected it to the series 3, and then powered them both up and went through the kickstart procedure.

The drive boots up on its own after a power failure as long as it is still connected to the TiVo via the esata cable and the TiVo has power as well.

Hope this helps anyone with concerns about the Free Agent Pro.

Now time to go fill up that drive.


----------



## GaryRudolph

I just had success with the Venus DS 3 SATA enclosure with a Seagate 750GB disk (max size it suports). It has a physical power button, and automatically starts up after power failure. It also has a fan. Couple notes:

1) I had to partition the drive beforehand (I used the USB).
2) I had to purchase a eSATA to SATA cable (I to L) as the enclosure is SATA and not eSATA.


----------



## Hystyk28

Jim Cook said:


> It seems this FreeAgent Pro 750GB (yes from Fry's - $239) has the biggest issues on this board on "getting it to work".
> 
> I'm on my like 20th attempt. Have read all these posts and tried everything meticulously:
> 
> My experience exactly duplicated Jack D's experience (
> This is my 2nd FreeAgent Drive - returned the 1st one - it's not the drive
> My 2nd eSata cable - it's not the cable
> Yes, new batteries in the remote
> Yes, both drives worked on my PC...removed the partition on both
> 
> Everything goes fine on the sequence...orange light goes out after the "2" is pushed in the 62 sequence...reboots...but every time it never gets to the 2nd screen and instead REBOOTS AGAIN..I don't see others mentioning this failing 2nd reboot screen?
> 
> I'm at a complete loss. My only conclusion is a software conflict inside the S3 itself. So I wonder if the code is conflicting with Amazon Unbox. Anyone else have that and gotten their FreeAgent Pro to work.
> 
> Any other advice...I do notice that several posts here take "4 or 5 attempts" to get it to work...I wonder why the FreeAgent Pro has so many issues that others don't seem to have?


Any solutions to this? I am experiencing the same thing.


----------



## rtudisco

I have successfully upgraded with an Antec MX-1 enclosure and a seagate 750 g drive.

A surprising problem I am having is after the kickstart 62 the cooling fan does not come on. I tried last night and didn't notice until the temp was at 70C! I disconnected and divorced the drive for the night. I tried again today and the same thing happened. I had to manually give the fan a couple of spins to get it running and it is running for now. I am concerned what will happen if there is a power failure and the Tivo reboots unattended. Any ideas why this would happen? It never occurred before I tried this expansion.

On the other hand the MX-1 enclosure is very quiet and easy to use with a real on/off switch.


----------



## Adam1115

Adam1115 said:


> Bought the same drive.
> 
> VERY good, stays on after a power failure.
> 
> Now running 500 Gig internal and 500 gig external, 1244 SD Hours, 131 HD Hours.
> 
> :up: :up: :up:
> 
> I should add, I bought a Sata to Esata cable, but didn't need it. The drive ships with an esata cable and an internal dongle that connects to the sata controller on the motherboard.


Still running strong on the Cavalry CAXM37500. Not one problem. Best $127.49 I've ever spent..


----------



## tase2

tase2 said:


> Not being a computer whiz, I have a question of which I think I know the answer, but want to be sure.
> 
> Say I have a *750Gb upgrade internal drive * from one of the upgrade companies.
> And say I have a new S3 on the way.
> This particular drive has months worth of recording on it already.
> 
> Is there anyway to make this work as a eSATA drive?
> 
> Actually it sound pretty dumb now that I have reread my question, but what the heck.





Jack D said:


> You can make it work as an eSata drvie but you can't save the data that is already on there because the TIVO deletes the basic disc partition on the eSata drive in the process of activating it.


A little OT, but I just want to double check something.

If I place that drive inside a new S3, will all the previous recordings still be there?


----------



## bonnie_raitt

rtudisco said:


> I have successfully upgraded with an Antec MX-1 enclosure and a seagate 750 g drive.
> 
> A surprising problem I am having is after the kickstart 62 the cooling fan does not come on. I tried last night and didn't notice until the temp was at 70C! I disconnected and divorced the drive for the night. I tried again today and the same thing happened. I had to manually give the fan a couple of spins to get it running and it is running for now. I am concerned what will happen if there is a power failure and the Tivo reboots unattended. Any ideas why this would happen? It never occurred before I tried this expansion.
> 
> On the other hand the MX-1 enclosure is very quiet and easy to use with a real on/off switch.


Probably a dumb question, but how did you check the temp?


----------



## Jim Cook

Hystyk28 said:


> Any solutions to this? I am experiencing the same thing.


 Well, after a few more tries...it finally worked. I have no idea how or why..but here's what I did

1) definitely pulled the plug on the Tivo and waited a full 1 minute before plugging back in
2) made sure the Seagate drive was spinning when I plugged the Tivo back in
3) double checked the cable connections by really, really, really pushing them both in hard to their connectors (while wiggling and pushing to make sure they were "seated")

Good luck....this drive and or connection is definitely finicky on getting it to recognize

Final note: I didn't have to rush to push the pause button. In fact on the success attempt I waited until all front panel lights came on and THEN hit the pause button. Personally, I believe you can hit pause anytime after it powers up and before the front panel lights go out......but definitely no need to be a 2 handed contortionist by plugging in and holding the button down..no need.

Good luck!


----------



## lcann44

bonnie_raitt said:


> Probably a dumb question, but how did you check the temp?


It's on the system information page. He's talking about his TiVo temp, not his eSATA.


----------



## XBR

rtudisco said:


> ...and didn't notice until the temp was at 70C!...


Just curious: what was your first clue? What made you go check the temp? Did you get an overtemp warning?


----------



## jfh3

The report of the internal fan not working after a FAP drive being attached externally concerns me - what is the experience of others?


----------



## jfh3

rtudisco said:


> I have successfully upgraded with an Antec MX-1 enclosure and a seagate 750 g drive.
> 
> A surprising problem I am having is after the kickstart 62 the cooling fan does not come on. I tried last night and didn't notice until the temp was at 70C! I disconnected and divorced the drive for the night. I tried again today and the same thing happened. I had to manually give the fan a couple of spins to get it running and it is running for now. I am concerned what will happen if there is a power failure and the Tivo reboots unattended. Any ideas why this would happen? It never occurred before I tried this expansion.


If you divorce the external drive and revert to single drive, does the internal fan start working again?


----------



## rtudisco

I checked the internal temp because the unit began to feel hot. The temperature was reported as high but still safe.

When I divorced the drive the fan wouldn't restart until I gave it a spin. That gave me the idea to reconnect the esata drive and start the fan. It seemed like the esata connection had damaged something....or maybe it is just coincidence and the fan is going bad?

Once the fan is running it stays running (so far).


----------



## Redux

rtudisco said:


> It seemed like the esata connection had damaged something....or maybe it is just coincidence and the fan is going bad?


This was a minor concession Tivo had to make to CableLabs. OK, the customer can add an external drive; but the Tivo has to then fry itself to death within 10 days.


----------



## Hystyk28

Jim Cook said:


> Well, after a few more tries...it finally worked. I have no idea how or why..but here's what I did
> 
> 1) definitely pulled the plug on the Tivo and waited a full 1 minute before plugging back in
> 2) made sure the Seagate drive was spinning when I plugged the Tivo back in
> 3) double checked the cable connections by really, really, really pushing them both in hard to their connectors (while wiggling and pushing to make sure they were "seated")
> 
> Good luck....this drive and or connection is definitely finicky on getting it to recognize
> 
> Final note: I didn't have to rush to push the pause button. In fact on the success attempt I waited until all front panel lights came on and THEN hit the pause button. Personally, I believe you can hit pause anytime after it powers up and before the front panel lights go out......but definitely no need to be a 2 handed contortionist by plugging in and holding the button down..no need.
> 
> Good luck!


I was about to give up, so my Hail Mary was shaving down the connector with my trusty Ginzu knife. Thanks Mr. Popeil I now have it working.

thanks for the help


----------



## bkdtv

Can those had who difficulty with the original instructions summarize the "tips" I should include in the the FAQ for others having problems?


----------



## 1283

tase2 said:


> If I place that drive inside a new S3, will all the previous recordings still be there?


No, you have to run "clear and delete everything".


----------



## tase2

c3 said:


> No, you have to run "clear and delete everything".


Seriously 

I thought for sure that I could drop it in there and I'd be good to go 

This makes me very sad.


----------



## Jack D

tase2 said:


> A little OT, but I just want to double check something.
> 
> If I place that drive inside a new S3, will all the previous recordings still be there?


Umm I don't think so because you have to reformat the drive with LINUX to install it either externally or internally.


----------



## lcann44

jfh3 said:


> The report of the internal fan not working after a FAP drive being attached externally concerns me - what is the experience of others?


I've actually already hooked up two different eSATA drives and replaced the last one I purchased so I've done 3 hookups, 2 divorces. I checked internal temperature everytime and not once did I have any problems.


----------



## hiker

rtudisco said:


> I checked the internal temp because the unit began to feel hot. The temperature was reported as high but still safe.
> 
> When I divorced the drive the fan wouldn't restart until I gave it a spin. That gave me the idea to reconnect the esata drive and start the fan. It seemed like the esata connection had damaged something....or maybe it is just coincidence and the fan is going bad?
> 
> Once the fan is running it stays running (so far).


Sorry if I missed it... what fan stopped spinning, S3 fan or MX-1 fan?


----------



## Bighouse

Hiker,
He mentions that it "never happened before he tried the expansion", so I'm assuming that it's the fan in his S3.


----------



## rtudisco

Hiker and Bighouse,

Yes, it is the fan in my S3. 

Do you think it is just coincidence and the fan cannot start on it's own now because it is failing (only 3 months old) or does the external drive effect the power to the fan somehow.

The S3 cooling fan has run continuously now (with the esata drive connected) for about 18 hrs.

The only problem is now it seems to need it's own "kickstart" when powering up with or without the external drive attached.


----------



## hiker

rtudisco,
The only possibility that comes to mind is that the eSATA connection might be draining the voltage and the S3's power supply is not providing enough voltage for the fan. But if that was the case, there would probably be more reports of this happening. I would open the S3 cover and make sure there is nothing restricting the fan like dust buildup.


----------



## rtudisco

hiker said:


> rtudisco,
> The only possibility that comes to mind is that the eSATA connection might be draining the voltage and the S3's power supply is not providing enough voltage for the fan. But if that was the case, there would probably be more reports of this happening. I would open the S3 cover and make sure there is nothing restricting the fan like dust buildup.


Thanks Hiker ... I will try that this week. I guess it wouldn't hurt for me to have an extra fan in the house just in case!

Glad for everyone else that this is just an isolated incident. I panicked thinking I had damaged my S3!

I'll let you know what I see inside.


----------



## tase2

Jack D said:


> Umm I don't think so because you have to reformat the drive with LINUX to install it either externally or internally.


So if this the case, and someone earlier in this tread said I could turn this interior drive into an exterior drive, do you think I should try to do this eSATA thing?


----------



## SC0TLANDF0REVER

tase2 said:


> So if this the case, and someone earlier in this tread said I could turn this interior drive into an exterior drive, do you think I should try to do this eSATA thing?


Totally 

OK - I'm gonna have to wait till the DB35 1TB drives come out later this yr to do this... I was so gonna do the Internal upgrade, but I like the flexibility of the external :up:


----------



## Mohuska

I followed the link to the product site and the SATA raid unit is very cool...but what is the info on the drives they show? Those are very cool drives....


----------



## jschmidt

Mohuska said:


> I followed the link to the product site and the SATA raid unit is very cool...but what is the info on the drives they show? Those are very cool drives....


I thought about doing a RAID setup as well. It definitely ups the cool factor. But, the problem with a RAID setup is that unless you are doing RAID 1 (Mirroring) or RAID 5 (Striping plus parity), you are asking for trouble. RAID 0 allows you to take two 500GB drives, for example, and combine them into a single 1TB logical drive. However, if *either* drive fails, you have just lost all of your programming.

My overarching concern about using the eSATA enclosure is that you have now just doubled your possible points of failure. Either your internal drive could go or your external drive could go. Either way, you have just lost all of your programming (or in the case of the eSATA, all of your programming since you have connected it).

In terms of reliability, you want to decrease the number of possible points of failure. Having a single 1TB eSATA drive is statistically more reliable than having a RAID 0 (500GB x 2) 1TB RAID array.

RAID 1 (Mirroring) is a possible solution, but it gets expensive. You would have to have 2 - 1TB drives in order to get 1TB of storage. That way, if either drive dies, you can simply insert a new one and they will re-sync without losing any of your data. But, you are paying a 100% premium for the space because for every GB, you have to pay twice as much.

RAID 5 would seem to be the best approach, but to do it, you have to have at least 3 drives. If you have 3 - 500GB drives, that will give you 1TB of storage space. If any of the 3 external drives fail, you can replace it while the drive is still on and then it will re-sync. In this case, you are paying a 50% premium for the space because for every GB, you have to buy half a GB for the parity storage.

Now, what if you did RAID 5, but using 4 drives? You could use 4 - 320GB drives, which would give you 3 x 320 = 960GB of storage plus the parity. That seems somewhat attractive, but 4 -320 GB drives just increase the possibility of a drive failure, which you have to then replace. In terms of premium, you are now only paying a 33% premium for the storage because you have to buy one extra drive for parity for every 3 data drives.

Although either RAID 1 or RAID 5 would save your data in the case of a single drive failure, the cost in terms of per GB is not really worth it to me. I have RAID 5 in a couple of servers in my home and they work well, but it seems overkill to me in this application. But, I came to the conclusion that IF I were going to do RAID, it would have to be RAID 5 because of the balance between reliability and $/GB.

Keep in mind that no matter how many drives you use in your RAID array, if your internal S3 drive fails, you are still SOL. All programs lost forever... even on the RAID box.

The other thing that you have to think about when thinking of RAID is noise. Now, instead of 1 drive, you have 2, 3, or 4 external drives running all the time. Those dbs really add up. My servers, even with high-quality drives, are very noisy. I would not want that in my living room.

So, after running through all these scenarios, I decided that a single drive configuration is the best compromise between noise, cost, and reliability.


----------



## jtreid

I recently reported that I had added a 750GB FreeAgent Pro with a little learning involved. On Saturday afternoon, I got a message that I had just been blessed with a service update (Gee. Thanks). Afterword, my wife went to watch a show she had started watching the day before and now it wasn't there. Upon further investigation, the drive was no longer recognized (only 32 hrs HD). 

I pulled power on the tivo and did the kickstart62 again. The unit rebooted as it originally did when I added the drive, but no drive seen. I changed the remote mode to 0 and tried again. Still no drive. I then pulled power from the drive and rebooted tivo. I got the OMG, do you know what you're about to do screen and divorced the drive. I rebooted and did the KS62 and finally my drive was ready to use. I lost everything since I had added the drive. What a PITA!

I guess whoever said before that the tivo would forever sit at the divorce screen after a power up and not seeing the married drive was wrong. Somehow, it updated and rebooted and would not see the drive until I divorced it and remarried it. I'll be glad when they officially sanction this so that I can yell at them about this sort of behavior.


----------



## bremmma

So it looks like a few problems have popped up as a result of the eSATA expansions. Do we have any way to ballpark the number of folks from this forum who have made the upgrade without any problems so far? I'm wondering if rate of people who are having problems is closer to 20% or 0.002% but its tough to tell because naturally the only people posting are the ones who are having issues...


----------



## Nate Finch

No issues for me. I installed before I got 8.3 and got the 8.3 upgrade without a hitch. Still have all my data, no problems (except not having enough time to watch all the good stuff I can record now)  For reference, the Icy Dock eSata enclosure I bought has a physical power switch, so it'll stay on if the system reboots. That may end up being a critical feature for those who are looking at eSata enclosures.

-Nate


----------



## TexasGrillChef

-------------------------- FYI ---------------------

It has been found, that with some (not all) but some eSATA drives will loose sync (Connection) with the Tivo S3 when the S3 is put into "STANDBY" mode.

I have a Lantec 300mbs eSATA enclosure with a Seagate DB35 750gb drive. Even when
the drive is left powered up. If I put the S3 into "Standby" mode, Then take it out of "Standby" mode the S3 will have lost connection to the eSATA drive.

As I understand it. This happens with some eSATA drives. Not all, but some. One thing for sure. It happens with my eSATA configuration.

TexasGrillChef

S3 is using 8.3


----------



## Adam1115

jschmidt said:


> My overarching concern about using the eSATA enclosure is that you have now just doubled your possible points of failure. Either your internal drive could go or your external drive could go. Either way, you have just lost all of your programming (or in the case of the eSATA, all of your programming since you have connected it).


This is incorrect. If you have an esata drive connected and it fails, you only lose the recordings on the esata drive, not the internal drive.


----------



## bremmma

TexasGrillChef said:


> I have a Lantec 300mbs eSATA enclosure with a Seagate DB35 750gb drive. Even when
> the drive is left powered up. If I put the S3 into "Standby" mode, Then take it out of "Standby" mode the S3 will have lost connection to the eSATA drive.


I'm confused on "Standby."

Is there ever a time when you need to use it? Is doing a regular restart still safe? What about just yanking the plug?


----------



## msu2k

bremmma said:


> So it looks like a few problems have popped up as a result of the eSATA expansions. Do we have any way to ballpark the number of folks from this forum who have made the upgrade without any problems so far? I'm wondering if rate of people who are having problems is closer to 20% or 0.002% but its tough to tell because naturally the only people posting are the ones who are having issues...


No issues for me still with the Cavalry drive others have reported problems with.


----------



## morac

bremmma said:


> I'm confused on "Standby."
> 
> Is there ever a time when you need to use it? Is doing a regular restart still safe? What about just yanking the plug?


People use Standby to get around the issue where an emergency broadcast system signal will interrupt any recordings that are in progress. This won't happen if the S3 is in standby mode.

Restarting the TiVo (or pulling the plug) actually shuts off the S3. As long the the external drive is powered on when the TiVo boots up there shouldn't be an issue.


----------



## jschmidt

Adam1115 said:


> This is incorrect. If you have an esata drive connected and it fails, you only lose the recordings on the esata drive, not the internal drive.


Others on this thread reported that you lose all recordings since the eSATA drive was connected. That was my experience as well. I added a drive on a Thursday and then removed it on a Saturday. All programs recorded between Thursday and Saturday were lost. I can only assume that at least some of those programs were recorded on the internal drive, but I have no way of knowing for sure, I guess.


----------



## bkdtv

TexasGrillChef said:


> -------------------------- FYI ---------------------
> 
> It has been found, that with some (not all) but some eSATA drives will loose sync (Connection) with the Tivo S3 when the S3 is put into "STANDBY" mode.
> 
> I have a Lantec 300mbs eSATA enclosure with a Seagate DB35 750gb drive. Even when
> the drive is left powered up. If I put the S3 into "Standby" mode, Then take it out of "Standby" mode the S3 will have lost connection to the eSATA drive.
> 
> As I understand it. This happens with some eSATA drives. Not all, but some. One thing for sure. It happens with my eSATA configuration.


Does your enclosure have a dedicated on/off switch?

Some eSATA drive enclosures power-up they detect power on the connected device, but also power-down when the connected device is turned off. I'm curious whether these drives will power-down when the Series3 is in "standby" mode.


----------



## Fofer

Adam1115 said:


> jschmidt said:
> 
> 
> 
> My overarching concern about using the eSATA enclosure is that you have now just doubled your possible points of failure. Either your internal drive could go or your external drive could go. Either way, you have just lost all of your programming (or in the case of the eSATA, all of your programming since you have connected it).
> 
> 
> 
> This is incorrect. If you have an esata drive connected and it fails, you only lose the recordings on the esata drive, not the internal drive.
Click to expand...

That's why jschmidt wrote "in the case of the eSATA, all of your programming since you have connected it."

It's bad news though, any way you slice it.



jtreid said:


> I guess whoever said before that the tivo would forever sit at the divorce screen after a power up and not seeing the married drive was wrong. Somehow, it updated and rebooted and would not see the drive until I divorced it and remarried it. I'll be glad when they officially sanction this so that I can yell at them about this sort of behavior.


Yikes. This is exactly what I've been concerned about, and why I'd hesitate to jump on this bandwagon. What this means to me (until it's debunked) is that a loose cable or a power outage or whatever could accidentally unlink the eSATA drive, and cause lots of lost recordings.


----------



## hiker

jschmidt said:


> Others on this thread reported that you lose all recordings since the eSATA drive was connected. That was my experience as well. I added a drive on a Thursday and then removed it on a Saturday. All programs recorded between Thursday and Saturday were lost. I can only assume that at least some of those programs were recorded on the internal drive, but I have no way of knowing for sure, I guess.


Maybe a single recording can be spread over both drives? That would account for why you will lose some of the recordings that were created after adding the eSATA drive.


----------



## jtreid

TexasGrillChef said:


> -------------------------- FYI ---------------------
> 
> It has been found, that with some (not all) but some eSATA drives will loose sync (Connection) with the Tivo S3 when the S3 is put into "STANDBY" mode.
> 
> I have a Lantec 300mbs eSATA enclosure with a Seagate DB35 750gb drive. Even when
> the drive is left powered up. If I put the S3 into "Standby" mode, Then take it out of "Standby" mode the S3 will have lost connection to the eSATA drive.
> 
> As I understand it. This happens with some eSATA drives. Not all, but some. One thing for sure. It happens with my eSATA configuration.
> 
> TexasGrillChef
> 
> S3 is using 8.3


What behavior did you witness when your S3 came back from stand by?
How did you get the eSATA back? Did you just reboot or KS62 again or what?
Did the system information screen simply revert back to the 32hrs HD?

Thanks


----------



## Bighouse

jtreid said:


> ...I'll be glad when they officially sanction this so that I can yell at them about this sort of behavior.


No kidding! I really hope TiVo makes some kind of an official acknowledgement soon. I really want to expand my drive, but won't do so until I know with certainty that TiVo will "bless" my configuration.

The cat's been out of the bag for a bit now, I wonder how long it will take before they make some sort of an official list of configuration devices- doesn't seem like it would in any way compromise their awaiting for CableLabs approval of other technology, since it seems CableLabs recently approved eSata type devices for external storage, right?

C'mon TiVo, quit hiding your head in the sand of "plausable deniability" or stop dragging your TiVo feet! This is a LOT more important of an issue than "My TiVo gets me..." yet, we've yet to hear so much as peep from the mothership.


----------



## Rob Helmerichs

hiker said:


> Maybe a single recording can be spread over both drives? That would account for why you will lose some of the recordings that were created after adding the eSATA drive.


They say (and I wish I knew who "they" are) that ALL recordings are split between the SATA and the original drive, so that's why when you lose the SATA, you lose all recordings since it was hooked up.

It is logical to do it that way, if the concern is people taking recordings and passing them around.


----------



## rainwater

Bighouse said:


> C'mon TiVo, quit hiding your head in the sand of "plausable deniability" or stop dragging your TiVo feet! This is a LOT more important of an issue than "My TiVo gets me..." yet, we've yet to hear so much as peep from the mothership.


You do realize that they will not be announcing eSATA support until they actually turn the feature on so you can use it without a kickstart. Maybe this feature hasn't been tested enough yet for them to enable it. TiVo didn't have to allow this option at all until they wanted, but they provided a backend already. I guess TiVo can never win with some people.


----------



## bremmma

Bighouse said:


> This is a LOT more important of an issue than "My TiVo gets me..." yet, we've yet to hear so much as peep from the mothership.


Agree 100% - I'm getting ready to make the leap once all my favorite shows end for the season but it makes me VERY nervous that we haven't heard anything from TiVo on this yet. Might seem like a good idea now but if I lose all my recordings in 6 months....


----------



## jtreid

bremmma said:


> Agree 100% - I'm getting ready to make the leap once all my favorite shows end for the season but it makes me VERY nervous that we haven't heard anything from TiVo on this yet. Might seem like a good idea now but if I lose all my recordings in 6 months....


Yep, that is probably what would happen: you'd lose everything since you added the drive. Believe me, losing a few days is enough of a PITA.

I will say that I think my internal drive was full when I added the external drive which begs the question if my interal drive was full when I added the external, how could it split the subsequent recordings? Further, how can it split programs on both drives when one is 250GB and the other is 750GB?

I have to believe based on a previous post in this thread by someone else and my experience (pain) in dealing with the FAT file system, that the S3 must blow away the FAT or boot record on the eSATA drive and use it as raw storage with a simulated FAT/look-up table on the internal drive. That would make more sense than trying to split recordings between the two especially with one drive being 3 times the size of the other.


----------



## bown

Rob Helmerichs said:


> They say (and I wish I knew who "they" are) that ALL recordings are split between the SATA and the original drive, so that's why when you lose the SATA, you lose all recordings since it was hooked up.
> 
> It is logical to do it that way, if the concern is people taking recordings and passing them around.


Actually, I think that there is a simpler explanation for why all new shows disappear when the esata drive is disconnected.

Deleted shows are kept in the "Recently Deleted" folder as long as possible. This means that until the newly connected esata drive is filled up with saved and deleted shows, the internal Tivo drive will not be used again.

I would imagine that if you kept the esata drive connected for a month or two, and disconnected it then, you would have some of your newly recorded shows.


----------



## phronimos

Looking at the chart in the top post, I noticed that the Seagate ST3500601XS-RK is listed as not having a fan. This unit actually does have an automatic fan. It only comes on occasionally and is pretty quiet when it does. I keep the drive inside a closed cabinet and can't hear it whether the fan is on or off.


----------



## bkdtv

phronimos said:


> Looking at the chart in the top post, I noticed that the Seagate ST3500601XS-RK is listed as not having a fan. This unit actually does have an automatic fan. It only comes on occasionally and is pretty quiet when it does. I keep the drive inside a closed cabinet and can't hear it whether the fan is on or off.


Thanks, I previously had it listed with a fan, but some members said it didn't have one (as far as they could tell). If the fan is temperature controlled, that would explain why some members can't hear it.


----------



## A-1

8.3 spring update

My Esata drive 









Connected it to my PC first and installed the software and copied files from drive to my system.

Once software was installed to my PC i removed them from Drive.

Ran Software from My PC and was able to set drive to always run and turn on and off light. I like the light so it's staying on for now.

Fallowed the instructions from Engadget and everything worked justs as posted.

Very Happy! 131HD and over 1200 SD

With light









Joy


----------



## vstone

In discussing drive failures, I recommend you consider system failure, not component failure, especially when considering catostrophic failure (lightening, flooding, dog peeing on TV, etc).

IOW:

internal drive fails =>you're out of luck.

installing a larger internal drive, can theoretically increase the likelihood of system failure, be it power supply, larger hard drive, or other components

adding one eSATA drive does NOT dramatically increase the likelihood of system failure (assuming the eSATA is not powered by the Tivo), but does increase the likelihood of losing some, but not all programming (as I see it, the loss of the eSATA drive is not likely to cause the Tivo itself to fail, although it is possible)

An eSATA drive not working on first attempt could be due to drive failure out of the box (I just saw that on a Seagate) or to failure of the eSATA port out of the box (not likely, but possible)

Installing RAID 0 doubles the likelihood of loss of some programming (but not all programming).

Installing RAID 5 with 3 drives reduces the likelihood of loss of eSATA programming since it is unlikely (but still possible) that two drives will fail at once,barring lightening strikes, etc 

Installing RAID 5 with 4 drives I believe further educes the likelihood of eSATA failure, but it's been over 25 years since I had statistics and I don't remember the mental gymnastics to support this.

Years ago I remember an option for Novell servers (probably still available) was to have redundant disk controllers as well as redundant disks.

Remember, it's just TV (depending of course of the reaction of your spouse to losing an ER episode during sweeps or seasonal finale. I once adjusted an old TV to get a better picture of ER during sweeps, only to lose reception completely. My better half was not happy with her lesser half.)


----------



## Adam1115

Fofer said:


> That's why jschmidt wrote "in the case of the eSATA, all of your programming since you have connected it."


But you DON'T lose ALL of your programming since you have connected it. You lose all of your programming only on that drive since you connected it.


----------



## jschmidt

Adam1115 said:


> But you DON'T lose ALL of your programming since you have connected it. You lose all of your programming only on that drive since you connected it.


I agree that this appears to make logical sense, but how to we KNOW this? Has anyone been able to verify that this is how it works for certain? I have only seen reports that indicate that all programming is lost from the time the eSATA drive is connected when the eSATA is divorced.


----------



## spike2k5

jschmidt said:


> I agree that this appears to make logical sense, but how to we KNOW this? Has anyone been able to verify that this is how it works for certain? I have only seen reports that indicate that all programming is lost from the time the eSATA drive is connected when the eSATA is divorced.


This is how divorce seems to work on S3:

Each recording or any other object in Tivo file system (MFS) is referenced by what's called "FSID". 
Divorce process simply looks at each fsid that "lies past end of diskspace" and "truncate" them.

After adding an eSATA drive,
an FSID can contain data blocks from both drives and when it truncates, it wipes everything referenced by that FSID.

There's much room for improvment here but Tivo does this outside of "tivosh" which is it's normal operating environment so technically, it might be little tough.


----------



## keenanSR

bkdtv said:


> Thanks, I previously had it listed with a fan, but some members said it didn't have one (as far as they could tell). If the fan is temperature controlled, that would explain why some members can't hear it.


Makes sense, at least we know for sure now.


----------



## bkdtv

spike2k5 said:


> This is how divorce seems to work on S3:
> 
> Each recording or any other object in Tivo file system (MFS) is referenced by what's called "FSID".
> Divorce process simply looks at each fsid that "lies past end of diskspace" and "truncate" them.
> 
> After adding an eSATA drive,
> an FSID can contain data blocks from both drives and when it truncates, it wipes everything referenced by that FSID.
> 
> There's much room for improvment here but Tivo does this outside of "tivosh" which is it's normal operating environment so technically, it might be little tough.


In the first post, I originally stated that removing the eSATA drive eliminated all new recordings, but I changed that after a few members reported that was not to be the case in all instances.

Some members reported that divorcing their drive eliminated some new recordings but not others. It was suggested that the Series3 "randomly" decides which drive to use when much of the internal drive capacity is still available.


----------



## stevereis

Any word on whether the effort to make it possible to enable eSATA on systems which have had a drive upgrade will also give the option of upgrading the internal drive after adding an eSATA (hopefully enable without losing the drive marriage and all the shows on the external drive)?

I would like to upgrade space the easy way now, but still have the option open to get to the max storage eventually. I wouldn't mind upgrading the internal drive now and adding eSATA later but I would like to avoid going through the effort to upgrade internally now and then have to go through the even more work to massage the upgraded drive to enable it for eSATA expansion.

Also, is there room inside the S3 for 2 drives? What I would really like is a Weaknees S3 bracket and 2-disk expansion option, using eSATA cable w/adapter to a 2nd internal drive for space/aesthetic reasons.


----------



## Jack D

tase2 said:


> So if this the case, and someone earlier in this tread said I could turn this interior drive into an exterior drive, do you think I should try to do this eSATA thing?


IIRC your basic problem was that you wanted to add a drive to your S3 with recordings on it. I don't think you can do that without losing the recordings. I guess you recorded those programs on an S2 or another S3? Anyway, it seems to me if you want more disc space you should either get a clean drive to add or resign yourself to the fact that you are going to lose the recordings.


----------



## jfh3

I have a Free Agent Pro 750 that I'm going to use for expansion. How do you figure out the performance of the FAP (or any eSATA drive) hooked up to the Series 3?

I'm concerned because I used an eSATA cable to hook up a FAP to my computer (to a eSATA backplate to a SATA motherboard connection) and ended up with DISMAL performance copying files to it (something like 250GB copies in 16 hours) and get much better performance using USB 2.0. Obviously, that shouldn't be the case.

So - either my computer has a problem using the eSATA connection or the drive does. How do I tell?

Anyone with a Free Agent Pro drive found a good support forum?


----------



## jlib

jfh3 said:


> ...I used an eSATA cable to hook up a FAP to my computer (to a eSATA backplate to a SATA motherboard connection) and ended up with DISMAL performance...


From Wikipedia:

In practice, some older SATA controllers do not properly implement SATA speed negotiation. Affected systems require user-intervention to manually set the SATA 3.0 Gbit/s peripherals to 1.5 Gbit/s mode, generally through the use of a jumper. [1] Known faulty chipsets include the VIA VT8237 and VT8237R south bridges, and the VIA VT6420 and VT6421L standalone SATA controllers. [2] SiS's 760 and 964 chipsets also initially exhibited this problem, though it can be rectified with an updated SATA controller ROM.​


----------



## jlib

stevereis said:


> ...Also, is there room inside the S3 for 2 drives? What I would really like is a Weaknees S3 bracket and 2-disk expansion option, using eSATA cable w/adapter to a 2nd internal drive for space/aesthetic reasons.


When the placement of components was designed for the S3 it is clear there was no intent to ever allow room for an internal drive. If you could somehow wedge one in there you will probably have cooling problems not to mention having to either leave the cover ajar or cut a hole for the external cable to enter inside. There is no internal access to the external ESATA port.


----------



## Nalez

jlib said:


> When the placement of components was designed for the S3 it is clear there was no intent to ever allow room for an internal drive. If you could somehow wedge one in there you will probably have cooling problems not to mention having to either leave the cover ajar or cut a hole for the external cable to enter inside. There is no internal access to the external ESATA port.


When I was looking inside my tivo, I do think a 2nd drive could squeeze in behind the
shielded tuner boxes. see:
http://www.tivolovers.com.nyud.net:8080/Photos/Series3-Review/Medium/Inside-2.jpg

it would be just a matter of making some kind of bracket


----------



## A J Ricaud

Nalez said:


> When I was looking inside my tivo, I do think a 2nd drive could squeeze in behind the
> shielded tuner boxes. see:
> http://www.tivolovers.com.nyud.net:8080/Photos/Series3-Review/Medium/Inside-2.jpg
> 
> it would be just a matter of making some kind of bracket


But how about heat and power?


----------



## gadgetrex

I came home this evening to witness my S3 rebooting/restarting for reasons unknown. Once it restarted, all seemed fine until it did it again, then again (about 20 minutes later). I then received a message that the second drive (the eSATA external drive) was having problems and was given the choice to go back to single drive mode, which I've done.) I'm guessing that my external hard drive is overheating, since I recall seeing a post about the drive's fan not starting. Any suggestions? Thank you.


----------



## gadgetrex

eSATA Problem (post 2). Further to my previous message, I disconnected the external drive, the case of which doesn't seem particularly hot; however, the base does seem quite hot to the touch.


----------



## bsather

Are these backup esata drives such as the FreeAgent Pro even intended or designed to operate 24/7. That is why I went with a Seagate DB35 drive in an external enclosure with a fan.


----------



## jlib

Nalez said:


> When I was looking inside my tivo, I do think a 2nd drive could squeeze in behind the
> shielded tuner boxes...


Well, maybe with an auxilliary fan to compensate for burying that heatsinked component.


----------



## jschmidt

bsather said:


> Are these backup esata drives such as the FreeAgent Pro even intended or designed to operate 24/7. That is why I went with a Seagate DB35 drive in an external enclosure with a fan.


This has been the subject of much debate in this thread, I think. I don't think we know the answer to this yet. One way to find out the answer is for someone to open up their Free Agent Pro or other external pre-packaged drive and check the model number of the drive that is being used. That should go a long way in tell us the potential reliability of those external drives.


----------



## lcann44

bsather said:


> Are these backup esata drives such as the FreeAgent Pro even intended or designed to operate 24/7. That is why I went with a Seagate DB35 drive in an external enclosure with a fan.


Most hard drives are designed to go 24/7. Having a fan is never a bad idea, but when I had the Maxtor Quickview Expander which was designed specifically for the SA 8300 came it with it's own enclosure and did not come with a fan. And it was so enclosed I felt a great deal of heat coming from it. Still, no hard drive failure. The SA 8300 itself was a complete failure, but I digress. 

My current eSATA is a Seagate ST3500674AS-RK, and I have it in this enclosure. Notice the perforated front that allows air into the drive. It actually stays quite cool most of the time, there are times when it's a bit warmer. In any case it never gets nearly as hot as my "made for DVR" Maxtor Quickview did.


----------



## fred2

A-1: 

re: your Freeagent Pro 750 setup

I just picked up that same drive from Fry's but it remains in its packaging as I continue to monitor this and other esata threads.

I notice that you ran the drive's included software to control some of its settings like LIGHT and POWER ON/OFF state. Do the instructions state whether these states are maintained when "paired" with different operating systems or systems like Tivo (I know Tivo is probably not mentioned)? 

I've now read where someone with one of these drives is having problems - I think with rebooting.

Of course, there are a variety of these drives. Fry's had the ones with and without the Firewire interface ($60.00 different in price, I think). I don't know about the 750's but the others in the series also have a "Pro" and "ordinary" versions, too. 

Anyone else want to chime in - feel free.


----------



## bferrell

The free agent 750 worked great for me. One question though, why do I still get "this recording may be deleted {within a day}" when I can't be using half of my total available space? I really thought that warning would go away.

B


----------



## lcann44

bferrell said:


> The free agent 750 worked great for me. One question though, why do I still get "this recording may be deleted {within a day}" when I can't be using half of my total available space? I really thought that warning would go away.
> 
> B


Ignore it. TiVo always does that but won't remove anything unless disk space is really used up.


----------



## MJedi

This is very exciting, but I have some questions.

What are the possibilities that there will be a way to duplicate the contents of the eSATA to another if it starts going bad? Or to expand it? Just like how we can do that now with the internal HD's of S2's.

Thanks.


----------



## lcann44

MJedi said:


> This is very exciting, but I have some questions.
> 
> What are the possibilities that there will be a way to duplicate the contents of the eSATA to another if it starts going bad? Or to expand it? Just like how we can do that now with the internal HD's of S2's.
> 
> Thanks.


Since the drive is married to the hard drive you cannot duplicate it to another hard drive. Once you seperate it from the S3 it "divorces" and any programing recorded will be deleted.


----------



## deeremj

MJedi said:


> This is very exciting, but I have some questions.
> 
> What are the possibilities that there will be a way to duplicate the contents of the eSATA to another if it starts going bad? Or to expand it? Just like how we can do that now with the internal HD's of S2's.
> 
> Thanks.


I would suggest that you should be able to shut down the s3, and take either drive (internal or external) , attach it (old) and a new drives to a pc, boot mfstools or mfslive, dd the old drive to new drive, re-install the new drives in the same s3 and it should boot without missing a beat!

-MJ


----------



## morac

lcann44 said:


> Since the drive is married to the hard drive you cannot duplicate it to another hard drive. Once you seperate it from the S3 it "divorces" and any programing recorded will be deleted.


I think he means doing a DD copy so that if the external drive dies, he can just plug in the backup drive and have it work.

Besides the fact that you'd have to duplicate the drive at least daily, I'm pretty sure that wouldn't work since the state of the external drive will always be changing and the internal drive is the one that has the index to programs on the external drive. I'm not sure what the TiVo would do if the internal drive shows that there is program X stored on the external drive , but it isn't actually there or vice-versa (because the backup drive wasn't in perfect sync with the drive that died).

If someone wants to test this by making a copy of the drive, waiting a few hours for more recordings to show up on the external drive and then shutting down the TiVo and plugging in the back up drive, they can. My guess though is that the TiVo will think the recording index has become corrupted and do a green screen or something, but who knows.

Basically the only sure fire way around this would be a RAID 1 or 5 where the "backup" occurs in real time.


----------



## TiivoDog

MJedi said:


> This is very exciting, but I have some questions.
> 
> What are the possibilities that there will be a way to duplicate the contents of the eSATA to another if it starts going bad? Or to expand it? Just like how we can do that now with the internal HD's of S2's.
> 
> Thanks.


If/when MRV or TTG is enabled, you can move the content, while the drive is connected, given flags would not you from doing so. Obviously, both of those requirements are rather steep, however that is the only forseeable options that one would as I see it.


----------



## bkdtv

deeremj said:


> I would suggest that you should be able to shut down the s3, and take either drive (internal or external) , attach it (old) and a new drives to a pc, boot mfstools or mfslive, dd the old drive to new drive, re-install the new drives in the same s3 and it should boot without missing a beat!


Refer to page 30 of the CableLabs' licensing agreement:


> A Unidirectional Digital Cable Product may use a user accessible digital interface to store Controlled Content on a storage device, if: (a) the Controlled Content is encrypted across the interface, and in storage, with an encryption algorithm that provides no less security than 128-bit Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) or 112-bit Triple DES Encryption Algorithm (3DES); (b) the Controlled Content is uniquely cryptographically associated with the original UDCP connected to the storage device, such that Controlled Content is unusable to any other product or device; *(c) the interface and storage device, or the system architecture, provides protection from a "disk cloning attack*; (d) no key information is stored on the storage device unless encrypted with security no less than AES (128 bit) or 3DES (112 bit); and (e) the move, storage and copying of Controlled Content otherwise meets the criteria set forth in the Robustness Rules and the Compliance Rules.





> A disk cloning attack is characterized by the following example:
> A first licensed product (UDCP-1) correctly stores "Copy one generation" content on a hard drive (HD-1).
> *A bit-for-bit copy (a "clone") of HD-1 is made (in violation of this license and federal copyright law) on a second hard drive (HD-Clone).*
> Content on HD-1 is then moved to a second licensed product (UDCP-2, having HD-2) in accordance with DFAST Compliance Rules, and the content is correctly obliterated from HD-1.
> HD-1 in UDCP-1 is now replaced with HD-Clone, resulting in two usable copies (one on UDCP-1 with HD-Clone, and a second on UDCP-2 with HD-2).
> Further unauthorized copies may be made similarly by making multiple clone disks


----------



## Rob Helmerichs

...and that's why I believe the stories that the TiVo will automatically split all new recordings onto both drives...


----------



## CrispyCritter

The key is the two usable copies on separate licensed machines. "dd" of the external disk does not result in usable copies on separate machines, so should be fine, IMO.


----------



## lcann44

Rob Helmerichs said:


> ...and that's why I believe the stories that the TiVo will automatically split all new recordings onto both drives...


Well, that kind of shoots to sh*t my theory of recording to drive with most space exclusively. Makes perfect sense.


----------



## SCSIRAID

bkdtv said:


> Refer to page 30 of the CableLabs' licensing agreement:


Note that the cloning attack speaks to moving the content to a DIFFERENT S3... not the same one. This can be done via the keying of the data to the given S3 which prevents it from being moved to another S3. That is in place today even with the internal drive.


----------



## SCSIRAID

lcann44 said:


> Well, that kind of shoots to sh*t my theory of recording to drive with most space exclusively. Makes perfect sense.


Not necessarily....


----------



## TexasGrillChef

jtreid said:


> What behavior did you witness when your S3 came back from stand by?
> How did you get the eSATA back? Did you just reboot or KS62 again or what?
> Did the system information screen simply revert back to the 32hrs HD?
> 
> Thanks


When it came the S3 came out of "Standby" it just reverted back to 32hrs. As if the eSATA drive wasn't connected. All I had to do is Turn off (Pull the power plug) on the S3 wait 1 min, & plug the power cord back in & let the S3 boot. After that it worked just fine.

When it came back out of "Standby" I never tested as to see if any of my recordings would play or not. I just noticed (by the drive lights on my eSATA) that it had lost sync.

I hope that helps

TexasGrillChef


----------



## TexasGrillChef

bkdtv said:


> Does your enclosure have a dedicated on/off switch?
> 
> Some eSATA drive enclosures power-up they detect power on the connected device, but also power-down when the connected device is turned off. I'm curious whether these drives will power-down when the Series3 is in "standby" mode.


My unit has a dedicated "HARD" power switch. When power is returned the unit comes back on. The unit always is on, even if the eSATA cable or device that it is plugged too is turned off.

However, for Power Safety. I have BOTH my eSATA drive AND my Tivo S3 plugged into a 750va UPS. Therefore unless power is out for more than 30 min. Power outages shouldn't be a problem for me.

TexasGrillChef


----------



## spike2k5

TexasGrillChef said:


> When it came the S3 came out of "Standby" it just reverted back to 32hrs. As if the eSATA drive wasn't connected. All I had to do is Turn off (Pull the power plug) on the S3 wait 1 min, & plug the power cord back in & let the S3 boot. After that it worked just fine.
> 
> When it came back out of "Standby" I never tested as to see if any of my recordings would play or not. I just noticed (by the drive lights on my eSATA) that it had lost sync.
> 
> I hope that helps
> 
> TexasGrillChef


I've tested many eSATA devices and did not duplicate that problem.

How long did you put your TiVo in standby mode?

Is S.M.A.R.T power management setting off on your hard drive?

You said you have Lantec enclosure right?
Did you get any kind of software that came with the device to control sleep mode and time?


----------



## Dajad

bremmma said:


> I'm confused on "Standby."
> 
> Is there ever a time when you need to use it? Is doing a regular restart still safe? What about just yanking the plug?


I've had several TiVo's since 1999 and have never had to put a unit in standby for any reason. I've never fully understood the point of that "feature" either.

...Dale


----------



## TiivoDog

I can't recall seeing this on any post, but where does the Tivo cache the most recent 60 minutes of each tuner? Would it remain on the host drive even after connecting an eSATA drive, might the recording be split or might it be completely migrated to the eSATA drive, if the host partition for recordings becomes full??


----------



## Dajad

bremmma said:


> ... Do we have any way to ballpark the number of folks from this forum who have made the upgrade without any problems so far? I'm wondering if rate of people who are having problems is closer to 20% or 0.002% but its tough to tell because naturally the only people posting are the ones who are having issues...


Bremmma, I have the same question .... so .....

I added a poll question about our collective eSata experiences to date. Please stop by and vote:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=352135

...Dale


----------



## morac

Dajad said:


> I've had several TiVo's since 1999 and have never had to put a unit in standby for any reason. I've never fully understood the point of that "feature" either.


For the original TiVos, going into Standby enabled bypass mode. This could be used to watch live TV. Not sure why you'd want to though.

For the S3, it disables EBS signals from automatically interrupting and halting your recordings as I described earlier in the thread. See also here.


----------



## bkdtv

TiivoDog said:


> I can't recall seeing this on any post, but where does the Tivo cache the most recent 60 minutes of each tuner? Would it remain on the host drive even after connecting an eSATA drive, might the recording be split or might it be completely migrated to the eSATA drive, if the host partition for recordings becomes full??


Previous posts suggest that the Series3 reserves space for the buffer on the internal drive.


----------



## morac

bkdtv said:


> Previous posts suggest that the Series3 reserves space for the buffer on the internal drive.


If that's true, what would the TiVo do if the internal drive was full and the user saved the currently recording buffer?

When this is done, the TiVo seems to just store the current buffer as a recording and allocates a new buffer elsewhere on the drive. I'm pretty sure it does this because: a) the recording can then be greater than 30 minutes in length and b) the process is very quick (too quick to do a copy).

If this was done then the buffer could end up on the external drive or the TiVo could delete an existing program on the internal drive to make room for the buffer even if the external drive was not full.


----------



## mfrns0123

I just wanted to report a successful install with the Cavalry CAXM37500 drive on the first try. I decided to take my chances rather than returning it, Lets see now if it holds up......


----------



## A-1

fred2 said:


> A-1:
> 
> re: your Freeagent Pro 750 setup
> 
> I just picked up that same drive from Fry's but it remains in its packaging as I continue to monitor this and other esata threads.
> 
> I notice that you ran the drive's included software to control some of its settings like LIGHT and POWER ON/OFF state. Do the instructions state whether these states are maintained when "paired" with different operating systems or systems like Tivo (I know Tivo is probably not mentioned)?
> 
> I've now read where someone with one of these drives is having problems - I think with rebooting.
> 
> Of course, there are a variety of these drives. Fry's had the ones with and without the Firewire interface ($60.00 different in price, I think). I don't know about the 750's but the others in the series also have a "Pro" and "ordinary" versions, too.
> 
> Anyone else want to chime in - feel free.


No issues and and if i turn the power off to the tivo the dive powers down too and boots with the tivo.

Also the light is not that bright so it just adds a nice look to my entire entertainment system.

When i take the drive off to connect it to my system to run the diagnostics or change settings like power or lights i make sure my tivo is off when i am done i plug it back into the tivo boot the tivo and it all my stuff is there.

So yes settings are maintained when paired to the Tivo.


----------



## A-1

Furthermore, the Drive does not get that hot. Been on for days and its warm but by no means hot.


----------



## richsadams

Just an FYI regarding power loss on my external drive .

I was repositioning my eSATA drive and accidentally disconnected the power cord.  TiVo happened to be recording two programs at the time. One was on an HD channel, the other an SD channel. (I didn't have the TV on at the moment.) The drive was off for about 30 seconds.

I reconnected the power cord and the drive came back on. I turned the TV on and both programs were still there, still recording. I viewed both programs after they had finished. At the moment that I disconnected the drive (about 18 minutes in) both programs lost audio and pixilated for a moment and then both resumed as normal...with the 30 seconds of the show missing. It's as if they had been edited.

Conclusion? Not sure.  It would seem that the external drive can be "lost", at least for a little while, without any real damage being done. It also appears that both programs may have been being saved to the external drive...OR that no matter what drive they are being saved to losing power to the eSATA drive will affect the recording of a program.

Guess more tests are in order. Anybody? Anybody? 

Also of note, I've exchanged a couple of e-mails with Apricorn (the maker of my eSATA drive) and Chris has responded immediately. I asked them what drives they were using for their DVR Xpander (WD) and another unrelated question. Chris got back to me with full answers right away. They are a little more expensive than a DIY solution, but based on their customer service, previous use of their products and the flawless install of this eSATA drive on our TiVo S3 I can still highly recommend them. :up:


----------



## fred2

A-1 said:


> No issues and and if i turn the power off to the tivo the dive powers down too and boots with the tivo.
> 
> Also the light is not that bright so it just adds a nice look to my entire entertainment system.
> 
> When i take the drive off to connect it to my system to run the diagnostics or change settings like power or lights i make sure my tivo is off when i am done i plug it back into the tivo boot the tivo and it all my stuff is there.
> 
> So yes settings are maintained when paired to the Tivo.


Thanks for the additional detail, I appreciate it (still sitting in the Fry's bag (G))

One more question (I'm sure you've read that before) - you mentioned "diagnostics or change settings like power or light....."

What operating system are you using? Windows or Linux? Do you just plug in the usb (I don't have sata on my XP desktop) and then check the drive? I was under the impression that plugging drives into a Windows system allowed Windows to "stamp or brand" or tweak some byte - that does not mess up the MARRIAGE to the Tivo?

Again, thanks for the info.


----------



## A-1

Windows Vista OS
USB connection

So far no problems with drive at all.

I will say this under the stand of the esata drive it does get more hot than the drive but not as hot as the underside of my laptop.


----------



## jschmidt

I'm happy to report that I was able to successfully install another Icy Dock enclosure, but with a DB35 drive in my bedroom. Worked first try!


----------



## NJChris

I hooked up my Freeagent 750gb external last night. I did *not* hook it up to my pc first. My Tivo was full (suggestions filling up the "empty" space). I updated my season passes to hold more shows. The tivo recorded a few programs and suggestions overnight so I know it was going onto the new drive. Zero problems with it playing back this morning.


----------



## TiivoDog

Speaking of Suggestions, since I hooked up my 750gb eSATA drive, I had over 150 shows inside of a few days..... It just records everything in sight!!


----------



## vstone

morac said:


> If that's true, what would the TiVo do if the internal drive was full and the user saved the currently recording buffer?
> 
> When this is done, the TiVo seems to just store the current buffer as a recording and allocates a new buffer elsewhere on the drive. I'm pretty sure it does this because: a) the recording can then be greater than 30 minutes in length and b) the process is very quick (too quick to do a copy).
> 
> If this was done then the buffer could end up on the external drive or the TiVo could delete an existing program on the internal drive to make room for the buffer even if the external drive was not full.


The internal drive has several partitions: at least two primary partitions to allow easy migration to updates (one is active. updates are installed on the other partition which becomes active when the system is rebooted as part of the update (but not every time you reboot). A third partition has your recorded programs. buffers and some other material are not recorded to the partition where your programs are recorded and do NOT take space from your recording space. I think the buffer, et al is kept on the active primary partition (or perhaps has its own partition since downloaded content must be able to survive system update). I'm sure they wouldn't put it on an external drive. Others here know far more about all this.


----------



## Adam1115

A-1 said:


> Windows Vista OS
> USB connection
> 
> So far no problems with drive at all.
> 
> I will say this under the stand of the esata drive it does get more hot than the drive but not as hot as the underside of my laptop.


HUH? You're running Vista on your TiVo?


----------



## Adam1115

msu2k said:


> No issues for me still with the Cavalry drive others have reported problems with.


No issues here either, well over a week...


----------



## A-1

Adam1115 said:


> HUH? You're running Vista on your TiVo?


You been eating retard sandwiches again? Vista on my Tivo, boy, I'm talkin about my dang computa not my tivo.


----------



## Adam1115

A-1 said:


> You been eating retard sandwiches again? Vista on my Tivo, boy, I'm talkin about my dang computa not my tivo.


How retarded of me! I should've exptected to read about how well esata drives work with Vista in a thread about upgrading TiVo's! 

BTW, I upgraded the spark plug on my lawnmower, working great.. since we're talking about things that have nothing to do with TiVo...


----------



## 1283

Adam1115 said:


> How retarded of me! I should've exptected to read about how well esata drives work with Vista in a thread about upgrading TiVo's!
> 
> BTW, I upgraded the spark plug on my lawnmower, working great.. since we're talking about things that have nothing to do with TiVo...


A-1 was responding to a question from fred2.


----------



## moxie1617

Adam1115 said:


> How retarded of me! ...


Yes it was. Read the post prior to your quote.


----------



## MJedi

I would still like to know if duplicating the external drive is possible (for replacing a failing drive only, not to extract it or use it somewhere else.) Will anyone want to try it?


----------



## lcann44

MJedi said:


> I would still like to know if duplicating the external drive is possible (for replacing a failing drive only, not to extract it or use it somewhere else.) Will anyone want to try it?


No I'm not. But if YOU would like to invest the money in an eSATA and then try it, that would be fine. Please let us know how that works out for you.


----------



## rrman

MJedi said:


> I would still like to know if duplicating the external drive is possible (for replacing a failing drive only, not to extract it or use it somewhere else.) Will anyone want to try it?


It might be possible to do this by using an image backup program which does a sector by sector copy of the disk. The target disk should be the same (or at least larger than) the source disk. For example, Norton Ghost and Acronis True Image software can do image copies, which basically copy on a sector-by-sector basis. I don't know what filesystem TiVo uses, but Acronis can handle certain types of filesystems used by Linux (in addition to Windows filesystems such as NTFS, FAT, etc.). Oh, there's also the DD approach mentioned before (I skipped a few pages of this thread earlier).


----------



## A-1

rrman you have a good idea.


----------



## rjom

I am one of the people who reported a problem with the Calvary 500G drive. My first one was DOA, and not able to be recognized by any device. Due to Buy.com's restrictive return policy, I was forced to take yet another Calvary. I am pleased to report though, that the second drive set up immediately, and took a marriage to the TIVO on first try. Unlike the first drive, I could hear the drive spinning. I recorded a couple of shows; not sure which drive they recorded on but all went well. System shows 98 HD hours. Given that this drive comes with the correct esata cable, has a fan, and on/off power button I will be very happy if it continues to work ok. On a purely irrelevant note, the blue power light coordinates nicely with my Samsung TV and DVD in the entertainment center.  
I will report if I experience any problems over time for others watching the Calvary.


----------



## sfhub

jtreid said:


> I recently reported that I had added a 750GB FreeAgent Pro with a little learning involved. On Saturday afternoon, I got a message that I had just been blessed with a service update (Gee. Thanks). Afterword, my wife went to watch a show she had started watching the day before and now it wasn't there. Upon further investigation, the drive was no longer recognized (only 32 hrs HD).
> 
> I pulled power on the tivo and did the kickstart62 again. The unit rebooted as it originally did when I added the drive, but no drive seen. I changed the remote mode to 0 and tried again. Still no drive. I then pulled power from the drive and rebooted tivo. I got the OMG, do you know what you're about to do screen and divorced the drive. I rebooted and did the KS62 and finally my drive was ready to use. I lost everything since I had added the drive. What a PITA!
> 
> I guess whoever said before that the tivo would forever sit at the divorce screen after a power up and not seeing the married drive was wrong. Somehow, it updated and rebooted and would not see the drive until I divorced it and remarried it. I'll be glad when they officially sanction this so that I can yell at them about this sort of behavior.


If TiVo detects the eSATA drive is connected, but there is a "problem" with it, it will try to "fix" the problem. What you are left with is a system that thinks it is using 2 drives, but has none of the space on the eSATA drive active. No amount of kickstart 62s allowed me to re-enable the eSATA drive once in this situation.

The only way I have found to cure this problem is to boot with the eSATA drive not connected, run the divorce procedure, then run kickstart 62, but then of course, as you have noticed, all your shows are gone.


----------



## sfhub

jschmidt said:


> Others on this thread reported that you lose all recordings since the eSATA drive was connected.


This is not true.

You lose the recordings that were recorded either partially or entirely on the eSATA drive. The recordings that were recorded entirely on the internal drive (despite occuring after the marriage) will still be there after divorce.


----------



## TiivoDog

MJedi said:


> I would still like to know if duplicating the external drive is possible (for replacing a failing drive only, not to extract it or use it somewhere else.) Will anyone want to try it?


MJedi - I had suggested this via a post on another thread, which was a string pertaining to Carsten's twin drive "Franken Tivo":

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5157231#post5157231

In essence, one should be able to Ghost or Image a drive for purposes of exploration or simply to create a redundant drive as a backup in the event of a hard drive failure.


----------



## TiivoDog

Dajad said:


> I've had several TiVo's since 1999 and have never had to put a unit in standby for any reason. I've never fully understood the point of that "feature" either.
> 
> ...Dale


I remember your post the other day and I stumbled across this post, which contained the verbiage below - it is from a really good tip page that I had bookmarked a long time ago:

.... Use Standby to record a show and still watch live tv on another station.
Put TiVo in standby, hide the remote, and use your old TV remote to watch
what ever you want. You might also use this with babysitters or house sitters
so they can just use the standard clicker and not mess up your TIVO
recordings. This is dependent on how you have wired up your TiVo. Do a
search in the forum for advice.....

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=71440


----------



## eric_mcgovern

I took my homebuilt 500 GB Enclosure back as it ran hot as heck and made a ton of noise. I did lose all the recordings that were made after the drive hookup. 

I picked up a FreeAgent 500GB for less than my homebuilt solution and it was running great for about 5 days. Last night my TiVo rebooted twice. The first time I wasn't watching TV, the second time I was trying to figure out if it really rebooted and why it rebooted. The picture kept freezing up and the TiVo was reacting very slowly, eventually it just rebooted. The FreeAgent doesn't run hot at all, and when I put my ear up to it, it sounds fine. 

I am not sure if this is from the eSATA being used, the FreeAgent, or something buggy in 8.3 that caused the reboot.


----------



## msu2k

I've been using a Cavalry drive with absolutely no problems the last week and a half. No errors, perfect. 

I also have a Seagate Free Agent Pro 750 and decided to try that out last night so that I could compare the noise level with the Cavalry. Plus 30 or so extra hours of HD storage appealed to me. So I divorced the Cav and had the Tivo go back to its single drive configuration. Then I started the wedding ceremony with the FAP 750. Took me two tries, but the S3 eventually gave me the always welcomed "your second drive has been installed" screen. :up: 

I checked the System Info. screen and yep, 130 HD hours and 1244 SD hours. Excellent. So far so good. :up: 

So I started to record a few shows. About 20 minutes into my first set of recordings....REBOOT.  The first random reboot I've ever experienced on my S3.

It came back up but there was no pretty animated background behind my Tivo menus. It didn't matter what menu I was on. Then I get the dreaded "Tivo has discovered a critical error and is trying to fix itself, this may take three hours, etc. etc." screen.  Uh oh.

About 20 minutes later it came back up and everything seemed to work fine the rest of the evening. 

This morning I woke up and there was no video on my TV. The S3 was running but the display was blank. No clock, nothing. I unplugged it and plugged it back in and it rebooted normally. Not cool.

Suggestions anyone?


----------



## susani8

msu2k said:


> This morning I woke up and there was no video on my TV. The S3 was running but the display was blank. No clock, nothing. I unplugged it and plugged it back in and it rebooted normally. Not cool.
> 
> Suggestions anyone?


Go back to your Cavalry drive and take the 750 gb back and take your significant other out on the town with the difference in $$....?

Seriously - a week and a half and not a glitch. I'm liking my Cavalry a lot!


----------



## hddude55

Can someone explain to me the least painful means of moving my eSATA drive from my old Series3 to the replacement Series3 that is arriving in the mail today? I don't care if I lose recordings that may reside on the eSATA. I just want to know what the proper steps should be to move the drive. For example, should I just disconnect the eSATA from my old tiVo then follow the Engadget "approved" process to connect it to the replacement TiVo?

(BTW, I used the Engadget procedure posted in this thread to attach the eSATA drive to my current Series3 and the procedure worked great -- 98 hours of HD using a 500 Gb Seagate ST3500630AS drive with AZIO 311SU41 enclosure. The drive fired right up and has worked flawlessly -- so far! I noticed some people had trouble with not having the correct SATA2 connectors on the cable. This enclosure has the correct SATA2 cable, but it does not have a fan.)


----------



## msu2k

susani8 said:


> Go back to your Cavalry drive and take the 750 gb back and take your significant other out on the town with the difference in $$....?
> 
> Seriously - a week and a half and not a glitch. I'm liking my Cavalry a lot!


The Cavalry is a bit noisier than the FAP 750. I'm hoping I can get it to work reliably.


----------



## sfhub

hddude55 said:


> I don't care if I lose recordings that may reside on the eSATA. I just want to know what the proper steps should be to move the drive. For example, should I just *disconnect the eSATA from my old tiVo then follow the Engadget "approved" process to connect it to the replacement TiVo?*


This will work perfectly fine. I've done it before.


----------



## MJedi

Thanks TiivoDog and rrman for your very helpful responses. :up: Unlike someone else's...  

Just need to look for good deal on that FAP 750.


----------



## pablop

I'm thinking that the weird problems with the Free Agent Pro are due to a poor eSATA connection...


----------



## T-Shee

I just finished installing an Antec MX-1 enclosure w/Samsung HD501LJ 500g. 100% Success.
No problems whatsoever.

I have to comment on the Antec enclosure. Very nice. Kudos to Antec. If you're sitting on the fence about buying this drive, don't. It's every bit the "high quality" thats been talked about. And the cables, ESATA and all, seem to be up to same standard as the enclosure - excellent.

By the way, I didn't even bother to power down the S3. I just hot-plugged the ESATA cable in with the drive up and spinning, restarted the S3, waited for the LEDs to go out, pushed PAUSE, 6, 2, and wham - 98 hrs HD!

Thanks to all for your good research on the MX-1 and KickStart 62! It rocks!


----------



## Gregor

The MX-1 is back in stock at Newegg.


----------



## JimPa

Just how large an eSATA drive is available before pricing jumps disproportiately?


----------



## bkdtv

JimPa said:


> Just how large an eSATA drive is available before pricing jumps disproportiately?


750Gb

Outpost.com has the 750Gb Seagate on sale for $199.99.

Then add a nice enclosure like the high-end Antec MX-1 or the budget Apricorn EZ Bus DTS.


----------



## bremmma

T-Shee said:


> I have to comment on the Antec enclosure. Very nice. Kudos to Antec. If you're sitting on the fence about buying this drive, don't. It's every bit the "high quality" thats been talked about. And the cables, ESATA and all, seem to be up to same standard as the enclosure - excellent.!


I have to agree with your opinion on the Antec - I highly recommend it. It is whisper quiet, and I've been running for 2 days now and the enclosure is actually cool to the touch. Also the cable they supplied fits perfectly. Got everything up & running on the first try. I'm very glad I chose this enclosure. Maybe a little more expensive than some of the other options, but worth it, in my estimation.

By the way, their site has a nice video demonstration of the assembly and the cooling methods: http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150


----------



## bremmma

bkdtv said:


> 750Gb
> 
> Outpost.com has the 750Gb Seagate on sale for $199.99.
> 
> Then add a nice enclosure like the high-end Antec MX-1 or the budget Apricorn EZ Bus DTS.


I want to point out that the drive linked is the AS model which is meant (I believe) for consumer & PC-type products, not DVRs. In other words, its not for great for running 24 hours, 7 days a week as it would if connected to TiVo.

The ES is probably a better option (got mine for $280 at newegg) or if cost isn't an issue the DB-35 which is quieter. If cost _is_ an issue, I think you can pick up a 500gb Barracuda ES for about the same price as the 750gb AS.

Great post with more info on Barracuda AS vs. ES:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5145944&&#post5145944

As for the noise debate which we had a few pages back, I have the ES in an Antec MX-1. You can definitely hear the HD spinning with the TV off and from probably 6-8 feet or less away from the drive. But when I either turn the TV on or step back away from the audio rack, I can't really hear it anymore. For a bedroom, where the TV is off most of the time (and where you sleep) you might consider a DB35 for noise sake. But for a TV room, especially if you are only in the room with the TV on (like my setup) I think you'd be fine with a ES model.


----------



## sfhub

bremmma said:


> I want to point out that the drive linked is the AS model which is meant (I believe) for consumer & PC-type products, not DVRs. In other words, its not for great for running 24 hours, 7 days a week as it would if connected to TiVo.


It is not *marketed* for DVRs which is different than saying it would not work well with DVRs. Only Seagate or someone with a lot of DVRs knows for sure whether it is acceptable for DVR applications. There are a lot of S2 users using AS models, so there is some body of evidence that it works reasonably well. I do think the Seagates after 7200.7 are somewhat noisy due to the elimination of the standard noise reduction feature, so in that sense they are not the greatest for DVRs.


----------



## PooBear

Worked great with:

Western Digital Caviar SE16 WD5000AAKS 500GB 7200 RPM SATA ($120 newegg)

and

BYTECC ME-747SATACOMBO 3.5" eSATA & USB2.0 External Enclosure w/ cooling Fan and On/Off Switch ($34 newegg)

98 hours of HD and 927 of standard... Nice!

Thank You!


----------



## T-Shee

Or, if cost is a factor, you could go with the Samsung Spinpoint HD501LJ ($119 Newegg). Check out the reviews and you'll find that it's highly rated.

(I've been running a Samsung Spinpoint in my Series-1 for years - never the slightest glitch; it's now in the bedroom, near zero noise, practically inaudible. The S1's fan is louder than the Samsung drive. When I first installed it, I thought it was DOA because I couldn't hear it unless I put my ear on the Tivo's case.)

The price of these drives makes them very hard to beat, esp. when the 1Tb drives are more than triple the cost of the 500gig HD501LJ.

When the 1Tb drives come down off the gouge pedestal and approach the $200 range next year, I'll upgrade again.

But for now, the Sammy is a fine drive and a fine choice, esp. at that price.


----------



## greg_burns

Gregor said:


> The MX-1 is back in stock at Newegg.


No longer.  ETA 5/22


----------



## dnorth12

Most of this posted in the thread for the poll, but I wanted to post here as well for others who may not view the poll.

I purchased the Apricorn 750G drive (400 smackers), which includes the drive, housing and cable.

My first attempt did not recognize the drive. Started over, including reseating the esata cable. And that was the problem. The cable end on the Apricorn drive seated without a snap sound, but the cable end on the TiVo seated with a very slight snap/feel which told me I didn't seat it correctly the first time. I was off by no more than 1/64 of an inch. Seating the cable properly the first time will alleviate a lot problems.

Did a little testing by recording a live channel, switching channels for awhile and then entering the now playing list to watch the recording while fast forwarding and rewinding. All appears normal for now.

The TiVo response to remote key presses seemed to lag for a minute or two after reboot but then starting responding immediately thereafter.


----------



## bremmma

sfhub said:


> It is not *marketed* for DVRs which is different than saying it would not work well with DVRs. Only Seagate or someone with a lot of DVRs knows for sure whether it is acceptable for DVR applications. There are a lot of S2 users using AS models, so there is some body of evidence that it works reasonably well. I do think the Seagates after 7200.7 are somewhat noisy due to the elimination of the standard noise reduction feature, so in that sense they are not the greatest for DVRs.


What you're saying is correct, the AS will work fine in a DVR. I'm sorry if I implied otherwise...

The point with my original post wasn't to tell anyone not to get the AS, just to let everyone know that they are different drives and people may prefer one over the other. If you still choose the AS - that's fine, it's entirely up to the individual. Personally, I had ordered the AS (didn't even realize they were different models until I read this forum), but I decided that I rather have the ES because of the possibly reliability issue. So I'm hoping everyone else deciding on Seagate drives will be able to make an informed decision, whichever way they decide. Anyway, if money is no issue, I'd probably recommend the DB35 anyway


----------



## Jadedone

Newbie poster.

I had a Segate 750gb As drive in a AZiO ENC311SU41 enclosure. The heat (very warm to the touch) and drive clicking noise concerned me. (inside a closed audio cabinet) The AZiO also had the worst installing and mounting hardware of any enclosure I've ever used. It seems engineered to be difficult and fussy. I will add that the AZiO never gave my Tivo any problems or reboots. 

I swapped out the drive into a Apricorn EZ BUS DTS enclosure. 

The Apricorn enclosure is cool to the touch now and the drive clicks have subsided. I don't know if the reduced drive noise is from the better cooling or tighter enclosure? The fan noise is just barely noticeable in a quite room. (the fan noise is quieter than my S2 that used to be in that location)


----------



## bkdtv

Jade,

Can you tell us whether the Apricorn EZ BUS DTS included an eSATA cable with a connector of appropriate length?


----------



## jazzsax

JimPa said:


> Just how large an eSATA drive is available before pricing jumps disproportiately?


500GB. You can get 500GB for .20 to .25/GB

750GB is still over .25/GB

Most drives can be had from .20 to .25/GB so you get the best buy at 500GB today.


----------



## Jadedone

bkdtv said:


> Jade,
> 
> Can you tell us whether the Apricorn EZ BUS DTS included an eSATA cable with a connector of appropriate length?


Yes and Yes.

Well the AZiO had a nice thick eSATA cable of 40" tip-tip.

The Apricorn is a little longer (about 44") and a bit thinner.

Both worked and seated fine..........


----------



## alyssa

Jadedone said:


> I had a Segate 750gb As drive in a AZiO ENC311SU41 enclosure. The heat (very warm to the touch) and drive clicking noise concerned me. (inside a closed audio cabinet) The AZiO also had the worst installing and mounting hardware of any enclosure I've ever used. It seems engineered to be difficult and fussy. I will add that the AZiO never gave my Tivo any problems or reboots.
> 
> I swapped out the drive into a Apricorn EZ BUS DTS enclosure.
> 
> The Apricorn enclosure is cool to the touch now and the drive clicks have subsided. I don't know if the reduced drive noise is from the better cooling or tighter enclosure? The fan noise is just barely noticeable in a quite room. (the fan noise is quieter than my S2 that used to be in that location)


I got a Seagate 750gb ST too with a AZiO enclosure. The clicking is driving me crazy- I would not recommend the AZio enclosure. I had difficulty's getting the Tivo to see the external unit. I can't say it's directly related to the enclosure because the attempt that worked was proceeded by a variety of changes, the remote code, opening up the enclosure & re-seating the drive etc. The good thing about the AZio was the eSATA cable was correct.

I recently built a computer & used a Antec case. I am very impressed with their sound baffling & compartmentalizing in the computer case. I'm gonna RMA the AZiO & get a Antec MX-1 as soon as they arrive at newegg on 5.22.07.

Does anyone know if the MX-1 comes with the correct eSATA cable?


----------



## hiker

alyssa said:


> ...
> Does anyone know if the MX-1 comes with the correct eSATA cable?


Right above here bremmma posted that it does.


----------



## msu2k

Can someone recommend an eSATA cable sold online that is KNOWN to work well with the Seagate Free Agent Pro 750?


----------



## jlib

jazzsax said:


> JimPa said:
> 
> 
> 
> Just how large an eSATA drive is available before pricing jumps disproportiately?
> 
> 
> 
> 500GB. You can get 500GB for .20 to .25/GB
> 
> 750GB is still over .25/GB
> 
> Most drives can be had from .20 to .25/GB so you get the best buy at 500GB today.
Click to expand...

Remember, though, that there is no documented clone and expand procedure yet for the external drive and there may never be so you may be married to the drive size you choose now forever. Once it is filled, most users will not want to suffer the recording loss of the divorce procedure just to get a slightly larger drive later. I would say go with the largest you can afford even if it isn't the best bargain. More is never enough!


----------



## deeremj

msu2k said:


> Can someone recommend an eSATA cable sold online that is KNOWN to work well with the Seagate Free Agent Pro 750?


This is the one I am using...NO PROBLEMS

http://shop4.outpost.com/product/5173976

-mj


----------



## alyssa

hiker said:


> Right above here bremmma posted that it does.


oh cripes, on the same page too  Thanks

But the point is worth repeating, if the MX-1 is built like my P180 computer case it's worth the extra $$, especially since the cable works too.
I wish I gone with it in the first place instead of trying to save $$.


----------



## dianebrat

Add me in, 

I had the Azio, it was a nice product, but didn't muffle the sound enough for my older louder Maxtor Diamondmax, and no active cooling meant it was more toasty then I was comfortable.

I ordered the MX-1, and it is simply the best built external enclosure I have every worked with, a bit bigger then most, but efficient and quiet cooling system. I wasn't as happy with the 2 screws that mount the HD/fan sled down being a bit tough to get at, but that was cancelled out by the silicone shock absorbing isolator for the HD.

Bad news is the cost of returning the Azio is high enough that I'd only wind up with $15 credit, so I figured might as well keep it, and it will sit unused for a year or so.


----------



## shaown

If you want to sell your Azio, send me a PM


----------



## 2farrell

msu2k said:


> Can someone recommend an eSATA cable sold online that is KNOWN to work well with the Seagate Free Agent Pro 750?


From buy.com I just got my Pro 750 for $249.95
http://www.buy.com/prod/seagate-fre...-external-hard-drive/q/loc/101/204110105.html
and 1mtr cable for $18.99
http://www.buy.com/prod/siig-esata-...sata-1-x-esata-cable/q/loc/101/202321891.html

I hooked them up today and the set up work great.
I have them hooked up to an APC UPS so I don't have any power issues.
I also deleted the partition and set it to never sleep via the software that came on the drive (don't know whether this helps alleviate any possible issues but I'm sure it can't hurt). 
Recoded two programs at once while CNET was downloading and watching a recorded program.
No reboots or glitches. Wonderful


----------



## T-Shee

msu2k said:


> Can someone recommend an eSATA cable sold online that is KNOWN to work well with the Seagate Free Agent Pro 750?


I'd love to see a drive "compatiblity" chart that includes third party ESATA-to-ESATA cables, overall quality etc. (if it exists, my bad, i couldn't find it.)

I was about to order one from monoprice.com but decided to hold off until we get more data on this.

I'd really like to find a source of cables that are of the same high quality as the ones that ship with the Antec MX-1. (I need a 6 footer, MX's is about 4.) If anybody knows, please post!


----------



## alyssa

FYI,
the MX-1 is back in stock at newegg


----------



## msu2k

T-Shee said:


> I'd love to see a drive "compatiblity" chart that includes third party ESATA-to-ESATA cables, overall quality etc. (if it exists, my bad, i couldn't find it.)
> 
> I was about to order one from monoprice.com but decided to hold off until we get more data on this.
> 
> I'd really like to find a source of cables that are of the same high quality as the ones that ship with the Antec MX-1. (I need a 6 footer, MX's is about 4.) If anybody knows, please post!


With my FAP 750 I ordered an eSATA to eSATA cable from monoprice.com, my usual source for ALL audio/video cables. The cable wouldn't work with my Cavalry drive or the FAP 750. So I trimmed it as others have suggested here. Still didn't work.

I switched back to the Cavalry and the cable it came with and the Cavalry worked instantly. Right now I'm testing that same cable on the FAP and it also worked on the first try. I recorded a few shows, then the same thing that happened as before, random reboot and the "Tivo has detected a critical error and is trying to fix itself...etc." screen popped up.

I think it's definitely an eSATA cable/connection issue with the FAP drives. So now I need to buy another cable that will hopefully work.


----------



## GotATiVoToo

GeneralTso,

Any tips on where to get the DB35? Google/Froogle is not turning up much.

For anybody who has tried the ES Seagate, what's the nature of the louder operation? Is it whine, or is it seek noise? My drive will be mounted in an enclosed rack closet, behind the main components, so I would guess that probably the noise would not be a factor unless the drive is just stupid-loud...


----------



## hiker

GotATiVoToo said:


> Any tips on where to get the DB35? Google/Froogle is not turning up much.
> ...


http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5143169&&#post5143169


----------



## A-1

msu2k said:


> With my FAP 750 I ordered an eSATA to eSATA cable from monoprice.com, my usual source for ALL audio/video cables. The cable wouldn't work with my Cavalry drive or the FAP 750. So I trimmed it as others have suggested here. Still didn't work.
> 
> I switched back to the Cavalry and the cable it came with and the Cavalry worked instantly. Right now I'm testing that same cable on the FAP and it also worked on the first try. I recorded a few shows, then the same thing that happened as before, random reboot and the "Tivo has detected a critical error and is trying to fix itself...etc." screen popped up.
> 
> I think it's definitely an eSATA cable/connection issue with the FAP drives. So now I need to buy another cable that will hopefully work.


This is the cable i used with my SFA 750 and i have, knock wood, no problems what so ever to report.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812191016
My setup:
Connected the esata drive to my pc first ran the install and set drive to always on then removed all files on the drive, then connected it to my tivo.

hope this helps. Also this cable is nice and sturdy feels of quality. They also make it in a 6 foot version.


----------



## popcult

GotATiVoToo said:


> GeneralTso,
> 
> Any tips on where to get the DB35? Google/Froogle is not turning up much.


I just bought my DB35 from this place: I never heard of 'em before but they're reliable and the price was decent: $279 plus shipping.

http://www.excaliberpc.com/Seagate_DB35_7200.3_Hard_drive/ST3750840SCE/partinfo-id-574243.html

Ordered it last Friday, came today via Fedex ground shipping. I just finished connecting it to my S3 (paired with a Nexstar 3 enclosure): no problems.


----------



## greg_burns

GotATiVoToo said:


> GeneralTso,
> 
> Any tips on where to get the DB35? Google/Froogle is not turning up much.


These are two places I've seen recommended on the other forum

http://www.thenerds.net/index.php?page=productpage&pn=ST3750840SCE

http://www.excaliberpc.com/Seagate_DB35_7200.3_Hard_drive/ST3750840SCE/partinfo-id-574243.html


----------



## mem1997

I'm new to this, so pardon what may be a dumb question. I just got a Series 3, and I'm interested in adding an external eSATA drive. The instructions for doing this say to start with "powering up" while holding the pause button. The TiVO 3 doesn't have a power button. Do I just use the "system restart" option from the menu?


----------



## msu2k

mem1997 said:


> I'm new to this, so pardon what may be a dumb question. I just got a Series 3, and I'm interested in adding an external eSATA drive. The instructions for doing this say to start with "powering up" while holding the pause button. The TiVO 3 doesn't have a power button. Do I just use the "system restart" option from the menu?


Some people have said that they needed to actually pull the power plug to get kickstart 62 to work. I've had it work several times though by just restarting the Tivo from within the menus.


----------



## T-Shee

T-Shee said:


> By the way, I didn't even bother to power down the S3. I just hot-plugged the ESATA cable in with the drive up and spinning, restarted the S3, waited for the LEDs to go out, pushed PAUSE, 6, 2, and wham - 98 hrs HD!


It's possible that some drives require a complete power shutdown of the S3 before they are recognized by the system, but I tend to doubt it. A simple restart worked for me.

Here's the simple sequence which worked with the Antec MX-1 enclosure:

1) plug the ESATA cable into ESATA port on the back of the S3 and the ESATA port on the drive
2) power up the ESATA drive
3) restart the S3
4) wait for LEDs on the S3 to go OFF (about a minute after you see the Powering Up screen) and quickly...
5) Hold PAUSE until the single amber LED lights up, then release PAUSE - it should light up in 1 second or less
6) press "6", then "2" (you have about 10 seconds to enter the numbers - if you wait too long you'll boot up without the ESATA drive being seen and you'll have to go back to step #3.)

This worked for me, but may not work for all S3/ESATA combos. As this forum thread gathers more information about the ESATA expansion port, drive enclosures, cables, etc., we'll see if it's a viable solution.


----------



## NJChris

msu2k said:


> I think it's definitely an eSATA cable/connection issue with the FAP drives. So now I need to buy another cable that will hopefully work.


I dont know if that is correct for you. I am using the cable that came with my Cavalry with my Tivo and freeagent 750 and have had no problems since i attached it 6 days ago. Maybe your FAP drive has bad sectors or something.


----------



## lcann44

It's officially two weeks today since I installed my inexpensive Seagate St3500641AS-RK 500 GB 16MB eSATA with it's 25.00 enclosure. Everything running smooth, but I do have to admit It is a bit loud from time to time. Sometimes it sounds a bit like a geiger counter but noises are withing normal paramaters according to Seagates website. It does get a bit warm but cools down on it's own, no fan and I do have the 5 year warranty. Very happy, I've got all kinds of good recordings comeing up includeing Star Wars on the 25th all 6 episodes in HD.

Thanks to the OP and to Spike2K5 for getting this together for everyone. :up:


----------



## bkdtv

Until we discover the source of the problem, I've added a warning for the Cavalry unit on #28.


----------



## alyssa

mem1997 said:


> .....Do I just use the "system restart" option from the menu?


I tried to do add the HD with the restart via the menu with no joy. Then changed the remote code, reseated the HD & did a hard restart(pulled the plug), then the S3 saw the HD.


----------



## msu2k

NJChris said:


> I dont know if that is correct for you. I am using the cable that came with my Cavalry with my Tivo and freeagent 750 and have had no problems since i attached it 6 days ago. Maybe your FAP drive has bad sectors or something.


Could be. I can get the FAP to connect and work for a little while with the Cavalry cord, then it will randomly start rebooting, etc. Maybe it's the FAP itself.


----------



## chrishicks

alyssa said:


> FYI,
> the MX-1 is back in stock at newegg


and it's on sale for 59.99 with 6.xx shipping. order now and save 10.00.


----------



## bitzerj

I just added a MX-1 and a Seagate 750GB DB drive. 131 hours of HD and no problems!

I'm very happy!!!!


----------



## MikeMacMan

> Use a newer 7200rpm drive that is rated for 24/7 operation.
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> [u]Models rated for 24/7 Operation[/u]
> Seagate  250Gb ST3250620NS
> Seagate  400Gb ST3400620NS
> Seagate  500Gb ST3500630NS
> Seagate  750Gb ST3750640NS
> 
> [u]Models rated for 24/7 Operation + Less Noise[/u]
> Hitachi  750Gb  HCS721075KLA330
> Hitachi 1000Gb  HCS721010KLA330
> Seagate  250Gb  ST3250820SCE
> Seagate  300Gb  ST3300820SCE
> Seagate  320Gb  ST3320820SCE
> Seagate  400Gb  ST3400820SCE
> Seagate  500Gb  ST3500830SCE
> Seagate  750Gb  ST3750640SCE
> Seagate  750Gb  ST3750840SCE
> WD       250Gb  WD2500AVJS
> WD       320Gb  WD3200AVJS
> WD       500Gb  WD5000AVJS


How do you know if a drive is rated for "24/7 operation"?


----------



## moxie1617

MikeMacMan said:


> How do you know if a drive is rated for "24/7 operation"?


From the manufacturer's web site. At least thats how I figured it out for Seagate. Their classifications are: Desktop(model ends in AS); Enterprise/Server(ES Series/model ends in NS); Consumer Electronics(DB35 series/model ends in CE). I didn't even bother researching WD, Hitachi, or Maxtor but they probably have the same type of info on their sites.


----------



## alyssa

bitzerj said:


> I just added a MX-1 and a Seagate 750GB DB drive. 131 hours of HD and no problems!
> 
> I'm very happy!!!!


is your Seagate a SE or a ES? If it's an SE how loud is it?


----------



## jfh3

OK, successfully married a 750GB Seagate DB35 drive in an MX-1 enclosure to a stock S3 on the first try ... so far so good. 

Question for anyone that has tried this:
If I want to use another external drive in place of the current married one, can I just "divorce" the current one and then "marry" a new one?


----------



## bkdtv

jfh3 said:


> Question for anyone that has tried this:
> If I want to use another external drive in place of the current married one, can I just "divorce" the current one and then "marry" a new one?


Yes, but you'll lose all recordings on the drive you divorced.


----------



## jfh3

bkdtv said:


> Yes, but you'll lose all recordings on the drive you divorced.


Thanks - I knew I'd lose the recordings, but didn't know if I could repeatedly divorce and remarry different drives.


----------



## jfh3

By the way, for anyone considering an external enclosure, I have to say that the Antec MX-1 has to be the best choice. I also have the NexStar3 and have looked at many of the others mentioned in this thread. The MX-1 is a bit larger than most, but is a VERY quiet and really seems to pull the air through. Coupled with the Seagate DB35 drive, I can't hear anything unless I get right next to it. Two feet away - nothing.


----------



## Welshdog

jfh3 said:


> By the way, for anyone considering an external enclosure, I have to say that the Antec MX-1 has to be the best choice. I also have the NexStar3 and have looked at many of the others mentioned in this thread. The MX-1 is a bit larger than most, but is a VERY quiet and really seems to pull the air through. Coupled with the Seagate DB35 drive, I can't hear anything unless I get right next to it. Two feet away - nothing.


One thing I have wondered about the Antec enclosure is this: what happens to your hard drive if the fan fails? The Antec seems like a great choice, but the Wiebetech fanless enclosure also appears to be solid. To fan or not to fan? I wonder if the Antec would indicate the fan had failed? Some equipment does that - fan failure shuts the system down.


----------



## nrnoble

jtreid said:


> I got my 750GB seagate freeagent pro today.
> 
> Lessons learned...
> 
> 2. HOLD THE PAUSE KEY DOWN UNTIL !!!ONLY!!! THE ORAGE LED IS LIT. Yes it takes a while, but DO IT!


I spent about 2 hours until I figured this one out.  I was letting go of PAUSE when the front panel went black. Maybe most the TiVo pros in the forum already know this goes without saying (holding until the ORANGE light stay solid), but the steps aren't quite that specific for those who don't make that mental leap immediately. Or maybe the TiVo has a slightly different behavior (longer delay) when a Free Agent Pro 750 HDD is connected. I had to hold the PAUSE key for extra 1-2 seconds after all front panel lights were turned off, THEN the ORANGE light came back on and I could enter "62". I must have booted the Tivo 20+ times trying to figure out what I was doing wrong. One thing is for sure, if TiVo Inc is going to make this a supported feature (which I doubt they will), entering codes at boot is probably not the way to go for the average Joe. The average Joe wants it to be as simple as using his toaster, microwave, or Tivo. 

Just to be clear, I am not complaining or being critical. I am most thankful for the efforts of those who have posted info that made this all possible (including TiVo).


----------



## alyssa

Agreed, I suspect the reason this isn't a supported feature is 'cus Tivo rather not deal with the large amount of CS calls until they've got a dead on simple procedure.

BTW, I found this review of the MX-1 with some good pic's.
http://www.virtual-hideout.net/reviews/Antec_MX-1/index.shtml


----------



## bitzerj

alyssa said:


> is your Seagate a SE or a ES? If it's an SE how loud is it?


It's a DB35 drive (CE), very very quiet.


----------



## T-Shee

Welshdog said:


> One thing I have wondered about the Antec enclosure is this: what happens to your hard drive if the fan fails? The Antec seems like a great choice, but the Wiebetech fanless enclosure also appears to be solid. To fan or not to fan? I wonder if the Antec would indicate the fan had failed? Some equipment does that - fan failure shuts the system down.


Good question. If there's anyone who's building a drive based on the MX-1 (or any other fan-cooled enclosure) would care to experiment a little, we could get an answer. (Now that my drive is built and installed in my video equipment rack, it would be a major pain to pull it out to test this now.)

Before putting the top cover back on as the last step in final assembly (drive installed and ready to go), attach the power cord, spin it up and simply pull the fan connection from the circuit board and see if the drive spins down. The fan connector is marked as such on the circuit board, so it's very easy to do.

There was a drive reliabilty study done recently (by Google, I think) that seemed to indicate that lower drive temperatures did not necessarily correlate to to higher reliabilty, ironically, but a fan failure in any enclosure designed to utilize a fan for cooling could indeed spell trouble. However, the MX-1's design could minimize fan-failure overheating because it's air intake holes are on the top of the enclosure and could serve to vent excess heat instead of trapping it. (Just a guess, anyone care to experiment? Didn't think so.)

On the flip side, small, low power fans are typically far less likely to fail than hard drives. (As an IT professional for over 20 yrs, I've seen hundreds of hard drive failures, but, come to think of it, I don't remember ever replacing a cooling fan. Hmm.)

Anyway, the MX-1 has a three-year warranty, which speaks volumes about product quality in general.


----------



## hddude55

dianebrat said:


> Add me in,
> 
> I had the Azio, it was a nice product, but didn't muffle the sound enough for my older louder Maxtor Diamondmax, and no active cooling meant it was more toasty then I was comfortable.
> 
> I ordered the MX-1, and it is simply the best built external enclosure I have every worked with, a bit bigger then most, but efficient and quiet cooling system. I wasn't as happy with the 2 screws that mount the HD/fan sled down being a bit tough to get at, but that was cancelled out by the silicone shock absorbing isolator for the HD.
> 
> Bad news is the cost of returning the Azio is high enough that I'd only wind up with $15 credit, so I figured might as well keep it, and it will sit unused for a year or so.


 I have the Azio 311SU41 with Seagate's "consumer drive" ST3500630AS and am very happy with both. Due to problems with my Series3 and its replacement two days ago, I have attached the eSATA drive several times and each time was a breeze per Engadget instructions, except as others have noted I did not have to unplug/power off the Series 3.

As for the noisy drive issue others have noted, I have about 2-3 feet of open space between my plasma's stand and the wall, and I stood the eSATA drive enclosure on the carpet in that space. I can't hear it at all anymore even when I mute the TV sound. As for the enclosure feeling a bit warm, I believe this type of fanless enclosure is designed to slough off heat through the case so if it didn't feel warm I'd wonder why.

I guess time will tell if this "consumer drive" holds up but it has a standard Seagate five-year warranty so even if it fails at some point, I'm only losing some TV programs.


----------



## inaka

For those looking to purchase a SATA hard drive, Frys.com has a nice deal right now on the following:

Maxtor 500GB 16MB Buffer SATA II $100 Shipped @ Fry's:
http://shop4.outpost.com/product/4551377

Now, onto the cheap enclosure hunt!


----------



## tlwizard

I have a question about the db35 Seagate drive.

The model above that is being linked (ST3750840SCE) has only an 8mb cache. Is this an issue of concern as all the other drives seem to offer a 16mb cache? Seagate does offer a db35 drive with 16mb cache (ST3750640SCE) but the only store that I could find listing it said that it had been discontinued at the end of April.

Planning on getting the MX-1 enclosure and adding either a db35 drive or the ES drive. Thanks for all the great advice and info!


----------



## bizzy

I've had more maxtors fail on me than all other brands combined.


----------



## moxie1617

tlwizard said:


> I have a question about the db35 Seagate drive.
> 
> The model above that is being linked (ST3750840SCE) has only an 8mb cache. Is this an issue of concern as all the other drives seem to offer a 16mb cache? Seagate does offer a db35 drive with 16mb cache (ST3750640SCE) but the only store that I could find listing it said that it had been discontinued at the end of April.
> 
> Planning on getting the MX-1 enclosure and adding either a db35 drive or the ES drive. Thanks for all the great advice and info!


The 8MB cache is the drive offered by weaknees in their upgrade kits, if that is any reassurance.


----------



## bizzy

You don't really need a lot of cache in a usage profile dominated by large sequential read/write.


----------



## inaka

bizzy said:


> I've had more maxtors fail on me than all other brands combined.


I haven't.
Plus, the maxtor drive I linked to is a rebranded Seagate drive.


----------



## moxie1617

bizzy said:


> I've had more maxtors fail on me than all other brands combined.


I've had the same experience with Maxtor, but I'm pretty sure it was prior to being taken over by Seagate. I'm still gun shy with Maxtor even though they are now a Seagate brand.


----------



## gteague

inaka said:


> For those looking to purchase a SATA hard drive, Frys.com has a nice deal right now on the following:
> 
> Maxtor 500GB 16MB Buffer SATA II $100 Shipped @ Fry's:
> http://shop4.outpost.com/product/4551377
> 
> Now, onto the cheap enclosure hunt!


that's the drive i went with. in the vantec nexstar enclosure it's a little warm and makes a sort of low frequency 'thumping' sound rather than a click for disk access. other than that it has been working flawlessly.

i have a maxtor maxline pro in my mac pro and that drive runs completely silently. the one i bought from fry's that i have attached to the tivo is a diamond max. i haven't bothered to compare the specs but in the future i will most likely get a 750gb external and use my current 500gb as a mac backup drive that will only be powered up when i do a backup.

btw, our sunday paper has a fry's ad with the seagate 750gb sata internal drive for $199 (one day only, 1 per customer)

/guy


----------



## dianebrat

Maxtors are not high on my reliability list either, we're *still* finding slimline Maxtor failures in the office, those drives will curse us for years until we find them all and replace them.

I will say they have gotten better, but I will never trust them as much as I trust Seagate.


----------



## jfh3

nrnoble said:


> One thing is for sure, if TiVo Inc is going to make this a supported feature (which I doubt they will), entering codes at boot is probably not the way to go for the average Joe. The average Joe wants it to be as simple as using his toaster, microwave, or Tivo.


I'm sure that, if and when Tivo makes this a supported feature, when you plug in an external drive it will be automatically recognized, just as plugging in a Tivo wireless G adapter is today.


----------



## Uday

gteague said:


> btw, our sunday paper has a fry's ad with the seagate 750gb sata internal drive for $199 (one day only, 1 per customer)


Here's the link for this deal -- http://shop2.outpost.com/product/4924331
It's a Seagate 750GB Serial ATA/300 16MB Buffer ST3750640AS-RK (Retail Hard Drive Kit)


----------



## Uday

Fry's also has the Seagate FreeAgent Pro Data Mover 750GB (eSATA / USB 2.0 External Hard Drive ST307504FPA1E2-RK) for $299. Check out http://shop2.outpost.com/product/5189186

Does anyone know how does this compare with the combination of Antec MX-1 plus the Seagate DB35 (CE) hard-rive?

Thanks.


----------



## jfh3

Uday said:


> Fry's also has the Seagate FreeAgent Pro Data Mover 750GB (eSATA / USB 2.0 External Hard Drive ST307504FPA1E2-RK) for $299. Check out http://shop2.outpost.com/product/5189186
> 
> Does anyone know how does this compare with the combination of Antec MX-1 plus the Seagate DB35 (CE) hard-drive?


 I bought both and decided to go with the DB35/MX-1 combo for the Tivo and put the FAP on a desktop PC.

They are both very quiet, though the DB35/MX-1 is quieter overall (even with the fan) and far cooler - the base of the FAP gets quite warm and I'm not sure I would want to leave it running 24x7.

The FAP looks cooler and the orange and black make it look like it belongs to the Tivo, but I think I'll just stick a little Tivo emblem on the MX-1.


----------



## fred2

Uday said:


> Fry's also has the Seagate FreeAgent Pro Data Mover 750GB (eSATA / USB 2.0 External Hard Drive ST307504FPA1E2-RK) for $299. Check out http://shop2.outpost.com/product/5189186
> 
> Does anyone know how does this compare with the combination of Antec MX-1 plus the Seagate DB35 (CE) hard-rive?
> 
> Thanks.


I purchased that same drive from Fry's last Monday for $239.99

I finally installed it yesterday and it has been running fine although it did take 4 attempts to get it recognized - I think it was the cable (which I modified)


----------



## dianebrat

dianebrat said:


> Maxtors are not high on my reliability list either, we're *still* finding slimline Maxtor failures in the office, those drives will curse us for years until we find them all and replace them.


Let me put in a vote for the benefits of Acoustic Management!
I pulled my Maxtor DiamondMAX 500GB that was noisy off of the S3 today and ran the 'Hitachi feature tool" from earlier in the thread, and moved it from max performance to quiet mode, (cranked it from 254 back down to 126 on the scale) and I'll be damned, the thing is next to silent, even the "chukka chukka chukka" seek noises I had been hearing are gone.

Very impressive results on a drive that supported AAM.

Diane


----------



## DCIFRTHS

tlwizard said:


> I have a question about the db35 Seagate drive.
> 
> The model above that is being linked (ST3750840SCE) has only an 8mb cache. Is this an issue of concern as all the other drives seem to offer a 16mb cache? Seagate does offer a db35 drive with 16mb cache (ST3750640SCE) but the only store that I could find listing it said that it had been discontinued at the end of April.
> 
> Planning on getting the MX-1 enclosure and adding either a db35 drive or the ES drive. Thanks for all the great advice and info!


Regarding the two drives listed above: ST3750840SCE and ST3750640SCE

The only difference between the two drives, that I can find is the cache size. Am I missing any other differences?

Thanks!


----------



## TiivoDog

jfh3 said:


> I bought both and decided to go with the DB35/MX-1 combo for the Tivo and put the FAP on a desktop PC.
> 
> They are both very quiet, though the DB35/MX-1 is quieter overall (even with the fan) and far cooler - the base of the FAP gets quite warm and I'm not sure I would want to leave it running 24x7.


If you have not already done so and have the room, you might want to try setting the unit on it's side per the available pictures on the manufacturer website as that might help??

http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150#


----------



## Bighouse

jfh3 said:


> The FAP looks cooler and the orange and black make it look like it belongs to the Tivo, but I think I'll just stick a little Tivo emblem on the MX-1.


My Antec MX-1 and Seagate DB35 are being shipped, should get them this week. I too want to stick a TiVo emblem on my MX-1 just for kicks. Any idea where to get one? Guess i could just scan/screen grab/print to high quality glossy photo paper and doublestick tape it, but I'd rather have a real 3D emblem... I've known people who've had their car emblems stolen, only to have to purchase replacements on ebay...(probably the very same ones that were stolen!)...wonder if there are any TiVo guy emblems on ebay...


----------



## tlwizard

DCIFRTHS said:


> Regarding the two drives listed above: ST3750840SCE and ST3750640SCE
> 
> The only difference between the two drives, that I can find is the cache size. Am I missing any other differences?
> 
> Thanks!


the db35 is also .2 bels quieter and a little bit harder to find.

there are other things I read about it though on the seagate white pages. apparently is has little to no error recovery. It will continue streaming the data rather than trying to go back and get it right. There are some other technological aspects that read as though it makes it better for TiVoing.

Since I have to use my 750gb temporarily for an NLE system, I might just go with the ES line and the MX-1 now before switching it over to the TiVo.


----------



## 1283

tlwizard said:


> there are other things I read about it though on the seagate white pages. apparently is has little to no error recovery. It will continue streaming the data rather than trying to go back and get it right.


*Only * if TiVo chooses to use it, which I doubt very much. You have to use a different command to access the hard drive. Otherwise, that feature is meaningless.


----------



## slimm

tlwizard said:


> the db35 is also .2 bels quieter and a little bit harder to find.
> 
> there are other things I read about it though on the seagate white pages. apparently is has little to no error recovery. It will continue streaming the data rather than trying to go back and get it right. There are some other technological aspects that read as though it makes it better for TiVoing.
> 
> Since I have to use my 750gb temporarily for an NLE system, I might just go with the ES line and the MX-1 now before switching it over to the TiVo.


I thought that both of these drives were DB35 and the only difference was the cache size.


----------



## moxie1617

slimm said:


> I thought that both of these drives were DB35 and the only difference was the cache size.


They are both DB35 drives. As far as I can tell from Seagate's site, the only difference is the cache size.


----------



## Fofer

How's the beta testing going on the procedure for folks to add eSATA drives to S3 TiVos that have already been upgraded with a larger internal drive?

I understand that procedure will call for the drive to be pulled from the S3 -- but do recordings get lost with the additional commands needed to make it work?

Just wondering what I have in store for me when I add a 750 (or 1 TB) drive to my 750 GB S3.


----------



## moxie1617

Fofer said:


> Just wondering what I have in store for me when I add a 750 (or 1 TB) drive to my 750 GB S3.


I think we'll see a few more of these    the first time you post with the new drive and capacity.


----------



## slimm

moxie1617 said:


> They are both DB35 drives. As far as I can tell from Seagate's site, the only difference is the cache size.


Thanks, it also looks like the ST3750640SCE is not listed any more.


----------



## moxie1617

Thanks.


----------



## slimm

SCSIRAID said:


> They are different 'generations'. The 16M cache is their 7200.2 family while the current drives are 7200.3 family.
> 
> Capacity per platter may be different.


Actually, I don't believe that their 7200.2 series ever had a 16M cache.I do believe that initially there was a 16M cache for the 7200.3 series and it was the ST3750640SCE which is no longer listed. Correct me if I'm wrong.


----------



## 1283

ST3750640SCE:

6: cache size
4: number of platters
0: generation/version


----------



## slimm

c3 said:


> ST3750640SCE:
> 
> 6: cache size
> 4: number of platters
> 0: generation/version


So would that be a cache of 16MB ?


----------



## tlwizard

slimm said:


> I thought that both of these drives were DB35 and the only difference was the cache size.


My apologies. I misread your message and therefore responded incorrectly. Yes, they're both db35. I was comparing the db35 with the ES line.


----------



## slimm

tlwizard said:


> My apologies. I misread your message and therefore responded incorrectly. Yes, they're both db35. I was comparing the db35 with the ES line.


No problem, I'm just trying to get this clear in my head also


----------



## 1283

slimm said:


> So would that be a cache of 16MB ?


Yes, 6 means 16MB.


----------



## slimm

c3 said:


> Yes, 6 means 16MB.


Thanks!


----------



## jfh3

TiivoDog said:


> If you have not already done so and have the room, you might want to try setting the unit on it's side per the available pictures on the manufacturer website as that might help??
> 
> http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150#


You mis-read my original post - the MX-1 is very cool; it is the Seagate Free Agent Pro whose base gets quite warm.


----------



## jfh3

Bighouse said:


> My Antec MX-1 and Seagate DB35 are being shipped, should get them this week. I too want to stick a TiVo emblem on my MX-1 just for kicks. Any idea where to get one?


I have a parts Series 2 box that mine is coming from.


----------



## SCSIRAID

slimm said:


> Actually, I don't believe that their 7200.2 series ever had a 16M cache.I do believe that initially there was a 16M cache for the 7200.3 series and it was the ST3750640SCE which is no longer listed. Correct me if I'm wrong.


Looks like I was wrong.... Here is the 7200.2 lineup... Largest drive was 500G

http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/datasheet/disc/ds_db35.pdf

Here is 7200.3.

http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/datasheet/disc/ds_db35_7200_3.pdf


----------



## Adam1115

Cavalry 500 Gig esata drive down to $99 after MIR...!

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...1031&CMP=EMC-IGNEFL052207&ATT=N82E16822101031

Still working great on my S3...


----------



## Dssturbo1

Adam1115 said:


> Cavalry 500 Gig esata drive down to $99 after MIR...!
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...1031&CMP=EMC-IGNEFL052207&ATT=N82E16822101031
> 
> Still working great on my S3...


adam, that is a usb only unit. would need a $ usb to esata conversion cable as well. has anyone tried one of those to see if it works?


----------



## Adam1115

You're right. My bad..

Correct link is http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822101030

$125.59.


----------



## Dajad

To the lurking Canadians, I've been checking the various shipping details of several of the online etailers mentioned in this thread. I'm happy to note that Fry's seems to be willing to ship to Canada, while all the others that I checked do not. Now, if only Frys carried both the DB35 and the MX-1 I'd be all set - especially with the constantly rising Canadian Loonie! Frys does carry the Free Agent I've also been eyeing. I"m not sure what I'll do yet but the French Open starts next week. Once it does, my TiVo's will be recording 8 to 10 hours a day. I'll need (well, not really need, but really really like) the additional capacity.

...Dale


----------



## moxie1617

You may want to check excaliberpc.com. They claim to ship internationally and have both the DB35(500 and 750) and MX-1 enclosure. Mine arrives tomorrow.


----------



## tivopalos

EXcaliberPC.com has the 500gb seagate DB35 on sale for $154, and the mx-1 enclosure for $58.53.


----------



## alyssa

Dajad said:


> <snip> I"m not sure what I'll do yet but the French Open starts next week. Once it does, my TiVo's will be recording 8 to 10 hours a day. I'll need (well, not really need, but really really like) the additional capacity.
> 
> ...Dale


yeah, the Italian 3 wk bike race (Giro) just started & I'm sooooo glad I've got the extra 750gbs!! It's about 4 hours/day.
I'm swapping out my enclosures from a azio to the Mx-1 tomorrow. Does anyone know if there'll be a problem? I assume not since I'll be powering down the tivo for the swap & the hd's will remain the same.

Go large Dale.


----------



## teddyk

My TIVO's wedding day arrived and the groom seems to have been left standing at the altar.

I can think of a million things that could have gone wrong.

I hooked in my hard drive (hitachi 1tb) to the antec mx-1 enclosure (this was not overly difficult, but not a piece of cake either, I could have screwed this up).

Then, I powered down my TIVO (not sure how to do this, I unplugged the power cable). I plugged in the esata cable to the TIVO (the cable is here http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicat...9488&CMP=EMC-TIGEREMAIL&SRCCODE=WEBLET03ORDER , is that the problem?), plugged the other end into the mx-1., powered the mx-1 on, reinserted the power cable, held down pause, got single orange light, entered 62, got reboot, got screen that says "just a few more minutes," then THX screen and nothing about new hard drive (also did not register in settings screen).

Help!


----------



## JimPa

Is there any cause to be concerned about a performance hit as these hard drive gets larger? i.e. longer seek times, etc.?

While I'm asking, in a Tivo application, is error correction of any value?


----------



## Bighouse

moxie1617 said:


> Mine arrives tomorrow.


My DB35 arrived two days ago, and my MX-1 arrived yesterday. Put it all together last night BUT, because I was recording the overlapping 3 hour block of AI and LOST, I couldn't turn my TiVo off to kickstart it! I'll be doing that tonight.


----------



## Bighouse

teddyk said:


> My TIVO's wedding day arrived and the groom seems to have been left standing at the altar.
> 
> I can think of a million things that could have gone wrong.
> 
> Help!


I have yet to try to marry my MX-1/DB35 with my S3, will be doing that tonight, BUT...the eSata cable that shipped with my MX-1 didn't seem like it had enough metal exposed on the ends per the photos shown in other threads on this forum. So, I took a razor knife and carefully trimmed back the soft rubber sheild by about 1/8"...you might try to do likewise...some people have noticed that it's sometimes that there isnt' enough metal end exposed on the cable connection and the connectors don't make adequate contact unless you trim back the cable ends a bit.


----------



## jlib

teddyk said:


> ...I hooked in my hard drive (*hitachi 1tb*) to the antec mx-1 enclosure (this was not overly difficult, but not a piece of cake either, I could have screwed this up).
> 
> Then, I powered down my TIVO (not sure how to do this, I unplugged the power cable). I plugged in the esata cable to the TIVO (the cable is here http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicat...9488&CMP=EMC-TIGEREMAIL&SRCCODE=WEBLET03ORDER , is that the problem?), plugged the other end into the mx-1., powered the mx-1 on, reinserted the power cable, held down pause, got single orange light, entered 62, got reboot, got screen that says "just a few more minutes," then THX screen and nothing about new hard drive (also did not register in settings screen).
> 
> Help!


I think this is the first instance of someone here using that drive so you are in even more uncharted territory than others. It is hard to tell if that cable is correct just from the description. Has anyone else here mentioned using it? If after repeated attempts you can't get it to work it would probably be worth trying one of the known working cables from this thread or the cable one. Look for eSATA II for whatever that is worth. Also, is it visible when connected to a PC?


----------



## Fofer

moxie1617 said:


> Fofer said:
> 
> 
> 
> How's the beta testing going on the procedure for folks to add eSATA drives to S3 TiVos that have already been upgraded with a larger internal drive?
> 
> I understand that procedure will call for the drive to be pulled from the S3 -- but do recordings get lost with the additional commands needed to make it work?
> 
> Just wondering what I have in store for me when I add a 750 (or 1 TB) drive to my 750 GB S3.
> 
> 
> 
> I think we'll see a few more of these    the first time you post with the new drive and capacity.
Click to expand...

I imagine so... but the delay in seeing any direct, public instructions for this is currently making me    and


----------



## richsadams

teddyk said:


> My TIVO's wedding day arrived and the groom seems to have been left standing at the altar.
> 
> I can think of a million things that could have gone wrong.
> 
> I hooked in my hard drive (hitachi 1tb) to the antec mx-1 enclosure (this was not overly difficult, but not a piece of cake either, I could have screwed this up).
> 
> Then, I powered down my TIVO (not sure how to do this, I unplugged the power cable). I plugged in the esata cable to the TIVO (the cable is here http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicat...9488&CMP=EMC-TIGEREMAIL&SRCCODE=WEBLET03ORDER , is that the problem?), plugged the other end into the mx-1., powered the mx-1 on, reinserted the power cable, held down pause, got single orange light, entered 62, got reboot, got screen that says "just a few more minutes," then THX screen and nothing about new hard drive (also did not register in settings screen).
> 
> Help!


 *Edit: The Antec MX-1 only supports SATA HDD's up to  750GB...a 1TB drive probably won't work unless you get a different enclosure.*


----------



## rnowicki

Anybody know of an online retailer that has the MX-1 in stock and shipping? I just checked about a half dozen and came up empty.

Robert


----------



## richsadams

rnowicki said:


> Anybody know of an online retailer that has the MX-1 in stock and shipping? I just checked about a half dozen and came up empty.
> 
> Robert


 ExcaliberPC has both the MX-1 and recommended Seagate DB35 HDD's in stock for very good prices. We ordered ours on a Tuesday...they called to verify the order the same day and everything arrived on Thursday (using regular FedEx ground). :up:

Edit: Here are the specific links:

Antec MX-1 Enclosure

Seagate 500GB DB35 HDD

Seagate 750GB DB35 HDD


----------



## rnowicki

richsadams said:


> ExcaliberPC has both the MX-1 and recommended Seagate DB35 HDD's in stock for very good prices. We ordered ours on a Tuesday...they called to verify the order the same day and everything arrived on Thursday (using regular FedEx ground). :up:
> 
> Edit: Here are the specific links:
> 
> Antec MX-1 Enclosure
> 
> Seagate 500GB DB35 HDD
> 
> Seagate 750GB DB35 HDD


Done deal, thanks. I got the 500GB cause it was $90 cheaper, and 98 total hours of HD is about all that I would need. I have never dealt with this company but since I'm in California I did get bit with the sales tax.


----------



## richsadams

rnowicki said:


> Done deal, thanks. I got the 500GB cause it was $90 cheaper, and 98 total hours of HD is about all that I would need. I have never dealt with this company but since I'm in California I did get bit with the sales tax.


 No worries. That's our setup too. :up: Sorry about the tax bite...ouch.


----------



## richsadams

teddyk said:


> My TIVO's wedding day arrived and the groom seems to have been left standing at the altar.
> 
> I can think of a million things that could have gone wrong.
> 
> I hooked in my hard drive (hitachi 1tb) to the antec mx-1 enclosure (this was not overly difficult, but not a piece of cake either, I could have screwed this up).
> 
> Then, I powered down my TIVO (not sure how to do this, I unplugged the power cable). I plugged in the esata cable to the TIVO (the cable is here http://www.tigerdirect.com/applicat...9488&CMP=EMC-TIGEREMAIL&SRCCODE=WEBLET03ORDER , is that the problem?), plugged the other end into the mx-1., powered the mx-1 on, reinserted the power cable, held down pause, got single orange light, entered 62, got reboot, got screen that says "just a few more minutes," then THX screen and nothing about new hard drive (also did not register in settings screen).
> 
> Help!


 Ah ha! I think I've found the problem. According to the Antec website the MX-1 enclosure only supports HDD's _up to _ 750GB. Since the drive you've installed is a 1TB it's probably a no go.


----------



## greg_burns

richsadams said:


> Ah ha! I think I've found the problem. According to the Antec website the MX-1 enclosure only supports HDD's _up to _ 750GB. Since the drive you've installed is a 1TB it's probably a no go.


I think it is pretty much agreed that these things can go bigger. (My Thecus only says it supports 2x500GB drives, but Justin had 2x750GB in his and it worked; at least the Thecus did anyways, perhaps not the Tivo).

1TB was not available when the MX-1 was first introduced so that is why it probably is not "supported".

My MX-1 arrives today, alas I don't have a TB drive to test with yet.


----------



## richsadams

greg_burns said:


> I think it is pretty much agreed that these things can go bigger. (My Thecus only says it supports 2x500GB drives, but Justin had 2x750GB in his and it worked; at least the Thecus did anyways, perhaps not the Tivo).
> 
> 1TB was not available when the MX-1 was first introduced so that is why it probably is not "supported".
> 
> My MX-1 arrives today, alas I don't have a TB drive to test with yet.


 Seems logical that it should work, but who knows?

If that's not the issue I'd then return to the long eSATA cable the OP is trying to use being the culprit and suggest using the shorter eSATA cable supplied by Antec with the MX-1 enclosure.


----------



## jfh3

Bighouse said:


> I have yet to try to marry my MX-1/DB35 with my S3, will be doing that tonight, BUT...the eSata cable that shipped with my MX-1 didn't seem like it had enough metal exposed on the ends per the photos shown in other threads on this forum. So, I took a razor knife and carefully trimmed back the soft rubber sheild by about 1/8"...you might try to do likewise...some people have noticed that it's sometimes that there isnt' enough metal end exposed on the cable connection and the connectors don't make adequate contact unless you trim back the cable ends a bit.


No need to trim the cable that comes with the MX-1 - works fine as is.


----------



## mem1997

pmace said:


> You don't have to reformat it. You do have to remove the NTSF partition with fdisk. Connect to your windows [i'm guesssing] machine Start | Run | CMD type fdisk and press enter. Make sure you clobber the external drive and not the internal one.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, find someone who's comfortable with all this. Seagate may have some software that will do this for you relatively safely


I think I have the same problem with my Seagate 500 - but I've seen other posts which said it worked without removing this partition. Could you let me know if this fix worked.


----------



## JimParks

Guys/Gals, an UPS is cheap and saves a lot of wear and tear. I have my HD Tv, and Tivo both on an UPS.


----------



## fred2

Re: The Seagate FreeAgentPro 750 - I plugged the usb into my computer. Copied the tools off the hd. Unplugged it from computer. Took it downstairs to the tivo and plugged it in. It did take 3 or 4 reboots of the Tivo and a TRIM of the esata cable to get it recognized.

I did forget to erase the tools from the drive. I did NOT repartition, fdisk or format the drive after copying the tools - I just carried it down and used it with the tivo.

I do NOT know if the trimming of the cable was necessary but frankly, the cable had a rough time staying plugged into the SEAGATE side of the equation. It was NOT snug and was LOOSE. It was snug in the tivo side. I did swap ends but it was still loose on the drive. Is the Seagate out of specs? I have no idea. Is the tivo "too tight" and also out of specs. I have no idea but prefer the tight fit on the tivo end. I think the trimmed cable is still loose but maybe fits in a bit further and so stays put. I'm tempted to use something to keep it in place like a dab of silicone caulk or similar.

I also don't know if I may have mis-timed the PAUSE-62 commands and maybe it would have worked without trimming.

Also, if I recall, I thought folks mentioned a message that the "new drive was detected" from tivo but I don't recall ever seeing that.

It would be nice when this is more official and the Tivo just detected plugged in esata drives (if ever).

Oh, trying to find the serial number of my Seagate, the cable popped out (again, too darn loose) and I got the "divorce" message. Reboot and got it a second time. Reboot once again and it found the drive and I did NOT lose any saved recordings.


----------



## alyssa

jfh3 said:


> No need to trim the cable that comes with the MX-1 - works fine as is.


Agreed.

I just swapped enclosures from a AZio to the MX-1. There were no issues because of the different enclosures.


----------



## greg_burns

jfh3 said:


> No need to trim the cable that comes with the MX-1 - works fine as is.


I concur. Mine is working great!


----------



## teddyk

Thanks for the replies to my delayed mx-1/hitachi1tb and tivo wedding.

It all works now.

First, for those wondering above, the mx1 does work with the hitachi drive\ and the hitchi drive does (so far) work with the tivo.

Second, the problem was apparently the esata cord. I switched from the 6 ft cordstogo cord to the shorter one that came with the mx1. Then, tried the whole shebang again and it would on the first try.

Third, wow, my tivo can hold a bunch of stuff now. Wish I had this much space before everything went to reruns...


----------



## zorprime

Hi. I finally got my Mybook Premium ES 500gb (WDG1SU5000), $139 @ BB, up and running. I went to the Arlington VA Micro Center to get a esata II cable, but they did not have them in stock. I ended up buying a NexStar 3 2.5" SATA HD Enclosure for the cable! Following suggestions I trimmed the cable and set out to install the Mybook. After about 7 failed attempts I realized I was not holding the pause button long enough. On the final attempt I held the pause button down until the orange light appeared, hit 62, and whammy I got the "Your second Hard Drive has been activated" message. Now I am cruising the Tivo flightpath at 98 HD hours, of 927 SD hours. I will have to check on the Mybook's auto on ability.


TIVO FTW!!!


----------



## richsadams

fred2 said:


> Re: The Seagate FreeAgentPro 750 - I plugged the usb into my computer. Copied the tools off the hd. Unplugged it from computer. Took it downstairs to the tivo and plugged it in. It did take 3 or 4 reboots of the Tivo and a TRIM of the esata cable to get it recognized.
> 
> I did forget to erase the tools from the drive. I did NOT repartition, fdisk or format the drive after copying the tools - I just carried it down and used it with the tivo.
> 
> I do NOT know if the trimming of the cable was necessary but frankly, the cable had a rough time staying plugged into the SEAGATE side of the equation. It was NOT snug and was LOOSE. It was snug in the tivo side. I did swap ends but it was still loose on the drive. Is the Seagate out of specs? I have no idea. Is the tivo "too tight" and also out of specs. I have no idea but prefer the tight fit on the tivo end. I think the trimmed cable is still loose but maybe fits in a bit further and so stays put. I'm tempted to use something to keep it in place like a dab of silicone caulk or similar.
> 
> I also don't know if I may have mis-timed the PAUSE-62 commands and maybe it would have worked without trimming.
> 
> Also, if I recall, I thought folks mentioned a message that the "new drive was detected" from tivo but I don't recall ever seeing that.
> 
> It would be nice when this is more official and the Tivo just detected plugged in esata drives (if ever).
> Oh, trying to find the serial number of my Seagate, the cable popped out (again, too darn loose) and I got the "divorce" message. Reboot and got it a second time. Reboot once again and it found the drive and I did NOT lose any saved recordings.


  Wow! Congrats on getting things working. I think you deserve a beer!

Based on numerous threads and testimonies and our experience (and contrary to the odd well-meaning post that says otherwise), there is no need to format, reformat, partition or do anything to an eSATA drive that's being added to TiVo S3's. TiVo automatically formats the drive upon boot up using the "Kick start 6-2" method. I've added and removed three now, one WD and two Seagates (one Barracuda and finally a DB35) with the Antec MX-1 enclosure and the eSATA cable that came with it and all worked the very first time.

You can indeed lose power or unplug the eSATA drive from TiVo for a short time, power it back on or plug it back in and not lose any programming as long as you don't reboot TiVo.

I'd avoid using silicon caulking to secure the cable...you may want to unplug it and replace it one day. I'd be more inclined to buy a new cable that fits both ends securely.

Enjoy your new-found space...and you're beer!


----------



## richsadams

teddyk said:


> Thanks for the replies to my delayed mx-1/hitachi1tb and tivo wedding.
> 
> It all works now.
> 
> First, for those wondering above, the mx1 does work with the hitachi drive\ and the hitchi drive does (so far) work with the tivo.
> 
> Second, the problem was apparently the esata cord. I switched from the 6 ft cordstogo cord to the shorter one that came with the mx1. Then, tried the whole shebang again and it would on the first try.
> 
> Third, wow, my tivo can hold a bunch of stuff now. Wish I had this much space before everything went to reruns...


 Good job! :up:

Guess I'd stay away from eSATA cables that are longer than 1 meter (about three feet). The cables supplied by Apricorn and Antec for their enclosures are of the correct size and ours required no trimming, etc.


----------



## SMB-IL

I just wanted to add to the many voices that are saying the eSATA cables are important. I'm using the SIIG cable from buy.com* (http://www.buy.com/prod/siig-esata-...sata-1-x-esata-cable/q/loc/101/202321891.html) with a 750GB Seagate FreeAgent Pro. I tried an eSATA cable from MicroCenter (QVS brand) and it didn't work no matter what I did. As soon as I used the SIIG cable, it married on the first try.

The biggest difference I noticed about the SIIG cable is that it *snapped* firmly into both the TiVo and the Seagate. The QVS cable installed like a USB cable -- smooth, but no snapping. I don't think there is any problem with the eSATA port on the Seagate as some have mentioned.

* The cable is also available at amazon.com:

1 meter (SIIG Part# CB-SA0111-S1): http://www.amazon.com/ESATA-CABLE-1...0?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1180087686&sr=1-1
2 meter (SIIG Part# CB-SA0211-S1): http://www.amazon.com/dp/B000BRQU10...e=380333&creativeASIN=B000BRQU10&linkCode=asn


----------



## Bighouse

jfh3 said:


> No need to trim the cable that comes with the MX-1 - works fine as is.


Too late- trimmed my cables! Got it all hooked up lastnight and my system now says I have 131 hours of HD capacity. 

Worked like a charm.


----------



## NJChris

Ugh... My drive has been working for over a week now since I installed it (FAP 750gb). Last night it rebooted and showed the green screen that it was attempting to fix the problem. I noticed this when the clock was out (I wasnt watching tv at the time).

It rebooted itself within 10 minutes and all looked fine. Then it happened again while I was doing something else.

Then one more time it happened... picture froze, then rebooted.

I did not unplug the tivo until this morning and let it reboot from that. I'm at work so I don't know if it's doing it. 

The only thing that happened is the power went out yesterday for 20 minutes. This normally isnt a problem but it's the only strange thing that has happened.


----------



## msu2k

NJChris said:


> Ugh... My drive has been working for over a week now since I installed it (FAP 750gb). Last night it rebooted and showed the green screen that it was attempting to fix the problem. I noticed this when the clock was out (I wasnt watching tv at the time).
> 
> It rebooted itself within 10 minutes and all looked fine. Then it happened again while I was doing something else.
> 
> Then one more time it happened... picture froze, then rebooted.


It's almost like you're writing my FAP 750's biography...except for the whole "working for over a week" part.


----------



## Boot

I finally have this working. I returned my Vantec case to NewEgg, and bought the WiebeTech case from TheNerds.net. Worked perfectly the first time.


----------



## gwsat

I havent committed to adding an eSATA drive yet but recent research has given rise to a couple of observations.

1. If you spring for the somewhat higher price of a drive and separate enclosure instead of a prepackaged external drive, the separate drive usually will come with a 5 year warranty and, if you shop carefully, a cable known to work with the S3. If you decide to save money by buying a prepackaged external drive, it will usually came with only a one year warranty and either no eSATA cable at all or one that will likely not work with the S3 right out of the box.

2. The vast majority of problems people have had with connecting eSATA drives to their S3s seem to have been related to the eSATA cables. Evidently the connectors on eSATA I cables are too short for the S3. Some have solved the problem by trimming the insulation away from the tip of the plugs but this solution is iffy. The preferred solution is to find eSATA II cables which are supposed to have a longer tip. It appears, though, that simply because a cable is labeled, eSATA II, doesnt necessarily mean that it will work. There are, however, enclosures, such as the Antec MX-1, which come with eSATA cables that are known to properly marry the hard drives they contain to S3s.


All of the foregoing is either contained in this thread or in other threads linked to this thread. Nevertheless, I thought it might be useful to summarize some of the information here. Thanks, pioneers!  

Wow, this is complicated! If and when I make my move, I will post a further report.


----------



## NJChris

msu2k said:


> It's almost like you're writing my FAP 750's biography...except for the whole "working for over a week" part.


It could be that the drive is filling up (I have over 160 suggestions and lots of HD too) - so it may be encountering bad sectors and the green screen process finds them and flags them until it next encounters one.

The other thing is that this happened the same day I got the service update.

Just wild guesses.


----------



## alyssa

NJChris said:


> It could be that the drive is filling up (I have over 160 suggestions and lots of HD too) - so it may be encountering bad sectors and the green screen process finds them and flags them until it next encounters one.
> 
> The other thing is that this happened the same day I got the service update.
> 
> Just wild guesses.


I got the update last night while my eSATA drive was pluged in. Everything was fine until this morning when I tried to watch a show. the S3 couldn't play the recordings then went to the GS-o-Death & rebooted.
Question is; is it the update or the eSATA or the combination?
(more of a rhetorical question)

eta; I did unplug my tivo to swap enclosures, not drive, just the enclosure.


----------



## JerryL

I very strange problem has developed with my Tivo since I upgraded my unit with a Seagate drive.. I have Verizon Fios and the hi def picture on HBO and Comcast Sports Net is unwatchable. It is very pixelated. These are the only stations that have this problem. On my other hi def Moto boxes the signal is perfect. I don't think it is the new Seagate hard drive or I assume it would be be bad on every station. Could it have something to do with the Esata cable or maybe some anticopy code on HBO & CSN that isn't on the other stations or the 8.3 software update? Maybe the cablecards have to be reprogrammed? Any thoughts


----------



## TracyMiller

alyssa said:


> I got the update last night while my eSATA drive was pluged in. Everything was fine until this morning when I tried to watch a show. the S3 couldn't play the recordings then went to the GS-o-Death & rebooted.
> Question is; is it the update or the eSATA or the combination?
> (more of a rhetorical question)


By any chance do you have a Cavalry eSata drive? I've been having the same thing happen with me for several weeks now. I am returning the unit and getting a replacement. Several others here have had issues with this drive, while others have had no problems at all. With mine, it seemed unrelated to the software, as I had both 8.1 and 8.3, and the problems occurred with both.

Check your cable to make sure there is enough metal exposed on both ends. Some users have had bad cables (not the case with me).


----------



## slimoli

JerryL said:


> I very strange problem has developed with my Tivo since I upgraded my unit with a Seagate drive.. I have Verizon Fios and the hi def picture on HBO and Comcast Sports Net is unwatchable. It is very pixelated. These are the only stations that have this problem. On my other hi def Moto boxes the signal is perfect. I don't think it is the new Seagate hard drive or I assume it would be be bad on every station. Could it have something to do with the Esata cable or maybe some anticopy code on HBO & CSN that isn't on the other stations or the 8.3 software update? Maybe the cablecards have to be reprogrammed? Any thoughts


I have a Mitsubishi TV with a built-in HDD and cablecard. If I record from any HD channel but HBO the picture is fine but HBO makes the recording like you described. I can bet the culprit is the disk drive. The cablecards were changed several times to no avail.

Sergio


----------



## alyssa

TracyMiller said:


> By any chance do you have a Cavalry eSata drive? I've been having the same thing happen with me for several weeks now. I am returning the unit and getting a replacement. Several others here have had issues with this drive, while others have had no problems at all. With mine, it seemed unrelated to the software, as I had both 8.1 and 8.3, and the problems occurred with both.
> 
> Check your cable to make sure there is enough metal exposed on both ends. Some users have had bad cables (not the case with me).


No I don't have a Cavalry drive. I've got a Seagate ST 750gb + a MX-1 enclosure. No one else has spoken about the MX-1 eSATA cable being a problem so I assume it isn't the case in my situation.


----------



## gwsat

alyssa said:


> No I don't have a Cavalry drive. I've got a Seagate ST 750gb + a MX-1 enclosure. No one else has spoken about the MX-1 eSATA cable being a problem so I assume it isn't the case in my situation.


From all indications one of the Seagate ST series drives in an Antec MX-1 enclosure seems to be the best bet for obtaining a trouble free eSATA installation. Based on my research, the best price for such a combination, even with a 500Gb drive, is nearly $225.

But even with that combination, some of you are having problems getting it to work with 8.3. The continuing risk of reliability problems, even with an ideal combination of gear and a $200 plus price tag continue to keep me on the eSATA sidelines. The upside seems to be that things are changing quickly so maybe a more clear cut solution isnt far off.


----------



## richsadams

gwsat said:


> I havent committed to adding an eSATA drive yet but recent research has given rise to a couple of observations.
> 
> 1. If you spring for the somewhat higher price of a drive and separate enclosure instead of a prepackaged external drive, the separate drive usually will come with a 5 year warranty and, if you shop carefully, a cable known to work with the S3. If you decide to save money by buying a prepackaged external drive, it will usually came with only a one year warranty and either no eSATA cable at all or one that will likely not work with the S3 right out of the box.
> 
> 2. The vast majority of problems people have had with connecting eSATA drives to their S3s seem to have been related to the eSATA cables. Evidently the connectors on eSATA I cables are too short for the S3. Some have solved the problem by trimming the insulation away from the tip of the plugs but this solution is iffy. The preferred solution is to find eSATA II cables which are supposed to have a longer tip. It appears, though, that simply because a cable is labeled, eSATA II, doesnt necessarily mean that it will work. There are, however, enclosures, such as the Antec MX-1, which come with eSATA cables that are known to properly marry the hard drives they contain to S3s.
> 
> All of the foregoing is either contained in this thread or in other threads linked to this thread. Nevertheless, I thought it might be useful to summarize some of the information here. Thanks, pioneers!
> 
> Wow, this is complicated! If and when I make my move, I will post a further report.


Good observations. :up: At least two companies supply eSATA cables with their drives and/or enclosures that work. Antec (MX-1 enclosure) and Apricorn (both with their drives and enclosures). I have used both and can recommend them.

Although a number of people are using various drives and drive combinations, there seems to be one "ideal":

Antec MX-1 Enclosure - Fan cooled & supplied with all of the correct cables, etc.
Seagate DB35 7200.3 Hard Drives - Designed exclusively for DVR use.

This combination is slightly more expensive than some others, but after reading all of the posts we decided that it was the way to go. We have the 500GB setup and it cost us a little more than $200. It has worked brilliantly, connected on the first try, is whisper quiet and runs very cool.

Both items are currently available from excaliberpc.com for very competitive pricing. (We ordered ours on a Tuesday and it arrived the following Thursday.)

Another option is to buy a complete drive ready for plug and play such as the Apricorn DVR Xpander. Others have had success with Apricorn's slightly less expensive EZ Bus dts eSATA drive. Both are also fan cooled and come with everything needed.

There are less expensive options out there, but these have been documented to work without fail.

Keep us posted!


----------



## Dajad

moxie1617 said:


> You may want to check excaliberpc.com. They claim to ship internationally and have both the DB35(500 and 750) and MX-1 enclosure. Mine arrives tomorrow.


Thanks man ... I'll add that to my very small list of quality U.S. electronics etailers that ship to Canada.

*Update 1:* ARGH!!! I just went to submit my order and they only accept Canadian orders with International Money Orders and Paypal. Give me a break!!!! WE have credit cards in Canada too! Damn, I hate how U.S. etailers almost uniformly treat Canada like a banana republic!!!! Argh!!!!

*Update 2:* Having found no U.S. etailer that had both the DB35 and the MX-1 in stock and would ship to Canada, I found a Canadian etailer that had both in stock. I used Agile Electronics. They (or more likely "he") had the best combined price (the MX-1 was $10 cheaper elsewhere) I could find using Price Canada. This site charged $328.85 Cdn for the 750 Gig DB35 and $64.25 for the MX-1. At current exchange rates, these are about the same prices as the average U.S. etailer prices. All in, shipping, PST & GST it comes to $459.53 Canadian. As I've never used this outfit before I have no idea how quickly they will ship etc. I'll update you all when/if (ha!) the unit arrives.

...Dale


----------



## gwsat

richsadams said:


> Good observations. :up: At least two companies supply eSATA cables with their drives and/or enclosures that work. Antec (MX-1 enclosure) and Apricorn (both with their drives and enclosures). I have used both and can recommend them.
> 
> Although a number of people are using various drives and drive combinations, there seems to be one "ideal":
> 
> Antec MX-1 Enclosure - Fan cooled & supplied with all of the correct cables, etc.
> Seagate DB35 7200.3 Hard Drives - Designed exclusively for DVR use.
> 
> This combination is slightly more expensive than some others, but after reading all of the posts we decided that it was the way to go. We have the 500GB setup and it cost us a little more than $200. It has worked brilliantly, connected on the first try, is whisper quiet and runs very cool.
> . . .
> 
> Keep us posted!


Thanks, both for the kind remarks, and for your input to this thread.

I was close to pulling the trigger on your preferred combination, a Seagate ST 500Gb drive in an Antec MX-1 enclosure. But then, I saw alyssas post, which reported problems getting even this preferred combination to work with 8.3, which, as noted in my last post, gave me cold feet. If alyssas problem with 8.3 proves to be easily resolved, I may, indeed, make my move.


----------



## dbong1021

Quick question ..

Stock internal + external eSATA

Down the line, I'd like to either upgrade or clone my original internal drive. Mainly for backup purposes in case my original drive ever dies. Is that going to be possible? 

I figure I'll have to divorce the eSata, then upgrade the internal, then marry the eSata again. Is that right? I don't mind losing the recordings .. just want to be sure that kind of plan can be implemented


----------



## moxie1617

gwsat said:


> Thanks, both for the kind remarks, and for your input to this thread.
> 
> I was close to pulling the trigger on your preferred combination, a Seagate ST 500Gb drive in an Antec MX-1 enclosure. But then, I saw alyssas post, which reported problems getting even this preferred combination to work with 8.3, which, as noted in my last post, gave me cold feet. If alyssas problem with 8.3 proves to be easily resolved, I may, indeed, make my move.


Hopefully alyssa will chime in but I don't think alyssa is using the DB35 drive. alyssa reported earlier about the loud clicking the drive was making in a previous enclosure, uncharacteristic of the DB35, more likely an AS series. I have two setups with a MX-1 enclosure, one is the 500GB DB35 for the Tivo, the second is a 500GB Seagate ES Series for server images. No clicking from either but the ES series has more vibration, and on the wrong surface the vibrations cause the table top to act like a soundboard and the setup hums.


----------



## TiivoDog

Regarding Alyssa's concern, one of my Seagate 750GB SATA drives is the (ST3750640*NS*) and it clicks like crazy!!! It is an Enterprise 24x7 drive, however I should have spent 50% more to get the Seagate DB35 (ST3750840SCE) as I have heard it is whisper quiet and runs cooler as it has an integrated fan. The other 2 Seagate 750gb SATA drives I have are not 24x7 (ST3750640*AS*)

Anyways, I'll be curious to see whether the non Enterprise drives I have will be able to keep up with the Enterprise Drive, but if you have the same drive as I noted above, then clicking is unfortunately 'normal'.....


----------



## T-Shee

moxie1617 said:


> Hopefully alyssa will chime in but I don't think alyssa is using the DB35 drive. alyssa reported earlier about the loud clicking the drive was making in a previous enclosure, uncharacteristic of the DB35, more likely an AS series. I have two setups with a MX-1 enclosure, one is the 500GB DB35 for the Tivo, the second is a 500GB Seagate ES Series for server images. No clicking from either but the ES series has more vibration, and on the wrong surface the vibrations cause the table top to act like a soundboard and the setup hums.


My MX-1 install (using a Samsung HD501LJ) was easy, no problems at all. It's been running for a week, silent, cool. Very pleased, especially for $166 total.

But I did notice a droning, low frequency hum from the setup because of the aforementioned soundboard effect - almost imperceptable, but there.

So, I cut some closed-cell polyfoam pieces about 1 inch thick (air-conditioner insulation, dark grey) and parked the MX-1 on top. No more hum, and the whole enclosure is now nearly silent. (If it gets any quieter, I'd think it was off.)


----------



## richsadams

gwsat said:


> Thanks, both for the kind remarks, and for your input to this thread.
> 
> I was close to pulling the trigger on your preferred combination, a Seagate ST 500Gb drive in an Antec MX-1 enclosure. But then, I saw alyssas post, which reported problems getting even this preferred combination to work with 8.3, which, as noted in my last post, gave me cold feet. If alyssas problem with 8.3 proves to be easily resolved, I may, indeed, make my move.


 My pleasure. Just a note that Seagates's ST and DB35 are two different drives, the DB35 being marketed as a DVR drive.

We have 8.3 (as do most folks that have added an eSATA drive) and again we've have had zero "defects" with the suggested combination.


----------



## teddyk

Green screen of death cometh. Oh no.


----------



## richsadams

TiivoDog said:


> Regarding Alyssa's concern, one of my Seagate 750GB SATA drives is the (ST3750640*NS*) and it clicks like crazy!!! It is an Enterprise 24x7 drive, however I should have spent 50% more to get the Seagate DB35 (ST3750840SCE) as I have heard it is whisper quiet and runs cooler as it has an integrated fan.


 Just a note...the Seagate DB35 drives are very quiet, but they of course do not have a cooling fan...the Antec MX-1 enclosure does have a large and quiet fan so they are a very good combo. :up:


----------



## JimPa

Rich & others,

Is the DB35 drive designed for 24/7 (not withstanding the DVR designation)?


----------



## gwsat

Thanks to both Moxie1617 and Rich for calling my attention to the fact that Alyssas Seagate drive is not the one specifically designed for DVR use. I had missed that and I now feel a little better. I cant imagine that I would buy anything other that the Seagate DB35 coupled with an MX-1 enclosure. Doing something else might save me $50 or $75 but the attendant potential problems make saving the hassle worth more than the difference in price


----------



## LHMPDX

I suggest avoiding nextwarehouse.com. I ordered the Antec MX-1 and a Seagate DB35 from them earlier this week. Both showed as "in stock." But two days later, when they still hadn't shipped, I checked the site, and the Antec MX-1 was shown as "back ordered." 

I tried to cancel both, before I received a shipping notice, but they claimed the drive had already shipped. 

A disagreeable experience.


----------



## alyssa

gwsat said:


> Thanks to both Moxie1617 and Rich for calling my attention to the fact that Alyssas Seagate drive is not the one specifically designed for DVR use. I had missed that and I now feel a little better. I cant imagine that I would buy anything other that the Seagate DB35 coupled with an MX-1 enclosure. Doing something else might save me $50 or $75 but the attendant potential problems make saving the hassle worth more than the difference in price


Yes, my Seagate was not the one rated for DVR use. The ST does click. However in the MX-1 enclosure it does not seem to run hot nor can I hear the clicking. It was a good choice for my situation. The DB is the way to go if the price isn't an issue. I chose to buy a less expensive big drive with an excellent cooling enclosure. But there is no question, a SGate DB + MX+1 is a sweet unit.

I really think my GS-o-Death issue was related to the Service update & swapping out the enclosure & having the eSATA drive connected all at the same time. Retrospectively I should have checked the status to see if any service updates were waiting to be loaded prior to swapping out the enclosure. I have not had another GS-o-D since then.


----------



## TracyMiller

Finally gave up on my Cavalry drive, but I'm going to try a straight exchange first, because there are apparently some good Cavalry drives out there. But if I have problems with the new one, I think I'm going to get that DB35 with the MX-1 enclosure that everyone here speaks highly of.


----------



## Ferd Berfle

teddyk said:


> Green screen of death cometh. Oh no.


That's bad news ...

Mine (Hitachi HDS721010KLA330 1TB in Antec MX-1) has been working fine for 9 days, married on the first try using Antec's supplied eSATA cable.

The only items of note are that the blue LED on the front of the MX-1 is out and occasionally the Hitachi makes a long series of thumping noises. Sort of sounds like the eraser end of a pencil softly thumping the top of the case, I assume that's head seek - it comes and goes and I can't hear it more than a couple feet from the unit.

There's no sign of trouble with the S3 operation -- sysinfo still says 165 HD hours, no freezes/pixelation, or other lack of responsiveness.

-- 
Go and lurk no more

S3 +eSATA 1TB 165hr HD lifetime
2 S2 240 140hr lifetime
1 S2 240 80hr 1 yr prepaid


----------



## richsadams

JimPa said:


> Rich & others,
> 
> Is the DB35 drive designed for 24/7 (not withstanding the DVR designation)?


 Yes, exactly. Not that other drives couldn't handle it, however since the drive spins 24/7 Seagate seems to have been able to address the noise and longevity issues fairly well.

Unless a drive is enterprise class most normal "computer" drives are designed to spin down when not in use. The drives we used in our server were very strong and long-lasting but loud as could be. It didn't matter since they were housed in a data center with hundreds of other noise makers. But for our home we wanted something that would last, not be a distraction and stay cool as it's sitting inside an entertainment cabinet with TiVo. The Seagate DB35/Antec MX-1 seemed to fit the bill.

I have to believe Seagate will be surprised by the sudden burst of orders as the marketing is aimed at DVR manufacturers for the most part.


----------



## moxie1617

T-Shee said:


> My MX-1 install (using a Samsung HD501LJ) was easy, no problems at all. It's been running for a week, silent, cool. Very pleased, especially for $166 total.
> 
> But I did notice a droning, low frequency hum from the setup because of the aforementioned soundboard effect - almost imperceptable, but there.
> 
> *So, I cut some closed-cell polyfoam pieces about 1 inch thick (air-conditioner insulation, dark grey) and parked the MX-1 on top. No more hum*, and the whole enclosure is now nearly silent. (If it gets any quieter, I'd think it was off.)


Slick trick, thanks. :up: The hum was driving me crazy this afternoon while working on the server.


----------



## gwsat

I learned at BestBuy this morning that they did not have eSATA cables there. This fact eliminated their $139 500Gb Western Digital drive, which someone had mentioned earlier in the thread. I then went to nearby PC Club store to see if they had eSATA cables. They did, but sold them only with an enclosure. I decided not to buy from them because they have a 15% restocking fee if you return a purchase for any reason other than failure and I couldnt be sure that their cable would work. This is primarily what convinced me to pretty much settle on the Seagate DB drive and the MX-1 enclosure.

The point of this somewhat windy story is to report that when I asked the clerk at the PC Club store for an eSATA cable, he remarked that about 10 other people had come in with the same request in recent weeks. I told him that I couldnt explain it because I really doubted that there were that many TiVo S3 owners in OKC who were looking for eSATA cables. Of course, there are other DVRs that are eSATA capable, including, I believe, the SA 8300HD, which Cox OKC uses.


----------



## dianebrat

Ferd Berfle said:


> occasionally the Hitachi makes a long series of thumping noises. Sort of sounds like the eraser end of a pencil softly thumping the top of the case, I assume that's head seek - it comes and goes and I can't hear it more than a couple feet from the unit.


I had exactly the same kind of noise from my Maxtor (only it was much louder) and by using the Hitachi Feature tool to adjust the Acoustic Management on the drive from 255 (maxperf) to about 128 (right in the middle) the drive became silent.

Also of note, I did this after the drive was married to the Tivo AND had recordings on it, I just powered them both down, then moved the eSata to my PC, booted up the Hitachi Feature tool from a CD and adjusted the settings, then placed the drive back on the S3, powered it up, and everything was still there, and now almost silent.

YMMV, no warranty implied on my experiences 

Diane


----------



## MichaelFF

I had success with a 750 GB Seagate DB35 and the APRICORN EZ BUS from TheNerds. The supplied esata cable supplied fit well, the noise level seems low and it is only slightly warm. It has only been installed a few hours, but so far so good. The red LED light on the front is too bright so it may get the tape treatment.


----------



## lrhorer

I installed a Seagate Barracuda 750G drive in an MX-1 housing and married it to my stock Series III. Many people had discouraged this combo because of potential drive noise, but I find the drive in the housing to be very quiet. It's certainly quieter than the fan in the projector or than the air conditioner, for that matter. At viewing distance (about 12 feet), I cannot say that I can hear the drive even with everything else in the room shut off.

Given the price and availability of the Barracuda, I'm very pleased, but...

Two days after installing the 750G drive, I turned on the video system and started navagating through Now Playing. The response was very sluggish, and indeed at some point it was essentially frozen for quite some seconds. I selected one video I no longer needed and deleted it. When I did, the GSOD popped up. I shut off the system and went about other business. I checked about 20 or 30 minutes later to find the TiVo rebooting. It booted just fine with no loss of programming or apparently anything else.

Two days later, it happened again. The TiVo was right at the end of recording two programs and the arrow keys became very sluggish. When the two programs were finished recording, the TiVo rebooted to the GSOD. After just a few minutes it rebooted and came back up, losing about 15 minutes of the next program. That was Tuesday. This is Friday. It hasn't happened since.


----------



## bkdtv

I updated the FAQ with the link to the Tripp-Lite P950 eSATA cable, which a number of members have recommended (#27).


----------



## MJedi

Another success story here! Using a Western Digital My Book Premium ES 500GB. As usual, the eSATA cable was not included. I got one from my local Fry's, but it did not work at first. So, I trimmed the rubber on both ends. It was a Link Depot brand, e-SATA to e-SATA 6-feet cable.

Thanks to kdmorse for the trim method! And to spike2k5 for figuring this out! :up:


----------



## jlib

dianebrat said:


> I had exactly the same kind of noise from my Maxtor (only it was much louder) and by using the Hitachi Feature tool to adjust the Acoustic Management on the drive from 255 (maxperf) to about 128 (right in the middle) the drive became silent.
> 
> Also of note, I did this after the drive was married to the Tivo AND had recordings on it, I just powered them both down, then moved the eSata to my PC, booted up the Hitachi Feature tool from a CD and adjusted the settings, then placed the drive back on the S3, powered it up, and everything was still there, and now almost silent.
> 
> YMMV, no warranty implied on my experiences
> 
> Diane


To reiterate dianebrat's suggestion, all drives (save modern Seagates which don't use the industry standard acoustic management) destined for TiVo use should first have the Hitachi Feature Tool run on them to have the default "performance" setting changed to "quiet." Note that it will work on any brand drive. It does not write to the disk itself but just flips a bit in the firmware so it can be done at any time.

There are no performance issues in doing this as the S3 even at full bore with both channels going and a third saved program being viewed is a very unchallenging task for a modern drive; it is just idling most of the time waiting for something to do. You will need to have a SATA capable PC to plug the bare drive into, though, to use the utility. You make a boot floppy or CD and boot directly into the utility. Very easy and I would say essential.

Also note that Hitachi (née IBM) now has a class of drives (CinemaStar) similar to the Seagate DB35 series.


----------



## JimPa

jlib,

If you don't have a SATA capable PC, can you use the usb port for drives so equipped??

What exactly does quiet mode do?


----------



## alyssa

lrhorer said:


> I installed a Seagate Barracuda 750G drive in an MX-1 housing and married it to my stock Series III. Many people had discouraged this combo because of potential drive noise, but I find the drive in the housing to be very quiet. It's certainly quieter than the fan in the projector or than the air conditioner, for that matter. At viewing distance (about 12 feet), I cannot say that I can hear the drive even with everything else in the room shut off.
> 
> Given the price and availability of the Barracuda, I'm very pleased, but...
> 
> Two days after installing the 750G drive, I turned on the video system and started navagating through Now Playing. The response was very sluggish, and indeed at some point it was essentially frozen for quite some seconds. I selected one video I no longer needed and deleted it. When I did, the GSOD popped up. I shut off the system and went about other business. I checked about 20 or 30 minutes later to find the TiVo rebooting. It booted just fine with no loss of programming or apparently anything else.
> 
> Two days later, it happened again. The TiVo was right at the end of recording two programs and the arrow keys became very sluggish. When the two programs were finished recording, the TiVo rebooted to the GSOD. After just a few minutes it rebooted and came back up, losing about 15 minutes of the next program. That was Tuesday. This is Friday. It hasn't happened since.


I too am happy with the combo SGate ST +mx-1 but I am willing to take the risk.

Let us/me know if you get another GSOD. I've been GSOD free for 24 hours now & see no signs of another ocurance. Did you get a service update from Tivo recently? Did you lose power to your S3 within 24hr's of the 1st GSOD? These were the two things that happened to my tivo just (12hrs) prior to the GSOD.


----------



## dianebrat

JimPa said:


> If you don't have a SATA capable PC, can you use the usb port for drives so equipped??
> 
> What exactly does quiet mode do?


I can't comment on the USB since the Hitachi Feature tool is initiated in DOS boot, and I would not want to risk booting the Tivo drive up on a PC with Windows running. (just in case a process decided it wanted to write to the drive)

But Samsung has a great primer on AAM located here Samsung AAM explanation


----------



## spike2k5

lrhorer said:


> I installed a Seagate Barracuda 750G drive in an MX-1 housing and married it to my stock Series III. Many people had discouraged this combo because of potential drive noise, but I find the drive in the housing to be very quiet. It's certainly quieter than the fan in the projector or than the air conditioner, for that matter. At viewing distance (about 12 feet), I cannot say that I can hear the drive even with everything else in the room shut off.
> 
> Given the price and availability of the Barracuda, I'm very pleased, but...
> 
> Two days after installing the 750G drive, I turned on the video system and started navagating through Now Playing. The response was very sluggish, and indeed at some point it was essentially frozen for quite some seconds. I selected one video I no longer needed and deleted it. When I did, the GSOD popped up. I shut off the system and went about other business. I checked about 20 or 30 minutes later to find the TiVo rebooting. It booted just fine with no loss of programming or apparently anything else.
> 
> Two days later, it happened again. The TiVo was right at the end of recording two programs and the arrow keys became very sluggish. When the two programs were finished recording, the TiVo rebooted to the GSOD. After just a few minutes it rebooted and came back up, losing about 15 minutes of the next program. That was Tuesday. This is Friday. It hasn't happened since.


Next time it happends can you make a note of when your TiVo dialed out or connected to TiVo Inc for daily update?

Was it recording two HD channels when it went down?


----------



## moraga695

Several posts have mentioned that some eSATA cables snap in when inserted and others slide in like a USB cable. I've got an Antec MX-1 on order (with a DB35). Would somebody with the Antec MX-1 who is using the included cable clue us in - does this cable snap in place or just slide in?

Also, unless I've missed any posts, all the posts say this cable works well. Has anybody had a different experience?

Thanks very much.


----------



## greg_burns

moraga695 said:


> Several posts have mentioned that some eSATA cables snap in when inserted and others slide in like a USB cable. I've got an Antec MX-1 on order (with a DB35). Would somebody with the Antec MX-1 who is using the included cable clue us in - does this cable snap in place or just slide in?
> 
> Also, unless I've missed any posts, all the posts say this cable works well. Has anybody had a different experience?
> 
> Thanks very much.


My MX-1 cable slides into place. There are "lips" on the top and bottom of the cable that holds the cable in place when inserted. I would not goes so far as to say it snaps in. It takes a slight amount of pressure to remove, but there is nothing that needs depressed first. Having said that, doesn't feel like the cable is just gonna come out on its own.

The MX-1 worked on the first try for me.


----------



## jlib

JimPa said:


> If you don't have a SATA capable PC, can you use the usb port for drives so equipped??
> 
> What exactly does quiet mode do?


No, the utility uses a primitive DOS boot disk. It only supports bare PATA and SATA drives connected directly to the mainboard of the computer or to an adapter card. Basically, whatever can be seen with a pre-Windows DOS boot disk. Quiet mode modifies the seek algorithm so the the actuator arm doesn't do the click-click or bang-bang dance anymore. The idling sound level is not changed, just the access chatter. The lazy algorithm works just fine for the TiVo application, though.

In this day of performance specification wars, a manufacturer really can't ship a drive tuned for acoustic considerations rather than raw seek times (except for the speciality AV/DVR drives like the DB35 and Cinema Star. Detuning a regular drive can make it as quiet as an AV/DVR drive (you don't get the desirable lackadaisical error correction and sometimes higher mean time before failure of the AV/DVR drive, though .


----------



## ajlee7

After 28 pages, can someone point me to the link that describes the best and ExacT combo for this upgrade?


----------



## bkdtv

ajlee7 said:


> After 28 pages, can someone point me to the link that describes the best and ExacT combo for this upgrade?


Did you read the first post? That includes the link to instructions and summarizes the last 28 pages of information.


----------



## 2farrell

For those looking for a good deal on the Seagate 750GB eSATA drive, it's on special at Best Buy for $199.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8294017&type=product&id=1172277308443&ref=10&loc=01


----------



## Dajad

ajlee7 said:


> After 28 pages, can someone point me to the link that describes the best and ExacT combo for this upgrade?


The concensus seems to be that the Antec MX-1 Enclosure combined with the Seagate 500GB or 750/GB DB35 drive is the best. See links to all three in this post:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5183480&&#post5183480

As a result, you can see here that I just ordered the 750 Meg combo from a Canadian source on Friday.

...Dale


----------



## richsadams

Dajad said:



> The concensus seems to be that the Antec MX-1 Enclosure combined with the Seagate 500GB or 750/GB DB35 drive is the best. See links to all three in this post:
> 
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5183480&&#post5183480
> 
> As a result, you can see here that I just ordered them from a Canadian source on Friday.
> 
> ...Dale


 Congrats! :up: I think you'll be happy that you did. Let us know how it goes when you get it hooked up!


----------



## dtphonehome

2farrell said:


> For those looking for a good deal on the Seagate 750GB eSATA drive, it's on special at Best Buy for $199.
> 
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8294017&type=product&id=1172277308443&ref=10&loc=01


Drops to $179 or $175 (rewardzone) with this coupon:
http://images.bestbuy.com/BestBuy_US/en_US/images/external/emailpdf/052207_mem_day_coupons.pdf

Just picked one up, but no eSata cable. Anyone know if the Tripp Lite cable at Amazon is any good?


----------



## lrhorer

alyssa said:


> Let us/me know if you get another GSOD. I've been GSOD free for 24 hours now & see no signs of another ocurance.


Its been 5 days, now. 'Not a burp.



alyssa said:


> Did you get a service update from Tivo recently?


I'm not certain. I didn't notice one. Is there a way to tell after the fact?



alyssa said:


> Did you lose power to your S3 within 24hr's of the 1st GSOD?


No. It's on a UPS.


----------



## lrhorer

spike2k5 said:


> Next time it happends can you make a note of when your TiVo dialed out or connected to TiVo Inc for daily update?


Surely.



spike2k5 said:


> Was it recording two HD channels when it went down?


Yes, it was, or to be precise the TiVo rebooted just after both HD channels stopped recording. I'm not certain about the first time, however. I don't think it was, but I could be very easily mistaken.


----------



## bevansmd

Note, BestBuy reward coupons are only off regular price but that Seagate is a great deal.


----------



## dtphonehome

bevansmd said:


> Note, BestBuy reward coupons are only off regular price but that Seagate is a great deal.


Nope, I used it today on the $199 sale price to bring it down to $176.


----------



## jeffk

dtphonehome said:


> Nope, I used it today on the $199 sale price to bring it down to $176.


same here


----------



## craigo

2farrell said:


> For those looking for a good deal on the Seagate 750GB eSATA drive, it's on special at Best Buy for $199.
> 
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8294017&type=product&id=1172277308443&ref=10&loc=01


Sorry for the silly question, but I'm not up to speed with all this eSATA stuff, I assume you only need eSATA II cables to go along with this, correct? No enclosure needed?


----------



## dtphonehome

craigo said:


> Sorry for the silly question, but I'm not up to speed with all this eSATA stuff, I assume you only need eSATA II cables to go along with this, correct? No enclosure needed?


Correct. The Seagate drive is external (it has its own enclosure).


----------



## Uday

2farrell said:


> For those looking for a good deal on the Seagate 750GB eSATA drive, it's on special at Best Buy for $199.
> 
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8294017&type=product&id=1172277308443&ref=10&loc=01


For those wanting to compare this Seagate FreeAgent external HDD & the combination of a Antec MX-1 + a DB35 -- check out
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5170582&highlight=uday#post5170582


----------



## craigo

dtphonehome said:


> Correct. The Seagate drive is external (it has its own enclosure).


Great! Thanks!


----------



## nandopr

Hello. Will this Seagate Drive work with my S3? I did some reserach but want to be sure before I buy it.

Thank you all.

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8294017&type=product&id=1172277308443&ref=10&loc=01


----------



## Adam1115

2farrell said:


> For those looking for a good deal on the Seagate 750GB eSATA drive, it's on special at Best Buy for $199.
> 
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8294017&type=product&id=1172277308443&ref=10&loc=01


When I open this, it says 750 Gig in the title, but the ad says:



> Add an extra 500GB of storage space for photos, music, documents and more with this external hard drive that features USB 2.0 and eSATA interfaces.


----------



## nandopr

Adam1115 said:


> When I open this, it says 750 Gig in the title, but the ad says:


You are correct. Maybe a typo? seagate.com shows that the capacity for this model ( ST307504FPA1E2-RK) is 750

http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/datasheet/disc/ds_fa_pro_us.pdf


----------



## bevansmd

dtphonehome said:


> Nope, I used it today on the $199 sale price to bring it down to $176.


so you used the coupon in store and it took off another 10-12%? I tried this with the 'wesern digital drive they had on sale Sat. and the employee didn't scan it because we both knew the drive was on sale for more than 12% off regular price. I have one more day on the coupon........debating about disconnecting the WD MYBook 500gb drive that I hooked up yesterday and getting the seagarte 750gb drive that I think has a 5 year warranty which would exceed the western digital one year warranty for that drive.

Any downside to disconnecting an esata drive after 48 hours use and returning it to Best Buy in exchange towards Seagate Pro 750 drive? I think most of the recordings would be tivo suggestions...


----------



## ajlee7

bkdtv said:


> Did you read the first post? That includes the link to instructions and summarizes the last 28 pages of information.


Hi, yes I know I read the first post of the thread!! I'm just confused if the first page is the definitive answer to this upgrade, not sure why others are asking similar follow-up questions (see quotes below)!! Anyway, can someone please answer on the below questions for the right combination to get this upgrade:

1) Will this Seagate 750GB FreeAgent Pro work?
2) Do I need an enclosure? (I think not)
3) Which eSATA do you need? Any recommendations?
4) If the answer to the above is Y, N, and Y then all I need to do is buy this and connect via the instructions on page 1 and I'm done?!

Thanks!



nandopr said:


> Hello. Will this Seagate Drive work with my S3? I did some reserach but want to be sure before I buy it.
> 
> Thank you all.
> 
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8294017&type=product&id=1172277308443&ref=10&loc=01





craigo said:


> Sorry for the silly question, but I'm not up to speed with all this eSATA stuff, I assume you only need eSATA II cables to go along with this, correct? No enclosure needed?





dtphonehome said:


> Correct. The Seagate drive is external (it has its own enclosure).


----------



## stevereis

bevansmd said:


> so you used the coupon in store and it took off another 10-12%? ...


Another data point - I had no issues using the 10% coupon yesterday.


----------



## stevereis

ajlee7 said:


> Hi, yes I know I read the first post of the thread!! I'm just confused if the first page is the definitive answer to this upgrade, not sure why others are asking similar follow-up questions (see quotes below)!! Anyway, can someone please answer on the below questions for the right combination to get this upgrade:
> 
> 1) Will this Seagate 750GB FreeAgent Pro work?
> 2) Do I need an enclosure? (I think not)
> 3) Which eSATA do you need? Any recommendations?
> 4) If the answer to the above is Y, N, and Y then all I need to do is buy this and connect via the instructions on page 1 and I'm done?!
> 
> Thanks!


Note that the first post is being updated as questions are asked & answered in the thread. Also, looks like people come into the thread & post questions without reviewing the first post or reading thru or searching to see if the same question has already been asked & answered.

Your questions:
1) Will this Seagate 750GB FreeAgent Pro work?
*Yes - see item #28 in FAQ* 
2) Do I need an enclosure? (I think not)
*No - see item #28 in FAQ - this is a drive + enclosure already, you do not need another enclosure* 
3) Which eSATA do you need? Any recommendations?
*See items #26 & #27 in FAQ if this concerns the eSATA cable.*


----------



## Dssturbo1

bevansmd said:


> Note, BestBuy reward coupons are only off regular price but that Seagate is a great deal.


Supposed to be only off regular price but many bb stores will let you use the coupons, no matter the BB store coupon policy.


----------



## snathanb

I had no problem using the coupon in-store today.


----------



## Alan Gordon

OK, I'm a couple of weeks away from taking advantage of the $200 rebate on the TiVo Series 3. 

My plan was to upgrade the hard drive with an external enclosure later this year (August perhaps?), but I live in the South where power outages are quite common with storms, sometimes going out for four or five hours at a time which would make upgrading internally be the better way to go.

Can someone post a link for instructions on upgrading the TiVo Series 3's internal hard drive with pictures?

Also, I know that Weakknees has an offer where you can copy your programming over, but can I do that myself, and if so, does anyone have a link to instructions for doing so?

Also, has anyone upgraded using the Hitachi 1TB hard drive?

~Alan


----------



## hiker

Alan Gordon said:


> ...
> Can someone post a link for instructions on upgrading the TiVo Series 3's internal hard drive with pictures?
> ...


Here is one. I'm not sure if you can "officially" add eSATA drive after upgrading the internal.


Alan Gordon said:


> ...
> Also, has anyone upgraded using the Hitachi 1TB hard drive?


Several have. Do a search.


----------



## MJedi

I had successfully used a WD My Book 500GB drive. But, now that Best Buy had the FAP750 on sale for $199 (and used my 12% coupon on top of it), I want to use that instead. Do I just unplug the My Book, let the S3 run the divorce procedure, then kickstart with the FAP connected to the S3? I am aware of losing programs on the My Book. There is no danger of losing what's in the internal HD, right?

Thanks!


----------



## hiker

MJedi said:


> I had successfully used a WD My Book 500GB drive. But, now that Best Buy had the FAP750 on sale for $199 (and used my 12% coupon on top of it), I want to use that instead. Do I just unplug the My Book, let the S3 run the divorce procedure, then kickstart with the FAP connected to the S3? I am aware of losing programs on the My Book. There is no danger of losing what's in the internal HD, right?
> 
> Thanks!


The new eSATA drive should work but you could lose any program recorded after adding the old eSATA drive.


----------



## Dajad

ajlee7 said:


> 1) Will this Seagate 750GB FreeAgent Pro work?
> 2) Do I need an enclosure? (I think not)
> 3) Which eSATA do you need? Any recommendations?
> 4) If the answer to the above is Y, N, and Y then all I need to do is buy this and connect via the instructions on page 1 and I'm done?!
> 
> Thanks!


Here's your answers without the need to point out again that everything you ask is answered in this thread a dozen times! Oops, I just did! 

1) Yes it works, but as has been observed/noted many times in this thread, it is not designed for 24/7 PVR-type operation like the DB35 and others are. So, your long term mileage may vary.

2) The FreeAgent is a drive/enclosure combo unit so no additional enclosure is needed.

3) Err... I don't understand that question. If you mean which eSata drive, most any eSata drive will work, that doesn't mean its the best. Read the first post for possible more info or read this thread through for the detailed discussions of the many drives/combos tried and working fine. Or do you mean what cable? The answer depends on the drive or drive/combo you choose. The 750 Free Agent does not come with a cable. I forget what cable you will need for that but it has been discussesd many times in this thread - read a bit and you'll find out. The MX-1 enclosure comes with the needed cable. My advice. Decide what solution you want first and then figure out what cable is needed, if any to support it. With my solution (that included the MX-1) I didn't have to figure out the cable question because I knew it came with a proper cable.

4) If you buy the FreeAGent Pro you'll need to get the proper cable for it (again, asked and answered many times in this thread). Otherwise, once you have the right cable, the instructions in the first post of this thread should be all you need. Its supposed to be very easy. I'm still waiting for my drive/enclosure to arrive so it will be a few days before I can concurr with what a 100 or so others ahead of me have already said/concluded.

...Dale


----------



## bkdtv

MJedi said:


> I had successfully used a WD My Book 500GB drive. But, now that Best Buy had the FAP750 on sale for $199 (and used my 12% coupon on top of it), I want to use that instead. Do I just unplug the My Book, let the S3 run the divorce procedure, then kickstart with the FAP connected to the S3? I am aware of losing programs on the My Book. There is no danger of losing what's in the internal HD, right?


You won't lose anything recorded before the drive was added (FAQ #13).

Since we've got so many questions about the Free Agent Pro, I added that as FAQ #32.


----------



## gteague

bkdtv said:


> You won't lose anything recorded before the drive was added (FAQ #13).
> 
> Since we've got so many questions about the Free Agent Pro, I added that as FAQ #32.


i was looking though the faq and wondered: is question #18 supposed to refer to question #12? or to #14?

#12 When you add the external drive, are the programs already recorded on the internal disk lost? No.

... ... ...

#14 What happens when I disconnect the eSATA drive?

If the eSATA drive is off or disconnected when you power up the Series3, the Tivo will give you two options. You can 1) reboot and reattach the drive or 2) switch the Series3 back to "single-drive mode" which deletes any recordings on that eSATA drive.

If you decide to switch to single-drive mode -- by pressing Thumbs Down three times --- the Series3 may delete some or all of the recordings made since the drive was connected. All recordings on the eSATA drive are deleted. Recordings made before the drive was connected are not affected.

When you disconnect or power off the eSATA drive while the Series3 is on, the Tivo will reboot and ask you to re-connect (or divorce) the drive.

... ... ...

#18 Can I swap between multiple eSATA drives to multiply my capacity?

No. When you connect an eSATA drive to the Series3, that drive is "married" to the internal hard drive. Only one eSATA drive can be "married" to the Tivo's internal hard drive at any given time. You can "divorce" (remove) an eSATA drive to replace it with another, as per the instructions in #12, but then you lose access to the recordings made on that drive. You do not lose recordings made before the drive was added.​
/guy


----------



## dtphonehome

bkdtv said:


> Since we've got so many questions about the Free Agent Pro, I added that as FAQ #32.


I see that you mention the reliability is an unknown. This is true, but I think I should point out that the Seagate is one of the only drives on the market with a 5 year warranty, which I think speaks to the reliability issue. You might want to mention that in the FAQ.


----------



## 1283

dtphonehome said:


> I see that you mention the reliability is an unknown. This is true, but I think I should point out that the Seagate is one of the only drives on the market with a 5 year warranty, which I think speaks to the reliability issue. You might want to mention that in the FAQ.


Warranty has more to do with marketing and price than actual reliability. The same drive can be sold with 1, 3, or 5 years of warranty.


----------



## bkdtv

dtphonehome said:


> I see that you mention the reliability is an unknown. This is true, but I think I should point out that the Seagate is one of the only drives on the market with a 5 year warranty, which I think speaks to the reliability issue. You might want to mention that in the FAQ.


Added.



gteague said:


> i was looking though the faq and wondered: is question #18 supposed to refer to question #12? or to #14?


Thanks, fixed. A few entries were added at the top since that was written.


----------



## MJedi

Thanks to everyone who responded to my question. I now have the FAP750 connected. Even though I was aware of losing some shows after removing the My Book 500, I was still shocked at just how many shows the S3 put on it. I thought it would fill up the internal HD first before using the eSATA. I guess it's like the RAID method of striping or concantenating data to both drives.


----------



## Dajad

TiVo doesn't choose the external drive - it purposely divides almost all shows across BOTH drives so it is impossilbe to remove a drive and extract programming from it. This is all required by cablelabs in order for TiVo to be cablecard certifies. Any show split on both drives will NOT appear once you remove the external drive, even if 99.9 percent of it was recorded on the internal drive. Don't you love DRM!? 



...Dale


----------



## spamdragon

This might be a bit off topic, but has anyone cracked open the FAP750? I'm curious what the drive is that's on the inside of this thing. At BB's $199, that's not a bad price even for an internal disk...


----------



## DCIFRTHS

spamdragon said:


> This might be a bit off topic, but has anyone cracked open the FAP750? I'm curious what the drive is that's on the inside of this thing. At BB's $199, that's not a bad price even for an internal disk...


I came here to ask the same question 

Even if someone has it connected to a computer, the drive model my be reported in Device Manager. Anyone care to give it a shot?

Thanks!


----------



## oldnacl

I connected a FAP750 to my TiVo last week. Since then, while it was recognized and shows over 100hours of recording time, the Tivo has rebooted multiple times, frozen, and green screened twice. Previously I had a 320GB drive in a Rosewill case and had only the occasional audio / video drop-out (which I also saw watching a show using just the TV tuner so I expect that's a Comcast, rather than a TiVo, issue). So yesterday evening after another green screen and recovery, I divorced the SATA drive and I'll use the TiVo a few days without external storage.


----------



## alyssa

oldracl,
what software version is your tivo on?


----------



## bkdtv

oldnacl said:


> I connected a FAP750 to my TiVo last week. Since then, while it was recognized and shows over 100hours of recording time, the Tivo has rebooted multiple times, frozen, and green screened twice. Previously I had a 320GB drive in a Rosewill case and had only the occasional audio / video drop-out (which I also saw watching a show using just the TV tuner so I expect that's a Comcast, rather than a TiVo, issue). So yesterday evening after another green screen and recovery, I divorced the SATA drive and I'll use the TiVo a few days without external storage.


Three questions...

Did you try another cable, like that linked in FAQ #27?

Were you storing the FAP750 in a well-ventilated environment? The FAP750 should not be used with the Series3 in enclosed cabinets with little or no ventilation.

What is the ambient temperature in the room where you had the FAP750?


----------



## gwsat

Dajad said:


> Don't you love DRM!?
> 
> 
> 
> ...Dale


NOT! I try to repress any thought of DRM, for this way lies madness.


----------



## msu2k

bkdtv said:


> Three questions...
> 
> Did you try another cable, like that linked in FAQ #27?
> 
> Were you storing the FAP750 in a well-ventilated environment? The FAP750 should not be used with the Series3 in enclosed cabinets with little or no ventilation.
> 
> What is the ambient temperature in the room where you had the FAP750?


I had the same issues with my FAP750 as that poster.

I did try another cable, two others in fact. I didn't buy the one in FAQ #27. I had given up on it after 3 other cords including one cord that worked fine for my Cavalry drive for more than three weeks, and another cord I had trimmed. The Cavalry cord is not a esata II cord as far as I know, but the other two I tried were esata II cords.

The FAP750 was in a well-venilated environment and was not in an enclosed cabinet.

The temperature in the room is between 60 and 70 degrees.

I've had flawless performance for a few weeks from the Cavalry drive which was on the FAQ list and was taken off. I had nothing but problems with the FAP750 which remains on the FAQ list.


----------



## Dssturbo1

DCIFRTHS said:


> I came here to ask the same question  Even if someone has it connected to a computer, the drive model my be reported in Device Manager. Anyone care to give it a shot? Thanks!


hooked up to a computer by USB the Device Manager info is given as a Seagate USB Free Agent Pro under Hard Drives, does not give specific model #, under Windows Explorer it just list as Free Agent Drive, Drive (I).

The Seagate model # for the 750FPA is ST-307504FPA1E2-RK.

Doubt it is the DB or the Enterprise drive but it is a 750Gb 7200 rpm 16Mb cache Sata drive.


----------



## spike2k5

spamdragon said:


> This might be a bit off topic, but has anyone cracked open the FAP750? I'm curious what the drive is that's on the inside of this thing. At BB's $199, that's not a bad price even for an internal disk...


It's got Barracuda 7200.10 SATA 3.0Gb/s drive in it.

So I took it apart, hook it up directly to pc & TiVo w/o any problem.
As soon as I hook it up to it's internal usb/eSATA board -> pc & tivo, no go.

eSATA port on this drive is not compatible or has a problem with pc and tivo so don't buy it. If you have it return.

I would stick with antec mx-1 and a bare drive.


----------



## Dssturbo1

Seagate Free Agent Pro ??
this might have been covered in another post, give me that number or let me know if so.

I hooked the FPA up to the computer, it comes formatted with NTFS and some small utilities and backup software included on the drive. The utility tools included say that it has by default a 15 minute sleep program built in so it goes into a "Power Saving Mode" after 15 minutes where it detects no activity. Besides the esata cable problems could this be causing some forum members problems?? It can easily be changed to Always On/Never Sleep with the utilities.

Doesn't the S3 do a quick format when you add the external esata drive and therefore wipe those utilites off the drive. I know the main OS for the S3 is held on the main internal drive but whatever new installed file system (Tivo/linux?) is used on the external drive would set the drive to then be Always On, right.

Note, I found this post about the 750FPA in comments left at Newegg

"Cons: Power "switch" (actually a touch-sensitive spot on the base) behaves erratically. Has a spin down issue on Linux systems (see below). 

Other Thoughts: There is a problem with the Seagate FreeAgent drives on some Linux systems: by default, the drive is set to spin down after 15 minutes of idling. When the system asks the drive to spin back up, it does not respond quickly enough, errors out and, gets re-mounted read-only. It is possible to set the drive to never spin down (with sdparm) though, that may cause other problems. Some (but not all) systems can be set to allow the drive more time to restart. None of these work-arounds are needed with competing USB drives from other manufacturers."


----------



## NJChris

I didnt change the settings on my FAP750. Just hooked it to the Tivo. It worked great for 2 weeks until the last software update... I think that it didn't get loaded right and the system rebooted a few times, but that was about a week ago and no other problems. That I do believe was not the drive's fault but the software (I think swivel was added, but it didnt show up in the menu until all the rebooting problems stopped - which happened only on one day).


I also think it's hard to diagnose a problem as a drive problem when there are so many cables out there. So when one person says their XXX drive isnt working - there's not much talk about the cables - or we don't know the person's expertise with identifying a good or bad cable. Too many variables.


----------



## bkdtv

> Doesn't the S3 do a quick format when you add the external esata drive and therefore wipe those utilites off the drive. I know the main OS for the S3 is held on the main internal drive but whatever new installed file system (Tivo/linux?) is used on the external drive would set the drive to then be Always On, right.


Yes, the Tivo wipes those utilities.

However, those utilities set a bit in the firmware so if you disable that spin down option, it would remain disabled even after Tivo wipes the drive.


----------



## MJedi

bkdtv said:


> However, those utilities set a bit in the firmware so if you disable that spin down option, it would remain disabled even after Tivo wipes the drive.


Do you know if the drive would need to be readable by Windows (formatted to FAT or NTFS) before I can use these utilities to change the settings?


----------



## Dajad

My DB35 arrived today but, wouldn't you know it, while the Canadian online etailer Agile listed the MX-1 as "in stock" when I ordered, they were not and I got an e-mail yesterday saying it won't arrive for four business days. So, my eSata sits beside my TiVo waiting patiently. Argh! I could really use it this week. With 10 hours of the French Open recording every day I'll have to micromanage my S3 until the MX-1 arrives.

...Dale (chomping at the bit - and happy I didn't choose the FAP 750!)

P.S. Roddick was knocked out in round 1 today. Damn!


----------



## NOD

Alright, I didn't check the 85 other pages of this thread to see if it had already been done, but the new Hitachi 1TB w/ the Antec MX-1 enclosure works and I don't hear a thing!!

(unfortunately, the Antec came w/o the big long screw that is used to hold the entire enclosure together, but Antec is mailing one out, and the drive housing is firmly attached to the enclosure anyway...)


----------



## DCIFRTHS

spike2k5 said:


> It's got Barracuda 7200.10 SATA 3.0Gb/s drive in it.
> 
> So I took it apart, hook it up directly to pc & TiVo w/o any problem.
> As soon as I hook it up to it's internal usb/eSATA board -> pc & tivo, no go.
> 
> eSATA port on this drive is not compatible or has a problem with pc and tivo so don't buy it. If you have it return.
> 
> I would stick with antec mx-1 and a bare drive.


Any chance you have the actual model number for the drive?


----------



## DCIFRTHS

Dssturbo1 said:


> hooked up to a computer by USB the Device Manager info is given as a Seagate USB Free Agent Pro under Hard Drives, does not give specific model #, under Windows Explorer it just list as Free Agent Drive, Drive (I).
> 
> The Seagate model # for the 750FPA is ST-307504FPA1E2-RK.
> 
> Doubt it is the DB or the Enterprise drive but it is a 750Gb 7200 rpm 16Mb cache Sata drive.


Thank you for checking


----------



## spike2k5

DCIFRTHS said:


> Any chance you have the actual model number for the drive?


I opened up 500Gb Seagate Free Agent pro

Model is ST3500630AS

I guess 750 would be

ST3750640AS


----------



## DCIFRTHS

spike2k5 said:


> I opened up 500Gb Seagate Free Agent pro
> 
> Model is ST3500630AS
> 
> I guess 750 would be
> 
> ST3750640AS


Thanks!


----------



## deeremj

Spike,

I want to pull my freeagent apart to put the drive into in an mx-1 enclosure for better cooling...Any tips on how to take it apart without destroying the enclosure?

-Thanks!

-mj



spike2k5 said:


> I opened up 500Gb Seagate Free Agent pro
> 
> Model is ST3500630AS
> 
> I guess 750 would be
> 
> ST3750640AS


----------



## spike2k5

deeremj said:


> Spike,
> 
> I want to pull my freeagent apart to put the drive into in an mx-1 enclosure for better cooling...Any tips on how to take it apart without destroying the enclosure?
> 
> -Thanks!
> 
> -mj


It's kind of hard not too but on the bottom of the drive you will see 3 small slits on each side.
Basically, plastic tab is holding the case together. So if you can find a flat objects that can fit through the middle slit, you can press the plastic tabs that is located about 2" down in side the case on both sides to release the cover.

Cover is the side that has Seagate logo on it.

If it's too hard, you can use a flat screw driver and just pull the cover off, breaking the plastic tabs.

I chose the brute force method and according to Seagate's warranty validation site, hard drive is still covered for 5 yrs. 

If you got BB deal, you are still on top even without the case as bare drive costs more than the eSATA drive.


----------



## oldnacl

bkdtv said:


> Three questions...
> 
> Did you try another cable, like that linked in FAQ #27?
> 
> Were you storing the FAP750 in a well-ventilated environment? The FAP750 should not be used with the Series3 in enclosed cabinets with little or no ventilation.
> 
> What is the ambient temperature in the room where you had the FAP750?


I tried the same cables (I have two, one from monoprice and another that came with an enclosure) that I used successfuly with a couple other, smaller, external SATA drives connected to the TiVo. In both cases, I was able to marry the drive to the Tivo without problems.
The external drive is on a shelf, wide open to sides, back and top and doesn't feel more than warm to the touch.
Ambient temperature is prolly around 80+ degrees (given heat from the TV, etc in the immediate area.
After divorcing, I used the TiVo last night in the same general way I've been using it with the external drives and had no problem - note that I haven't had problems with the smaller dives in a Rosewill case either.
I ordered a couple of the Trip-Lite SATA cables mentioned earlier in the thread from Amazon (lower shipping costs) and I'll try again with that cable when it arrives and post my results.


----------



## bkdtv

Several members have suggested that I take the FAP750 off the list in the first post, due to the number of problems reported with that drive? What do you guys say?

It is better to error on the side of caution, is it not?

I think many FAP750 issues are related to the use of improper cables, but there are clearly some members experiencing issues with that drive for other reasons, possibly due to overheating in Seagate's fanless enclosure.

Can anyone confirm that removing the Seagate drive from the FAP750 and enclosure into another enclosure like the Antex MX-1 fixed their problems?


----------



## msu2k

bkdtv said:


> Several members have suggested that I take the FAP750 off the list in the first post, due to the number of problems reported with that drive? What do you guys say?
> 
> It is better to error on the side of caution, is it not?
> 
> I think many FAP750 issues are related to the cable, but there are clearly some members experiencing issues with that drive for other reasons, possibly due to overheating in Seagate's fanless enclosure.


I mentioned in a previous post that I've had nothing but trouble with the FAP750 and I tried three different cables, including the one that has worked perfectly for my Cavalry drive. The other two cables I used were esata II cables which were supposed to have worked.

The Cavalry drive that is no longer on the list, has worked flawlessly since day one three weeks ago. No reboots, no hiccups, nothing. If the Cavalry isn't on the list due to some people having issues with them, it seems like the FAP750 falls into the same category. There seems like there are actually more people having issues with the FAP750 than the Cavalry.

It's a shame because both are low cost solutions that work perfectly well for some but not others.

I think I'm sticking with the Cavalry until the price of 1 TB drives come down. I only want to spend "big" once on this experiment and figure it should be when the largest possible drive size is available for a decent price.


----------



## MJedi

bkdtv said:


> Several members have suggested that I take the FAP750 off the list in the first post, due to the number of problems reported with that drive? What do you guys say?
> 
> It is better to error on the side of caution, is it not?
> 
> I think many FAP750 issues are related to the use of improper cables, but there are clearly some members experiencing issues with that drive for other reasons, possibly due to overheating in Seagate's fanless enclosure.
> 
> Can anyone confirm that removing the Seagate drive from the FAP750 and enclosure into another enclosure like the Antex MX-1 fixed their problems?


I've only had the FAP750 for 3 days, but so far so good. I'm even using trimmed eSATA cables. What I suggest is to keep the FAP750 on the list, but with a note that several members have experienced problems with it, despite trying different cables. And recommend that the drive should not be placed in an enclosed cabinet, and not near other heat sources (e.g., TV, TiVo, receiver)

Just my 2c.


----------



## Jack D

bkdtv said:


> Several members have suggested that I take the FAP750 off the list in the first post, due to the number of problems reported with that drive? What do you guys say?
> 
> It is better to error on the side of caution, is it not?
> 
> I think many FAP750 issues are related to the use of improper cables, but there are clearly some members experiencing issues with that drive for other reasons, possibly due to overheating in Seagate's fanless enclosure.
> 
> Can anyone confirm that removing the Seagate drive from the FAP750 and enclosure into another enclosure like the Antex MX-1 fixed their problems?


Why not keep it on the list with a caveat that some have experienced problems (BTW do we really even know what percentage of FAP750 users have had problems? As always the ones who have no problems don't often post) I had a lot of problems getting the FAP750 recognized but that was because of my remote. Since I got it set up I've had absolutely no problems whatsoever (knock on wood).


----------



## sfhub

Something to consider is that often this all-in-one units will change the internal chipsets and designs without warning. Sometimes they'll say v2 but often it is a silent upgrade. That might explain some of the varying experiences with the same product.


----------



## bown

bkdtv said:


> Several members have suggested that I take the FAP750 off the list in the first post, due to the number of problems reported with that drive? What do you guys say?
> 
> It is better to error on the side of caution, is it not?
> 
> I think many FAP750 issues are related to the use of improper cables, but there are clearly some members experiencing issues with that drive for other reasons, possibly due to overheating in Seagate's fanless enclosure.
> 
> Can anyone confirm that removing the Seagate drive from the FAP750 and enclosure into another enclosure like the Antex MX-1 fixed their problems?


My Freeagent Pro 750 was instantly detected by tivo, and has worked flawlessly for several weeks now. I would certainly recommend it.

Not that the drive would probably ever go idle, but I used the PC utilities to disable the spin down before I first connected the drive to tivo.

About overheating, well, I have my drive in the large space next to my TV in my entertainment center so there is enough air circulation. If the drive was placed in a small cubby hole or an enclosed entertainment center, I could understand it overheating. My case never gets THAT hot. Its very warm, but not burning hot.

BTW, it is SO cool to see 130 shows in the recently deleted folder!


----------



## fred2

I have had problems with the FAP750 but I believe that they were all cable related.

I used an UNaltered Monoprice and it did not work. I trimmed it and it did work although the connection on the DRIVE side is not snug. When attempting to look for the serial number the cable easily detached and I lost the tivo-drive connection. I was able to restore it with no loss of data.

But seeing the Antex MX-1 deal, I purchased one as insurance but tried using its cable UNaltered with the FAP750. Since I had heard that the Antex MX-1 was terrific I figured its cable would be too. NO DICE. The cable was also loose on the DRIVE side (tight on the tivo side) and I could not get connection.

Went back to my trimmed Monoprice and I was back in business. Again, no data loss.

It has been running for about 2 weeks with the only problems when I've fussed with the cable.

I also have the tivo and drive plugged into a power-strip. As a test, I used the strip's off button to kill power to both the tivo and FAP750. Turned it back on the they both booted fine as if there were no problems. (I'm probably not fond of the FAP's on/off switch but if the tivo is on, it appears to power on the drive, too. If the tivo is off, the drive will NOT power on without pressing the switch)

edit:

Just plugged the Antex MX-1 esata cable into the Antex MX-1 enclosure (I had not tried that before) and it is physically snug. I do not have a standalone drive so cannot test the "electrical" connection aspect. 

I hazard a guess that the FAP750 (and other FAP's, probably) have a slightly enlarged socket and therefore, some cables do not fit snuggly. Now I do not know the physical specs (height/width) and maybe the FAP meets those perfectly but cables are not meeting the specs. Your mileage may vary.


----------



## jtreid

bkdtv said:


> Several members have suggested that I take the FAP750 off the list in the first post, due to the number of problems reported with that drive? What do you guys say?
> 
> It is better to error on the side of caution, is it not?
> 
> I think many FAP750 issues are related to the use of improper cables, but there are clearly some members experiencing issues with that drive for other reasons, possibly due to overheating in Seagate's fanless enclosure.
> 
> Can anyone confirm that removing the Seagate drive from the FAP750 and enclosure into another enclosure like the Antex MX-1 fixed their problems?


With the exception of my S3 mysteriously divorcing the FAP750 after getting the second 8.3 update, I've had no problems. It was difficult to get it married, but I think that was pilot error.

I added a cooling fan to the back of my e-center to circulate the air from the FAP, an S3, an S2 and a comcast HD box. Without the fan, it was extremely hot inside. Even then, I did not experience any problems with the drive.


----------



## richsadams

jtreid said:


> I added a cooling fan to the back of my e-center to circulate the air from the FAP, an S3, an S2 and a comcast HD box. Without the fan, it was extremely hot inside. Even then, I did not experience any problems with the drive.


 If you have a Comcast HD box I'd keep a fire extinguisher handy!


----------



## paladin732

would a USB external enclosure (http://www.buy.com/retail/product.asp?sku=202581102&adid=17662 ) with a USB to eSata adapter work?


----------



## richsadams

fred2 said:


> But seeing the Antex MX-1 deal, I purchased one as insurance but tried using its cable UNaltered with the FAP750. Since I had heard that the Antex MX-1 was terrific I figured its cable would be too. NO DICE. The cable was also loose on the DRIVE side (tight on the tivo side) and I could not get connection.


 Based on this and many other postings it sounds like the FAP750's eSATA connection has been the culprit all along as the connections to other enclosures (MX-1, Apricorn, etc.) all seem to be fine as does TiVo's.


----------



## jboy

Hi,

If you buy a Seagate drive and stick it an enclosure be sure to check to see if it has the 1.5 GB/sec limiter jumper. Many Seagate models have this jumper and it is installed in the on position by default. This effectively turns your nice speedy 3 GB/sec drive in older 1.5 GByte/sec model.

jerry


----------



## Bodie

NOD said:


> Alright, I didn't check the 85 other pages of this thread to see if it had already been done, but the new Hitachi 1TB w/ the Antec MX-1 enclosure works and I don't hear a thing!!
> 
> (unfortunately, the Antec came w/o the big long screw that is used to hold the entire enclosure together, but Antec is mailing one out, and the drive housing is firmly attached to the enclosure anyway...)


Cool, will have to try it. Now to find the drive not backordered...


----------



## DN325Ci

Bodie said:


> Cool, will have to try it. Now to find the drive not backordered...


Looks like excaliberpc still has 77 500GB drives in stock. Excaliber was recommended earlier in the thread. I bought from them as well, and experience has been great so far. Pretty speedy shipping.

Don

EDIT: Ahh .. you wanted the Hitachi I see now.


----------



## jlib

jboy said:


> If you buy a Seagate drive and stick it an enclosure be sure to check to see if it has the 1.5 GB/sec limiter jumper. Many Seagate models have this jumper and it is installed in the on position by default. This effectively turns your nice speedy 3 GB/sec drive in older 1.5 GByte/sec model.


Not to worry, there is no drive that can use even half of the bandwidth of SATA 1.5Gb (giga_bits_) Hence the use of port multipliers to add more drives (a feature not applicable to the S3, though).


----------



## gteague

just got mine about 36 hours ago, but i have absolutely no dissatisfaction to report. i did not modify anything or even install the tools before i plugged it into my tivo although i did plug it into a pc via usb to make sure it worked and to copy off the software.

tivo recognized the drive first pass through and either sent a trigger to turn the drive on or the drive sensed the connection and turned itself on. the drive is completely silent in use--even under hard use--and is not even running warm, more cool-ish than warm-ish. i have it at the top of an a/v cabinet and the ambient temperature in the room is 79-81 degrees.

for comparison, before the fap750 i had a maxtor in a vantec nexstar enclosure. although it functioned perfectly in the 3 weeks i ran it, the disk i/o noise was quite loud and the fanless, aluminum enclosure got very wam indeed. i'd describe it as hot. just nearly too hot to touch.

i am using the cable that came with the vantec enclosure. i have no idea as to its origins.

oh, and one of the frequent texas thunderstorm blew through today while i was sleeping and i lost power for a few hours. i have a ups, but it's only good for 15 minutes. when i woke up the tivo was recording two programs--the drive had recovered perfectly.

if this drive proves reliable in 24/7 duty i find it a great match for the tivo for those of us who can place it where the ambient temperature is low enough a fan isn't needed.

my recommendation would be to leave it as a working solution in the faq--perhaps with a footnote that more data points are needed.

/guy


----------



## bp888

gteague said:


> ...
> 
> if this drive proves reliable in 24/7 duty i find it a great match for the tivo for those of us who can place it where the ambient temperature is low enough a fan isn't needed.
> 
> my recommendation would be to leave it as a working solution in the faq--perhaps with a footnote that *more data points are needed*.
> 
> /guy


... and more time.


----------



## topjazz

bown said:


> My Freeagent Pro 750 was instantly detected by tivo, and has worked flawlessly for several weeks now. I would certainly recommend it.
> 
> BTW, it is SO cool to see 130 shows in the recently deleted folder!


What he said!


----------



## TiivoDog

I have done searching, however I can not locate the problem I have now encountered. All of my S3 units have drives connected, however I have an Enterprise drive on one of them, however I could no longer tolerate the noise in my Family room, so I was going to swap it out for another drive.

At the Divorce screen, I was presented with 2 options: 1) reboot and reattach any drive or 2) switch the Series3 back to "single-drive mode" which deletes any recordings on that eSATA drive. I chose to turn the tivo off and connect my new drive, but it would not recognized the unit - I tried numerous times and same result..... I then thought the drive, enclosure or cable were bad, so I thought I would just try to connect the old one. First I simply connected it and let it boot up - the drive was not recognized, so I figured I would need to re-marry that one, which will not marry up, either.....

Do I need to somehow Force a divorce or has the eSATA port possibly somehow gone bad - any thoughts or recommendations with what to do next????


----------



## spike2k5

TiivoDog said:


> I have done searching, however I can not locate the problem I have now encountered. All of my S3 units have drives connected, however I have an Enterprise drive on one of them, however I could no longer tolerate the noise in my Family room, so I was going to swap it out for another drive.
> 
> At the Divorce screen, I was presented with 2 options: 1) reboot and reattach any drive or 2) switch the Series3 back to "single-drive mode" which deletes any recordings on that eSATA drive. I chose to turn the tivo off and connect my new drive, but it would not recognized the unit - I tried numerous times and same result..... I then thought the drive, enclosure or cable were bad, so I thought I would just try to connect the old one. First I simply connected it and let it boot up - the drive was not recognized, so I figured I would need to re-marry that one, which will not marry up, either.....
> 
> Do I need to somehow Force a divorce or has the eSATA port possibly somehow gone bad - any thoughts or recommendations with what to do next????


You cannot add a new eSATA drive unless you divorce your old one.

If you don't want to loose your recording on eSATA drive, you can dd copy your old one to a new one and it should work w/o divorcing. New drive has to be the same size or bigger than the old one.


----------



## TiivoDog

I am not concerned with losing the data at this point, I just want to get me new drive connected, but it won't marry up.... Also, I cant' get the old drive to divorce as it is not being recognized on boot up to subsequently divorce on a following boot up sequence. How can I get back to a divorce screen to hit 3 thumbs down/etc...??


----------



## spike2k5

TiivoDog said:


> I am not concerned with losing the data at this point, I just want to get me new drive connected, but it won't marry up.... Also, I cant' get the old drive to divorce as it is not being recognized on boot up to subsequently divorce on a following boot up sequence. How can I get back to a divorce screen to hit 3 thumbs down/etc...??


Disconnect any eSATA drive, boot and you should get a divorce screen.


----------



## LHMPDX

Count me as another very satisfied Antec MX-1 + Seagate DB35 customer. This combo is quiet and cool, and seemingly very well made. Kickstart 62 worked the first time. 

Not the cheapest approach, but neither is the TiVo Series 3.


----------



## TiivoDog

I was not getting the divorce screen when I did not have any eSATA drives connected to the Tivo - I subsequently just had a clean boot up with 32 / 303 hrs of storage. I also tried this on many attempts...........

HOWEVER, I tried some conventional wisdom and during boot up, I tried using Kickstart 63 instead of 62 for 'marrying' thinking that a forced Divorce would occur and it worked!! I know the Kickstart 63 has not been documented, but it worked, so unless this was a strange coincidence, that must be a hidden Kickstart value????

Anyways, thx for the replies!!!!


----------



## JimPa

Must have had study hall first thing in the morning..


----------



## efreedenburg

Originally Posted by bown
My Freeagent Pro 750 was instantly detected by tivo, and has worked flawlessly for several weeks now. I would certainly recommend it.

BTW, it is SO cool to see 130 shows in the recently deleted folder!



topjazz said:


> What he said!


Same here, no reboots or other problems.

By the way I'm Satellite Beach, haven't turned on airconditioning yet, room temp approx 82.


----------



## xnappo

Hello,

I don't have a Tivo, but I maintain a database for eSATA compatibility on the SA8300HD. Seems like y'all see a similar pattern of success/failure.

I can set up a database for you and give someone admin access if you would like.

I can't post a link, but google this:
scientific atlanta esata database 8300hd xnappo 

Regards,
xnappo


----------



## greg_burns

xnappo said:


> I can't post a link


http://baseportal.com/cgi-bin/baseportal.pl?htx=/xnappo/main&localparams=1


----------



## spike2k5

TiivoDog said:


> I was not getting the divorce screen when I did not have any eSATA drives connected to the Tivo - I subsequently just had a clean boot up with 32 / 303 hrs of storage. I also tried this on many attempts...........
> 
> HOWEVER, I tried some conventional wisdom and during boot up, I tried using Kickstart 63 instead of 62 for 'marrying' thinking that a forced Divorce would occur and it worked!! I know the Kickstart 63 has not been documented, but it worked, so unless this was a strange coincidence, that must be a hidden Kickstart value????
> 
> Anyways, thx for the replies!!!!


S3 does not listen for code 63 but if it encounters unknown code, there is catch-all clause that puts Tivo in diagnostic mode. So might as well use 63.

code 57 might work as well since it forces mfs filesystem check.


----------



## TiivoDog

Sounds like it must have been the unknown code routine and I saw some of the other codes, such as 57, but based on how my unit was behaving, I was rather leary that might trigger another undesirable response...

Thx for the info!!


----------



## donaudio

Just received my Freeagent Pro. I ordered it before I read the warning about not using it. Thought I would tryto install it before I returned it. Took about 4 tries and then it installed perfectly. 130 Hours is wonderful. Don


----------



## ckelly33

Freeagent Pro 750 worked for me on 2nd try (on the first attemp, I entered in the "6-2" when all lights were on, instead of just orange). Before I started, I hooked it into my PC and removed all the factory issued software.

With 141 hrs HD, I'm ready for SW 1-6!


----------



## bkdtv

I amended FAQ item #32 on the Seagate FAP750. Do you guys feel that is sufficient?


----------



## keenanSR

I hadn't looked at that first post in quite some time, but just looked now to see what #32 said and I have to say, bkdtv, you've done an outstanding job with that FAQ, thanks very much for the time and effort it must have/be taking to put it together. :up:


----------



## gteague

bkdtv said:


> I amended FAQ item #32 on the Seagate FAP750. Do you guys feel that is sufficient?


that looks pretty thorough to me. i think it's justified to devote that much space to this seagate drive since many folks, like me, are going to find the size, the look, the form-factor, the acoustics, the availability and the price attractive.

i did do the 'stress test' suggested by recording 2xhd programs while playing back another and the fap did get somewhat warmer, but not to the point it was uncomfortable to place my palm anywhere on its surface. i'd say the running temperature on this seagate is only 25-33% of the nexstar enclosure i was previously using and i had no problems with it in the 3 weeks it was in use.

i just tried improvising a couple of thermometers and i got less than 100deg on the seagate case compared with nearly 130deg on the nexstar case. for comparison, the 4 internal drives in my mac pro are all in the 90-99deg range right now. i keep a temp monitor running all the time on my mac mostly because i have one of those wd raptor drives as my boot drive which runs @10000rpm but even under full load rarely runs over 110-115deg.

the only downsides to the fap750 so far seem to be: lack of an esata cable and, under less than desirable ambient conditions, lack of a fan.
/guy


----------



## fred2

bkdtv said:


> I amended FAQ item #32 on the Seagate FAP750. Do you guys feel that is sufficient?


I'm not sure if "a bit smaller" should read "a bit larger" in the following quote:

"Some cables that are confirmed to work with other enclosures do not actually work with the FAP750, since its eSATA connector is a bit smaller than normal, which makes for a loose fit with some cables."

And a by-the-way:

I just got my cable from CablesToGo and its connector is noticeably longer (more exposed metal) than the one that I got from MonoPrice or the one that came with the Antec MX1 enclosure. I have not had a time to test it but with that much more "connector depth" I suspect it will work.


----------



## ckelly33

bkdtv said:


> If possible, before you install the drive, connect the Free Agent Pro 750 to a Windows PC via USB. The FAP750 includes a software diagnostic utility you can run to disable spin-down mode in the drive's firmware; you do not want the drive to spin-down while it is attached to the Series3. If you no longer have the original software and want to download the diagnostics utility separately, you can do so here..


What is spindown? I didn't perform this on my drive. What happens if I leave it as is?

Thanks.


----------



## richsadams

bkdtv said:


> I amended FAQ item #32 on the Seagate FAP750. Do you guys feel that is sufficient?


 Excellent work. Thanks! :up:


----------



## richsadams

ckelly33 said:


> What is spindown? I didn't perform this on my drive. What happens if I leave it as is?
> 
> Thanks.


 Some HDD's are programmed to stop spinning/idle after a period of non-activity, sometimes in as little as fifteen minutes, to save energy, wear and tear. TiVo requires/expects the HDD's to spin 24/7.

I'm not clear if all Freeagent Pro's spin down or not. (We have a Seagate DB35 drive which is designed for DVR use and never spins down.) Judging by various posts I'd say there are a number of people using FAP's successfully that simply plugged them in and never made any modifications. True?


----------



## gteague

richsadams said:


> Some HDD's are programmed to stop spinning/idle after a period of non-activity, sometimes in as little as fifteen minutes, to save energy, wear and tear. TiVo requires/expects the HDD's to spin 24/7.
> 
> I'm not clear if all Freeagent Pro's spin down or not. (We have a Seagate DB35 drive which is designed for DVR use and never spins down.) Judging by various posts I'd say there are a number of people using FAP's successfully that simply plugged them in and never made any modifications. True?


true here. i just plugged it in. i did plug it in to a pc via usb to make sure it worked and to copy off the supplied software. then i used the soft switch to turn it off before unplugging it from the pc.

my uninformed guess is that since the drive powered up automatically (the last power state was off) when connected to the tivo, there is enough communications there that the drive will keep spinning.

i read that you can suppress the live tv buffering/streaming by putting the tivo on an unreceived channel. perhaps a test could be run that way.

/guy


----------



## ajlee7

bkdtv said:


> Did you read the first post? That includes the link to instructions and summarizes the last 28 pages of information.


I was able to marry my FAP 750 using this ESTAT cable. Let's see how long this will last.

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.j...7f70110VgnVCM100000f5ee0a0aRCRD&reqPage=Model
http://www.provantage.com/tripp-lite-p950-36i~7TRPA1HW.htm


----------



## ajlee7

ajlee7 said:


> I was able to marry my FAP 750 using this ESTAT cable. Let's see how long this will last.
> 
> http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.j...7f70110VgnVCM100000f5ee0a0aRCRD&reqPage=Model
> http://www.provantage.com/tripp-lite-p950-36i~7TRPA1HW.htm


 

Again it was easy to have my TiVo recognize my FAP750 on the first try but however, there is an extremely loud clicking noise that is unbearable. It happens when you access the screen and actually slows down my TiVo. I'm not sure if it's the FAP750 but I'm going to have to disconnect it. I'll try another FAP750 but by reading this thread, people have complained about clicking in other HDs. Not sure if an enclosure is whisper quiet but may have to go that route.


----------



## oldnacl

oldnacl said:


> I tried the same cables (I have two, one from monoprice and another that came with an enclosure) that I used successfuly with a couple other, smaller, external SATA drives connected to the TiVo. In both cases, I was able to marry the drive to the Tivo without problems.
> The external drive is on a shelf, wide open to sides, back and top and doesn't feel more than warm to the touch.
> Ambient temperature is prolly around 80+ degrees (given heat from the TV, etc in the immediate area.
> After divorcing, I used the TiVo last night in the same general way I've been using it with the external drives and had no problem - note that I haven't had problems with the smaller dives in a Rosewill case either.
> I ordered a couple of the Trip-Lite SATA cables mentioned earlier in the thread from Amazon (lower shipping costs) and I'll try again with that cable when it arrives and post my results.


It's a couple days into my test and so far, doing things similar to what I was doing with the FAP750 connected I haven't seen any hangs or green screens or reboots. I'm still waiting for the new SATA cable to arrive. Meanwhile, I'll hook up my 320GB drive in the Rosewill case again and run with that over the weekend, exercising the TiVo as I did when I was seeing the reboots, etc. Then, if it still works OK, I'll connect the FAP750 with the new cable (hoping it will arrive on Monday - states it's been shipped) and do the drill again and report for anyone who's interested.
A side note - kudos to TiVo support! When these problems first occured, it was a couple days into using the FAP750 and I didn't immediately connect the issues with the external drive as it had been working flawlessly. So I called TiVo support and while the tech was searching his database, I went over what I'd done and decided I'd remove the FAP750 to see if that was causing the problem. The tech gave me a case number and I said I'd try to get more information on the failures before pursuing the matter further. Two days ago I had a message on my answering machine from TiVo asking whether the problem was still occuring. Thanks for the concern, TiVo! (Once this is resolved, I will let them know)


----------



## The_Bear

Ok, any thoughts on how this might be used? I know that Tivo only has the internal SATA and the single eSATA, but since the spec allows chaining does anyone know if this would work and if so are we still limited to 2gb? If it works then an internal may not be needed.

www.tomshardware.com/2007/05/29/silicon_image_brings_virtualization_to_esata/

(BTW sorry for the 2 above, but I couldn't include the link for my question until I hit 5 post... frustrating rule.)

Bear


----------



## moxie1617

The_Bear said:


> ........if so are we still limited to 2gb? If it works then an internal may not be needed.
> .Bear


Assuming you meant 2 TB, the limit is 1TB per drive. Internal plus e-sata= 2TB max storage.


----------



## Jerry_K

I am using this drive bay with success.

http://www.granitedigital.com/catalog/pg58_alumhotswap1drive.htm

DO NOT USE THE ADAPTER CABLE available from this source. It will not work. You will need to find another solution to the SATA to eSATA adaptation. I found an adapter on eBay which works.


----------



## The_Bear

Well, I guess the question is are we limited to 2 physical drives to reach the Tivo limit of 2TB? With the chaining option as outlined in the eSATA specification would Tivo support 3 devices with 2 externally chained using one of the above drives.

Bear


----------



## moxie1617

If the chained drives appear as one, 1TB drive I don't believe Tivo will have a problem. It would allow you to use less expensive drives to get to the 1TB lmit using Raid 0 or JBOD


----------



## jlib

The_Bear said:


> Ok, any thoughts on how this might be used? I know that Tivo only has the internal SATA and the single eSATA, but since the spec allows chaining does anyone know if this would work and if so are we still limited to 2gb? If it works then an internal may not be needed.
> 
> www.tomshardware.com/2007/05/29/silicon_image_brings_virtualization_to_esata/


Yes, it would work but only within the current limitations of the S3, as moxie1617 pointed out. This would have been nice a year ago when there were limited ways to upgrade the internal drive and there were no quiet 750GB and 1TB drives. There are now already similar devices on the market (allowing multiple drives to appear as one to a non-multiport aware SATA controller like the S3). So, since it won't allow you any increase in the current size limitations the whole idea is of limited utility, of interest only to someone who might already have two 500GB drives lying around or perhaps someone with a retentive streak that might want to mirror two 1TB drives for redundancy.


----------



## eDbolson

Actually, warm may be too mild a word, it is quite hot to the touch. It is in a cabinet with speaker cloth covering it in front and little or no air flow anywhere else. On the same shelf is the HDTiVo and a digital cable box (for On-demand - hardly ever use it, and shouldnt be paying extra for the paltry HD on-demand stuff). All of these are also warm, but the TiVo had been working fine since November. I guess the drive case is not warmer than the other cabinets, but I'm wondering if I should figure out a ventilation technique. It is not feasible to put the drive on a different shelf, and I doubt if that would make much difference.

All that said, it has been running continuously, recording suggestions, with no obvious problems (except the occasional static screen and sound dropouts that others have reported - I don't think the frequency has increased) for about 5 days now. 

Should I be worried about this? The thing has a 5 year warranty, which I love, but I don't want it to fail prematurely.


----------



## MJedi

My FAP750 is out in the open, away from other components that generate heat, and it is still hot. No problems though. I actually think that it's a good thing that the case is hot. The case is metallic (aluminum?), so it conducts heat out of the drive to the environment. My only gripe is that the orange light is too bright!


----------



## gwsat

richsadams said:


> Excellent work [on the FAQ]. Thanks! :up:


Indeed! In recent days, several of us have posted links to the FAQ and this thread in discussions over the S3s compatibility with eSATA going on at AVS Forum.


----------



## V7Goose

Man, this thread is LONG, and I'm only up to page 20 so far!

Anyway, I wanted to share some thoughts and information with my eSATA drive addition that might help others. If it has already been covered, my apologies.

I added a Seagate Free Agent Pro 750 with some trouble, but it has been working fine for a couple of days now. I think I have figured out the problem I had and what may be causing others some problem getting the marriage to work or stay working.

Since the Seagate drive did not come with an eSATA cable, I had to go back to Fry's and pick one up. The only one they had was round and quite stiff (yes, I got one with two "I" connectors, not the "L"). When I positioned the drive on the shelf above my S3, I suspect the cable connector in either device twisted some and slightly came loose - they do NOT lock in place or fit with a real tight friction fit.

After trying the kickstart 4 or 5 times without success, I rerouted the cable and made sure it was seated well (and straight). Worked perfectly on the next try.

So if you are having any problems getting a drive to work (or stay working), I'd suggest one of the first things you do is make sure the cable is seated well on both ends. Good luck.


----------



## slrdc

LHMPDX said:


> Count me as another very satisfied Antec MX-1 + Seagate DB35 customer. This combo is quiet and cool, and seemingly very well made. Kickstart 62 worked the first time.


Same here! This feature is great.


----------



## Dajad

gwsat said:


> Indeed! In recent days, several of us have posted links to the FAQ and this thread in discussions over the S3s compatibility with eSATA going on at AVS Forum.


Care to link back from here? The AVSForum is a maze to find your way through (or at least it is for me much of the time). Links to related topics over there would be helpful.

And despite Agile Computer's assurance on a 4 business day delivery time for my MX-1, I'm now on business day 4 without a case for my lonely DB35. Argh ... another weekend of tennis I'll have to babysit.

Thanks.

...Dale


----------



## keenanSR

Dajad said:


> Care to link back from here? The AVSForum is a maze to find your way through (or at least it is for me much of the time). Links to related topics over there would be helpful.
> 
> And despite Agile Computer's assurance on a 4 business day delivery time for my MX-1, I'm now on business day 4 without a case for my lonely DB35. Argh ... another weekend of tennis I'll have to babysit.
> 
> Thanks.
> 
> ...Dale


The below is the only real thread about the S3 at AVS, TiVo Community is far more informational.

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=722696
TiVo Series 3 - "Official" Thread - AVS Forum


----------



## Dssturbo1

ckelly33 said:


> What is spindown? I didn't perform this on my drive. What happens if I leave it as is? Thanks.


 in the FAP utilities it is refferred to as "Sleep Mode", by default it comes set at 15 minutes. with the utility you can change it to different timed intervals or set it to Always On/Never Off.


----------



## bonnie_raitt

Been using a Seagate 750 GB drive and Icy Dock enclosure for the past 3 weeks. Today I got the "divorce drive screen". I unplugged the S3 and waited an excrutiating 10 minutes to see if it would boot up. After a scary "serious error" message and being told could take 3 hours to recover, it came back to life after 5 or 10 minutes. All my recording appear to be there though I haven't tried to watch any of them yet

Guess my karma must be right


----------



## moxie1617

V7Goose said:


> Man, this thread is LONG, and I'm only up to page 20 so far!


FYI......... bkdtv has been updating the 1st post of this thread daily as new info comes in. 
Read the 1st post thoroughly and at most you should only have to go back one day from the end of this thread to get caught up.


----------



## jschmidt

bonnie_raitt said:


> Been using a Seagate 750 GB drive and Icy Dock enclosure for the past 3 weeks. Today I got the "divorce drive screen". I unplugged the S3 and waited an excrutiating 10 minutes to see if it would boot up. After a scary "serious error" message and being told could take 3 hours to recover, it came back to life after 5 or 10 minutes. All my recording appear to be there though I haven't tried to watch any of them yet
> 
> Guess my karma must be right


Just curious, which model Seagate do you have?


----------



## ajlee7

ajlee7 said:


> Again it was easy to have my TiVo recognize my FAP750 on the first try but however, there is an extremely loud clicking noise that is unbearable. It happens when you access the screen and actually slows down my TiVo. I'm not sure if it's the FAP750 but I'm going to have to disconnect it. I'll try another FAP750 but by reading this thread, people have complained about clicking in other HDs. Not sure if an enclosure is whisper quiet but may have to go that route.


I want a divorce. I mean I want to remove my FAP 750 from my setup. How do I get it back to the original settings? If I pull the ESAT cable, and reboot my TiVo does not boot up. The clicking (chirping) is driving me nuts. Do you guys think it's a defective unit?


----------



## richsadams

ajlee7 said:


> I want a divorce. I mean I want to remove my FAP 750 from my setup. How do I get it back to the original settings? If I pull the ESAT cable, and reboot my TiVo does not boot up. The clicking (chirping) is driving me nuts. Do you guys think it's a defective unit?


 When you said you pulled your "eSAT cable", did you remove it from your drive or from TiVo? It will need to be removed from TiVo.

If you power TiVo down (unplug it), remove the eSATA cable from TiVo and then plug TiVo back in it should display a screen saying it cannot read your external drive and do you want to remove it (all shows may be lost, yadda, yadda). If you give it three thumbs down it will reboot once again and everything should be back to normal. That should work and hopefully you won't have to hire an attorney.  If that's not the case, try to be more specific about what's happening.

I've experimented with it a couple of times and went through the same process each time. Also, in our case a number of the SD programs that had been recorded since adding the eSATA drive were still available, but no HD programs (except for those recorded prior to adding the eSATA drive).

If you're looking for peace and quiet, the Antec MX-1 enclosure and a Seagate DB35 SATA drive combo is your best bet.


----------



## gteague

ajlee7 said:


> I want a divorce. I mean I want to remove my FAP 750 from my setup. How do I get it back to the original settings? If I pull the ESAT cable, and reboot my TiVo does not boot up. The clicking (chirping) is driving me nuts. Do you guys think it's a defective unit?


my fap750 is absolutely silent. i wasn't exaggerating when i said i had to have my ear 2" from the drive to hear any noise whatsoever. that's one reason i was so pleased to have it to replace a maxtor diamondmax in a nexstar enclosure--that one was loud enough to keep me awake in the next room.

/guy


----------



## alyssa

bonnie_raitt said:


> Been using a Seagate 750 GB drive and Icy Dock enclosure for the past 3 weeks. Today I got the "divorce drive screen". I unplugged the S3 and waited an excrutiating 10 minutes to see if it would boot up. After a scary "serious error" message and being told could take 3 hours to recover, it came back to life after 5 or 10 minutes. All my recording appear to be there though I haven't tried to watch any of them yet
> 
> Guess my karma must be right


A similar GSOD occurred to me. Did you lose power, get a service update or notice anything out of the ordinary the day prior to the divorce & GSOD? What type of 750gb Seagate drive do you have? a ST or DB?


----------



## jlib

> ...Try thenerds.net...


Anyone who decides to purchase any upgrade products from thenerds.net should use the gateway links at MFSlive.org. That assures the source is properly credited.


----------



## snathanb

MJedi said:


> My FAP750 is out in the open, away from other components that generate heat, and it is still hot. No problems though. I actually think that it's a good thing that the case is hot. The case is metallic (aluminum?), so it conducts heat out of the drive to the environment. My only gripe is that the orange light is too bright!


If you kept the utilities that were on the drive, you can plug the drive into your PC and disable the orange lights.


----------



## ajlee7

gteague said:


> my fap750 is absolutely silent. i wasn't exaggerating when i said i had to have my ear 2" from the drive to hear any noise whatsoever. that's one reason i was so pleased to have it to replace a maxtor diamondmax in a nexstar enclosure--that one was loud enough to keep me awake in the next room.
> 
> /guy


Thanks. That's encouraging. I got my FAP750 from BB via the $200 special. I think I'll return it and ask for a replacement. My eSTAT cable from PROVANTAGE works but I also hope that the eSTAT cable is not the cause of my clicking.


----------



## fred2

The FAP is OVERlit. I would not mind a simple led showing it was on or dim the main light. But I can live with it.


----------



## pghkirwan

This forum's been great - followed the directions and it took 10 minutes to hook up a Seagate FAP750 with the recommended Provantage Tripp-lite 36" cable. 

Seagate from BB on sale last weekend.
Provantage shipped the cable Tuesday - got it Wednesday.

Now, any idea when TTG will be enabled?

thanks again. 

Don


----------



## SMB-IL

Another FAP 750GB user here: I've had it attached to the TiVo for about a week and it runs absolutely silently. Due to heat concerns, I have it sitting on top of my subwoofer so it's out in the open and not near any heat generating units -- the subwoofer doesn't produce any heat on top.

I have a Mac, and as I wasn't able to run any of the tools on the drive, mine was hooked up right out of the box. As soon as I found the *correct* cable, marrying the two was a snap!

As far as the light, I've always been a proponent of black equipment and LEDs covered with electrical tape and I thought the FAP's light would make me crazy, but I'm getting used to it and actually am starting to find it kind of cool in a ubergeek sort of way....


----------



## bkdtv

snathanb said:


> If you kept the utilities that were on the [FAP750] drive, you can plug the drive into your PC and disable the orange lights.


If you don't have the original utilities, I believe you can download them here:

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.j...toid=bcd8d59424b8e010VgnVCM100000dd04090aRCRD


----------



## S3-2501

Another FAP750 experience:

I also purchased a FAP750 at Best Buy at the sale price and with a coupon. I purchased the SIIG cable that someone else here said worked well with their FAP. I got the 6ft version (model CB-SA0211-S1) from Amazon. As mentioned previously in this thread, this cable actually clicks into place on both the Tivo and the FAP. It definitely seems like a decent cable and so far I would also recommend it for users with an FAP.

Prior to connecting the drive to the s3, I connected it to my PC to turn off the light, copy the software and delete it from the drive. 

When I connected the drive to the s3 and plugged it in, the light turned back on anyway. The drive was recognized by the s3 on the first try. 

I tried to accept the light, but decided it was just a bit too much for the living room and ended up reconnecting the drive to my PC again to turn the light off. Strangely, the setting still didnt stick. In the end, I managed to get the light to stay off when I powered off the drive using the soft switch rather than unplugging it completely. I have a feeling it will come back on after a power failure though. (P.S. To add to the previous debate, the light on my drive was definitely pulsing along the side of the drive.)

Heat:
I have the drive placed in the open atop an equipment stand, along with my s3 and other equipment. After approximately 12 hours in use it is definitely putting out heat, but feels only slightly more intense that than the heat put off by my Nintendo Wii in standby. I felt underneath the top shelf and could not sense any heat from underneath the drive.

Noise: Initially I literally had to put my ear to the FAP to make sure it was on. After a few hours, there began intermittent periods of soft clicking that were definitely noticeable, but not too annoying. In between these periods the s3 actually seems to produces more ambient noise. If the noise becomes more frequent it may be a problem, but only time will tell...

Special note:
I use my s3 for OTA reception only, so no cable company issues are present to complicate things. 

Thank you so much to everyone who has participated in this thread! I hope this added data point is of use to someone and I will definitely post a follow-up if I experience any problems!


----------



## deeremj

For those who may have missed it, It Looks as though the esata feature for already expanded single drives has been officially released:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5208456#post5208456

I have tried it on 2 s3 units, one with dual 750gb and the other with dual 1tb.

So far so good!

-mj


----------



## inaka

Well, I got my cablecards installed at about 3pm and rounf 9pm after making sure things were running well, I attached a 500GB SATA drive using the Apricorn EZ BUS Desktop enclosure from newegg and it's working like a charm. This enclosure includes a eSATA cable, and so far so good. It's quiet and now I have nearly 100 hours of HD on this S3. Awesome!


----------



## jlib

Re: Bright LED problems. 

These new superbite LEDs belong in flashlights not electronic equipment. I don't have any of the enclosures mentioned so I don't know if this is applicable but what I did on my enclosure is slip several sheets of white paper (maybe a notecard would be similar) between the case and LEDs. It allows just a hint of the light but on my terms.


----------



## inaka

Cant you just use black electrical tape?


----------



## DCIFRTHS

SMB-IL said:


> Another FAP 750GB user here: I've had it attached to the TiVo for about a week and it runs absolutely silently. Due to heat concerns, I have it sitting on top of my subwoofer so it's out in the open and not near any heat generating units -- the subwoofer doesn't produce any heat on top. ...


My only concern with putting the FAP, or any HD, on top of a sub, would be the vibration that that will inevitably be transfered to the spinning HD


----------



## bonnie_raitt

jschmidt said:


> Just curious, which model Seagate do you have?


ST3750640AS

I'm not sure what happened. May have rebooted. It was first thing in the morning when I noticed the GSOD. No power problems.


----------



## V7Goose

Been thrilled with my FAP750 for about four days now. It is sitting on an open shelf behind my plasma TV, and there is absolutely no sound that I can detect from any place in front of or beside the TV.

I have been checking temperature with an infrared thermometer several times a day, and the the front side of the case stays at 110 degrees; the back side is about 4 degrees cooler. I wish my Sony plasma TV was that "cool"!!

I did not turn the lights off before I installed the drive. The edge light does slowly pulse (more like a very slow wave), but it is almost impossible to detect unless I get fairly close and look directly at it.


----------



## gear

Seagate drive doing something ocassionally???

I have a Seagate Barracuda 750GB drive (ST3750640ASRK) in an Icy Dock case. I pulled it from the shipping box and placed it in the case then turned it on and plugged it into the Tivo using the "kick 62" proceedure. It was flawless. Instantly have 131hours of HD space.

Now I have noticed that the drive seems to be doing somethig (writing or reading?) because from time to time it clicks with the LED blinking. This happens when the Tivo isn't recording or playing.

Does anyone have an idea what might be happening? I didn't do any disc utility setup and am wondering if that has anything to do with it. Otherwise all seems to be going fine, shows are recording and playing back (although I'm not sure on which drive).


----------



## uw69

I'm still confused on method #2 for those of us who had previously upgraded the internal HDD of our S3. I am not familiar with MFStools. Any step by step instrctions? (Or if I need detailed instruction I shouldn't be attempting?  )

Thanks


----------



## stevereis

uw69 said:


> I'm still confused on method #2 for those of us who had previously upgraded the internal HDD of our S3. I am not familiar with MFStools. Any step by step instrctions? (Or if I need detailed instruction I shouldn't be attempting?  )
> 
> Thanks


Go to MFSLive.org for option 2. Here is a direct link to the "Adding a Second Drive" portion of the guide: http://www.mfslive.org/softwareguidep5.htm 
You have to pull out the upgraded drive and attach it and the new external drive to a PC you boot into the MFS tool and bless the second drive using 'mfsadd' I am guessing this uses into on the first drive to bless the 2nd drive that will be mounted externally. Using this method means you do not have to use the Kickstart 62 procedure.


----------



## stevereis

If you have upgraded the internal drive yourself (vs. just installing a weaknees preformatted drive), you should be able to do this process. 
And, even if you've just gone the preformatted route, it's not too difficult.


----------



## V7Goose

gear said:


> Seagate drive doing something occasionally???
> 
> Now I have noticed that the drive seems to be doing somethig (writing or reading?) because from time to time it clicks with the LED blinking. This happens when the Tivo isn't recording or playing.


This is a common misconception. The TiVo is ALWAYS recording. Since each tuner keeps a 30 minute buffer, both channels will be recording 24x7 as long as the power is supplied.

Seems like you are just hearing normal head movement that is evident with most drives in a quiet environment. Good luck.


----------



## jboy

Did anyone else have this experience? The fan is really moving in this unit and creates quite a racket you can definitely hear it in a quite room from 5 feet away.


----------



## jboy

DCIFRTHS said:


> My only concern with putting the FAP, or any HD, on top of a sub, would be the vibration that that will inevitably be transfered to the spinning HD


I would also be concerned about the magnetic field generated by a sub. You are moving a pretty good mass and need some current.


----------



## uw69

stevereis said:


> If you have upgraded the internal drive yourself (vs. just installing a weaknees preformatted drive), you should be able to do this process.
> And, even if you've just gone the preformatted route, it's not too difficult.


Thanks for the info, I will give it a try!


----------



## hdhdliving

gear said:


> Seagate drive doing something ocassionally???
> 
> I have a Seagate Barracuda 750GB drive (ST3750640ASRK) in an Icy Dock case. I pulled it from the shipping box and placed it in the case then turned it on and plugged it into the Tivo using the "kick 62" proceedure. It was flawless. Instantly have 131hours of HD space.
> 
> Now I have noticed that the drive seems to be doing somethig (writing or reading?) because from time to time it clicks with the LED blinking. This happens when the Tivo isn't recording or playing.
> 
> Does anyone have an idea what might be happening? I didn't do any disc utility setup and am wondering if that has anything to do with it. Otherwise all seems to be going fine, shows are recording and playing back (although I'm not sure on which drive).


I have a 500 gb Seagate drive and it makes clicking noises from time to time. Upon reading Seagate's website this is normal. However in my case I was worried because it seemed to be making noise frequently and stopping only intermediately.

Then last week the clicking stoped. Completely. Days went by and I didn't hear a thing. I began to worry because it *wasn't* clicking.

On June 1 however I noticed the clicking again as Star Wars was recording. It's still intermediately and sometimes it can go on for a while but it always stops even if just for a bit.

Oh and something else I've noticed. The enclosure doesn't have a fan but when these clicking noises occurre the temperature of the drive drops dramatically. When it's just sitting there seems to be when it warms up a bit. But it never gets too warm so I have no worries. Plus it does have a 5 year warranty.


----------



## richsadams

jboy said:


> Did anyone else have this experience? The fan is really moving in this unit and creates quite a racket you can definitely hear it in a quite room from 5 feet away.


 I've used several Apricorn drive enclosures and they are generally very quiet. Are you sure it's the fan? As noted elsewhere some drives can be noisy. If you're sure it's the fan it sounds like it's going bad. If it's under warranty you may want to get an RMA # from Apricorn and return it for a replacement.


----------



## dtphonehome

Here's another FAP750 success story:
Got it at BestBuy for $176, and this Tripp Lite cable from Amazon. Married perfectly to the S3 on the first try, and 4 days later I've had no problems at all.

The FAP is on the shelf above the S3 in a media cabinet with cutouts in the back panel for ventilation/cable pass-through, and a speaker in front (which blocks about 75% of the front opening, leaving some room for airflow around it). I estimate there's about 2 cubic feet of empty space surrounding the drive. Since I had an Airport Express on that shelf as well (that's the S3's internet connection), I used the USB port to plug in a USB fan (similar to this one) that I had lying around and directed it onto the FAP's case. It doesn't move much air, but I guess it's better than nothing. The drive is definitely warm, but not excessively so. Oh, and I did turn off spin down with the included utility.

I'll report back if anything changes. Just wanted to add to the body of evidence in favor of the FAP750.


----------



## pseamans

As others have noted finding an Antec MX-1 that is in stock is proving difficult. After several orders from sites showing "In Stock" they all contacted me to indicate back-ordered status on the enclosure. I however have found that TheNerds.net appear to have quite a few in stock (100 as of this posting) and I have included the link below in case you are interested.

http://www.thenerds.net/ANTEC_HARD_DRIVE_COOLING_ENCLOSURE_USB_20_SATA_QUIET_FAN.MX1.html


----------



## richsadams

pseamans said:


> As others have noted finding an Antec MX-1 that is in stock is proving difficult. After several orders from sites showing "In Stock" they all contacted me to indicate back-ordered status on the enclosure. I however have found that TheNerds.net appear to have quite a few in stock (100 as of this posting) and I have included the link below in case you are interested.
> 
> http://www.thenerds.net/ANTEC_HARD_DRIVE_COOLING_ENCLOSURE_USB_20_SATA_QUIET_FAN.MX1.html


 Thanks for the "heads up".

Excaliberpc.com also shows the MX-1 and the 500GB Seagate DB35 and 750GB Seagate DB35 drive in stock (although thenerds.net have better pricing ion the MX-1 right now). We received both products within 48 hours of ordering from Excaliberpc.com. :up:


----------



## Hystyk28

dtphonehome said:


> Here's another FAP750 success story:
> Got it at BestBuy for $176, and [


How did you get it for $176? The best I got was $199.($213 with tax) Please tell.


----------



## gteague

Hystyk28 said:


> How did you get it for $176? The best I got was $199.($213 with tax) Please tell.


can't speak for the op, but bestbuy distributed coupons through their rewards program good for 3 days. one coupon was for 12% and my total came to 175.96 before tax--around $190 after tax.

since i had a 500gb already hooked up, i had been planning to wait as long as necessary for a good deal on a 750gb drive and that price was just too low to ignore.

/guy


----------



## URPREY

gteague said:


> can't speak for the op, but bestbuy distributed coupons through their rewards program good for 3 days. one coupon was for 12% and my total came to 175.96 beefore tax--around $190 after tax.
> 
> since i had a 500gb already hooked up, i had been planning to wait as long as necessary for a good deal on a 750gb drive and that price was just too low to ignore.
> 
> /guy


That's exactly what I did also. Worked out great!


----------



## patroldawg

had a FAP 750gb going well since 21 May. All of sudden yesterday in the middle of watching a recording I got the divorce screen. Turned off the tv and went out for a few hours, came back still the same divorce screen (drive was cool to the touch, which was a first). divorced the drive, hooked up the FAP to my computer and the drive was dead. Put my ear up to it and it sounded like it was spinning, but faintly, but the drive was not responding when hooked up to my computer via mini usb-usb. long story short, i returned the damn thing for a refund, and I have a antec mx-1 on order along with a 500gb samsung hoping for better luck with stability/reliability. Just sucks because I was happy i finally got to hook up an external drive to my S3.

on another note I tried to hook up my Maxtor 300gb quickview (used w/ my old cox cable SA3800 POS) which i've had laying around, and after 2 million attempts to code 62 the thing it won't connect... back in the closet it goes


----------



## ckelly33

patroldawg said:


> had a FAP 750gb going well since 21 May. All of sudden yesterday in the middle of watching a recording I got the divorce screen. Turned off the tv and went out for a few hours, came back still the same divorce screen (drive was cool to the touch, which was a first). divorced the drive, hooked up the FAP to my computer and the drive was dead. Put my ear up to it and it sounded like it was spinning, but faintly, but the drive was not responding when hooked up to my computer via mini usb-usb. long story short, i returned the damn thing for a refund, and I have a antec mx-1 on order along with a 500gb samsung hoping for better luck with stability/reliability. Just sucks because I was happy i finally got to hook up an external drive to my S3.
> 
> on another note I tried to hook up my Maxtor 300gb quickview (used w/ my old cox cable SA3800 POS) which i've had laying around, and after 2 million attempts to code 62 the thing it won't connect... back in the closet it goes


Just curious, what changes did you make to the FAP prior to hooking it up? Also, how much programming did you lose?


----------



## ckelly33

I didn't see this in the FAQ's: I have three S3's, can I move the drive to another S3 and retain programming?


----------



## TexasAg

ckelly33 said:


> I didn't see this in the FAQ's: I have three S3's, can I move the drive to another S3 and retain programming?


No.


----------



## dtphonehome

Hystyk28 said:


> How did you get it for $176? The best I got was $199.($213 with tax) Please tell.


What gteague said...I used the coupon for 12% off. FYI, the coupon was widely available on the internet, not just to Rewards members (but you only got 10% off if not a member).


----------



## sfhub

ckelly33 said:


> I didn't see this in the FAQ's: I have three S3's, can I move the drive to another S3 and retain programming?


No, the programming will not be accessible if you switch drives and the unit will force you to do clear & delete everything to resume normal operations.

There are some marketing options on your account that retain your season passes and if those are enabled, your S3 will repopulate your season pass information, but the recorded shows are gone either way.


----------



## T-Shee

patroldawg said:


> I have a antec mx-1 on order along with a 500gb samsung hoping for better luck with stability/reliability


I'm not sure why the FAP drives are so popular around here. My guess is because it's plug-n-play, also record. No screwdriver needed. And price.

Before spending "dime one" on my ESATA setup, I spent about a week researching all currently available ESATA enclosures. I kept returning to the MX-1 due to it's fan design, chipset and cable compatibility.

If anyone is looking for an OEM alternative to the Seagates, Samsung makes quiet, cool running drives that are highly reliable. I've been running a Samsung drive in my Series 1 Tivo for about 4 years. I can't hear it and the S1 runs cooler.

I've also upgraded my Mac computers with Samsung drives. They're great.

The Antec MX-1 with the Samsung HD-501LJ 500gig has been running without problems here for close to three weeks. I can't hear it and it's barely above room temperature, not warm at all. By the way, no accoustic management needed inside the MX-1, in my opinion.

When Samsung makes a 1TB drive, I'll upgrade. 'Till then, I'll have to get by with only 98 hours of HD.


----------



## 1283

Before you buy Samsung drives, make sure you understand this:


> 1. Please contact and request the RMA(Return Material Authorization) service to your dealer(supplier). Your dealer(supplier) has the RMA responsibility.


----------



## patroldawg

ckelly33 said:


> Just curious, what changes did you make to the FAP prior to hooking it up? Also, how much programming did you lose?


no changes at all. Just plug and play and it hooked up first time through 62. I lost a ton of programming, but still a decent amount on the tivo drive was left. I was thrilled with the FAP 750 price. Luckily, I was able to get a refund and avoid warranty claim.


----------



## Tuckrat

SMB-IL said:


> Another FAP 750GB user here: I've had it attached to the TiVo for about a week and it runs absolutely silently. Due to heat concerns, I have it sitting on top of my subwoofer so it's out in the open and not near any heat generating units -- the subwoofer doesn't produce any heat on top.


Hmm, subwoofers tend to have very large magnets in them (not sure how large of a sub you are talking about.) I also don't know if they are actually magnetically shielded. What I'm suggesting is that placing a hard drive on a sub with a very large magnet may not be a good idea.

FWIW, I'm looking at the sub next to my entertainment center, where about 1 inch of wood separates it from my S3, and am now wondering if it might be the cause of the hiccups i get on various shows! Time to move it away and find out!


----------



## T-Shee

c3 said:


> Before you buy Samsung drives, make sure you understand this:
> Quote:
> 1. Please contact and request the RMA(Return Material Authorization) service to your dealer(supplier). Your dealer(supplier) has the RMA responsibility.


1) Who, or what, are you quoting?
2) This is relevant to the discussion... how, exactly? We need to understand this because...?

A previous poster's Seagate FAP died after a two weeks. It has a five year warranty. The relevance of who handles warranty coverage doesn't affect the drives reliability one iota.
Personally, I'd rather deal with the vendor than the manufacturer any day.


----------



## jlib

c3 said:


> Before you buy Samsung drives, make sure you understand this: 1. Please contact and request the RMA(Return Material Authorization) service to your dealer(supplier). Your dealer(supplier) has the RMA responsibility.


Does that mean other manufacturers _will_ honor the warranty of their OEM drives directly, just not Samsung?


----------



## 1283

T-Shee said:


> 1) Who, or what, are you quoting?
> 2) This is relevant to the discussion... how, exactly? We need to understand this because...?
> 
> A previous poster's Seagate FAP died after a two weeks. It has a five year warranty. The relevance of who handles warranty coverage doesn't affect the drives reliability one iota.
> Personally, I'd rather deal with the vendor than the manufacturer any day.


1. Samsung's hard drive RMA policy.
2. You were recommending Samsung drives.

This has nothing to do with reliability. Does your vendor actually take care of warranty service for Samsung?

http://www.samsung.com/Products/HardDiskDrive/warranty/index.htm


----------



## 1283

jlib said:


> Does that mean other manufacturers _will_ honor the warranty of their OEM drives directly, just not Samsung?


I was referring to drives purchased from retailers. Other manufacturers such as Seagate, WD, and Hitachi handle warranty services directly.


----------



## rickeame

Argh, I feel like I'm the only idiot that can't get this to work. I have tried three times tonight. WD book drive 500GB), cable is fine, it works with my computer just fine, but when I do the whole pause button restart 62 business, I never get the "added your drive" screen. 

I envy you people who got it to work.


----------



## jboy

richsadams said:


> I've used several Apricorn drive enclosures and they are generally very quiet. Are you sure it's the fan? As noted elsewhere some drives can be noisy. If you're sure it's the fan it sounds like it's going bad. If it's under warranty you may want to get an RMA # from Apricorn and return it for a replacement.


It is the fan. I tested the unit even before I installed the drive. It does not sound like a bad fan. I just think it is spinning too fast.


----------



## SCSIRAID

Tuckrat said:


> Hmm, subwoofers tend to have very large magnets in them (not sure how large of a sub you are talking about.) I also don't know if they are actually magnetically shielded. What I'm suggesting is that placing a hard drive on a sub with a very large magnet may not be a good idea.
> 
> FWIW, I'm looking at the sub next to my entertainment center, where about 1 inch of wood separates it from my S3, and am now wondering if it might be the cause of the hiccups i get on various shows! Time to move it away and find out!


I would be concerned about vibration more than magnetic fields. Disk drives dont like vibration which causes error rates to increase and performance to decrease.... soft read errors and write inhibits lead to retries which could lead to negative joy.


----------



## DCIFRTHS

SCSIRAID said:


> I would be concerned about vibration more than magnetic fields. Disk drives dont like vibration which causes error rates to increase and performance to decrease.... soft read errors and write inhibits lead to retries which could lead to negative joy.


My thoughts too.


----------



## richsadams

jboy said:


> It is the fan. I tested the unit even before I installed the drive. It does not sound like a bad fan. I just think it is spinning too fast.


 Fan speed shouldn't be of concern...only if it's noisy. You should hardly be able to hear it when the case is closed...no more than a constant low hum at most. If it's loud I'd contact Apricorn and get a replacement because it will be annoying in the long run.


----------



## richsadams

rickeame said:


> Argh, I feel like I'm the only idiot that can't get this to work. I have tried three times tonight. WD book drive 500GB), cable is fine, it works with my computer just fine, but when I do the whole pause button restart 62 business, I never get the "added your drive" screen.
> 
> I envy you people who got it to work.


 Sorry you're having trouble with this. You shouldn't if you're following these instructions exactly and all of your connections are good.

Connections have been the root problem in a majority of cases. Even though you can connect your drive to your computer it doesn't mean your eSATA cable is working with TiVo. Double check everythingthe cable should fit snugly in both your drive and TiVo. If it feels at all loose that may be the problem.

If the cable appears to be okay and your drive is securely connected in its enclosure and you're following all of the steps I'd try another eSATA cable. Make sure it is an eSATA II. Check out FAQ #27 & #28 in the sticky eSATA thread for more info and several choices of eSATA to eSATA cables that work..

Otherwise post some more details and we'll try to help.


----------



## oldnacl

richsadams said:


> Connections have been the root problem in a majority of cases. Even though you can connect your drive to your computer it doesn't mean your eSATA cable is working with TiVo. Double check everythingthe cable should fit snugly in both your drive and TiVo. If it feels at all loose that may be the problem.QUOTE]
> 
> Update on my experience with the FAP750. After using it a couple days without problem, the Tivo began rebooting and I saw 2 GSODs. I disconnected and divorced the external drive. No problems after nearly a week of use. I received my Tripp-Lite P950 eSATA cable from Amazon on Monday and reconnected the FAP750. So far no problems. I compared the cables with others I have and found, as reported, the depth of the metal end is greater than found on a cable purchased from Monoprice and the same as one of the other cables I had. The Tripp-Lite cable does not give a secure feeling when plugged in and I suspect that's due to the case thickness, however (knock on wood) it does appear to be functioning well now. I do notice significent video tearing when I go to the now playing screen, not previously observed without an external drive, but it appears to be cosmetic.


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> Update on my experience with the FAP750. <snip> The Tripp-Lite cable does not give a secure feeling when plugged in and I suspect that's due to the case thickness, however (knock on wood) it does appear to be functioning well now. I do notice significent video tearing when I go to the now playing screen, not previously observed without an external drive, but it appears to be cosmetic.


 Which connection doesn't feel secure...the FAP750 or TiVo...or both? A number of people have mentioned that they are concerned about the connection to the FAP750 even with the correct cables.

No idea what the cause of the "video tearing" might be. No one else has reported that. Is it possible to divorce the drive, reboot TiVo and see if it still happens w/o the eSATA drive connected? (Or do you already have dozens of shows recorded that you can't live without?  )


----------



## jshabel

The Western Digital 500 GB My Book Premium ES (WDG1SU5000N) worked for me with one of the 6' SIIG cables (CB-SA0211-S1) right out of the box. I followed the setup instructions from this thread and it worked perfectly. No problems at all that I can see. Tivo confirmed the drive was set up correctly and I now have something like 96 HD hours accorind to my S3. Perfect! Although the drive gets quite warm so you need to ventilate it well (like I have to do with a mini USB fan) if it's in a confined space. The specs say that the temp shouldn't go > 95 degrees.


----------



## oldnacl

richsadams said:


> Which connection doesn't feel secure...the FAP750 or TiVo...or both? A number of people have mentioned that they are concerned about the connection to the FAP750 even with the correct cables.
> 
> No idea what the cause of the "video tearing" might be. No one else has reported that. Is it possible to divorce the drive, reboot TiVo and see if it still happens w/o the eSATA drive connected? (Or do you already have dozens of shows recorded that you can't live without?  )


The FAP connection doesn't feel particularily secure, but in reality, neither does the connection at the TiVo end. Still, it's clear that the Tripp-Lite cable fits better into the FAP than the ones I tried earlier (I have several external SATA drives in various housings and experimented with the several cables I had for comparison). Since I'm into this, I'll order a SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 eSATA cable from Amazon and try that - and perhaps go back to just the internal drive temporarily to confirm whether the tearing has always been there or is related to the external drive, and especially if it's related to the FAP external drive (I have used other drive/housing combinations without problem, but they were smaller - 320 GB)


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> The FAP connection doesn't feel particularily secure, but in reality, neither does the connection at the TiVo end. Still, it's clear that the Tripp-Lite cable fits better into the FAP than the ones I tried earlier (I have several external SATA drives in various housings and experimented with the several cables I had for comparison). Since I'm into this, I'll order a SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 eSATA cable from Amazon and try that - and perhaps go back to just the internal drive temporarily to confirm whether the tearing has always been there or is related to the external drive, and especially if it's related to the FAP external drive (I have used other drive/housing combinations without problem, but they were smaller - 320 GB)


 Good work...and ordering a new cable is probably a wise decision. Keep us posted! :up:


----------



## bkdtv

oldnacl said:


> The FAP connection doesn't feel particularily secure, but in reality, neither does the connection at the TiVo end. Still, it's clear that the Tripp-Lite cable fits better into the FAP than the ones I tried earlier (I have several external SATA drives in various housings and experimented with the several cables I had for comparison). Since I'm into this, I'll order a SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 eSATA cable from Amazon and try that - and perhaps go back to just the internal drive temporarily to confirm whether the tearing has always been there or is related to the external drive, and especially if it's related to the FAP external drive (I have used other drive/housing combinations without problem, but they were smaller - 320 GB)


If you or anyone else can report back on how the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 and Tripp-Lite P950 eSATA cables compare, I would appreciate it. Both are listed in the FAQ, but the Tripp-Lite is listed first, since it is cheaper. However, if the SIIG provides for a better (i.e. more "snug") connection, then I will be sure to note that in the FAQ.


----------



## oldnacl

bkdtv said:


> If you or anyone else can report back on how the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 and Tripp-Lite P950 eSATA cables compare, I would appreciate it. Both are listed in the FAQ, but the Tripp-Lite is listed first, since it is cheaper. However, if the SIIG provides for a better (i.e. more "snug") connection, then I will be sure to note that in the FAQ.


I'll be glad to do that - I placed the order for the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 cable today.


----------



## dtphonehome

jshabel said:


> Although the drive gets quite warm so you need to ventilate it well (like I have to do with a mini USB fan) if it's in a confined space.


Glad to hear I'm not the only one who thought of that ridiculous idea! Although to tell you the truth, that tiny fan is getting awfully loud...guess it's not meant for 24/7 operation. Still, I only hear it when the TV and A/C is off and I'm in the same room (which is rare). I'd probably just change the case before I get a dedicated fan, though.


----------



## hizhonor

richsadams said:


> Thanks for the "heads up".
> 
> Excaliberpc.com also shows the MX-1 and the 500GB Seagate DB35 and 750GB Seagate DB35 drive in stock (although thenerds.net have better pricing ion the MX-1 right now). We received both products within 48 hours of ordering from Excaliberpc.com. :up:


Relying heavily on the information in this thread, I ordered an Antec MX1 and Seagate DB35.3 SATA drive (ST3500830SCE) from Excaliberpc.com Sunday evening. Order was confirmed Monday morning (6/4) and showed shipped later that same day with an anticipated arrival on Wednesday 6/6.

Drive and case arrived this afternoon, right on schedule. It took less than 15 minutes to install and I now have 98 hour of HD recording space. Very smooth!

Not quite plug-n-play as I did have to install the drive into the case, but having everything I needed arrive together sure made it as close as you can get.

Steve


----------



## jboy

richsadams said:


> Fan speed shouldn't be of concern...only if it's noisy. You should hardly be able to hear it when the case is closed...no more than a constant low hum at most. If it's loud I'd contact Apricorn and get a replacement because it will be annoying in the long run.


I guess this is normal then. I was really hoping I would not hear it all. When I walk in the room I cannot hear my Series 3. But I can hear the fan in this drive. I still may stick a Fanmate in it to slow down the fan.

Like children, computer and electronic equipment should be seen and not heard.


----------



## FrogGremlin

Adding my thanks (and my wife's) to Spike2k5, TiVo, and the rest of the community. My MX-1 and 750GB Seagate SCE married one of our TiVos without a hitch, and all is cool and silent. (The other Series 3 on the same TV awaits cheaper 1TB drives. 160+ hours of HD is fine for now.)

Now, what's the kickstart-62 equivalent for TTGB?


----------



## DN325Ci

I'll pile on with my similar report: I added the MX-1/DB35 combination to my new Series3 last night. One minor install glitch occurred. The first attempt at the kickstart 62 procedure did not succeed in recognizing the drive. So I shut it down again, reached behind the S3 to make sure I had pushed the eSATA connector in all the way, and rebooted. Voila! 98 Hours of HD storage.

This combination is has been widely reported as quiet, and in my application it is simply silent. I cannot hear it whatsoever. Air is moving though, so I assume the fan is running.

Don


----------



## moxie1617

unFortunately, I smoke but the only advantage recently is to verify that there is airflow thru the MX-1 case. Combined with the 500GB DB35 it is quiet and been working flawlessly for 14 days.


----------



## silentbob

For those who use the MX-1, do you place it sideways on the stand or not? Does it make a difference one way or the other?

I am not at all a techie and managed to complete the set-up with the DB35 last night with no problems, although some kind of narrative with the MX-1 "manual" would have been nice instead of rudimentary diagrams only.


----------



## richsadams

DN325Ci said:


> I'll pile on with my similar report: I added the MX-1/DB35 combination to my new Series3 last night. One minor install glitch occurred. The first attempt at the kickstart 62 procedure did not succeed in recognizing the drive. So I shut it down again, reached behind the S3 to make sure I had pushed the eSATA connector in all the way, and rebooted. Voila! 98 Hours of HD storage.
> 
> This combination is has been widely reported as quiet, and in my application it is simply silent. I cannot hear it whatsoever. Air is moving though, so I assume the fan is running.
> 
> Don


 Congrats! Works for us too. :up:

To check the fan's airflow wet your fingers and place them in front of the drive's exhaust vents...you should feel a cool breeze.


----------



## richsadams

silentbob said:


> For those who use the MX-1, do you place it sideways on the stand or not? Does it make a difference one way or the other?
> 
> I am not at all a techie and managed to complete the set-up with the DB35 last night with no problems, although some kind of narrative with the MX-1 "manual" would have been nice instead of rudimentary diagrams only.


 Well done!  It won't make any difference how you place the drive...horizontal or vertical...your call.

For anyone buying an MX-1 enclosure there is a good video tutorial here:

http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150


----------



## rt1027

Just curious....is the cable supplied w/ the MX-1 SATA 2 or do I need to purchase a seperate cable?


----------



## richsadams

rt1027 said:


> Just curious....is the cable supplied w/ the MX-1 SATA 2 or do I need to purchase a seperate cable?


 The cable supplied with the MX-1 is _exactly _ what you need! :up:


----------



## silentbob

richsadams said:


> Well done!  It won't make any difference how you place the drive...horizontal or vertical...your call.
> 
> For anyone buying an MX-1 enclosure there is a good video tutorial here:
> 
> http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150


Thanks, and the video tutorial that you linked would definitely be helpful for those who haven't installed their drives yet.


----------



## slimm

silentbob said:


> For those who use the MX-1, do you place it sideways on the stand or not? Does it make a difference one way or the other?
> 
> I am not at all a techie and managed to complete the set-up with the DB35 last night with no problems, although some kind of narrative with the MX-1 "manual" would have been nice instead of rudimentary diagrams only.


I place mine sideways without the stand. Won't fit in my entertainment center with the stand.


----------



## bkdtv

At the suggestion of some members, I've added an "eSATA cable" column to the list of enclosures (FAQ #30).

If you are using an external enclosure other than the Antec MX-1 and Apricorn EZ-DTS, please send me a PM indicating whether your particular enclosure included an eSATA cable that worked well with the Series3.


----------



## tivopalos

I was also successful with the MX-1 and the DB35 drive. 

Although, I do get a humming, kind of buzzing sound from both my Tivo and the new hard drive. Not quit loud enough to be annoying, but neither is silent. I ran the MX-1 without the drive and it is dead silent, so I know it's the DB35.


----------



## Dajad

I'm delighted to post yet another 750 Gig DB35/Antec MX-1 Success. My TiVo now reports 131 HD hours and 1244 SD hours of available recording space. All in, it took me about a half hour to do.

The Kickstart 62 instructions were perfect. The MX-1 video tutorial was helpful.



silentbob said:


> I am not at all a techie and managed to complete the set-up with the DB35 last night with no problems, although some kind of narrative with the MX-1 "manual" would have been nice instead of rudimentary diagrams only.


Here's my attempt at an MX-1/eSata installtion manual. The numbers correspond to the tiny numbered pictures that make up the Antec MX-1's enclosed instructions:

1. Remove screw on back of MX-1 enclosure
2. Turn over, slide lid to the right and remove.
3. Irrelevant closeup of power/data connectors (you dont have to remove these). Remove the two screws on either side of internal fan unit/hard drive holder within the enclosure.
4. Slide internal fan unit/hard drive holder back and out of the case.
5. Slide your eSata drive onto internal fan/hard drive holder unit. It should slide in snugly onto the connector. The eSata drive will sit on top of the nice white rubbery base on the fan unit/hard drive holder.
6. Flip the internal fan unit/hard drive holder with the newly attached eSata drive over.
7. Screw in the four supplied screws from other side of fan unit/hard drive holder to fasten the eSata drive to it. The screws screw in through white rubbery feet.
8. Flip back over again and place the combined fan unit/hard drive holder /eSata drive back into case and slide left into the plastic brackets within the internal casing.
9. Another irrelevant closeup of power/data connectors (I gather if you removed the connectors in step three you are to re-attach them - you do NOT have to remove these connectors)
10. Screw back the two screws removed in step 3 that hold the fan unit/hard drive within the enclosure.
11 Place lid back on enclosure, slide from left to right (opposite direction of step 2).
12. Screw back in screw removed in step 1

I'll report back any problems I have if they arise.

Thanks to all!

...Dale


----------



## donaudio

For those using FAP I recommend using a cable from Cooldrives. I used a 6 foot ESata II cable and had no problem with it. The cable seems to click in. Don


----------



## fred2

Getting the MX-1's two little interior screws back into place needs dexterity or a magnetic screwdriver. (g)


----------



## oldnacl

oldnacl said:


> richsadams said:
> 
> 
> 
> Connections have been the root problem in a majority of cases. Even though you can connect your drive to your computer it doesn't mean your eSATA cable is working with TiVo. Double check everythingthe cable should fit snugly in both your drive and TiVo. If it feels at all loose that may be the problem.QUOTE]
> 
> Update on my experience with the FAP750. After using it a couple days without problem, the Tivo began rebooting and I saw 2 GSODs. I disconnected and divorced the external drive. No problems after nearly a week of use. I received my Tripp-Lite P950 eSATA cable from Amazon on Monday and reconnected the FAP750. So far no problems. I compared the cables with others I have and found, as reported, the depth of the metal end is greater than found on a cable purchased from Monoprice and the same as one of the other cables I had. The Tripp-Lite cable does not give a secure feeling when plugged in and I suspect that's due to the case thickness, however (knock on wood) it does appear to be functioning well now. I do notice significent video tearing when I go to the now playing screen, not previously observed without an external drive, but it appears to be cosmetic.
> 
> 
> 
> Another update on this saga. After almost 2 days running flawlessly, recording, watching and sending shows to my DVD recorder, tonight it rebooted while playing a recorded program that I was burning to DVD. From reboot to GSOD to reboot to GSOD etc, etc. I pulled the plug, disconnected the FAP, restarted the TiVo, divorced the drive and it booted up successfully. I scheduled several movies to record and for the next the next couple days I'll repeat the same pattern to see if it's the external drive or the TiVo that's causing the problem (so far the problem has only occurred with the external drive connected). If it doesn't fail in a couple days, I'll connect a different eSATA drive and run the drill. By that time the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 eSATA cable should arrive and I'll hook up the FAP again, unless I've narrowed the problem down to the TiVo. For anyone interested, I'll report my progress in a few days.
> P.S. I'm about ready to upgrade the internal drive and call it a day.
Click to expand...


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> oldnacl said:
> 
> 
> 
> Another update on this saga. After almost 2 days running flawlessly, recording, watching and sending shows to my DVD recorder, tonight it rebooted while playing a recorded program that I was burning to DVD. From reboot to GSOD to reboot to GSOD etc, etc. I pulled the plug, disconnected the FAP, restarted the TiVo, divorced the drive and it booted up successfully. I scheduled several movies to record and for the next the next couple days I'll repeat the same pattern to see if it's the external drive or the TiVo that's causing the problem (so far the problem has only occurred with the external drive connected). If it doesn't fail in a couple days, I'll connect a different eSATA drive and run the drill. By that time the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 eSATA cable should arrive and I'll hook up the FAP again, unless I've narrowed the problem down to the TiVo. For anyone interested, I'll report my progress in a few days.
> P.S. I'm about ready to upgrade the internal drive and call it a day.
> 
> 
> 
> That's excellent feedback...thanks very much. Unless the external drive and/or cable is being moved or the cable is somehow coming loose it sounds as if the eSATA drive may be having problems...possibly bad sectors, bad read/write head, etc.
> 
> Since the eSATA drive had been running a couple of days each time before things go wrong it may have recorded enough data to hit a bad area thus causing the GSOD. If TiVo is working well w/o the external drive IMO your eSATA drive is certainly more suspect at this point than the cable.
> 
> I can't remember if you purchased the drive retail or on line. If it's from a local store you might just want to return it for a new one anyway?
> 
> You're taking all of the right steps...swapping cables and then swapping drives. Just hope you don't miss too many recordings by marrying and divorcing them each time!
> 
> Thanks again and let us know how it goes! :up:
Click to expand...


----------



## oldnacl

richsadams said:


> oldnacl said:
> 
> 
> 
> That's excellent feedback...thanks very much. Unless the external drive and/or cable is being moved or the cable is somehow coming loose it sounds as if the eSATA drive may be having problems...possibly bad sectors, bad read/write head, etc.
> 
> Since the eSATA drive had been running a couple of days each time before things go wrong it may have recorded enough data to hit a bad area thus causing the GSOD. If TiVo is working well w/o the external drive IMO your eSATA drive is certainly more suspect at this point than the cable.
> 
> I can't remember if you purchased the drive retail or on line. If it's from a local store you might just want to return it for a new one anyway?
> 
> You're taking all of the right steps...swapping cables and then swapping drives. Just hope you don't miss too many recordings by marrying and divorcing them each time!
> 
> Thanks again and let us know how it goes! :up:
> 
> 
> 
> I doubt movement could be the culprit as I live alone and have no pets other than the occasional lizard that slips in the open door. I don't recall any earthquakes. A previous eSATA connection using a drive that I'd used previously on a SA8300HD ran for a couple weeks before I got the FAP, so the diagnosis of a defective drive in the FAP is looking pretty good. I'll hook that drive up to one of my computers and run a disk check on it, although, even if the computer locks out defective blocks, I assume TiVo will ignore that as it reformats when it marries. The FAP was a Web purchase so sending it back is a PITA unless it fails some test that Seagate provides - don't know if they offer that like Maxtor or WD does. I appreciate the feedback.
Click to expand...


----------



## jlib

oldnacl said:


> ...I'll hook that drive up to one of my computers and run a disk check on it, although, even if the computer locks out defective blocks, I assume TiVo will ignore that as it reformats when it marries.


The remapping of defective blocks (the really long version of scandisk in Windows or better yet Spinrite) occurs at the harddrive level below any standard format by an operating system so if defects are found the remapping will survive a future format by the S3.


----------



## oldnacl

jlib said:


> The remapping of defective blocks (the really long version of scandisk in Windows or better yet Spinrite) occurs at the harddrive level below any standard format by an operating system so if defects are found the remapping will survive a future format by the S3.


Thanks, that's good info. I'll run the test tonight - prolly take forever on the 750 GB drive.


----------



## SAH2

S3-2501 said:


> Another FAP750 experience:
> 
> Prior to connecting the drive to the s3, I connected it to my PC to turn off the light, copy the software and delete it from the drive.
> 
> When I connected the drive to the s3 and plugged it in, the light turned back on anyway. The drive was recognized by the s3 on the first try.
> 
> I tried to accept the light, but decided it was just a bit too much for the living room and ended up reconnecting the drive to my PC again to turn the light off. Strangely, the setting still didnt stick. In the end, I managed to get the light to stay off when I powered off the drive using the soft switch rather than unplugging it completely. I have a feeling it will come back on after a power failure though. (P.S. To add to the previous debate, the light on my drive was definitely pulsing along the side of the drive.)
> !


I also followed the above procedure and turned off the light from the USB connection on the PC. This worked. I then soft powered off the FAP and then unplugged it and moved it to a new outlet near the Tivo. I plugged it in and then soft powered it on and the light was back.

Did you soft power off the FAP while it was connected to the TIVO or to the PC to get it to stay off.


----------



## DrSchnitz

Dear Everyone who participated in this discussion,
Thank you.
Today I connected the eSATA port to a recommended Apricorn DVR Xpander (750 gigs) with a recommended TrippLite cable following these instructions, and it worked instantly (well in a couple of minutes - but no problems at all.) My hard drive capacity quadrupled.
The Apricorn people were very nice and patient - it was a good experience. They are coming out with a 1 Terabyte Xpander in a couple of months, but the discussions of whether terabyte drives could work confused me, so I jumped now. I am very glad - no more trying to decide what to delete to make sure the Sopranos gets recorded.
I am very grateful to you all - especially (and I am going to get this wrong) bdktv who wrote the instructions.


----------



## S3-2501

SAH2 said:


> I also followed the above procedure and turned off the light from the USB connection on the PC. This worked. I then soft powered off the FAP and then unplugged it and moved it to a new outlet near the Tivo. I plugged it in and then soft powered it on and the light was back.
> 
> Did you soft power off the FAP while it was connected to the TIVO or to the PC to get it to stay off.


I did the following:

1. Pulled the power plug on the TIVO.
2. Brought my laptop PC near the TV and connected it to the FAP. 
3. Turned off the drive light and soft-powered-down the FAP.
4. Disconnected the USB cable and then applied power back to the TIVO.

The light did not come on as the drive soft-powered back up, but I *suspect* that it will come back on after a power failure or other hard power off. It would be most helpful if someone knows a trick to make the setting permanent.

So far my experience with the drive continues to be pleasant. Well over 100 suggestions have been recorded now, and it's wonderful being able to let OTA HD recordings stack up on the drive without any concerns about free space!


----------



## gteague

bkdtv said:


> At the suggestion of some members, I've added an "eSATA cable" column to the list of enclosures (FAQ #30).
> 
> If you are using an external enclosure other than the Antec MX-1 and Apricorn EZ-DTS, please send me a PM indicating whether your particular enclosure included an eSATA cable that worked well with the Series3.


pm sent

/guy


----------



## SAH2

S3-2501 said:


> I did the following:
> 
> 1. Pulled the power plug on the TIVO.
> 2. Brought my laptop PC near the TV and connected it to the FAP.
> 3. Turned off the drive light and soft-powered-down the FAP.
> 4. Disconnected the USB cable and then applied power back to the TIVO.
> 
> !


Thanks - This worked perfectly! Now I don't have to look at the bright orange light.

And thanks to all for posting your experiences This made the whole procedure very easy to follow.


----------



## jboy

tivopalos said:


> I was also successful with the MX-1 and the DB35 drive.
> 
> Although, I do get a humming, kind of buzzing sound from both my Tivo and the new hard drive. Not quit loud enough to be annoying, but neither is silent. I ran the MX-1 without the drive and it is dead silent, so I know it's the DB35.


That's disappointing.  I was thinking about changing to the DB35.


----------



## jboy

rickeame said:


> Argh, I feel like I'm the only idiot that can't get this to work. I have tried three times tonight. WD book drive 500GB), cable is fine, it works with my computer just fine, but when I do the whole pause button restart 62 business, I never get the "added your drive" screen.
> 
> I envy you people who got it to work.


I had a similar issue. I found I had to punch in 62 really fast as soon when the yellow light appeared. The light only lasted a second or two for me and if I did not get 62 entered in that time the unit just rebooted without seeing the eSATA drive.

jerry


----------



## jlhender23

Can anyone give me any advice about how to snap the hard drive into the MX-1? Admittedly, I am not a techie, but the drive just will not slide in at all. It doesn't even seem like the connector is the same size. I bought a Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 and from the comments on the board I thought it would be relatively easy. Any help would be greatly appreciated!


----------



## 1283

jlhender23 said:


> Can anyone give me any advice about how to snap the hard drive into the MX-1? Admittedly, I am not a techie, but the drive just will not slide in at all. It doesn't even seem like the connector is the same size. I bought a Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 and from the comments on the board I thought it would be relatively easy. Any help would be greatly appreciated!


Did you buy a PATA or SATA drive?


----------



## jlhender23

It is a SATA drive. It's just that the connector on the MX-1 seems to be about half the length of the connector on the hard drive.


----------



## richsadams

jlhender23 said:


> Can anyone give me any advice about how to snap the hard drive into the MX-1? Admittedly, I am not a techie, but the drive just will not slide in at all. It doesn't even seem like the connector is the same size. I bought a Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 and from the comments on the board I thought it would be relatively easy. Any help would be greatly appreciated!


 Here is a video tutorial about using the MX-1 enclosure:

http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150

If your drive doesn't easily connect to the MX-1 connector it sounds like you have the wrong kind of drive. Although the drive you've listed is an SATA drive, it sounds more like you may have an IDE drive if drive's connection point is longer than the one in the MX-1. Don't try and force it. Return the drive and buy a proper Serial ATA drive....preferably a Seagate DB35 series.


----------



## richsadams

jboy said:


> That's disappointing.  I was thinking about changing to the DB35.


We have an MX-1 enclosure with a 500GB Seagate DB35 drive and it is whisper quiet and cool. I have to put my ear right up next to it to hear the drive working when it's recording.


----------



## jlib

jlhender23 said:


> It is a SATA drive. It's just that the connector on the MX-1 seems to be about half the length of the connector on the hard drive.


You might have it upside down and are confusing the SATA power connector for the data port. Does the drive model number end in "S"?

Power is the larger connector:


----------



## bevansmd

Just want to report another success story with Seagate Free Agent Pro 750GB drive. Also want to thank bkdtv for the original post and instructions. Now I can go on vacation without worrying about missing my favorite HD shows.

Also, thanks to the folks who posted the Best Buy coupon last week. I didn't know you could use it on a sale item...so got a steal on the Seagate for about $175.

Thanks to all!


----------



## jlhender23

Thanks to all for your help, but I am an idiot. It turns out I ordered an Ultra ATA instead of a Serial ATA. I just reordered the Seagate 750 GB SATA drive. I should be OK, right?


----------



## uw69

stevereis said:


> Go to MFSLive.org for option 2. Here is a direct link to the "Adding a Second Drive" portion of the guide: http://www.mfslive.org/softwareguidep5.htm
> You have to pull out the upgraded drive and attach it and the new external drive to a PC you boot into the MFS tool and bless the second drive using 'mfsadd' I am guessing this uses into on the first drive to bless the 2nd drive that will be mounted externally. Using this method means you do not have to use the Kickstart 62 procedure.


Gave the method #2 a try this morning..now have 218 hours for HD and over 2000 for SD. Thanks to all who helped develop this method and for the specific help given me.


----------



## jboy

richsadams said:


> We have an MX-1 enclosure with a 500GB Seagate DB35 drive and it is whisper quiet and cool. I have to put my ear right up next to it to hear the drive working when it's recording.


I assume you are doing this when everything else in the room is off? That is, the TV is not playing, doors and windows closed, kids outside, A/C off, etc. So pretty much dead quiet other than the Tivo and the drive.

I would hope the combination would perform as you describe. But, others are reporting that they can hear the drive in this enclosure. I might give it a try anyway because the Apricorn DTS enclosure is too loud.


----------



## FrogGremlin

We had a weird occurrence last night. Trying to watch several movies which had been recorded off different channels earlier in the day, we'd get a long pause after selecting "Play" and then a message indicating that perhaps we don't actually receive the channel. (Programs recorded pre-eSATA-expansion played fine.) Finally, the GSOD appeared. After the TiVo rebooted, there they were, recorded perfectly!

Before adding the eSATA drive (MX-1 + DB35), we'd been rock-stable for months. Has anyone else had this experience? Does it signal the possibility of a bad expansion drive? Or can the TiVo somehow lose touch with the expansion drive until a reboot?


----------



## richsadams

jlhender23 said:


> Thanks to all for your help, but I am an idiot. It turns out I ordered an Ultra ATA instead of a Serial ATA. I just reordered the Seagate 750 GB SATA drive. I should be OK, right?


 That's the ticket! You should have no problems with the new drive. Enjoy!


----------



## richsadams

jboy said:


> I assume you are doing this when everything else in the room is off? That is, the TV is not playing, doors and windows closed, kids outside, A/C off, etc. So pretty much dead quiet other than the Tivo and the drive.
> 
> I would hope the combination would perform as you describe. But, others are reporting that they can hear the drive in this enclosure. I might give it a try anyway because the Apricorn DTS enclosure is too loud.


 Yes, without other noise in the room (kids?  ) the MX-1/Seagate DB35 drive combo we have is very quiet. Our TiVo and eSATA drive are on an oak wood shelf and we have the drive in the vertical holder that came with it.

If I put my ear right next to it I can hear the low hum of the fan when it's idle and when it's recording the movement of the heads. But at about a foot away, no sound to speak of. In other words, it creates no more noise than our TiVo S3...probably a little less.

Depending on the surface on which the drive is sitting, fan hum and activity can be picked up and amplified. It seemed to isolate the sound of the drive a little more by placing it vertically in the holder. I've read where others have created additional isolation by placing their drives on an added surface such as a mouse pad.

No internal or external drive is completely silent of course but this is the quietest one I've ever used. :up:


----------



## tivopalos

I just turned on my TV and the picture appeared frozen. 
I tried to change channels, then got the GSOD. 

After about 20 minutes, it powered back up and there was a message from Tivo concerning the service agreement/privacy policy. 

I have the MX-1 and DB35 500gb going for about a week with no problems. 

I'm not sure if this was due to the message sent by Tivo, or something else. 

Anyone else experience this when receiving messages, or maybe it was just a coincidence and it was something else ?


----------



## moxie1617

tivopalos said:


> I just turned on my TV and the picture appeared frozen.
> I tried to change channels, then got the GSOD.
> 
> After about 20 minutes, it powered back up and there was a message from Tivo concerning the service agreement/privacy policy.
> 
> I have the MX-1 and DB35 500gb going for about a week with no problems.
> 
> I'm not sure if this was due to the message sent by Tivo, or something else.
> 
> Anyone else experience this when receiving messages, or maybe it was just a coincidence and it was something else ?


I got the message this AM but no GSOD. Running the same combo of MX-1 and 500GB DB35. This is day 16 since the install with no problems.


----------



## gwsat

I got the same message without any problems while I was watching a show I had recorded earlier. In fact, I didn't realize it was there until the S3 took me to it when I pressed the TiVo button.


----------



## alyssa

Regarding the GSOD-
did anyone have a power issue within 24 hours prior to the event?

I ask 'cuz I've had two GSOD's post eSATA connection. Both events occured within 24 hours of a power event. The first GSOD happened 18 hr(or so) hours after I hooked it up the second happened 4 -6 hours after a major thunder/lighting storm. And yes my S3 is on a UPS but it's a bit on the old side.
Another poster has suggested the GSOD was related to a bad section on the HD.

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=354597


----------



## tivopalos

We we out shopping about 20 miles from home, and there was a few thunder storms while we were out. We are plugged into a power conditioner which is not as good as a UPS. 

Possibly a spike in the power?


----------



## TexasGrillChef

The AVERAGE MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) for 99% of all SATA Hard drives made today, including eSATA drives have a MTBF of at least 60,000 Hours.

In math terms..

60,000 hours = 2500 days = 6.849 years.

So any SATA drive hooked up to your Series 3 Unit should last on AVERAGE at least that long!

I don't know about you. But I am pretty sure that in the next 6.849 years. I will want to REPLACE my TIVO S3 with maybe a Tivo S4, or S5, or mayb S6 even.

So 6.849 years should be enough "LIFE" for any eSATA drive you add to your TIVO S3

TexasGrillChef

P.S.
When I looked at seagate.com for their hard drives. I didn't see a single drive they currently produce that had less than 50,000 hours of MTBF.


----------



## 1283

TexasGrillChef said:


> The AVERAGE MTBF (Mean Time Between Failure) for 99% of all SATA Hard drives made today, including eSATA drives have a MTBF of at least 60,000 Hours.


MTBF is more meaningful for a large group of drives, not individual drives. If you have 60,000 drives running, you're likely to get one failure per hour.


----------



## DN325Ci

Guys, had an issue with my MX-1/DB35 I wanted to ask you about.

I've had two instances now when I've selected to watch a show from the Now Playing list and the screen will go blank for about 10 seconds (just shows the typical lightbulb background) then the S3 completely reboots. After the reboot, all is well.

So my layman's diagnosis: it makes me think that maybe the eSATA drive had gone into "park" or something, and when the S3 called upon it, the S3 got no response and froze. After a reboot the communication is re-established and its' all good.

Any thoughts?

Don


----------



## FrogGremlin

DN325Ci said:


> I've had two instances now when I've selected to watch a show from the Now Playing list and the screen will go blank for about 10 seconds (just shows the typical lightbulb background) then the S3 completely reboots. After the reboot, all is well.
> 
> Any thoughts?


No thoughts, unfortunately, except I'm glad that I'm not alone. I've had two of precisely the same, also fine after the reboot. I have a Seagate SCE drive in an MX-1 enclosure. What do you have?

When mine goes "dead," here are the details:

1. Older recordings play fine.
2. Recent recordings get a "TiVo received no signal on this channel" message" (not true - the recordings are there after the reboot).
3. An attempt to view something that's in the process of recording gets a frozen blank lightbulb screen, and then - after a couple of minutes - a "Green Screen of Death) reboot.


----------



## spike2k5

> No thoughts, unfortunately, except I'm glad that I'm not alone. I've had two of precisely the same, also fine after the reboot. I have a Seagate SCE drive in an MX-1 enclosure. What do you have?
> 
> When mine goes "dead," here are the details:
> 
> 1. Older recordings play fine.
> 2. Recent recordings get a "TiVo received no signal on this channel" message" (not true - the recordings are there after the reboot).
> 3. An attempt to view something that's in the process of recording gets a frozen blank lightbulb screen, and then - after a couple of minutes - a "Green Screen of Death) reboot.


What is the model number of your db35 drive?

ST3500830SCE? (500GB)
ST3750840SCE? (750GB)

How full is your drive or roughly how many recorded shows do you have?

How old is your drive and where did you buy it?

I would run the manufacturer diagnostic software to see if there's any probelm with the drive.

http://download.seagate.com/seatools/registration.nsf/eula/desktop

Run the DOS version and not the windows.


----------



## richsadams

DN325Ci said:


> Guys, had an issue with my MX-1/DB35 I wanted to ask you about.
> 
> I've had two instances now when I've selected to watch a show from the Now Playing list and the screen will go blank for about 10 seconds (just shows the typical lightbulb background) then the S3 completely reboots. After the reboot, all is well.
> 
> So my layman's diagnosis: it makes me think that maybe the eSATA drive had gone into "park" or something, and when the S3 called upon it, the S3 got no response and froze. After a reboot the communication is re-established and its' all good.
> 
> Any thoughts?
> 
> Don


 Sorry to hear about your TiVo acting up. We've had our MX-1/DB35 (ST3500830SCE) running since May 15th without incident. We have about 180 programs in the recently deleted folder and about 60 shows in our now playing list plus other odds and ends (The Onion, etc.) so I know our eSATA drive is being used daily.

Since the Seagate ST3500830SCE and ST3500840SCE drives are designed for DVR's they do not spin down or go into "park".

I'd echo Spike 2k5's recommendation to run diagnostics on the drive. I'd also ensure that the eSATA cable is snug at both connections.

Keep us posted!


----------



## MikeMacMan

tivopalos said:


> I just turned on my TV and the picture appeared frozen.
> I tried to change channels, then got the GSOD.
> 
> After about 20 minutes, it powered back up and there was a message from Tivo concerning the service agreement/privacy policy.
> 
> I have the MX-1 and DB35 500gb going for about a week with no problems.
> 
> I'm not sure if this was due to the message sent by Tivo, or something else.
> 
> Anyone else experience this when receiving messages, or maybe it was just a coincidence and it was something else ?


I had the same problem but my S3 is completely stock. I haven't added a drive yet.

I turned on my TV and my Tivo was GSOD. I rebooted it and I got the message about updated TOS. I can only assume that a software update and/or message from Tivo caused it.


----------



## dtphonehome

Don't know if it's worth posting, but I'll just mention that my FAP 750 has been working flawlessly for 10 days now. So they aren't all diving off the cliff like lemmings (man I loved that game).


----------



## richsadams

MikeMacMan said:


> I had the same problem but my S3 is completely stock. I haven't added a drive yet.
> 
> I turned on my TV and my Tivo was GSOD. I rebooted it and I got the message about updated TOS. I can only assume that a software update and/or message from Tivo caused it.


 Although scary  it's almost reassuring that you've experienced this problem w/o an external drive. Phew!

We received the TOS message on all of our TiVo's and they are all working normally including our S3 with the eSATA drive. Hopefully we can all breath a little easier knowing that these things happen to people that haven't been trying to create a bigger/better wheel!


----------



## richsadams

dtphonehome said:


> Don't know if it's worth posting, but I'll just mention that my FAP 750 has been working flawlessly for 10 days now. So they aren't all diving off the cliff like lemmings (man I loved that game).


 Yes indeed it's worth posting. :up: Keeping tabs on what's working and what isn't is key to ensuring that we are up to date on everything as well as helping those that follow in our often staggering footsteps. Thanks!


----------



## DN325Ci

spike2k5 said:


> What is the model number of your db35 drive?
> 
> ST3500830SCE? (500GB)
> ST3750840SCE? (750GB)
> 
> How full is your drive or roughly how many recorded shows do you have?
> 
> How old is your drive and where did you buy it?
> 
> I would run the manufacturer diagnostic software to see if there's any probelm with the drive.
> 
> http://download.seagate.com/seatools/registration.nsf/eula/desktop
> 
> Run the DOS version and not the windows.


I have the 500GB version, and it barely has anything on it. The S3 is brand-new as well, and the software has already been updated on it. After reading some of those eSATA cable discussions, doesn't that seem like the most likely root cause? It seems the symptoms are the same.

Don


----------



## spike2k5

DN325Ci said:


> I have the 500GB version, and it barely has anything on it. The S3 is brand-new as well, and the software has already been updated on it. After reading some of those eSATA cable discussions, doesn't that seem like the most likely root cause? It seems the symptoms are the same.
> 
> Don


Stock eSATA cable that came with MX-1 seems to be ok.
It wouldn't hurt to try another eSATA II cable and see if your problem clears up.

You might want to check your drive out. 
New doesn't always mean it's error free.


----------



## CyberTom

DN325Ci said:


> Guys, had an issue with my MX-1/DB35 I wanted to ask you about.
> 
> I've had two instances now when I've selected to watch a show from the Now Playing list and the screen will go blank for about 10 seconds (just shows the typical lightbulb background) then the S3 completely reboots. After the reboot, all is well.


I've got the same thing going on with the MX-1/DB35-750 gb. I removed the DB35 and now running SpinRite on the disk.

Maybe there is something a little more complicated going on here.


----------



## wgw

Possible addtion to the FAQ, Troubleshooting section, Causes of reboots.

Route eSata cable away from strong magnetic fields such as voltage regulators, subwoofers or speakers.

I inadvertantly laid my eSata cable over the top of an APC voltage regulator sitting behind my entertainment center. The Tivo would pause and stutter and eventually reboot. At first I thought it was the hard drive or a bad cable. Moving the cable away from the voltage regulator immediately fixed the problem.


----------



## FrogGremlin

spike2k5 said:


> What is the model number of your db35 drive?


ST3750840SCE, with original 250GB drive in the TiVo.


> How full is your drive or roughly how many recorded shows do you have?


Approximately 450GB total.


> How old is your drive and where did you buy it?


I received it last week from NextWarehouse.com.


> I would run the manufacturer diagnostic software to see if there's any probelm with the drive. http://download.seagate.com/seatools/registration.nsf/eula/desktop Run the DOS version and not the windows.


Ready to try after the next crash. First I'm going to reroute the eSATA cable and see if that works.

And again, thanks for the marvelous work you've done.


----------



## richsadams

wgw said:


> Possible addtion to the FAQ, Troubleshooting section, Causes of reboots.
> 
> Route eSata cable away from strong magnetic fields such as voltage regulators, subwoofers or speakers.
> 
> I inadvertantly laid my eSata cable over the top of an APC voltage regulator sitting behind my entertainment center. The Tivo would pause and stutter and eventually reboot. At first I thought it was the hard drive or a bad cable. Moving the cable away from the voltage regulator immediately fixed the problem.


 Now that's really interesting. Are you sure it had something to do with the position of the cable and not the connection to your drive or TiVo (or both)?

Curious...did you try replicating it by relocating the cable back across the APC VR?

Thanks for posting and if you can replicate the problem we certainly need to make others aware of this. :up:


----------



## maynerd

Frys.com has the FAP 750 for 239 and I'm considering getting it one. So what's the general thought here? Is it not a good idea?


----------



## Ilene

I was trying to get the same answer you are seeking. There is another related thread talking about this: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=354978
I returned my FAP750 that I bought 2 weeks ago at BestBuy for $199 because I was concerned with reliability and did not want to risk "burning the house down" by running the drive 24/7. I ordered a SeagateDB35 (500) and the Antec MX-1 enclosure for the same price as the FAP750. I decided that 91 hours was about as much TV as I could handle anyways. 
Soon after I placed my order, there have been several posts with issues with this set up as well. I am not sure if we can really get a good answer. I seriously also looked at the Apricorn DVR Xpander, but was talked out of it because Seagate really does make the best drives, and we knew nothing about Apricorn. I could only find one post (and they were happy) about the Xpander. Gut tells me now that I probably should have gotten the Xpander.


----------



## richsadams

Ilene said:


> I was trying to get the same answer you are seeking. There is another related thread talking about this: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=354978
> I returned my FAP750 that I bought 2 weeks ago at BestBuy for $199 because I was concerned with reliability and did not want to risk "burning the house down" by running the drive 24/7. I ordered a SeagateDB35 (500) and the Antec MX-1 enclosure for the same price as the FAP750. I decided that 91 hours was about as much TV as I could handle anyways.
> Soon after I placed my order, there have been several posts with issues with this set up as well. I am not sure if we can really get a good answer. I seriously also looked at the Apricorn DVR Xpander, but was talked out of it because Seagate really does make the best drives, and we knew nothing about Apricorn. I could only find one post (and they were happy) about the Xpander. Gut tells me now that I probably should have gotten the Xpander.


 I don't think anyone's posted true problems with the Antec MX-1/Seagate DB35 500GB or Seagate DB35 750GB hard drive combo. Most posts about them have been odds and ends; generally things unrelated to the drive itself or questions. I haven't seen one post saying there was a real problem and that the OP was returning it.

There have been many posts about issues with the FAP750 however, most related to heat problems (no fan) and eSATA cable connections on the drive as the FAP750 does not come with the proper eSATA II cable (the correct cable is supplied with the MX-1). However others have posted postive reports about their FAP750 drives running without issues. You'll need to pour through these posts or better yet do a search on the FAP750 if you want more details.

The Apricorn DVR Xpander currently uses WD HDD's which also run hot but the enclosure has a fan and the drives are designed to run 24/7. The Apricorn eSATA drives and enclosures come with the proper eSATA II cable. I've used their external drives and have had no problems.

I chose the MX-1/Seagate DB35 combo because it is a bit quieter and runs cooler. This combo installed the first time and has run flawlessly since May 15th. It runs much cooler than other external drives we have and is just about silent at about 1 ft. distance. So far I can highly recommend this combination. :up:


----------



## Ilene

:up: OK, now I feel better about my purchase. Now I just need to be patient until it gets shipped. I have seen the many posts about "How to" assemble, so I think I'll be able to handle that too. Because I knew the FAP750 did not come with a cable, I do have a Triplite cable too. Too hard to return to Amazon, so now not sure what I will do with it since you have confirmed that the MX-1 cable works.


----------



## dvdwilly

richsadams said:


> Now that's really interesting. Are you sure it had something to do with the position of the cable and not the connection to your drive or TiVo (or both)?
> 
> Curious...did you try replicating it by relocating the cable back across the APC VR?
> 
> Thanks for posting and if you can replicate the problem we certainly need to make others aware of this. :up:


Rich, et al, I have a sneaking hunch that the voltage regulator is generating a magnetic field sufficiently strong to cause electromagnetic interference (EMI) which wgw was observing. If you chase around Google and look at some of the specs of SATA vs eSATA, they all speak of improved reduction of EMI, which would imply that such a thing would occur, particularly with SATA cables vice eSATA cables. Magnetic fields will disrupt electric current so you keep them separated...and do not adapt a SATA cable to use in place of an eSATA cable. Just a guess...

Bill C.


----------



## richsadams

dvdwilly said:


> Rich, et al, I have a sneaking hunch that the voltage regulator is generating a magnetic field sufficiently strong to cause electromagnetic interference (EMI) which wgw was observing. If you chase around Google and look at some of the specs of SATA vs eSATA, they all speak of improved reduction of EMI, which would imply that such a thing would occur, particularly with SATA cables vice eSATA cables. Magnetic fields will disrupt electric current so you keep them separated...and do not adapt a SATA cable to use in place of an eSATA cable. Just a guess...
> 
> Bill C.


 Cheers for that and it makes perfect sense. :up: A similar rule of thumb is to ensure that audio cables are kept away from power sources and laid at right-angles to power cables to avoid EMI/hum induction as well. There's no reason to think that eSATA cables would be any less subject to the same problems particularly since they have very little shielding. 
*
bkdtv*: This should probably be added to the _excellent _ FAQ you've created.

I've also seen a number of online sources recommending that eSATA cables should be no longer than 1 meter (about three feet) to avoid signal degradation...something to which TiVo is apparently very sensitive.

Something along the lines of Keep your eSATA II cable as short as possible and away from electrical power sources might help.

This could explain some of the rebooting issues some people are running into.


----------



## richsadams

Ilene said:


> ...I do have a Triplite cable too. Too hard to return to Amazon, so now not sure what I will do with it since you have confirmed that the MX-1 cable works.


 One word...e-bay!


----------



## S3-2501

richsadams said:


> This should probably be added to the _excellent _ FAQ you've created.
> 
> I've also seen a number of online sources recommending that eSATA cables should be no longer than 1 meter (about three feet) to avoid signal degradation...something to which TiVo is apparently very sensitive.
> 
> Something along the lines of Keep your eSATA II cable as short as possible and away from electrical power sources might help.
> 
> This could explain some of the rebooting issues some people are running into.


I'm using a 6ft SIIG eSATA cable and have had no issues so far using it with my FAP 750. The extra cable length is just hanging behind my equipment stand.

I don't have enough posts yet to post the link, but the official page for the SIIG cable claims "Extra shielding and metal contacts provide better EMI protection" so maybe that's a factor. Visit SIIG's site for more info.


----------



## richsadams

S3-2501 said:


> I'm using a 6ft SIIG eSATA cable and have had no issues so far using it with my FAP 750. The extra cable length is just hanging behind my equipment stand.
> 
> I don't have enough posts yet to post the link, but the official page for the SIIG cable claims "Extra shielding and metal contacts provide better EMI protection" so maybe that's a factor. Visit SIIG's site for more info.


 That's good news. I think unless I had to have a drive six feet away from TiVo for some reason I'd still opt for the 1 meter eSATA II cables such as those that come with the MX-1 and Apricorn drives. But it's good to hear some positive news on both items! :up:


----------



## Kenji

I just connected a 500GB Apricorn DVR Xpander to my S3, and the installation went completely smoothly. Thanks to everyone who contributed to this excellent thread.


----------



## bkdtv

richsadams said:


> Something along the lines of Keep your eSATA II cable as short as possible and away from electrical power sources might help.
> 
> This could explain some of the rebooting issues some people are running into.


I updated #27 and the troubleshooting section in the FAQ.


----------



## 1283

I would highly recommend using a 1-meter cable instead of a 2-meter cable. The most common USB-eSATA bridge chip simply taps onto the SATA wires, which degrades the signal quality. A longer cable would reduce the noise margin even further.


----------



## HD_Dude

A word of thanks...

I did the eSata hard drive expansion on my TIVO S3, using the links provided by members here and at AVS Forum, and it worked perfectly!

I bought the Apricorn 750G DVR XPander....bought it online from Apricorn.

Arrived the next day. Came with the drive in a BEAUTIFUL enclosure, power cable, and the correct eSata cable...everything in one box.

The drive has a power-on switch and fan, which are recommended, and it's certified for 24/7 operation....and yes, it is whisper quiet.

Followed the '62 jumpstart' technique and YES! I now have 132 hours of HD recordings available.

If you're a true tech, you could do what I did for less money. But for roughly $400, I found a totally turn-key operation, idiot-proof and successful.

Thanks!


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> ...I've also seen a number of online sources recommending that eSATA cables should be no longer than 1 meter (about three feet) to avoid signal degradation...something to which TiVo is apparently very sensitive.


The only time that limitation would be valid is in the special case of somebody, in lieu of installing a true eSATA card, using a bracket on a PC slot with a passive eSATA port connected to the motherboard SATA port. The eSATA port is then essentially a SATA port (with its weaker electrical signals). The S3 has a true eSATA port so the eSATA spec of 2 meter maximum applies. Your point is valid, though, that there is no point having the longer cable if all it is going to do is lay on top of things it shouldn't. But if there is a need for the length there is no signal degradation with a 2 meter length.


----------



## wgw

richsadams said:


> Now that's really interesting. Are you sure it had something to do with the position of the cable and not the connection to your drive or TiVo (or both)?
> 
> Curious...did you try replicating it by relocating the cable back across the APC VR?
> 
> Thanks for posting and if you can replicate the problem we certainly need to make others aware of this. :up:


For confirmation, I just placed the eSata cable over the top of the voltage regulator. As soon as I powered on the voltage regulator the Tivo rebooted. During reboot, it just hung there and would not give me the "Almost there" screen. When I turned off the VR and moved the cable away from the VR, it would still not boot. Apparently it totally corrupted the drive. I'd say that's confirmation. Would anyone else like to try it?

Oh thank the heavens. After multiple reboots it finally came back to life. Phew, I thought it was a gonner. Please, do not try this at home unless you are a professional.


----------



## wgw

A second test using a 6ft cable made by SIIG did not produce the same results. It did not reboot or cause any problems. Apparently a quality cable will protect the unit from EMI. I also had no problem with a 3ft cable of unknown origin.

I just tried another cable exactly like the one that caused the reboot. There is no labeling on the packaging so I can't say who made them. This new cable did not cause a reboot or as yet any stutter. It appears that there is some defect in the first cable that only became apparent when subjected to a strong EM field. EGADS, one would think a brand new cable would be good.

So while this test seems to prove that an EM field can cause problems, it seems to only make a difference when there is some defect in the cable itself. Perhaps there is a gap in the shielding along the length of the cable or a break in one of the wires. At least now I know how to test my cables.

Just to make certain, I retested the bad cable again and it caused a reboot. I also retested the duplicate cable and it worked fine. The original cable is definitely defective.


----------



## richsadams

wgw said:


> A second test using a 6ft cable made by SIIG did not produce the same results. It did not reboot or cause any problems. Apparently a quality cable will protect the unit from EMI. I also had no problem with a 3ft cable of unknown origin.
> 
> I just tried another cable exactly like the one that caused the reboot. There is no labeling on the packaging so I can't say who made them. This new cable did not cause a reboot or as yet any stutter. It appears that there is some defect in the first cable that only became apparent when subjected to a strong EM field. EGADS, one would think a brand new cable would be good.
> 
> So while this test seems to prove that an EM field can cause problems, it seems to only make a difference when there is some defect in the cable itself. Perhaps there is a gap in the shielding along the length of the cable or a break in one of the wires. At least now I know how to test my cables.
> 
> Just to make certain, I retested the bad cable again and it caused a reboot. I also retested the duplicate cable and it worked fine. The original cable is definitely defective.


 Wow!  You should win some kind of award for your courageous work! :up:

At least now we know...most cables are fine, but it's best to keep them away from power sources if only as a preventative measure.

Thanks!


----------



## oldnacl

oldnacl said:


> richsadams said:
> 
> 
> 
> I doubt movement could be the culprit as I live alone and have no pets other than the occasional lizard that slips in the open door. I don't recall any earthquakes. A previous eSATA connection using a drive that I'd used previously on a SA8300HD ran for a couple weeks before I got the FAP, so the diagnosis of a defective drive in the FAP is looking pretty good. I'll hook that drive up to one of my computers and run a disk check on it, although, even if the computer locks out defective blocks, I assume TiVo will ignore that as it reformats when it marries. The FAP was a Web purchase so sending it back is a PITA unless it fails some test that Seagate provides - don't know if they offer that like Maxtor or WD does. I appreciate the feedback.
> 
> 
> 
> Update on this FAP 750 issue. After 2 GSODs and and enless loop of rebooting, I disconnected the FAP and ran the TiVo bareheaded for a couple days - no problems. I had a 500 GB Cavalry drive available, so I connected that and it's passed the two day mark and still working properly.
> I connected the FAP to my Windows computer and formatted the disk, then ran scandisk with the fix option. Took a long time and when I checked the event viewer upon completion, it had three entries that suggested replacing the drive if additional warnings were generated. I tried to use the Seagate tools to determine whether the drive would pass/fail but they wouldn't run on a USB attached drive. I used Seagate web support chat and the rep suggested returning the drive. It's boxed up and I'll ship it tomorrow. When the new one comes, I'll start this epic again. Meanwhile, I hope the Cavalry 500 keeps on truckin'.
Click to expand...


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> oldnacl said:
> 
> 
> 
> Update on this FAP 750 issue. After 2 GSODs and and enless loop of rebooting, I disconnected the FAP and ran the TiVo bareheaded for a couple days - no problems. I had a 500 GB Cavalry drive available, so I connected that and it's passed the two day mark and still working properly.
> I connected the FAP to my Windows computer and formatted the disk, then ran scandisk with the fix option. Took a long time and when I checked the event viewer upon completion, it had three entries that suggested replacing the drive if additional warnings were generated. I tried to use the Seagate tools to determine whether the drive would pass/fail but they wouldn't run on a USB attached drive. I used Seagate web support chat and the rep suggested returning the drive. It's boxed up and I'll ship it tomorrow. When the new one comes, I'll start this epic again. Meanwhile, I hope the Cavalry 500 keeps on truckin'.
> 
> 
> 
> Thanks for keeping us up to date. Bad drives are to be expected now and then. It's amazing there aren't more problems based on how large and complicated they've gotten over the years.
Click to expand...


----------



## maynerd

Anyone using a ST3500641AS-RK Seagate 500GB 3.5-inch SATA II NCQ Internal Hard Drive for any length of time with success?


----------



## fandango jango

Long time reader but new poster. My 750GB Seagate FAP drive has been running smoothly for over a week. No reboots. Thanks to advice from this forum, used the 6ft. SIIG eSata cable . Although slightly more expensive than other cables advertised, it snaps snugly into the back of the FAP & TIVO. I was able to complete the kickstart on the first attempt.

Drive is located in the open air, not in cabinet. Definitely runs warm, but not unreasonably hot. Heard the hard drive chirping a little last night, but didn't last. Will keep an eye on that.


----------



## URPREY

Just wanted to add my .02 - I bought the FAP 750 from Best Buy for $176 a couple weeks ago. I finally got my S3 cable cards and set up the FAP a week ago. I'm using the Trip-Lite cable from ProVantage. My cable is routed outside of my AV cabinet back inside my AV closet where my FAP is located. My FAP just barely runs warm, and it's been working great for a week. It's nice to have the extra storage for sure. FWIW, I did connect my FAP to my PC and disable spindown before I attached it to my S3. I left the lights alone since it's in a closet and not seen.


----------



## oldnacl

More on my FAP/TiVo saga. The FAP drive is in the car to be dropped off @ FedEx during lunch, but, the TiVo rebooted spontaneously last evening while copying a show to DVD. No GSOD and everything was fine after the reboot, but of course the DVD was trashed. Currently using a new Cavalry 500 with the Tripp-Lite cable. Still waiting for the SIIG eSata cable from Amazon. Now I wonder if I should send the FAP back... There were those errors when I ran scandisk though.
Got home tonight and the Tivo was locked up tighter than a bull's behind at fly time. so it wasn't just the FAP, anyway. The new SIIG cable arrived and I'll install it, but I think my TiVo just isn't happy with an external drive. Bummer. Time for an internal drive upgrade for me.


----------



## gbrown

I had bought the Calvary 500GB external drive. It's been working without a hitch for 3 weeks. The only issue was the NOISE. It is really bad. I had opened the case to see if I could swap the fan with a whisper fan from Frys. The Calvary fan is molded into the circuit board.

I found an Antec MX-1 case at my local store (Central Computers in San Jose, CA) for $55.00. It's like night and day. Absolutely Great! There is no more noise than any of my components in the living room.

I'm a very happy camper.


----------



## wgw

richsadams said:


> Wow!  You should win some kind of award for your courageous work! :up:
> 
> At least now we know...most cables are fine, but it's best to keep them away from power sources if only as a preventative measure.
> 
> Thanks!


I don't think I should win an award, but thank you for prompting me to confirm the problem I had with the VR. I would not have done more testing or discovered the problem with that cable otherwise. There is no telling what problems it may have caused down the road even though it appeared to be working properly once I moved it away from the VR. Lately, I have spent more time testing various upgrade senarios thanks to MFSTools and MFSLive and just playing with my Tivos to see what they can do rather than using them to just record and watch TV as they were intended. I tend to enjoy testing things more than actually using them. But I'm glad we found out just a little more about cables and hopefully it will help someone else. If nothing else, we learned that it's a good idea to try a second cable before considering the Tivo or a drive to be defective. And to keep the cable away from EM sources as a precaution as you stated. Thanks.

This weekend, I think I might cut open both the bad cable and the good cable just to see exactly what the difference is that caused the suseptibility to the VR. I would really like to know if one of my cables was manufactured without shielding or if there is a break in one of the wires. I'll report back later.


----------



## richsadams

wgw said:


> I don't think I should win an award, but thank you for prompting me to confirm the problem I had with the VR. I would not have done more testing or discovered the problem with that cable otherwise. There is no telling what problems it may have caused down the road even though it appeared to be working properly once I moved it away from the VR. Lately, I have spent more time testing various upgrade senarios thanks to MFSTools and MFSLive and just playing with my Tivos to see what they can do rather than using them to just record and watch TV as they were intended. I tend to enjoy testing things more than actually using them. But I'm glad we found out just a little more about cables and hopefully it will help someone else. If nothing else, we learned that it's a good idea to try a second cable before considering the Tivo or a drive to be defective. And to keep the cable away from EM sources as a precaution as you stated. Thanks.
> 
> This weekend, I think I might cut open both the bad cable and the good cable just to see exactly what the difference is that caused the suseptibility to the VR. I would really like to know if one of my cables was manufactured without shielding or if there is a break in one of the wires. I'll report back later.


 Cheers for keeping us up to date. Knowing that it might help someone else is gold for me. I know how frustrating something like that can be...especially when you can't figure out what the heck is causing it.

Good work! Keep it up and keep us posted on your adventures! :up:


----------



## maynerd

Those MX-1 enclosures are hard to find. I called excalibur and they said they were selling like 50 a day. Everyone is backordered for at least 2 weeks. Damn it I should have bought the stuff sooner.


----------



## DCIFRTHS

maynerd said:


> Those MX-1 enclosures are hard to find. I called excalibur and they said they were selling like 50 a day. Everyone is backordered for at least 2 weeks. Damn it I should have bought the stuff sooner.


I saw a couple on the shelf at one of my local Best Buy stores. I think it was ~$65.00.


----------



## TexasAg

maynerd said:


> Those MX-1 enclosures are hard to find. I called excalibur and they said they were selling like 50 a day. Everyone is backordered for at least 2 weeks. Damn it I should have bought the stuff sooner.


I got one yesterday at Microcenter. Might be worth a try (it's listed at $70, but they do have it).

http://www.microcenter.com/single_product_results.phtml?product_id=0257444


----------



## silentbob

richsadams said:


> I don't think anyone's posted true problems with the Antec MX-1/Seagate DB35 500GB or Seagate DB35 750GB hard drive combo. Most posts about them have been odds and ends; generally things unrelated to the drive itself or questions.


Uh-oh.

Things had been running flawlessly with my MX-1/DB35 combo for the past week. Then, this morning, I turned on the television to see a frozen image of Tony Soprano. As soon as I press the TiVo button on the remote, the screen goes dark and I get the yellow screen indicating that the second hard drive isn't operating correctly.

I reboot, and get the yellow screen again. Then I disconnect the MX-1, take out the hard drive, put it back in, and re-connect. The reboot works. But the system is sluggish, and 5 minutes later I get the yellow screen again. I try rebooting...

GSoD.

The instructions say not to do anything for three hours while the system tries to fix itself. My past experiences with the GSoD on the Series 2 are not good. What's the likely problem here?


----------



## oldnacl

I've seen that issue several times and so far it's only taken several minutes to recover, but I haven't yet figured out whether it's the external drive (I've tried 3 different ones) cables (tried several - currently am using the SIIG cable recommended) or the TiVo itself. I'm beginning to think my problems lie with the TiVo itself and I'm about ready to update the internal drive as I'm really tired of all the external drive problems. As an aside, one of the external drives is a drive that worked flawlessly for months attached to a SA8300HD STB.


----------



## silentbob

FWIW, there have been thunderstorms in the area over the last two days, and I have no idea to what extent there have been any power disturbances in the house while I'm at the office.

I'd like to think that these problems are strictly storm-related. My television, TiVo, and MX-1 are all connected to a standard $10 power strip. I see posts here and there about people investing in line conditioners, UPSs, and so forth. That can't possibly be the only "solution"?

Interestingly, my TiVo ended up rebooting just as I was leaving the house and appears to be running fine now. But who knows when problems will strike again and whether they're even preventable.


----------



## oldnacl

Well, if you look back through this thread you'll see that I've had multiple reboots, GSODs, all with an external drive connected and none w/o. I have a 1500VA voltage regulated UPS handling the TV and the TiVo and the external drive(s).
So far my experience has been as follows:
1) Tivo alone - no reboots, no GSODs
2) Tivo plus 320GB external in Rosewill enclosure using monoprice cable - a few audio dropouts and some pixelation but no reboots, no GSOD
3) FAP750 with monoprice and later Tripp-Lite cable. Multiple reboots, 2 GSODs, system freeze.
4) Cavalry 500 with Tripp-Lite 1 Reboot, 1 system freeze.
I just replaced the Tripp-Lite cable with the SIIG cable last evening after the freeeze. We'll see what the results are using that with the Cavalry.
Each time I tried a new combination, it ran for a couple days without problems and then began failing. I'm letting TiVo suggestions record in order to stress the system.


----------



## richsadams

silentbob said:


> Uh-oh.
> 
> Things had been running flawlessly with my MX-1/DB35 combo for the past week. Then, this morning, I turned on the television to see a frozen image of Tony Soprano. As soon as I press the TiVo button on the remote, the screen goes dark and I get the yellow screen indicating that the second hard drive isn't operating correctly.
> 
> I reboot, and get the yellow screen again. Then I disconnect the MX-1, take out the hard drive, put it back in, and re-connect. The reboot works. But the system is sluggish, and 5 minutes later I get the yellow screen again. I try rebooting...
> 
> GSoD.
> 
> The instructions say not to do anything for three hours while the system tries to fix itself. My past experiences with the GSoD on the Series 2 are not good. What's the likely problem here?
> 
> FWIW, there have been thunderstorms in the area over the last two days, and I have no idea to what extent there have been any power disturbances in the house while I'm at the office.
> 
> I'd like to think that these problems are strictly storm-related. My television, TiVo, and MX-1 are all connected to a standard $10 power strip. I see posts here and there about people investing in line conditioners, UPSs, and so forth. That can't possibly be the only "solution"?
> 
> Interestingly, my TiVo ended up rebooting just as I was leaving the house and appears to be running fine now. But who knows when problems will strike again and whether they're even preventable


 Hmmm....I think yours is the first post where problems were encountered by someone with a MX-1/DB35 combo. But since weve just started down this path thats probably not unusual.

A problem with the eSATA cable seems to be the biggest cause of reboots. The eSATA cable supplied with the MX-1 is of the right type but I'd make sure it's seated snugly into TiVo and the drive and that it's not located on or too near any power sources.

Can you verify which drive you are using? Is it the Seagate DB35 Series 7200.3 SATA 500-GB Hard Drive - ST3500830SCE or the Seagate DB35 Series 7200.3 SATA 750-GB Hard Drive - ST3750840SCE? Both of these are specifically designed for DVR use. Or is it one of the other DB35 models?

Drive failure could also be an issue. If TiVo's "A" drive or the eSATA drive have bad sectors or read/write heads it can cause a problem. TiVo is set up to make corrections by locking out bad sectors and while it does that it displays the GSOD. So it could all be coincidental to the storms (or the addition of the external drive for that matter).

But if the drives are good and the cable is good it sounds like the only other issue may be the thunderstorms. I've noted posts that encountered the GSOD during a storm long before we were fooling around with eSATA drives. It would appear that TiVo is very sensitive to any sort of power disturbances...particularly spikes. Even simple power failures can be a problem because of the spike that can occur when the power is restored.

Were it me I would certainly invest in either a UPS or at least a good surge protecting power strip for your TiVo and drive. (There's no need for a UPS for your TV of course; but it should be on a good surge protector.) We use a UPS for our computers, but have a Monster branded surge protector that handles our TiVo and components which cost about $30 at Frys. (We don't use the cable element as it degraded the signal.) Our power has briefly failed once since we added the eSATA drive and everything's working fine so far. We werent home when it happened so Im not sure if TiVo rebooted or not but Id assume so.

If there are abnormal power issues in your area (storms, brown outs, etc.) you can also purchase voltage regulators/conditioners that not only act as surge protectors but ensure the electricity is kept within strict parameters - they are fairly expensive though.

Maybe your TiVo just didn't like the final episode of the Sopranos is all. 

Good luck and please let us know how it goes. :up:


----------



## maynerd

Couple of questions.

Anyone having problems with their Apricorn DVR expander drives?

Does anyone think that the drives that are having problems could be due to the external enclosure supporting USB and eSata? Could the circuitry in these devices cause conflicts?

Also, I noticed the Seagate DB35 drives have an 8mb cache vs 16mb could this be a source of the problem as well?


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> Couple of questions.
> 
> Anyone having problems with their Apricorn DVR expander drives?
> 
> Does anyone think that the drives that are having problems could be due to the external enclosure supporting USB and eSata? Could the circuitry in these devices cause conflicts?
> 
> Also, I noticed the Seagate DB35 drives have an 8mb cache vs 16mb could this be a source of the problem as well?


 What kind of problem(s) are you having?


----------



## maynerd

richsadams said:


> What kind of problem(s) are you having?


Sorry I'm not having problems I'm just reading other people's issues. I was trying to figure out why they might be having problems.


----------



## oldnacl

I would respectfully disagree with not need ing a UPS for TVs - especially if the TV is a recent projector model. "Blips" and power outages can be damaging, especially if the projector bulb is hot and the cooling fan stops running.


----------



## maynerd

Heads up on the Apricorn DVD Xpander

Contacted Apricorn directly and asked what model hard drive that they use in their Xpander.

I asked about the 500gb version so the 750gb version may be different.

I was told that they use WD5000AAKS

This drive does not appear to be a 24/7 rated drive.

I was considering this drive but now I'm not so sure.


----------



## kylen

I bought the 500 Cavalry drive from NewEgg a month ago and everything works fine for the most part. 

However, the issue I am seeing is that every 3 or so days when I come home from work:
- the image will be frozen on the screen
- any attempts to change channel don't work
- any attempts to play a recorded show will give me a screen that says i don't get the channel, so nothing is recorded
- if I reboot the tivo (which takes forever), everything is fine--channels and same recorded programs that gave errors earlier now play fine

Is anyone else seeing this? Does anyone know what the issue would be? 

I don't think it would be a drive thing since I never power cycle the drive when I reboot the tivo, and it comes back up fine. Could it be a bad cable? I used the one that came with the Cavalry drive.

Thanks,
-Kyle


----------



## jtreid

kylen said:


> I bought the 500 Cavalry drive from NewEgg a month ago and everything works fine for the most part.
> 
> However, the issue I am seeing is that every 3 or so days when I come home from work:
> - the image will be frozen on the screen
> - any attempts to change channel don't work
> - any attempts to play a recorded show will give me a screen that says i don't get the channel, so nothing is recorded
> - if I reboot the tivo (which takes forever), everything is fine--channels and same recorded programs that gave errors earlier now play fine
> 
> Is anyone else seeing this? Does anyone know what the issue would be?
> 
> I don't think it would be a drive thing since I never power cycle the drive when I reboot the tivo, and it comes back up fine. Could it be a bad cable? I used the one that came with the Cavalry drive.
> 
> Thanks,
> -Kyle


I've in the past several days had freezes followed by GSOD followed by reboot. It happens almost everyday now. I can now tell when this is about to happen because the Tivo begins slowing down in response to the remote. Then it basically seems to ignore the remote. Then it will pause and play by itself. Sometimes, in this state, the green bar at the bottom stays on screen showing the Tivo as paused when, in fact, it is playing. This happens for several minutes until it freezes. I noticed when it freezes the display in the front is blank. This happened in the middle of a show the other night. After recovery, we went back to the show and where it was recording just before or during these events, the recording was extremely pixelated. Not like normal pixelation that others talk about while watching a show, but almost black and white pixels that seem smaller than the normal pixelation.

I've not changed or moved anything since I installed the FAP 750. There is no heat problem I can detect and I have had it for about 4-5 weeks now. Prior to the last few days, it ran flawlessly with the exception of one time half-way divorcing itself. See my previous post in this thread.

We've had some power outages lately and I'm beginning to suspect some drive corruption since the think seems to be constantly recording with over 370 suggestions on file. I don't want to lose my recordings. Is there a way to force the Tivo to do a drive scan or something?


----------



## rt1027

Just received and installed my MX-1/DB35. Unbelievably easy 20 min. job. The MX-1 is terrifically manufactured, a pleasure to look at its workmanship.

Only bump was re-securing the drive sled to the enclosure. I didn't have a magnatized phillips head (which would make the install effortless) but a small needle nose plier allowed me to align the securing screw.

The drive and fan are totally silent.

Thanks for everyones help.


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> I would respectfully disagree with not need ing a UPS for TVs - especially if the TV is a recent projector model. "Blips" and power outages can be damaging, especially if the projector bulb is hot and the cooling fan stops running.


 Ah, true...hadn't thought about projection TV's...or video projectors. My bad. 

We used to have one of those monster Mitsubishi projection TV's...when the power failed we didn't notice any problems. But good point none-the-less. :up:


----------



## richsadams

rt1027 said:


> Just received and installed my MX-1/DB35. Unbelievably easy 20 min. job. The MX-1 is terrifically manufactured, a pleasure to look at its workmanship.
> 
> Only bump was re-securing the drive sled to the enclosure. I didn't have a magnatized phillips head (which would make the install effortless) but a small needle nose plier allowed me to align the securing screw.
> 
> The drive and fan are totally silent.
> 
> Thanks for everyones help.


Congrats on getting things up and running!

Agreed that the sled screws and snapping the sled back into the enclosure are the MX-1's only downfall. I was afraid I'd break something while snapping it back in, but it worked. The two tiny sled screws are hard to deal with indeed. I must have dropped mine a half-dozen times each before I got them to thread. I noticed that they kind of glossed over that part of the installation process on their little video tutorial . But once that was done it has been a real pleasure to deal with. :up:


----------



## richsadams

kylen said:


> I bought the 500 Cavalry drive from NewEgg a month ago and everything works fine for the most part.
> 
> However, the issue I am seeing is that every 3 or so days when I come home from work:
> - the image will be frozen on the screen
> - any attempts to change channel don't work
> - any attempts to play a recorded show will give me a screen that says i don't get the channel, so nothing is recorded
> - if I reboot the tivo (which takes forever), everything is fine--channels and same recorded programs that gave errors earlier now play fine
> 
> Is anyone else seeing this? Does anyone know what the issue would be?
> 
> I don't think it would be a drive thing since I never power cycle the drive when I reboot the tivo, and it comes back up fine. Could it be a bad cable? I used the one that came with the Cavalry drive.
> 
> Thanks,
> -Kyle


 The Cavalry drives have been dissapointing for a number of people. They are even highlighted in #32 of the Series3 eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion which talks about the exact same problems you're having. A few have said they are working fine.

It certainly could be the eSATA cable though. First make sure the connections are snug at both ends. Also ensure that the cable is positioned away from any power source that you might have as there is evidence that poor cable shielding can cause signal corruption and reboots. If there's no improvement then you may want to pick up a new 1 meter eSATA II cable and give it a try.

If the cable doesn't reslove the issue I'd try returning the drive for a refund if possible and going with one of the suggested alternatives.

Keep us posted!


----------



## oldnacl

My Cavalry 500 again failed after replacing the Tripp-Lite cable with a SIIG. I was copying a program to a DVD and about an hour into the copy (I played the resulting DVD back to see what happened) the TiVo rebooted, reported it had lost connection with the external drive and then(since I wasn't there to respond to the question of whether to divorce the drive or not) went to a black screen with repeated clicking sounds until the recording ended. I unplugged the TiVo, then the external drive and restarted the TiVo and divorced it. Now I'm going to follow the same drill without any external drive and see if I can reproduce the problem. One thing is that it seems to always fail while copying a recorded show to a DVD recorder. Hmmm.
This has happened with two different DVD recorders connected, so I think I can rule out a problem with the DVD recorder.


----------



## gear

I installed a Seagate Barracuda 750GB in an Icydock enclosure. The install went flawless but within days drive was chirping a lot then went beserk and screeched to a halt. TiVo asked for a divorce and the judge granted it one.

Seagate was great about the warranty return and when the new one arrives I will try again.

Lost the season ending of L&O Criminal Intent but will look for its' rerun.


----------



## silentbob

richsadams said:


> I'd echo Spike 2k5's recommendation to run diagnostics on the drive. I'd also ensure that the eSATA cable is snug at both connections.


I'm beginning to think that this is the source of my problem, although it's not clear how I can fix it.

My TiVo was fine for about 18 hours yesterday and recorded a whole bunch of stuff. Then, sometime overnight, the dreaded "second drive not working" yellow screen appeared. It was sunny yesterday, so I can probably eliminate the storm theory.

At first, I rebooted successfully this morning. Then, I jiggled the eSATA cable on the back of the MX-1 slightly just to make sure that it was snug. It was, but as soon as I moved it the screen froze and the TiVo rebooted on its own. I got the yellow screen again, pushed the eSATA cable in as hard as I could, and rebooted successfully before leaving for work.

My best hope is that there isn't a problem with the DB35 drive, but rather the MX-1 eSATA cable port is very sensitive to any kind of movement. The cable is snug, but it seems like I may be dealing with random reboots going forward if the cable moves even a slight amount.


----------



## maynerd

silentbob said:


> I'm beginning to think that this is the source of my problem, although it's not clear how I can fix it.
> 
> My TiVo was fine for about 18 hours yesterday and recorded a whole bunch of stuff. Then, sometime overnight, the dreaded "second drive not working" yellow screen appeared. It was sunny yesterday, so I can probably eliminate the storm theory.
> 
> At first, I rebooted successfully this morning. Then, I jiggled the eSATA cable on the back of the MX-1 slightly just to make sure that it was snug. It was, but as soon as I moved it the screen froze and the TiVo rebooted on its own. I got the yellow screen again, pushed the eSATA cable in as hard as I could, and rebooted successfully before leaving for work.
> 
> My best hope is that there isn't a problem with the DB35 drive, but rather the MX-1 eSATA cable port is very sensitive to any kind of movement. The cable is snug, but it seems like I may be dealing with random reboots going forward if the cable moves even a slight amount.


I asked a question previously that was basically asking if anyone with a SATA only enclosure is having any issues. I am starting to wonder if the USB/esata enclosures are potential problems. Perhaps the USB is conflicting with the esata. I'm not sure though.

Anyone have a problem that has an Sata only enclosure?


----------



## richsadams

silentbob said:


> I'm beginning to think that this is the source of my problem, although it's not clear how I can fix it.
> 
> My TiVo was fine for about 18 hours yesterday and recorded a whole bunch of stuff. Then, sometime overnight, the dreaded "second drive not working" yellow screen appeared. It was sunny yesterday, so I can probably eliminate the storm theory.
> 
> At first, I rebooted successfully this morning. Then, I jiggled the eSATA cable on the back of the MX-1 slightly just to make sure that it was snug. It was, but as soon as I moved it the screen froze and the TiVo rebooted on its own. I got the yellow screen again, pushed the eSATA cable in as hard as I could, and rebooted successfully before leaving for work.
> 
> My best hope is that there isn't a problem with the DB35 drive, but rather the MX-1 eSATA cable port is very sensitive to any kind of movement. The cable is snug, but it seems like I may be dealing with random reboots going forward if the cable moves even a slight amount.


 It does indeed sound like an eSATA connection problem and probably not the drive...but most likely on the eSATA drive end of the setup.

I've moved our drive (MX-1/DB35) a few times...from one side of the shelf it's sitting on to the other, etc....and haven't experienced any issues.

There are a couple of choices. One option would be to replace the cable. Yours may simply have a poorly made connector or short in the wiring...not unheard of. You can pick up a new eSATA II cable at a local CE store (and return it if it didn't improve things.)

Or you could return the MX-1, cable and all for a replacement as it could be the port connection on the enclosure itself. Or by some perfect storm, both the port _and _ the cable. 

Keep us posted. :up:



maynerd said:


> I asked a question previously that was basically asking if anyone with a SATA only enclosure is having any issues. I am starting to wonder if the USB/esata enclosures are potential problems. Perhaps the USB is conflicting with the esata. I'm not sure though.
> 
> Anyone have a problem that has an Sata only enclosure?


 That's a good question. Again our MX-1 (which has an eSATA/USB output) hasn't displayed any issues, and silentbob's problem sounds like a bad connection...but that's certainly something to think about.


----------



## T-Shee

maynerd said:


> I asked a question previously that was basically asking if anyone with a SATA only enclosure is having any issues. I am starting to wonder if the USB/esata enclosures are potential problems. Perhaps the USB is conflicting with the esata. I'm not sure though.
> 
> Anyone have a problem that has an Sata only enclosure?


FYI - my MX-1 (Samsung HD-501LJ) has been running for 29 days now without the slightest problem. It's transparent to the "user experience" - no stutters, no hiccups, no sign at all that it's connected except for the increased storage capacity.

It's very, very quiet and runs cooler than I expected. Add me to the list of satisfied customers.


----------



## slimm

T-Shee said:


> FYI - my MX-1 (Samsung HD-501LJ) has been running for 29 days now without the slightest problem. It's transparent to the "user experience" - no stutters, no hiccups, no sign at all that it's connected except for the increased storage capacity.
> 
> It's very, very quiet and runs cooler than I expected. Add me to the list of satisfied customers.


Not even a hint of a problem with my MX-1/DB35 combo. :up:


----------



## Dajad

I'm happy to report two weeks in that my MX-1/750Gig DB35 is still working flawleslly and whisper quiet. For those having problems finding the MX-1, keep it up, its worth it to get a hassle free enclosure that is easy to set up. It took almost two weeks for me to find one too.

OKAY, What does GSOD stand for? Green Screen of Death? Guided Setup or Die? I know it has something to do with the external drive failing or something but I thought that was an orange screen. Enquiring minds wat to know.

...Dale


----------



## maynerd

Good to hear that those MX-1s are working fine. I'm waiting for mine to come in. So if it isn't the USB/Seta thing...what is it?

Bad cable?


----------



## mdobbins

I have been going strong without any problems for more than 3 weeks with an IntelliVault DT10 Raid unit and two Hitachi 500GB SATA II Model HDS725050KLA360 drives - 1TB of extra storage. The enclosure is eSATA and USB 2.0 capable. The unit shipped with its own eSATA cable - it seemed to "click" into place for the Tivo and the enclosure. Setup for RAID 0 striped and the kickstart 62 process were both without incident. I did not use the Hitachi disk tools to do any pre-conditioning of the drives. The enclosure is a little noisy due to the fan, but I have it behind my DLP television and the noise is muffled to the point of being inconspicuous. All-in-all, a very happy experience so far!


----------



## hizhonor

silentbob said:


> Uh-oh.
> 
> Things had been running flawlessly with my MX-1/DB35 combo for the past week. Then, this morning, I turned on the television to see a frozen image of Tony Soprano. As soon as I press the TiVo button on the remote, the screen goes dark and I get the yellow screen indicating that the second hard drive isn't operating correctly.
> 
> I reboot, and get the yellow screen again. Then I disconnect the MX-1, take out the hard drive, put it back in, and re-connect. The reboot works. But the system is sluggish, and 5 minutes later I get the yellow screen again. I try rebooting...
> 
> GSoD.
> 
> The instructions say not to do anything for three hours while the system tries to fix itself. My past experiences with the GSoD on the Series 2 are not good. What's the likely problem here?


Uh-oh is right. Similar issues here as well. Same hardware and I can only guess at the yellow screen. Seems my Samsung doesn't like the output resolution of the system generated screens. I get to see nothing until the THX stuff happens. Haven't found a resolution choice that gets me everything I want.

Given the time it takes to reboot, I'm assuming its a GSoD sequence of event. After 10 minutes, I'm back up and going. Never seems to fail when I'm watching. Only over night.

I'm going to futz with things this weekend to see if I can make it fail on demand or otherwise change the symptoms

Steve

*Update:*
Here it is a week later and the unit is performing fine. I reseated the cables at both ends and re-routed the cable away from all power cords. Judging from the short amount of time deleted shows stay in the deleted folder, I'm guessing I'm full up. I'm feeling pretty good about the stability of the drive upgrade now. Time will tell.


----------



## FrogGremlin

We seem to break into two groups: Those with no problems at all, and a number of us with exactly the same setup as the no-problem group who are experiencing sporadic lockups or reboots.

One symptom I have in common with several other posters is the occasional "You don't seem to get a signal on this channel" message when trying to view an already-recorded program, although (after a reboot) that program can be viewed with no problems.

I think this symptom might be the critical one - and that TiVo might even know what the root cause is, if only they would/could start talking to us openly. What has to happen for the TiVo to generate that incorrect message when trying to play back something from the eSATA drive? A bad eSATA signal? A flaky TiVo eSATA port?

I'd think that a disk-read error would generate a different message. Besides, I have trouble believing there are those many bad SCE drives, especially since the reboot (and "three hour" - really 10 minutes - wait) solves all of the problems (except, of course, for losing anything that was recording at reboot time). Has anyone with this problem solved it purely by running diagnostics on their drive or replacing the drive?

Personally, I've swapped one MX-1 cable with another, running the second cable along a very clean physical route, and checking connections very carefully - and the problem is still there.

Anyway, maybe we temporarily need another sticky thread devoted solely to this problem ...


----------



## gteague

in the interests of full disclosure, i've been posting about having great success with the fap750. i've been running full bore about 3 weeks now and i've only had 2 'glitches' (screen frozen, box unresponsive, had to be power-cycled) which i didn't feel needed to be reported due to:

1) we had 5 power outages which over-ran my 15 minute capacity ups in 2 days leading up to those freezes

2) i had overloaded my season pass manager with hd 'catchall' categories at the end of the list which caused 40-80 minute processing delays when changing wishlist items. removing just those half-dozen items decreased those delays down to less than 60 seconds

i haven't had the least bit of trouble (i've never seen the '... no signal' message at all) since these 2 items have been resolved. the fap750 is still noiseless and doesn't run worryingly warm out in the open with 80-84 deg ambient temperature.

/guy


----------



## richsadams

FrogGremlin said:


> We seem to break into two groups: Those with no problems at all, and a number of us with exactly the same setup as the no-problem group who are experiencing sporadic lockups or reboots.
> 
> One symptom I have in common with several other posters is the occasional "You don't seem to get a signal on this channel" message when trying to view an already-recorded program, although (after a reboot) that program can be viewed with no problems.
> 
> I think this symptom might be the critical one - and that TiVo might even know what the root cause is, if only they would/could start talking to us openly. What has to happen for the TiVo to generate that incorrect message when trying to play back something from the eSATA drive? A bad eSATA signal? A flaky TiVo eSATA port?
> 
> I'd think that a disk-read error would generate a different message. Besides, I have trouble believing there are those many bad SCE drives, especially since the reboot (and "three hour" - really 10 minutes - wait) solves all of the problems (except, of course, for losing anything that was recording at reboot time). Has anyone with this problem solved it purely by running diagnostics on their drive or replacing the drive?
> 
> Personally, I've swapped one MX-1 cable with another, running the second cable along a very clean physical route, and checking connections very carefully - and the problem is still there.
> 
> Anyway, maybe we temporarily need another sticky thread devoted solely to this problem ...


 Before we diagnose this...a quick question.

Are you using an HDMI connection? If so does it go directly from TiVo to your TV or through a home theater (HT)?

Thanks!


----------



## richsadams

gteague said:


> in the interests of full disclosure, i've been posting about having great success with the fap750. i've been running full bore about 3 weeks now and i've only had 2 'glitches' (screen frozen, box unresponsive, had to be power-cycled) which i didn't feel needed to be reported due to:
> 
> 1) we had 5 power outages which over-ran my 15 minute capacity ups in 2 days leading up to those freezes
> 
> 2) i had overloaded my season pass manager with hd 'catchall' categories at the end of the list which caused 40-80 minute processing delays when changing wishlist items. removing just those half-dozen items decreased those delays down to less than 60 seconds
> 
> i haven't had the least bit of trouble (i've never seen the '... no signal' message at all) since these 2 items have been resolved. the fap750 is still noiseless and doesn't run worryingly warm out in the open with 80-84 deg ambient temperature.
> 
> /guy


 Good info. Others have noted that lengthy SP's and wish lists can cause all sorts of delays. Ours seems to slow down at about 50 or 60 SP's when we go to shuffle things around.

Glad to hear that the FAP750 is soldiering along! :up:


----------



## maynerd

gteague said:


> 2) i had overloaded my season pass manager with hd 'catchall' categories at the end of the list which caused 40-80 minute processing delays when changing wishlist items. removing just those half-dozen items decreased those delays down to less than 60 seconds


What is this HD 'catchall' thing you speak of? Are you saying that it would take 40 minutes to make a change to your wishlist?


----------



## richsadams

Dajad said:


> I'm happy to report two weeks in that my MX-1/750Gig DB35 is still working flawleslly and whisper quiet. For those having problems finding the MX-1, keep it up, its worth it to get a hassle free enclosure that is easy to set up. It took almost two weeks for me to find one too.
> 
> OKAY, What does GSOD stand for? Green Screen of Death? Guided Setup or Die? I know it has something to do with the external drive failing or something but I thought that was an orange screen. Enquiring minds wat to know.
> 
> ...Dale


 We're so acronym oriented around here we forget that some of it is just B.S. 

GSOD = Green Screen of Death. It's a play on Microsoft Windows' "Blue Screen of Death". It's actually a warning screen that TiVo displays when it has encountered a "serious problem" and needs time to rectify it...up to three hours. (Although most find that it only takes a few minutes before it automatically reboots the system.)










The GSOD allows TiVo the time to make necessary modifications to the system to deal with some of the problems (usually locking out bad sectors on a HDD).

Now that you have the 404 on the GSOD, you're a VIP!


----------



## gteague

maynerd said:


> What is this HD 'catchall' thing you speak of? Are you saying that it would take 40 minutes to make a change to your wishlist?


i opened a thread to ask about it several days ago here:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=355097

basically, i had the bright idea to try to improve on tivo suggestions by placing wishlists like the following at the end of my season pass manager list, thinking that these would get recorded before tivo suggestions kick in:

hd/comedy/sitcom
hd/movies/fantasy
hd/science&nature/animals
hd/documentary

evidently, the processing needed--whether hardware or software-related--to index these last few items was sorely lacking and ballooned a normal one minute wait time to a one hour wait time.

just the addition of a 'favor hd content' pref in tivo suggestions would help my viewing quite a bit.

/guy


----------



## donaudio

I have an FAP 750 hooked up. The installation ran without a hitch and it worked well for about 2 weeks. Now all I get is constant rebooting. I did a divorce and added an external fan and did the marriage without any trouble. Now I keep getting reboots. Don


----------



## FrogGremlin

richsadams said:


> Before we diagnose this...a quick question.
> 
> Are you using an HDMI connection? If so does it go directly from TiVo to your TV or through a home theater (HT)?
> 
> Thanks!


HDMI, directly to a Sony A2000. I've run the Series 3 with this connection for nearly 9 months with no problems until I added the eSATA drive.


----------



## richsadams

gteague said:


> i opened a thread to ask about it several days ago here:
> 
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=355097
> 
> basically, i had the bright idea to try to improve on tivo suggestions by placing wishlists like the following at the end of my season pass manager list, thinking that these would get recorded before tivo suggestions kick in:
> 
> hd/comedy/sitcom
> hd/movies/fantasy
> hd/science&nature/animals
> hd/documentary
> 
> evidently, the processing needed--whether hardware or software-related--to index these last few items was sorely lacking and ballooned a normal one minute wait time to a one hour wait time.
> 
> just the addition of a 'favor hd content' pref in tivo suggestions would help my viewing quite a bit.
> 
> /guy


 Maybe it's me, but it seems like any time HD is involved it takes TiVo longer to deal with it. I could understand that with recorded programs due to their large size. However even basic searches using the "HD" category slows things way down. I'd only be speculating but it seems like TiVo segregates HD information somehow, causing it longer to process requests. But I have the patience of a gnat according to my wife so it's probably just me.


----------



## richsadams

FrogGremlin said:


> HDMI, directly to a Sony A2000.


 Okay that's possibly a "good" sign. I think we're quick to suspect that there's a problem with the eSATA drive because that's probably the most recent change we've made, but there are other areas that may need a look. The fact that you're seeing the "You don't seem to get a signal on this channel" message and _not _ getting automatic reboots causes me to think that the problem may lie elsewhere.

Problems like you're experiencing can also result from a bad HDMI connection. Try connecting TiVo directly to your TV with the component or the RCA composite video outputs to determine if that resolves the problem.

I could go into boring details, but I won't here. Just know that the HDMI connection is a constant two-way feed. If the signal is corrupted or interrupted it can cause issues that can result in a loss of programming plus there can be problems with the HDCP (High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection) signal to boot.

Each time TiVo is rebooted it "reads" the HDMI connection (if one is attached) and sets the HDCP coding. (You can check it out in TiVo's system info - 2nd screen under "HDMI Status".) Rebooting TiVo may temporarily "clean up" your HDMI connection.

So there can be issues with the HDMI setup...either with the cable itself or with the components which can include TiVo, the TV or a HT receiver. Analog (component and composite) video connections do not carry the HDCP signal nor are they as prone to signal corruption. Many say they can't see a difference between the PQ of HDMI and component. There's a good article on that subject here.

If everything seems to work fine using an analog video connection direct from TiVo to the TV Id then start taking a look at the HDMI connections, cable(s), etc.

That may or may not solve your problem, but it's another possibility besides the eSATA drive.

Bottom line...I would certainly ensure everything about the eSATA connection is good for starters (snug fit, good cable, etc.) as that seems to be the biggest issue; then look to other remedies.

I doubt if well hear anything from TiVo on this, but hope that helps and let us know how it goes.


----------



## richsadams

donaudio said:


> I have an FAP 750 hooked up. The installation ran without a hitch and it worked well for about 2 weeks. Now all I get is constant rebooting. I did a divorce and added an external fan and did the marriage without any trouble. Now I keep getting reboots. Don


 Sounds like an eSATA connection issue...which FAP750's are becoming famous for.

Check out the excellent original FAQ and Troubleshooting post, particularly #3 under Troubleshooting.


----------



## richsadams

Geeze! Looks like I'm the only one posting here!  I'll shut up for now.


----------



## gteague

richsadams said:


> Maybe it's me, but it seems like any time HD is involved it takes TiVo longer to deal with it. I could understand that with recorded programs due to their large size. However even basic searches using the "HD" category slows things way down. I'd only be speculating but it seems like TiVo segregates HD information somehow, causing it longer to process requests. But I have the patience of a gnat according to my wife so it's probably just me.


no, it's not just you. anyone can create a category wishlist search and compare how long it take to display upcoming hd shows vs sd shows. i don't understand why searching for the 'hd' field seems to take 4 to 6 to 8 to 10 times as long. perhaps searching for the 'hd' field is some sort of kludge, i have no idea.

/guy


----------



## maynerd

richsadams said:


> Geeze! Looks like I'm the only one posting here!  I'll shut up for now.


You've been really helpful and even though I don't have my esata drive yet I hope you are still around helping people if I run into issues!

THANKS!


----------



## DN325Ci

Tonight I received the SIIG eSATA cable and used it to replace the one that came with the Antec MX-1 enclosure. Right away, I noticed a difference in the cable - the SIIG cable is significantly thicker. I'm not sure that thickness means anything, though.

Anyway, I'll see how it goes for a few days and see if the SIIG cable stops the re-booting issue.

Don


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> You've been really helpful and even though I don't have my esata drive yet I hope you are still around helping people if I run into issues!
> 
> THANKS!


----------



## richsadams

DN325Ci said:


> Tonight I received the SIIG eSATA cable and used it to replace the one that came with the Antec MX-1 enclosure. Right away, I noticed a difference in the cable - the SIIG cable is significantly thicker. I'm not sure that thickness means anything, though.
> 
> Anyway, I'll see how it goes for a few days and see if the SIIG cable stops the re-booting issue.
> 
> Don


 Cool. Thicker s/b better. Hope it cures what ails ya! :up:


----------



## oldnacl

I've now had the esata drive disconnected for 2 days, done several dubs to DVD and haven't had a glitch. I've tried the FAP 750 with a monoprice cable, a no-name that came with an enclosure cable, a tripp-lite cable and a SIIG cable. I've tried a Cavalry 500 with all those cables. I haven't yet stressed my Rosewill case with Seagate Barracuda 320 GB drive and perhaps I will, but I'm really getting bored with this experience. In all the cases mentioned above, I've seen GSODs around the second day after adding the eSATA drive. One thing I'm doing that I haven't heard anyone else mention, is a lot of dubbing from the TiVo to a standalone DVD recorder. All the failures I've experienced have been while doing a copy.


----------



## moxie1617

I've only dubbed four movies since installing MX-1/500GB DB35 combo on 5/25. Target is a panny ES-10 using S-video. Don't know if that is alot or not, methinks not. However, no problems yet. If this combo starts blowing up I hope it doesn't wait until the fall. Until then I'm recording a lot of HD PBS programming trying to exercise the combo.


----------



## 1283

oldnacl said:


> One thing I'm doing that I haven't heard anyone else mention, is a lot of dubbing from the TiVo to a standalone DVD recorder. All the failures I've experienced have been while doing a copy.


That's exactly the same as playing back the recorded programs. Unless there is an issue with EMI, there is no way an external DVD recorder can affect the TiVo's operation.


----------



## oldnacl

c3 said:


> That's exactly the same as playing back the recorded programs. Unless there is an issue with EMI, there is no way an external DVD recorder can affect the TiVo's operation.


While I don't argue the comment above, I find it interesting that I've not had any problems watching recorded programs to date. All failures occured when recording to a DVD was in progress - and I used 2 different DVD recorders over the past few weeks. Also, the failures occur with the TV turned off as I generally turn it off after I begin a recording. I'm connected to the TV via component and (currently) to a Panasonic DMR-EZ27V recorder by S-video.
I hooked up a Rosewill USB/eSATA case with a Seagate Barracuda 320 GB drive inside using a SIIG cable this afternoon This had been used without problem for several months on a SA 8300 HD STB that I had before buying the TiVo. We'll see if there are failures in the next couple days. After that I have one other case, a Sun Bright USB/eSATA with a 250GB Maxtor inside to try before my FAP 750 is returned under warranty, hopefully in a week or so. If I can't get any of these combinations to work, I'm buying a 750 DB35 and putting it inside. Note too, that all these case combinations work fine connected to a variety of PCs / Macs although the FAP did show 3 errors in the logs after running scan disk with fix errors selected (so I shipped it back to Seagate).


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> While I don't argue the comment above, I find it interesting that I've not had any problems watching recorded programs to date. All failures occured when recording to a DVD was in progress - and I used 2 different DVD recorders over the past few weeks. <snip>


 That is really bizarre!  It seems likely that if you were able to transfer programs from TiVo to your DVD recorder without any problems before you added an eSATA drive and now you can't...that logically it has something to do with the addition of the drive. But I can't imagine why. That's not helpful is it? 

Once you've tried connecting things with various cables and changing out enclosures, etc. I for one would be really interested in what you determine to be the problem or what you did to resolve it at the very least.

I hope you can figure this out and thanks for keeping us up to speed. :up:


----------



## FrogGremlin

oldnacl said:


> While I don't argue the comment above, I find it interesting that I've not had any problems watching recorded programs to date. All failures occured when recording to a DVD was in progress.


I don't find this surprising at all. It fits right in with the false "It seems you don't get this channel" messages I've noted earlier, i.e., it seems that the TiVo continues to successfully record onto the eSATA drive, but for some reason loses the ability to fetch recently-recorded data from it (until after a reboot). If it weren't for the fact that some folks seem to be having NO problems, I'd be starting to suspect the TiVo is temporarily losing track of how it's encrypted the externally-stored data.


----------



## richsadams

FrogGremlin said:


> I don't find this surprising at all. It fits right in with the false "It seems you don't get this channel" messages I've noted earlier, i.e., it seems that the TiVo continues to successfully record onto the eSATA drive, but for some reason loses the ability to fetch recently-recorded data from it (until after a reboot). If it weren't for the fact that some folks seem to be having NO problems, I'd be starting to suspect the TiVo is temporarily losing track of how it's encrypted the externally-stored data.


 It would be interesting to determine if the programs causing the "problems" are actually located on the external drive or the "A" drive.

I can tell when programs are being recorded on my eSATA drive as the light on the enclosure flickers...and if I put my ear to it I can hear the HDD working. But that's about the only way to know which program is where as far as I can tell.

Or, perhaps as you're suggesting, it's all a matter of indexing and it really doesn't matter where the recorded program is located...that some TiVo's are having a hard time keeping up as it were.

We haven't had any problems to date (eSATA drive installed for more than a month now), but I haven't tried to record a program to an outside source.

I agree though; recording a program on a VCR or DVD recorder is (or should be) no different than simply playing it on T.V.


----------



## tomlewis

Just a note to try and help you guys pin this down. I have had the Cavalry 500 GB installed for 3 weeks with just the cable that came with it. I have suggestions turned on so the TiVo is recording on both tuners almost constantly. I send recordings to my DVD recorder quite often, and have had no problems what-so-ever (knock on wood). No re-boots or messages about unreceived channels. I've even done this while receiving a download from Unbox. I wish we could figure out what the common denominator is among those having the problems.


----------



## richsadams

tomlewis said:


> Just a note to try and help you guys pin this down. I have had the Cavalry 500 GB installed for 3 weeks with just the cable that came with it. I have suggestions turned on so the TiVo is recording on both tuners almost constantly. I send recordings to my DVD recorder quite often, and have had no problems what-so-ever (knock on wood). No re-boots or messages about unreceived channels. I've even done this while receiving a download from Unbox. I wish we could figure out what the common denominator is among those having the problems.


 Cheerz for that Tom. Its always good to know others are doing well. I think we tend to focus on a problem and begin thinking its wide-spread.

I suspect that those having an eSATA/DVD recorder problem are very few...perhaps just the one that mentioned it hereso it may just be coincidental to the new drive installation. There are probably a number like you happily going about their business with no need to visit the forums because there are no problems to speak of. It is a curious situation though.


----------



## NOD

an FYI -- my local Best Buy has the Antec MX-1 on sale today for 59 bucks. I took the opportunity to get a 2nd one to match my 2nd series 3, which arrived on Friday.

Now if I could just get as good a deal on a second 1TB Hitachi as I got on the first one.


----------



## oldnacl

richsadams said:


> It would be interesting to determine if the programs causing the "problems" are actually located on the external drive or the "A" drive.
> 
> I can tell when programs are being recorded on my eSATA drive as the light on the enclosure flickers...and if I put my ear to it I can hear the HDD working. But that's about the only way to know which program is where as far as I can tell.
> 
> Or, perhaps as you're suggesting, it's all a matter of indexing and it really doesn't matter where the recorded program is located...that some TiVo's are having a hard time keeping up as it were.
> 
> We haven't had any problems to date (eSATA drive installed for more than a month now), but I haven't tried to record a program to an outside source.
> 
> I agree though; recording a program on a VCR or DVD recorder is (or should be) no different than simply playing it on T.V.


On the enclosure I have connected to the TiVo now, I can tell if it's in use as I have an obvious flickering "busy" light. As we speak, I'm dubbing a movie to DVD and the external drive indicates it's busy and the TiVo doen't indicate recording activity. If this external drive exhibits problems I plan to set up a condition (that I so far haven't monitored) to see whether the problem occurs when the Tivo is recording (on one or both tuners) AND it's dubbing to DVD at the same time. It will prolly be a while before I have the time to watch the unit with these conditions, but if I learn anything I'll report it. So far no failed dubs since I attached the Rosewill enclosure yesterday, but I did get a flawed recording on the Tivo where a scheduled movie was recorded in 2 parts with a large gap missing in the middle. No dubbing was going on at the time and looking at the beginnings and ends of the partial recordings gave me no clue what happened. Many thanks for the suggestions and coments to all, especially richsadams who's really on top of this.
Puzzled in FL.
BTW, I postponed buying a second TiVo until I resolve this issue - hopefully there will be another rebate.


----------



## ckelly33

My FAP has both USB and eSata inputs. I haven't tried, but has anyone tried to connect their external HD to a laptop simultaneously and remove files to the laptop. I know it is a stretch to think you could...but I figure that someone that reads this has tried it.


----------



## 1283

ckelly33 said:


> My FAP has both USB and eSata inputs. I haven't tried, but has anyone tried to connect their external HD to a laptop simultaneously and remove files to the laptop. I know it is a stretch to think you could...but I figure that someone that reads this has tried it.


Even if a PC can read the TiVo file (it cannot), only one interface can be used at a time.


----------



## jtreid

jtreid said:


> I've in the past several days had freezes followed by GSOD followed by reboot. It happens almost everyday now. I can now tell when this is about to happen because the Tivo begins slowing down in response to the remote. Then it basically seems to ignore the remote. Then it will pause and play by itself. Sometimes, in this state, the green bar at the bottom stays on screen showing the Tivo as paused when, in fact, it is playing. This happens for several minutes until it freezes. I noticed when it freezes the display in the front is blank. This happened in the middle of a show the other night. After recovery, we went back to the show and where it was recording just before or during these events, the recording was extremely pixelated. Not like normal pixelation that others talk about while watching a show, but almost black and white pixels that seem smaller than the normal pixelation.
> 
> I've not changed or moved anything since I installed the FAP 750. There is no heat problem I can detect and I have had it for about 4-5 weeks now. Prior to the last few days, it ran flawlessly with the exception of one time half-way divorcing itself. See my previous post in this thread.
> 
> We've had some power outages lately and I'm beginning to suspect some drive corruption since the think seems to be constantly recording with over 370 suggestions on file. I don't want to lose my recordings. Is there a way to force the Tivo to do a drive scan or something?


UPDATE: Since the S3 was rebooting every night when we were watching a program, I decided one night to just restart the system when I got home from work. This way we would hopefully get through whatever we would watch. Well, 3 days have passed and no more freezing, sugglishness or rebooting (knock on wood). Something seems to have magically fixed itself. I did not move any cables or anything. Magic!

By the way, thanks to the clarifier of GSOD = GREEN screen of death. I thought it was a GRAY screen of death because everytime the Tivo rebooted the screen would go gray for several seconds before I got the powering up screen. I've never seen the GreenSOD. I've also never seen the message about not getting the channel either.

P.S. I picked up an APC 1250VA UPS this weekend at SamsClub for $121. No more power glitches for this S3.


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## mikesweeney

can anyone speak to this drive/enclosure?

http://www.egoodz.com/product.asp?pf_id=3500SASPWO_WD5000


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## DN325Ci

An update: A quick note for those who were interested, after two hard days of S3 usage it seems that simply changing the eSATA cable from the one supplied with the Antec MX-1 to the SIIG 1 meter cable has made the difference. My S3 has not rebooted since I made the change.

I'd like to get a few more days on it before judging it a success, but my initial take away is that (as many have said) the whole external eSATA arrangement is extremely sensitive to the cable. Even the supplied MX-1 cable, which has been widely reported as a good one, may have some variability that can cause malfunction.

Don


----------



## maynerd

DN325Ci said:


> An update: A quick note for those who were interested, after two hard days of S3 usage it seems that simply changing the eSATA cable from the one supplied with the Antec MX-1 to the SIIG 1 meter cable has made the difference. My S3 has not rebooted since I made the change.
> 
> I'd like to get a few more days on it before judging it a success, but my initial take away is that (as many have said) the whole external eSATA arrangement is extremely sensitive to the cable. Even the supplied MX-1 cable, which has been widely reported as a good one, may have some variability that can cause malfunction.
> 
> Don


Good to know thanks!


----------



## richsadams

mikesweeney said:


> can anyone speak to this drive/enclosure?
> 
> http://www.egoodz.com/product.asp?pf_id=3500SASPWO_WD5000


 Hey Mike. That drive appears to be an old, first generation SATA/150 drive. In the description it lists "SATA transfer rate up to 1500mbps". Current SATA II drives have a TR up to 3.0GB (or 3000mbps).

I don't know if the lower transfer speed would cause a problem but the ability to support multiple outstanding requests is likely important to TiVo if/when it is recording two programs and playing back a third and some or all of the input/output data was coming from the external drive. I dont believe SATA/150 (also known as SATA 1) drives had that capacity.

The other concern I'd have is with the supplied cable as it is almost surely an eSATA I cable which will not work with TiVo.

Its a good price, but probably not a wise buy for use with your TiVo S3.


----------



## richsadams

DN325Ci said:


> An update: A quick note for those who were interested, after two hard days of S3 usage it seems that simply changing the eSATA cable from the one supplied with the Antec MX-1 to the SIIG 1 meter cable has made the difference. My S3 has not rebooted since I made the change.
> 
> I'd like to get a few more days on it before judging it a success, but my initial take away is that (as many have said) the whole external eSATA arrangement is extremely sensitive to the cable. Even the supplied MX-1 cable, which has been widely reported as a good one, may have some variability that can cause malfunction.
> 
> Don


 Cheers for that Don. If ours ever exhibits any issues I'll be installing a new cable first thing. Just to be safe I think I'll order one as a backup.

Thanks again! :up:


----------



## juanian

richsadams said:


> That is really bizarre!  It seems likely that if you were able to transfer programs from TiVo to your DVD recorder without any problems before you added an eSATA drive and now you can't...that logically it has something to do with the addition of the drive. But I can't imagine why. That's not helpful is it?
> 
> Once you've tried connecting things with various cables and changing out enclosures, etc. I for one would be really interested in what you determine to be the problem or what you did to resolve it at the very least.
> 
> I hope you can figure this out and thanks for keeping us up to speed. :up:


Although I don't have an S3 (so I can't speak specifically about these issues), I have seen problems with cable movement (such as with USB cables) causing read/write errors with drives. With some cables (or connectors), just slight downward pressure can cause a USB cable to have a problem.

Now, if there *is* a potential cable connection problem, the vibration from a DVD recorder (when a disk is spinning in it) *might* just be enough to cause an intermittent error on a cable that might be susceptible to movement. (Yea, it is a stretch, but the possibility exists.) So, there *is* a possibility that recording a DVD could increase the chance of a cable connection problem.

Not something I would try if I had lots of programs on an eSATA drive, but someone (with an urge for adventure!) might look into pressing down (or up) on a cable end to see if a drive problem can be generated. I would think that a problem would occur fairly quickly (assuming that something, like a recorded show, is being read from the drive). *WARNING NOTE:* Attempting this could cause the corruption of data on the drive, requiring a reinitialization (hopefully just a quickie divorce (of the drive, not your spouse  )).


----------



## richsadams

juanian said:


> Although I don't have an S3 (so I can't speak specifically about these issues), I have seen problems with cable movement (such as with USB cables) causing read/write errors with drives. With some cables (or connectors), just slight downward pressure can cause a USB cable to have a problem.
> 
> Now, if there *is* a potential cable connection problem, the vibration from a DVD recorder (when a disk is spinning in it) *might* just be enough to cause an intermittent error on a cable that might be susceptible to movement. (Yea, it is a stretch, but the possibility exists.) So, there *is* a possibility that recording a DVD could increase the chance of a cable connection problem.
> 
> Not something I would try if I had lots of programs on an eSATA drive, but someone (with an urge for adventure!) might look into pressing down (or up) on a cable end to see if a drive problem can be generated. I would think that a problem would occur fairly quickly (assuming that something, like a recorded show, is being read from the drive). *WARNING NOTE:* Attempting this could cause the corruption of data on the drive, requiring a reinitialization (hopefully just a quickie divorce (of the drive, not your spouse  )).


 Thanks Juan...good info.

It's becoming very clear that even the slightest interruption of the connection from an eSATA drive to TiVo is going to cause problems. *Ensuring all of the cables going to/from TiVo are good and that the connections are secure...and stay that way is very important.*

I'm also starting to suspect that when new eSATA drives are installed that other connections; HDMI, etc. may become problematic simply from the movement of the TiVo box. I always try to double-check every connection when I move components around. With the spaghetti of cables and cords going to and from things it's very easy for some of them to come loose...even on equipment that isn't being moved as the cables tend to tug on each other unexpectedly. We try to tidy our maze of cables up with zip ties and all, but it seems like every time we pull something out of our HT a bundle of cables get moved around and some connector or other has to be pushed back into place.


----------



## bkdtv

I updated FAQ #5 to reflect the availability of the new MFSLive V1.2 CD, which supports eSATA expansion on Series3 units with upgraded internal drives.


----------



## oldnacl

juanian said:


> Although I don't have an S3 (so I can't speak specifically about these issues), I have seen problems with cable movement (such as with USB cables) causing read/write errors with drives. With some cables (or connectors), just slight downward pressure can cause a USB cable to have a problem.
> 
> Now, if there *is* a potential cable connection problem, the vibration from a DVD recorder (when a disk is spinning in it) *might* just be enough to cause an intermittent error on a cable that might be susceptible to movement. (Yea, it is a stretch, but the possibility exists.) So, there *is* a possibility that recording a DVD could increase the chance of a cable connection problem.
> 
> Not something I would try if I had lots of programs on an eSATA drive, but someone (with an urge for adventure!) might look into pressing down (or up) on a cable end to see if a drive problem can be generated. I would think that a problem would occur fairly quickly (assuming that something, like a recorded show, is being read from the drive). *WARNING NOTE:* Attempting this could cause the corruption of data on the drive, requiring a reinitialization (hopefully just a quickie divorce (of the drive, not your spouse  )).


I'm quite sure it's not cable movement causing the problem and I have tried multiple cables, including those mentioned specifically as working well and or best. Vibration is also somewhat unlikely as the drive is located on a different shelf than the recorder (although both are on the same piece of furniture). I'm inclined to think more along the lines of too much going on at once, as in recording two programs while playing one, especially if all the HDD activity is on the external drive, as I suspect it is. I'll work on confirming whether that's connected to the problem next week when I have more time.


----------



## surfnutbry

I have the Seagate DB35 500Gb in the Antec MX-1 with the original MX-1 Sata cable and lately my Tivo has been locking up about once a day usually around 2:00 am. When the Tivo locks up the clock stops, the screen freezes and the remote is useless. I then have to pull the plug. I also have had the missing video error that is solved by a reboot and the GSoD a couple of times. The HDTivo has never been as reliable as my Series one Tivo, but I have been assuming it had something to do with the cable cards. Now with the external drive it seems even more unreliable. My Tivo and the external hard drive are both plugged into a UPS so the problem should not be power related. I used Seatools to check both hard drives. Both drives passed the long test, but the internal Western Digital drive reported that it had a SMART over temp error of 108 degrees in the past. The DB35 500Gb reported a max temp of 48 degrees. I don't know if my locking up problems are related to the internal drive overheating but it is possible. I don't have any clue as to why the hard drive may be overheating other than a possible fan issue. The next time my Tivo locks up I am going to check if the fan is running and if the drive is hot to the touch. I also have ordered the SIIG eSATA cable in hopes of preventing lockups.

Does any one know how to remove SMART errors so I can keep track of how hot this drive gets from now on?


Bryan


----------



## richsadams

surfnutbry said:


> I have the Seagate DB35 500Gb in the Antec MX-1 with the original MX-1 Sata cable and lately my Tivo has been locking up about once a day usually around 2:00 am. When the Tivo locks up the clock stops, the screen freezes and the remote is useless. I then have to pull the plug. I also have had the missing video error that is solved by a reboot and the GSoD a couple of times. The HDTivo has never been as reliable as my Series one Tivo, but I have been assuming it had something to do with the cable cards. Now with the external drive it seems even more unreliable. My Tivo and the external hard drive are both plugged into a UPS so the problem should not be power related. I used Seatools to check both hard drives. Both drives passed the long test, but the internal Western Digital drive reported that it had a SMART over temp error of 108 degrees in the past. The DB35 500Gb reported a max temp of 48 degrees. I don't know if my locking up problems are related to the internal drive overheating but it is possible. I don't have any clue as to why the hard drive may be overheating other than a possible fan issue. The next time my Tivo locks up I am going to check if the fan is running and if the drive is hot to the touch. I also have ordered the SIIG eSATA cable in hopes of preventing lockups.
> 
> Does any one know how to remove SMART errors so I can keep track of how hot this drive gets from now on?
> 
> Bryan


 I'm not sure about the SMART errors...but that does sound like a problem and may be coincidental to the addition of the eSATA drive. If you're getting the GSOD it indicates there is a problem with a HDD.

It sounds like the first thing you did was to ensure that your eSATA cable connections were snug and that the cable was not running near any power source. There's an earlier report of a bad eSATA cable that came with an MX-1. It's the first one but cables can be defective. Your new cable may clear up the problem.

Also, 2:00 a.m. is generally when TiVo would perform a remote reboot for updates. It's possible that it's trying to reboot but running into a drive problem which it can't rectify causing it to freeze up. If the update wasn't successful it would continue to try daily until it is successful.

If I'm not mistaken the TiVo fan should be running 24/7. Is that not the case for yours?

Keep us posted. :up:


----------



## V7Goose

Just a brief update - my FAP750 is still running fine after three weeks. I do a LOT of HD channel recording and then dubbing these movies to DVD (non HD copy, of course, but still an excellent PQ), and my recently deleted folder seems to be holding steady around 75 - 80 items, so I'd guess both drives are full. Not one single error after resolving initial marriage problems by re-seating the cable and making sure it was hanging with NO side twists or pressure to strain the connection.

On a related note, just my observation that the huge amount of problems we have all seen and reported in these threads make it pretty darn clear to me why TiVo has not and will not officially support the eSATA drives until someone gets it bulletproof. This stuff we are dealing with will put the average user over the deep end! Good luck all.


----------



## BruceShultes

I finally got my new Antec MX-1 and Hitachi 1TB drive to be recognized by my S3. 

Maybe I am just dense, but I couldn't get it to work when removing and re-inserting the power cable to the S3. 

After a few choice words, while I tried about four times, I decided to just get up off the floor and see if it would work with a menu re-start. 

That worked fine. You might want to modify the initial instructions page to say that the power only needs to be off to the S3 while the esata cable is connected.


----------



## 1283

BTW, bestbuy.com is selling the Hitachi 1TB for $320.


----------



## maynerd

V7Goose said:


> Just a brief update - my FAP750 is still running fine after three weeks. I do a LOT of HD channel recording and then dubbing these movies to DVD (non HD copy, of course, but still an excellent PQ), and my recently deleted folder seems to be holding steady around 75 - 80 items, so I'd guess both drives are full. Not one single error after resolving initial marriage problems by re-seating the cable and making sure it was hanging with NO side twists or pressure to strain the connection.
> 
> On a related note, just my observation that the huge amount of problems we have all seen and reported in these threads make it pretty darn clear to me why TiVo has not and will not officially support the eSATA drives until someone gets it bulletproof. This stuff we are dealing with will put the average user over the deep end! Good luck all.


Interesting. Glad to hear it is working for you. How noisy is the FAP?


----------



## juanian

oldnacl said:


> I'm quite sure it's not cable movement causing the problem and I have tried multiple cables, including those mentioned specifically as working well and or best. Vibration is also somewhat unlikely as the drive is located on a different shelf than the recorder (although both are on the same piece of furniture). I'm inclined to think more along the lines of too much going on at once, as in recording two programs while playing one, especially if all the HDD activity is on the external drive, as I suspect it is. I'll work on confirming whether that's connected to the problem next week when I have more time.


If the problem was excessive HDD activity, I don't think there would be any difference between watching a recorded show, and using 'Save to VCR' to write a DVD. So, something else must be influencing the situation.

To further the investigation -- if you are watching a show from your TiVo (and, lets say recording two shows), has the problem occurred? If you are watching a DVD in your DVD recorder (pre-recorded, or one you have recorded yourself), has the problem occurred?

The more activity to the drive, the greater chance that something might get corrupted. Interference with signals on the cable can come from many sources (as previously mentioned); poorly shielded cables (and cables with cheap connectors) will be more susceptible to interference (and other factors) than better cables.

Good quality cables (and the shorter the better) should reduce signal issues. (Anyone who had a Mac and dealt with hooking up devices in the ever-finicky SCSI days can agree!) If a hard drive enclosure vendor ships their drive with cheap cables, it will bite them in the end, because the reputation of their cases will suffer, even if the case might be just fine. So, once the market matures, you should be able to rely on cables that come with the better cases. But for now, beware of cases being shipped with less-perfect cables (and prepare to purchase a quality cable separately).


----------



## patroldawg

I now have the MX-1 hooked up and running smoothly for the past 3 weeks or so, but the question is where is all the heat going? it's sucking in plenty of cool air, but i do not feel an output of heat exhaust as i had anticipated.


----------



## Nethead28

OK - drive finally arrived.

Seagate 750 with MX-1

Hooked all up and everything went well first try.

131Hours of HD - [email protected]!

Anyway - I used the cable that came with the MX-1 - should I change this? I thought this was an OK cable but I read a couple of post where people have replaced this cable because of rebooting ??? PLEASE ADVISE - Thanks.

Will post any issues.


----------



## richsadams

patroldawg said:


> I now have the MX-1 hooked up and running smoothly for the past 3 weeks or so, but the question is where is all the heat going? it's sucking in plenty of cool air, but i do not feel an output of heat exhaust as i had anticipated.


 Ours runs fairly cool too. HDD's only heat up when they are being used. If it's not recording anything at the time there shouldn't be much hot air coming out. We have a Seagate DB35 in our MX-1 and the enclosure is warm to the touch but never hot and I've never noticed any hot air coming out of the enclosure. I'd only worry if it were the other way around.


----------



## richsadams

Nethead28 said:


> OK - drive finally arrived.
> 
> Seagate 750 with MX-1
> 
> Hooked all up and everything went well first try.
> 
> 131Hours of HD - [email protected]!
> 
> Anyway - I used the cable that came with the MX-1 - should I change this? I thought this was an OK cable but I read a couple of post where people have replaced this cable because of rebooting ??? PLEASE ADVISE - Thanks.
> 
> Will post any issues.


 Congrats! Now you can go on vacation and not miss a thing! :up:

We've used the MX-1 supplied cable for over a month now with no problems. I was thinking about ordering a "backup" but haven't gotten around to it. I might not either...the odds of some bad cables showing up now and then are pretty normal I'd think.

Enjoy!


----------



## moraga695

I've got an S3 already modified with an internal 750GB DB35. I've gotten an MX-1 and 500GB DB35 and am about to try the MFSLIVE method of adding it. Any tips would be very welcome!

Regarding cables, it seems that a quality cable is an absolute requirement. I've used SCSI cables from Granite Digital for a long time and they are excellent. So I checked their web site and they sell 3 and 6 foot eSATA cables. I've got one on order and will use that cable instead of the one that comes with the MX-1.

If anybody is interested, they are Granite Digital's part numbers 6161 for the 3 footer and 8731 for the 6 footer. Granite Digital stuff is expensive but you get what you pay for.


----------



## DCIFRTHS

c3 said:


> BTW, bestbuy.com is selling the Hitachi 1TB for $320.


Do you know if this is one of the quiet drives from Hitachi?

Thanks


----------



## 1283

DCIFRTHS said:


> Do you know if this is one of the quiet drives from Hitachi?


No idea. I have no plan to get it myself.


----------



## jlib

surfnutbry said:


> ...the internal Western Digital drive reported that it had a SMART over temp error of 108 degrees in the past. The DB35 500Gb reported a max temp of 48 degrees. I don't know if my locking up problems are related to the internal drive overheating but it is possible. I don't have any clue as to why the hard drive may be overheating other than a possible fan issue.


48C (118F) and 42C (108F) are nowhere near the over-temp range of a hard drive. If it were 60C (140F) then you would have a problem on your hands. Overheating is not your problem. On Seagate drives I don't know how to reset the SMART max temp. Maybe try turning SMART off and then back on again? See if the new or older version of SeaTools does that.

Note that even though you are not close to exceeding the drives operating range, at least one longterm study has shown that although heat is less of a problem than many people think, the sweet spot for temperature for long-term reliability is 35C-40C. So getting your drive down to 40C is a worthwhile effort. But that only increases the statistical average over time. The drive is fully capable of operating perfectly well at 48C and is well within specs.


----------



## jlib

DCIFRTHS said:


> Do you know if this is one of the quiet drives from Hitachi?


All non-Seagate drives can be made quiet by the user by turning off aggressive head seeks. Since the TiVo is a very unchallenging application for a hard drive there is no disadvantage to to doing this. You can use the Hitachi Feature Tool at any time (drive contents are not affected) to adjust the acoustic mode on any non-Seagate drive.

The Hitachi CinemaStar (the DB35 equivalent) isn't coming out until later this year. Since the regular DeskStar can be acoustically managed there is less value in going with the DVR specific factory quieted drive from Hitachi.


----------



## oldnacl

juanian said:


> If the problem was excessive HDD activity, I don't think there would be any difference between watching a recorded show, and using 'Save to VCR' to write a DVD. So, something else must be influencing the situation.
> 
> To further the investigation -- if you are watching a show from your TiVo (and, lets say recording two shows), has the problem occurred? If you are watching a DVD in your DVD recorder (pre-recorded, or one you have recorded yourself), has the problem occurred?
> 
> The more activity to the drive, the greater chance that something might get corrupted. Interference with signals on the cable can come from many sources (as previously mentioned); poorly shielded cables (and cables with cheap connectors) will be more susceptible to interference (and other factors) than better cables.
> 
> Good quality cables (and the shorter the better) should reduce signal issues. (Anyone who had a Mac and dealt with hooking up devices in the ever-finicky SCSI days can agree!) If a hard drive enclosure vendor ships their drive with cheap cables, it will bite them in the end, because the reputation of their cases will suffer, even if the case might be just fine. So, once the market matures, you should be able to rely on cables that come with the better cases. But for now, beware of cases being shipped with less-perfect cables (and prepare to purchase a quality cable separately).


As I mentioned in an earlier post, I've used 3 different drive/housing combinations with several cables up to and including the present one, a SIIG that's been highly recommended. Results have been the same in all cases - a couple days of trouble free use and then reboots, GSODs and hangs. Running the TiVo without an external drive attached has been trouble free. I currently am in the second day with the latest combination, a Rosewill case and a 320GB SATA drive that I used successfully for several months attached to a SA8300HD STB. If this follows the pattern, I'll start seeing problems tonight.
I plan to schedule recordings so that the device is both recording and playing back (and/or recording to DVD) simultaneously. My problem at the moment is a rather busy schedule so I don't anticipate reporting results until next week. That also depends on my level of patience as I'm about "over" this and ready to replace the internal drive with a larger one and delegate the external devices back to my computers.


----------



## juanian

oldnacl said:


> As I mentioned in an earlier post, I've used 3 different drive/housing combinations with several cables up to and including the present one, a SIIG that's been highly recommended. Results have been the same in all cases - a couple days of trouble free use and then reboots, GSODs and hangs. Running the TiVo without an external drive attached has been trouble free. I currently am in the second day with the latest combination, a Rosewill case and a 320GB SATA drive that I used successfully for several months attached to a SA8300HD STB. If this follows the pattern, I'll start seeing problems tonight.
> I plan to schedule recordings so that the device is both recording and playing back (and/or recording to DVD) simultaneously. My problem at the moment is a rather busy schedule so I don't anticipate reporting results until next week. That also depends on my level of patience as I'm about "over" this and ready to replace the internal drive with a larger one and delegate the external devices back to my computers.


OK, I think I've got it -- your problem is that guy coming in and stress-testing your system with a rubber mallet when you aren't looking!

Seriously, it seems that you've covered nearly all of the points that can relate to external failure -- different drives, different cases, different cables. The only items remaining seem to be drive heat (which seems symptomatic but not likely since you have tried multiple cases and multiple drives, unless it gets *really* hot where your drive is, which probably isn't the case), bad power going to the drives (which could cause bad information to be written to the drive, but wouldn't cause a 'problem' until later, when the bad data was read), or (gasp) a problem with your TiVo (maybe a defective eSATA controller chip or connector). Maybe you *should* have purchased that additional TiVo for comparison purposes!


----------



## oldnacl

juanian said:


> OK, I think I've got it -- your problem is that guy coming in and stress-testing your system with a rubber mallet when you aren't looking!
> 
> Seriously, it seems that you've covered nearly all of the points that can relate to external failure -- different drives, different cases, different cables. The only items remaining seem to be drive heat (which seems symptomatic but not likely since you have tried multiple cases and multiple drives, unless it gets *really* hot where your drive is, which probably isn't the case), bad power going to the drives (which could cause bad information to be written to the drive, but wouldn't cause a 'problem' until later, when the bad data was read), or (gasp) a problem with your TiVo (maybe a defective eSATA controller chip or connector). Maybe you *should* have purchased that additional TiVo for comparison purposes!


Yeah, you're right - I let that $200 rebate slip by me. Regarding a couple points you made - the external drive is in the open air - no heat problems with any of them. And I first thought it was the TiVo until I disconnected the external drive and, doing the same sort of things, had no problems. I actually called support to complain about the issue when it first came up but neglected to tell them I had an external drive connected. Later, when I removed it and the problem went away, I discounted the TiVo as the source of the problem - or at least moved it back in the que.
Power to the Tivo and external drive is supplied through a 1500VA battery backup with VR, so I think that can be ruled out.
Once my out of town guest leaves on Sunday, I'll do some very controlled experiments and see if I can isolate the problem. You think TiVo would extend that rebate program to me so I could test the box itself?


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> Yeah, you're right - I let that $200 rebate slip by me. Regarding a couple points you made - the external drive is in the open air - no heat problems with any of them. And I first thought it was the TiVo until I disconnected the external drive and, doing the same sort of things, had no problems. I actually called support to complain about the issue when it first came up but neglected to tell them I had an external drive connected. Later, when I removed it and the problem went away, I discounted the TiVo as the source of the problem - or at least moved it back in the que.
> Power to the Tivo and external drive is supplied through a 1500VA battery backup with VR, so I think that can be ruled out.
> Once my out of town guest leaves on Sunday, I'll do some very controlled experiments and see if I can isolate the problem. You think TiVo would extend that rebate program to me so I could test the box itself?


 I noted that you have a UPS/VR...is it anywhere near TiVo or particularly the eSATA drive and/or eSATA cable? Others have had issues which were resolved by moving everything away from any power sources to avoid EMI. Just a thought.


----------



## oldnacl

richsadams said:


> I noted that you have a UPS/VR...is it anywhere near TiVo or particularly the eSATA drive and/or eSATA cable? Others have had issues which were resolved by moving everything away from any power sources to avoid EMI. Just a thought.


I've considered that too, especially after reading the post from the fellow who draped his eSATA cable over the UPS. Mine is a couple feet away and I didn't want to move it before I ruled out other variables. As a long time software tester, I like to change just one thing at a time while troubleshooting. So far it's been cables and external drive/housing combinations. If this current setup exhibits the same problem, I'll try moving it even further away without changing anything else. Seems unlikely though, if it was an issue, that it would take a couple days to show up.


----------



## BruceShultes

jlib said:


> The Hitachi CinemaStar (the DB35 equivalent) isn't coming out until later this year. Since the regular DeskStar can be acoustically managed there is less value in going with the DVR specific factory quieted drive from Hitachi.


I don't see any reason to wait for the CinemaStar. With the 1TB DeskStar in an MX-1 case, the fan on the MX-1 makes more noise than the hard drive.

Besides, the CinemaStar will probably be more expensive.


----------



## maynerd

BruceShultes said:


> I don't see any reason to wait for the CinemaStar. With the 1TB DeskStar in an MX-1 case, the fan on the MX-1 makes more noise than the hard drive.
> 
> Besides, the CinemaStar will probably be more expensive.


Really the MX-1 case is that loud? I thought people were saying you can't hear it at all.


----------



## George Cifranci

maynerd said:


> Really the MX-1 case is that loud? I thought people were saying you can't hear it at all.


I have a Seagate DB35 in a Antec MX-1 and I can't hear it at all.


----------



## Ilene

Just got my Seagate DB35 500 (ST3500830SCE) from ExCaliberPC today and since they ran out of the Antec MX-1 - I ran to Best Buy last week and purchased it from there (and this Sunday they put it on sale  so I got the sale price too!)

Had to watch the Antec video a couple of times (luckily my Mr 7 Hands Screwdriver was magnetic) and assembled it myself . 

I have it connected to my S3 and after the 2nd try, I was successful! I used the supplied cable from Antec - I have a Tripp-Lite waiting in the wings. So far so good!

I'll keep my fingers crossed. This is really a great time to be piloting since it is not the fall season - but let's hope it works, September will be here before we know it!


----------



## patroldawg

maynerd said:


> Really the MX-1 case is that loud? I thought people were saying you can't hear it at all.


I use a Hitachi Deskstar with my MX-1. the whole combination is silent


----------



## maynerd

If the eSATA cable fails as some of you have mentioned. What happens to the existing recordings on the HD?


----------



## BruceShultes

maynerd said:


> Really the MX-1 case is that loud? I thought people were saying you can't hear it at all.


I actually only hear the fan in the MX-1 when I about a foot away from the case.

I hear nothing from either the Deskstar or the MX-1 when I am farther away.


----------



## George Cifranci

I hooked up my Antec MX-1 to my Tivo S3 after using MFSLive 1.2 CD (I have an internal 750GB Seagate DB35 and another 750GB Seagate DB-35 in the MX-1. It has been running since Sunday evening. Today when I came home I turned on my TV (a Sony R60XBR1) and my Tivo Series 3 rebooted. It hasn't done that before. Can this be a sign of EMI? I am using the cable that came with the MX-1. Should I look to get a better eSATA cable?

After it rebooted it seemed all my recordings from today were available and I played them without any issues.


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## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> I've considered that too, especially after reading the post from the fellow who draped his eSATA cable over the UPS. Mine is a couple feet away and I didn't want to move it before I ruled out other variables. As a long time software tester, I like to change just one thing at a time while troubleshooting. So far it's been cables and external drive/housing combinations. If this current setup exhibits the same problem, I'll try moving it even further away without changing anything else. Seems unlikely though, if it was an issue, that it would take a couple days to show up.


 Excellent work. :up: I'd agree, having the power source two feet away should be more than sufficient. Thanks for keeping us up to date.


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## richsadams

maynerd said:


> Really the MX-1 case is that loud? I thought people were saying you can't hear it at all.


 I've used a number of enclosures w/fans and Antec's MX-1 is about as near-silent as they come.


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## richsadams

George Cifranci said:


> I hooked up my Antec MX-1 to my Tivo S3 after using MFSLive 1.2 CD (I have an internal 750GB Seagate DB35 and another 750GB Seagate DB-35 in the MX-1. It has been running since Sunday evening. Today when I came home I turned on my TV (a Sony R60XBR1) and my Tivo Series 3 rebooted. It hasn't done that before. Can this be a sign of EMI? I am using the cable that came with the MX-1. Should I look to get a better eSATA cable?
> 
> After it rebooted it seemed all my recordings from today were available and I played them without any issues.


 Reboots happen...it's a fact of life. Our DT S2 rebooted last week during the middle of the day for unknown reasons. Of course it doesn't have an external HDD attached. Our S3 hasn't rebooted since we installed our eSATA drive over a month ago. Reboots happen for a variety of reasons; either automatically for a TiVo update (usually at 2 a.m.) or due to data corruption.

It's possible that there's an issue with your external drive, but if your drive and cables are not near a power source and the connections are snug _and _ this is the one and only time you've experienced a reboot I wouldn't be too concerned.

If TiVo rebooted when you turned your TV on I'd focus on that. I'd wager you have TiVo attached via HDMI and I'd be more concerned with that connection. If there's an interruption of the High-bandwidth Digital Content Protection (HDCP) signal (which is carried by the HDMI cable) it can cause problems for TiVo. A reboot would re-establish the HDCP "handshake" between TiVo and a component connection.

The excellent Series3 eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion  has some good info...particularly with regard to reboots under #3 in the Troubleshooting area as well.


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## fred2

maynerd said:


> If the eSATA cable fails as some of you have mentioned. What happens to the existing recordings on the HD?


You will get an intercept message of some kind basically informing you that the "spare" drive is missing. Options to reboot without the drive and then lose whatever. Or reconnect and reboot and generally the data will be intact.

I've had it happen a few times when messing around behind the units and jarring the cable.

The last time I got a mesage that a "major error" occurred and it might take 3 hours to cleanup. It took about 10 minutes and my data was still there. And yes, I was trying to plug in an optical cable and must have jarred the esata cable.


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## oldnacl

Good News (I think) hopefully not premature - but, the most recent incarnation of a 320GB drive, Rosewill case and SIIG cable has passed the two day mark without a freeze or reboot. So, it's looking like the bad sectors I discovered on the FAP750 and the Cavalry being generally somewhat undependable (according to reports) points to it being a hardware issue with the external drives. I'm stressing the system as before and keeping my fingers crossed. I still have 2 other drive/case combinations to try if this doesn't continue to work and also got a shipping note from Seagate that the replacement FAP750 is on the way. Maybe I'll have a dependable working eSATA by the forth of July although, if I could start over, I'd just put in a larger drive internally.


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## larrs

my eSata question:

I ran out back a couple of weeks ago and got the FAP750 while it was on sale at BB for $199. i used some reward zone certificates and ended up paying $159. After reading some of the comments here, I have sat on opening it up and trying it out. However, I am inclined to believe most issues are related to the heat as I had that issue once before on an enclosure that I tried to use with my SA8300HD. Once I replaced the enclosure with one that had a fan, I haven't had an issue in two years. 

So, I am thinking that given the great price, I should just take the FAP drive out and pop it into an Antec or apricorn case. Thoughts?


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## richsadams

larrs said:


> my eSata question:
> 
> I ran out back a couple of weeks ago and got the FAP750 while it was on sale at BB for $199. i used some reward zone certificates and ended up paying $159. After reading some of the comments here, I have sat on opening it up and trying it out. However, I am inclined to believe most issues are related to the heat as I had that issue once before on an enclosure that I tried to use with my SA8300HD. Once I replaced the enclosure with one that had a fan, I haven't had an issue in two years.
> 
> So, I am thinking that given the great price, I should just take the FAP drive out and pop it into an Antec or apricorn case. Thoughts?


 The other issues seem to be with the eSATA cables that have to be purchased separately and the FAP's connection port not being as good as one would hope.

Another concern would be that you will probably void the drive's warranty by opening the case.

Here's another thought; how important is having 750GB of space? The difference between a 750GB drive and a 500GB drive is about 33 hours of additional HD recording space. Our 500GB drive gives us 98 hours of HD and 928 hours of SD recording space which we've found is more than enough for us. However others insist they need at least 3,000+ hours (or 2TB) of space though  so it's a personal call. 

The reason I ask is that a 500GB Seagate DB35 HDD and MX-1 enclosure would cost about the same as what you're planning on doing. The MX-1 comes with the proper cable, the DB35 drive is specifically designed for DVR use, has a 5 year warranty and seems to be the ideal, near-silent combo. Of course if space is important you could get a 750GB Seagate DB35 HDD, but then the cost goes over the magic $200 price area.

Were it me I'd opt for somewhat proven reliability, a little less space, and a solid warranty by taking the FAP back and purchasing the 500GB Seagate DB35 and MX-1.

Oh, I have Apricorn enclosures as well and they are fine, but I've found that Antec's MX-1 runs cooler. Since the drive will be on 24/7 for this application I'd get the MX-1.

Just some thoughts and hope that helps!


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## larrs

richsadams said:


> The other issues seem to be with the eSATA cables that have to be purchased separately and the FAP's connection port not being as good as one would hope.
> 
> Another concern would be that you will probably void the drive's warranty by opening the case.
> 
> Here's another thought; how important is having 750GB of space? The difference between a 750GB drive and a 500GB drive is about 33 hours of additional HD recording space. Our 500GB drive gives us 98 hours of HD and 928 hours of SD recording space which we've found is more than enough for us. However others insist they need at least 3,000+ hours (or 2TB) of space though  so it's a personal call.
> 
> The reason I ask is that a 500GB Seagate DB35 HDD and MX-1 enclosure would cost about the same as what you're planning on doing. The MX-1 comes with the proper cable, the DB35 drive is specifically designed for DVR use, has a 5 year warranty and seems to be the ideal, near-silent combo. Of course if space is important you could get a 750GB Seagate DB35 HDD, but then the cost goes over the magic $200 price area.
> 
> Were it me I'd opt for somewhat proven reliability, a little less space, and a solid warranty by taking the FAP back and purchasing the 500GB Seagate DB35 and MX-1.
> 
> Oh, I have Apricorn enclosures as well and they are fine, but I've found that Antec's MX-1 runs cooler. Since the drive will be on 24/7 for this application I'd get the MX-1.
> 
> Just some thoughts and hope that helps!


All opinions help. I have a 500GB DB35 in my Tivo now. My other option is to go back to the original drive and drop the 500GB into a MX-1. I just hate letting the FAP deal go by.


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## coldfusionak

I have the FAP on my Tivo, it has been recording a lot of SD lately and some HD. I haven't had any reboot issues or other things like that with it. It has been 2 weeks I believe. The FAP is in open air, a 25 dollar (after shipping) eSATA cable seems to do the trick. Just thought I would chime in.


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## richsadams

larrs said:


> All opinions help. I have a 500GB DB35 in my Tivo now. My other option is to go back to the original drive and drop the 500GB into a MX-1. I just hate letting the FAP deal go by.


 Ah...so you already have 500GB's worth of space. That certainly changes the equation. Space is obviously a priority so you've already thought that through. Looks like either way you'll have to pull the "A" drive out of TiVo. Keep us posted on what you decide to do! :up:


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## larrs

So another question. If you turn off Tivo suggestions (which I have done on my S3, not on my others), does the external run 24/7, or does it come back on when called upon? I know that on my SA8300HD, I have was able to use a fanless external drive for more part of the 2 years I had it as the unit was off most of the time and only records/buffers when powered on or when scheduled recordings occur (the hard drive runs I guess, but there are no reads/writes during this period, so I have never had heat issues). however as we started leaving it on all of the time (most of the time as it powers itself off at night, I had to go to a fan enclosure.
I take it that Tivo buffers all of the time, but how does that work between internal and external drives? Would the external drive ever get a break?


----------



## pseamans

Just a curiosity question regarding the Seagate DB35 drives. A friend and I recently purchased the 750GB Seagate DB35 drives from different online retailers. Both are OEM drives that arrived in "bulk" packaging, no cables/screws/manuals... I don't need the extra stuff anyway but I wish the sites would have made it more clear. The site that I purchased my drive from did have a comment at the end of the item title stating "bulk", my friends order said nothing like OEM or bulk, nothing to indicate it was anything different from retail. I can't complain both drives are working flawlessly for the last week or so and silently (seriously you have to basically put your ear next to it to hear anything) both in Antec MX-1 cases without problems. It did take us a few tries to get it to recognize the drives but I think I was a little slow on typing in the code.

I guess my question is two fold; Are these drives only sold bulk/OEM? and does this affect the warranty?

Thanks to those documenting/testing this feature, I appreciate your efforts.


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## richsadams

larrs said:


> So another question. If you turn off Tivo suggestions (which I have done on my S3, not on my others), does the external run 24/7, or does it come back on when called upon? I know that on my SA8300HD, I have was able to use a fanless external drive for more part of the 2 years I had it as the unit was off most of the time and only records/buffers when powered on or when scheduled recordings occur (the hard drive runs I guess, but there are no reads/writes during this period, so I have never had heat issues). however as we started leaving it on all of the time (most of the time as it powers itself off at night, I had to go to a fan enclosure.
> I take it that Tivo buffers all of the time, but how does that work between internal and external drives? Would the external drive ever get a break?


 From all accounts posted here and on other threads a TiVo eSATA drive runs/spins 24/7. A number of people have apparently tried using drives that had an auto spin down program on idle and have had to attach them to their PCs to change the programming. (Although I think most have just plugged in the drive and nothing more.) Its a possibility that drive spin-down may be causing some problems like rebooting. My understanding is that if a drive spins down the connection to TiVo is lost.

If I put my ear next to ours I can hear the read/write head moving when it's actually recording but when it's idle the slight vibration/hum (beyond what the fan would account for as it's almost silent) indicates that the drive is still spinning otherwise. The Seagate DB35 like we are using is a DVR specific application and is said to never spin down.

If TiVo uses the external drive to buffer programs at any time I can't be sure but judging by the activity on ours it doesnt appear so. We've had over 200 "Recently deleted" programs and heaps of others in our "Now playing" list and I haven't noted any eSATA drive activity while everything is idle. Having worked with Unix/Linux servers I'd say that the buffer would logically be held on the "A" drive and the only activity sent to the external drive would be an actual recording...but others here are likely more knowledgeable about that sort of thing with TiVo and will hopefully chime in.


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## 1283

pseamans said:


> Are these drives only sold bulk/OEM?


Yes. There is no retail-packaged DB35.


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## richsadams

pseamans said:


> Just a curiosity question regarding the Seagate DB35 drives. A friend and I recently purchased the 750GB Seagate DB35 drives from different online retailers. Both are OEM drives that arrived in "bulk" packaging, no cables/screws/manuals... I don't need the extra stuff anyway but I wish the sites would have made it more clear. The site that I purchased my drive from did have a comment at the end of the item title stating "bulk", my friends order said nothing like OEM or bulk, nothing to indicate it was anything different from retail. I can't complain both drives are working flawlessly for the last week or so and silently (seriously you have to basically put your ear next to it to hear anything) both in Antec MX-1 cases without problems. It did take us a few tries to get it to recognize the drives but I think I was a little slow on typing in the code.
> 
> I guess my question is two fold; Are these drives only sold bulk/OEM? and does this affect the warranty?
> 
> Thanks to those documenting/testing this feature, I appreciate your efforts.


 I've never seen the Seagate DB35 7200.3 series drives in retail stores. Being that they are intended for DVR's and home media servers I doubt that they believe that there's much of a standard market for them. I'm sure this little burst of sales has caught them by surprise to some extent. It's certainly caught Antec with their pants down as evidenced by the backorders for the MX-1!

Unless you purchase from a retail store like Best Buy, Circuit City, etc., (either brick and mortar or on line) you can usually expect to get a basic drive from Internet merchants. That's generally why they are less expensive. All of the consumer packaging, extra cables, etc. costs money to produce and ship. Most on line "wholesalers" sell the basic OEM drives, usually delivered in a plastic clam shell. Unless they display a nice box, etc. in their ad...WYSIWYG.

Drive warranties are the same either way. The online seller will usually display the warranty info or give a link to the manufacturer's website. The Seagate DB35 7200.3 500GB and 750GB series are warranted for five years.

You should keep your receipts and note the serial number of the drive (before you install it in the enclosure) and go to Seagate's drive registration page to register it. (This is the DB35 registration page)

Enjoy all of that new recording space!


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## T-Shee

richsadams said:


> If TiVo uses the external drive to buffer programs at any time I can't be sure but judging by the activity on ours it doesnt appear so. .


I think it does buffer to the ESATA drive: the day after my ESATA install, I noticed what seemed like furious head seek activity, drive light blinking like crazy and yet it wasn't recording or playing back - it was displaying the Tivo Central screen. There would have been no other reason for the drive activity save for the background buffering of two HD channels.

To confirm my theory, I deleted a quite a few HD movies I had already watched and within a minute or so, the ESATA activity stopped.

Go figure. Sure, it could all be circumstantial/coincindental. But it sure seems like the buffer moves to where it finds free space.


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## richsadams

T-Shee said:


> I think it does buffer to the ESATA drive: the day after my ESATA install, I noticed what seemed like furious head seek activity, drive light blinking like crazy and yet it wasn't recording or playing back - it was displaying the Tivo Central screen. There would have been no other reason for the drive activity save for the background buffering of two HD channels.
> 
> To confirm my theory, I deleted a quite a few HD movies I had already watched and within a minute or so, the ESATA activity stopped.
> 
> Go figure. Sure, it could all be circumstantial/coincindental. But it sure seems like the buffer moves to where it finds free space.


 Hmmm...sounds like that might be the case then. I'll have to keep an eye on ours, you never know what it might be up to.


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## slimm

T-Shee said:


> I think it does buffer to the ESATA drive: the day after my ESATA install, I noticed what seemed like furious head seek activity, drive light blinking like crazy and yet it wasn't recording or playing back -


I have seen the same thing happen as well.


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## Ilene

I thought I had successfully installed my Seagate DB35/500g into my MX-1 and attached to my S3, but last night my TV screen went blank during the 10pm news (recorded) and a few minutes later the screen froze. The TiVo rebooted on its own, but GSOD  showed up. I waited it out (actually I was scared to death it was going to self destruct) and about 20 minutes later it rebooted and all was well...
At 8 am this morning, same thing happened while watching CNN live. 
Not sure what to do. I checked the connections last night - I am using the cable that came with the MX-1. If it happens again, I am thinking that I will try the Tripp-lite cable that I am still holding onto. 
How would I do this? Unplug the TiVo, turn off the MX-1, replace the cable. Turn on the MX-1, plug in the TiVo? Is that the correct sequence? 
Y'all know I'll be asking what to do next if that doesn't fix it. Not sure how to run a check on the drive to make sure it is good. I was concerned at first that it didn't come in a box, but I see that they aren't shipped that way...
Thanks,
Ilene


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## richsadams

Ilene said:


> I thought I had successfully installed my Seagate DB35/500g into my MX-1 and attached to my S3, but last night my TV screen went blank during the 10pm news (recorded) and a few minutes later the screen froze. The TiVo rebooted on its own, but GSOD  showed up. I waited it out (actually I was scared to death it was going to self destruct) and about 20 minutes later it rebooted and all was well...
> At 8 am this morning, same thing happened while watching CNN live.
> Not sure what to do. I checked the connections last night - I am using the cable that came with the MX-1. If it happens again, I am thinking that I will try the Tripp-lite cable that I am still holding onto.
> How would I do this? Unplug the TiVo, turn off the MX-1, replace the cable. Turn on the MX-1, plug in the TiVo? Is that the correct sequence?
> Y'all know I'll be asking what to do next if that doesn't fix it. Not sure how to run a check on the drive to make sure it is good. I was concerned at first that it didn't come in a box, but I see that they aren't shipped that way...
> Thanks,
> Ilene


 First...stop watching the news! There's obviously something about it that TiVo doesn't care for. (These days I tend to agree) 

Sorry to hear that you've had to endure the GSOD. That generally means that some data has either been corrupted and become unreadable or that TiVo can't write data to an area of a drive. The "downtime" allows it to work out what to do...generally locking out bad sectors of a drive.

The thing is; if TiVo is rebooting and everything seems to be fine afterward...at least for a time...it doesn't sound like a bad cable. It sounds more like a drive issue. If it were a bad cable there's no reason for it to recover (unless you moved it around or something) and it should just ask for a divorce.

It could be an issue with the "A" drive or it could indeed be something to do with your new eSATA drive. 

There's certainly no harm in trying a new cable. You have the replacement sequence correct.

Let us know how it goes after you've swapped out the cable.


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## oldnacl

Not wanting to jinx my setup, but I'm now into 5 days of no problem recording and DVD burning. Rosewill case using the SIIG cable and an old 320GB drive I previously used with a SA8300HD STB. 
Previous failing setups (reboots, GSOD, freezes) included a FAP750 using a Monoprice cable, a Tripp-LIte cable and the SIIG. Same problems occured with a Cavalry 500 drive with the SIIG cable. I'm close to concluding I had 2 bum drives in a row. The replacement FAP should arrive any day now. I'll hook it up using the SIIG cable and see if things work or not. Hopefully, in another week or so, you'll see my last post on this subject


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## Nethead28

OK - had Seagate 750 db35 + MX-1 with MX-1 supplied cable running for 3 days - all OK.

Last night I turned on TV and TiVo was acting strange, only showing partial menus etc... Then I got the "GSOD" wasn't 3 hours though only about 10 minutes before it came back and I got the second drive problem screen, asking to continue without second drive or power off TiVo and hook up second drive. I did order a different cable and just so happens it was delivered yesterday so I shut all down and hooked up the new SIIG cable instead of the one that came with the MX-1. We will see what happens next - if anything. Cable wasn't by any power supplies or anything? MX-1 one is setting right on top of the S3.

Has anyone been running any setup that hasn't had problems? If so - what and how long?

Maybe this just isn't ready for prime time, that is why TiVo is so hush about it.


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## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> Not wanting to jinx my setup, but I'm now into 5 days of no problem recording and DVD burning. Rosewill case using the SIIG cable and an old 320GB drive I previously used with a SA8300HD STB.
> Previous failing setups (reboots, GSOD, freezes) included a FAP750 using a Monoprice cable, a Tripp-LIte cable and the SIIG. Same problems occured with a Cavalry 500 drive with the SIIG cable. I'm close to concluding I had 2 bum drives in a row. The replacement FAP should arrive any day now. I'll hook it up using the SIIG cable and see if things work or not. Hopefully, in another week or so, you'll see my last post on this subject


 That's excellent news...about not having any problems, not about the previous drive problems.  knock on wood all will go well from now on. :up: Thanks very much for keeping us posted.


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## richsadams

Nethead28 said:


> OK - had Seagate 750 db35 + MX-1 with MX-1 supplied cable running for 3 days - all OK.
> 
> Last night I turned on TV and TiVo was acting strange, only showing partial menus etc... Then I got the "GSOD" wasn't 3 hours though only about 10 minutes before it came back and I got the second drive problem screen, asking to continue without second drive or power off TiVo and hook up second drive. I did order a different cable and just so happens it was delivered yesterday so I shut all down and hooked up the new SIIG cable instead of the one that came with the MX-1. We will see what happens next - if anything. Cable wasn't by any power supplies or anything? MX-1 one is setting right on top of the S3.
> 
> Has anyone been running any setup that hasn't had problems? If so - what and how long?
> 
> Maybe this just isn't ready for prime time, that is why TiVo is so hush about it.


 We have had a 500GB Seagate DB35 7200.3 series drive and Antecs MX-1 enclosure (using the cable supplied with the MX-1) running since May 15th without any problems. The drive is on a shelf just above the S3 however, not sitting on it.

Quick questionshow full do you think your drives were/are? Are there a lot of saved programs and a lot (say 200+) of recently deleted programs? Im wondering if theres a tipping point at which TiVo cannot handle all of the data.


----------



## Nethead28

richsadams said:


> We have had a 500GB Seagate DB35 7200.3 series drive and Antecs MX-1 enclosure (using the cable supplied with the MX-1) running since May 15th without any problems. The drive is on a shelf just above the S3 however, not sitting on it.
> 
> Quick questionshow full do you think your drives were/are? Are there a lot of saved programs and a lot (say 200+) of recently deleted programs? Im wondering if theres a tipping point at which TiVo cannot handle all of the data.


Being I only hooked it up 3 days ago there were only about 10-15 HD shows I have saved until I delete and there may be about 50 in the recently deleted folder and another 25 suggestion listed.


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## richsadams

Nethead28 said:


> Being I only hooked it up 3 days ago there were only about 10-15 HD shows I have saved until I delete and there may be about 50 in the recently deleted folder and another 25 suggestion listed.


 So it doesn't sound like an overload issue.

Thanks for posting. Hopefully the new cable will be the cure. Please keep us up to date. :up:


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## CyberTom

I'm one of those who installed the DB35/MX-1 combination and encountered the "Freeze" problem. 

I changed the eSATA cable routing. Ran SpinRite on the 750gb DB35 and found no errors. Nothing seemed to work. I ordered the SIIG-SATA II (eSATA to eSATA) 1-meter cable. RoHS compliant. 

I've been running this combination for 3 days error-free. Fingers are crossed but I think it's a winner. :up:


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## jtreid

Update: I did not have a freeze, but the Tivo started getting sluggish again last night. I preempted a freeze/lock-up/reboot by restarting the system myself. We'll see if things continue.

My question still remains unanswered. Is there a way to command Tivo to do a drive scan or some diagnostic on the internal and esata drives?


----------



## richsadams

jtreid said:


> Update: I did not have a freeze, but the Tivo started getting sluggish again last night. I preempted a freeze/lock-up/reboot by restarting the system myself. We'll see if things continue.
> 
> My question still remains unanswered. Is there a way to command Tivo to do a drive scan or some diagnostic on the internal and esata drives?


 When you reboot TiVo it runs a diagnostic at that time but it may not find any/all problems. Probably the best way is to pull the drive, hook it up to a P.C. and run a program such as "SpinRite".

However there is a Kick Start command that runs various mfs checks that works on TiVo S2's, but I cannot be sure it will work on an S3...never tried it. It's called, appropriately enough, "kickstart 57"...which is very similar to the "kickstart 62" method you used to install the eSATA drive.

1. Unplug TiVo for 10-15 seconds
2. Plug in TiVo and hold the yellow pause button on the remote until all other lights on the face panel go out and the yellow light shows on the front of TiVo.
3. Release the pause button and type 5-7.

TiVo will reboot and a green screen (commonly known as the "green screen of death" or GSOD) will appear stating that the TiVo has encountered an error and may take up to 3 hours to repair it. Its also possible that the screen may say "installing TiVo Software". If you do not see one or the other screen, repeat the Kick Start procedure. When the error has been repaired TiVo will restart. You may have to download program information again.

I dont know of any reason that kickstart 57 wont work on an S3, but before anyone tries it can someone confirm that this will work on an S3?


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## T-Shee

jtreid said:


> Update: I did not have a freeze, but the Tivo started getting sluggish again last night. I preempted a freeze/lock-up/reboot by restarting the system myself. We'll see if things continue.
> 
> My question still remains unanswered. Is there a way to command Tivo to do a drive scan or some diagnostic on the internal and esata drives?


I found two kickstart codes, from Series 1 and 2, that may work, but I have no way to verify them on the Series 3 without running them myself. 
*Use at your own risk*, until we know they work -

"57 - mfs check?
58 - perform mfs cleanup?-- both of these will cause the green screen and various mfs checks (sometimes you won't see a green screen, but just get the "loading new software" screen even though it is mfs-checking)"


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## moxie1617

Nethead28 said:


> OK - had Seagate 750 db35 + MX-1 with MX-1 supplied cable running for 3 days - all OK.
> 
> ...........
> 
> Has anyone been running any setup that hasn't had problems? If so - what and how long?
> 
> Maybe this just isn't ready for prime time, that is why TiVo is so hush about it.


Antec MX-1 with a 500GB DB35 using stock Antec cable sitting on top of the S3 since 5/25. Four weeks today w/o any problem. (We need a emoticon for fingers crossed.)


----------



## demon

moxie1617 said:


> Antec MX-1 with a 500GB DB35 using stock Antec cable sitting on top of the S3 since 5/25. Four weeks today w/o any problem. (We need a emoticon for fingers crossed.)


I'm using WD MyBook Premium ES 500 GB drive, and a Tripp Lite eSATA cable - been running it continuously since mid-May with no problems (knocking on wood). It's pretty stuffed with good things (50 HD recordings, plus other SD content).


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## T-Shee

moxie1617 said:


> Antec MX-1 with a 500GB DB35 using stock Antec cable sitting on top of the S3 since 5/25. Four weeks today w/o any problem. (We need a emoticon for fingers crossed.)


Five weeks - no problems, using the Antec ESATA-to-ESATA cable that ships with MX-1. 
(MX-1, Samsung HD-501LJ).


----------



## richsadams

I don't know if I'm starting to see a pattern here or not but is it possible that a majority of the issues that people are having with TiVo are being encountered by those with 750GB drives? Without going completely back through the 40+ pages of this thread it appears that very few owners of 500GB drives have posted problems (and most of those were from early Calvary adopters).

At first common sense says that more people probably opted for 750GB over 500GB drives and that would account for it (and I still think that might be the case). However this poll shows about 100 people have installed an eSATA drive (at least that many answered the poll in any case). Of those that posted a comment, five had installed 500GB drives and five 750GB drives - 50/50. That's certainly not a scientific survey, but without knowing Im wondering if this is something we need to look at?

Granted any results are going to be skewed by a number of factors such as the type of drive (stand alone, built w/enclosure) and the issues with proper cables, etc. But I'm wondering if it would be worth it to post yet another, more specific poll to find out more...such as:



> "If you have installed an eSATA drive please respond to this poll. If you have installed an eSATA drive and had or are having subsequent problems, please also post a comment with details including drive model, actions taken to correct any problems, etc. If you have a drive other than the two sizes listed your comments would also be welcome."
> 
> I have installed a...
> 
> 1. 500GB Drive with no problems since the installation
> 2. 500GB Drive with problems post installation but now resolved
> 3. 500GB Drive with problems post installation unresolved
> 4. 750GB Drive with no problems since the installation
> 5. 750GB Drive with problems post installation but now resolved
> 6. 750GB Drive with problems post installation unresolved
> 
> If you have questions about eSATA drives, please read the Series3 eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion thread and post your questions there. Thank you.


 *NOTE: This is NOT a poll...only a sample for comments.*

If it turns out to be nothing, that's fine, but if there is some sort of tipping point with TiVo and 750GB (or 500GB) drives it seems that it would be very important to know that as well as what remedies were used to resolve the problem(s).

Before posting a new poll I'd welcome any constructive feedback or additional ideas...or thoughts about a poll being helpful or necessary at this time or at all.


----------



## alyssa

interesting idea. My personal story would support your hypothesis. I have a SGate 750 SE & am using a MX-1 enclosure & cable.

I've gotten 3 GSOD's since I installed the eSATA drive. It's been suggested that my cable is the issue but to my knowledge the MX-1 cable has been deemed a good cable.


----------



## maynerd

richsadams said:


> I don't know if I'm starting to see a pattern here or not but is it possible that a majority of the issues that people are having with TiVo are being encountered by those with 750GB drives? Without going completely back through the 40+ pages of this thread it appears that very few owners of 500GB drives have posted problems (and most of those were from early Calvary adopters).
> 
> At first common sense says that more people probably opted for 750GB over 500GB drives and that would account for it (and I still think that might be the case). However this poll shows about 100 people have installed an eSATA drive (at least that many answered the poll in any case). Of those that posted a comment, five had installed 500GB drives and five 750GB drives - 50/50. That's certainly not a scientific survey, but without knowing Im wondering if this is something we need to look at?
> 
> Granted any results are going to be skewed by a number of factors such as the type of drive (stand alone, built w/enclosure) and the issues with proper cables, etc. But I'm wondering if it would be worth it to post yet another, more specific poll to find out more...such as:
> 
> *NOTE: This is NOT a poll...only a sample for comments.*
> 
> If it turns out to be nothing, that's fine, but if there is some sort of tipping point with TiVo and 750GB (or 500GB) drives it seems that it would be very important to know that as well as what remedies were used to resolve the problem(s).
> 
> Before posting a new poll I'd welcome any constructive feedback or additional ideas...or thoughts about a poll being helpful or necessary at this time or at all.


Interesting theory. I will be getting my 500GB drive on Monday and shall report how it goes.


----------



## gteague

i used a vantec nexstar3 enclosure (cable was included) with a maxtor diamondmax 500gb drive for 7-10 days. i had no problems with it other than heat and noise and when the $176 deal for the fap750 came along i replaced the nexstar with the larger drive.

i just checked my receipt and the fap750 has been in service since 05/28, so what's that--24 days? i am using the esata cable that came with the nexstar enclosure. i have this drive on top of my a/v cabinet in approx 82-84deg ambient temperature and it runs absolutely silently and only warm-ish. i tried to rig a crude thermometer and got 38-40c for a temperature reading.

in that time i've had 3 freezes where i found the tivo was frozen on a screen of a show it was recording. in all cases i was not actively watching the tivo at the time, the display was off, so i did not note any special symptoms leading up to the freeze. more tellingly, i think, was that in each case there was at least one commercial power failure that overran my 20-minute ups less than 4 hours beforehand and in the first two cases i had my tivo 'overloaded' with wishlist items. i have not seen the gsod since i got my tivo about 3 months ago.

/guy


----------



## slimm

I've got a 750GB DB35/MX-1 combo and have had no problems at all since installation (~4 weeks). Not sure about the brand of esata cable as it's one I had laying around.


----------



## rjom

My first Calvary 500G drive never worked. My second one has worked flawlessly since about May 15.


----------



## CyberTom

gteague said:


> in that time i've had 3 freezes where i found the tivo was frozen on a screen of a show it was recording. in all cases i was not actively watching the tivo at the time, the display was off, so i did not note any special symptoms leading up to the freeze.


How did you get your unit "unfrozen" and did all functions work correctly after that? Was a restart necessary?


----------



## gteague

CyberTom said:


> How did you get your unit "unfrozen" and did all functions work correctly after that? Was a restart necessary?


yes, i had to do a power reset. it seemed like the unit continued to record and it lit up the orange led when i issued a remote command, but was otherwise unresponsive and the hard buttons on the front did not work either. since i was not at home any of the 3 times it happened, i'm unsure how many, if any, recordings i missed but my guess is very few to none with the exception of the recording that it froze on.

i did try holding various buttons in various combinations and i also removed each cable from the connectors on the rear in case it was the catv signal or ethernet that had it locked up.

/guy


----------



## njspeed

500GB DB35/apricorn DTS enclosure. Literally 10mins max from the time I opened the box with the HDD and installed it into the DTS until I had 98hrs of HD on the account screen! I will report back in a week or so to let people know how stable it has been.


----------



## V7Goose

maynerd said:


> Interesting. Glad to hear it is working for you. How noisy is the FAP?


Even with everything off in the room, I hear NOTHING from the FAP750. I have to crawl behind the TV and put my ear next to the drive to hear even a faint whir.


----------



## tivopalos

My recent experience with a frozen screen: 

I have a mx-1, db35 500gb that froze and GSOD once 2 weeks ago, yesterday morning, when I turned on the TV, the picture was frozen, on a HD cable channel. I have no cablecards installed.

I hit the pause button a few times... nothing. Then I hit the backup button, and the program did backup and play. I changed channels to an OTA HD channel and everything worked fine on all OTA channel. Cable SD channels also came in, but none of the HD cable channels worked. After a few minutes, one a the time, each of the HD cable channel came back. 

I'm not sure if this was the beginning of a Tivo GSOD, or if Cable was having a problem broadcasting HD at that particular time.


----------



## richsadams

tivopalos said:


> My recent experience with a frozen screen:
> 
> I have a mx-1, db35 500gb that froze and GSOD once 2 weeks ago, yesterday morning, when I turned on the TV, the picture was frozen, on a HD cable channel. I have no cablecards installed.
> 
> I hit the pause button a few times... nothing. Then I hit the backup button, and the program did backup and play. I changed channels to an OTA HD channel and everything worked fine on all OTA channel. Cable SD channels also came in, but none of the HD cable channels worked. After a few minutes, one a the time, each of the HD cable channel came back.
> 
> I'm not sure if this was the beginning of a Tivo GSOD, or if Cable was having a problem broadcasting HD at that particular time.


 The GSOD earlier could have been associated with the eSATA drive or it could have been something to do with TiVo's "A" drive...data was corrupted somewhere. If nothing has happened since then it should be resolved.

The frozen picture from yesterday sounds more like a signal issue as it recovered w/o a reboot, etc.

Keep us posted!


----------



## rt1027

Just curious...in the future, after software upgrades, does the "kickstart 62" process need to be repeated to re-marry the external drive?


----------



## richsadams

rt1027 said:


> Just curious...in the future, after software upgrades, does the "kickstart 62" process need to be repeated to re-marry the external drive?


 Good question. Firmware upgrades only happen a few times a year if that...so nothing to worry about right away (unless you're still on FW v8.1x)

Some of us installed an eSATA drive a while back and then were upgraded from FW v8.1x to v8.3x (there was no FW v8.2) and nothing happened regarding the eSATA drive. Of course that doesn't guarantee that something won't happen with future upgrades.

I suspect that the issue will arise if/when TiVo decides to support eSATA expansion drives. At that time I'd imagine that they will make adding the drive more or less plug 'n pray...um...plug 'n play. Then we'll all be in for some fun!


----------



## demon

I added an external drive to my Series3 before it was upgraded to the 8.3.1-01 release. The software upgrade went off without a hitch, and the external drive kept on functioning. Having to "remarry" the drive to the unit would cause the external drive to be cleared, losing any stored programming, so that wouldn't be too cool.


----------



## rt1027

Thanks demon for the heads-up.


----------



## gteague

it got me. or i got myself, more like it.

question: is there anything in the fap750 that would react with a laser?

being curious as to exactly what temperature the fap was running at and never neglecting the opportunity to add to my gadget list, i picked up one of those pistol-grip infrared remote temperature meters at fry's this evening. it has a laser built in to help you aim it.

and of course one of the first things i aimed it towards was the fap drive atop my a/v cabinet. the tivo was recording one program and i had the live news channel playing at the time. i was taking temperature readings of various spots on the outside of the fap from about 2-4' away. i activated the laser at the top of the base of the drive when suddenly the picture on the tivo froze.

i immediately thought of the previous freezes and had reconciled myself to the inevitable reboot, but i issued some remote commands anyway and to my surprise the tivo started responding within a minute. the recording started up again and i returned to my live channel only to experience another freeze.

the tivo again started responding, but rebooted itself this time. and, to my horror, i saw the dreaded screen that said it no longer recognized the external drive. it is not an amusing screen ... 

i immediately pulled the power plug to reset the tivo and the fap750. again i got the 'unrecognized' screen. i again pulled the plug and waited for 5 minutes. after this i got my first sight of the gsod saying it was going to attempt to recover. just about when i was prepared to hook the fap up to my mac via usb and reformat, the tivo finally recovered the external drive.

checking the history, it appears that only one program was caught by this problem: 'lady in the water' an hd program which in the 'to do' list history says there was an 'internal error'. this was evidently the program that was recording at the time.

so this makes the 4th time i've had an incident since i connected the fap750, but each time i've had some external event to point to. i'm a computer tech, but i can't think of a reason the laser would have affected a hard drive. an optical drive, sure, but not a magnetic hard drive. of course, i'm not up-to-speed on modern hard drive technology either.

so, should i blame the fap yet? or write it off as an anomaly yet again? i'm way too spooked to fire up the laser again to see if the incident is reproducible.

oh, btw: the temperature was up to 50c/122f in the hottest spot at the base of the platform and 40c/104f in the coolest. i think that was what my guesses were already using my $9 coffee thermometer, so i really didn't learn anything i didn't already know, but hey, i got a new gadget!

/guy


----------



## richsadams

gteague said:


> it got me. or i got myself, more like it.
> 
> question: is there anything in the fap750 that would react with a laser?
> 
> being curious as to exactly what temperature the fap was running at and never neglecting the opportunity to add to my gadget list, i picked up one of those pistol-grip infrared remote temperature meters at fry's this evening. it has a laser built in to help you aim it.
> 
> and of course one of the first things i aimed it towards was the fap drive atop my a/v cabinet. the tivo was recording one program and i had the live news channel playing at the time. i was taking temperature readings of various spots on the outside of the fap from about 2-4' away. i activated the laser at the top of the base of the drive when suddenly the picture on the tivo froze.
> 
> i immediately thought of the previous freezes and had reconciled myself to the inevitable reboot, but i issued some remote commands anyway and to my surprise the tivo started responding within a minute. the recording started up again and i returned to my live channel only to experience another freeze.
> 
> the tivo again started responding again, but rebooted itself this time. and, to my horror, i saw the dreaded screen that said it no longer recognized the external drive. it is not an amusing screen ...
> 
> i immediately pulled the power plug to reset the tivo and the fap750. again i got the 'unrecognized' screen. i again pulled the plug and waited for 5 minutes. after this i got my first sight of the gsod saying it was going to attempt to recover. just about when i was prepared to hook the fap up to my mac via usb and reformat, the tivo finally recovered the external drive.
> 
> checking the history, it appears that only one program was caught by this problem: 'lady in the water' an hd program which in the 'to do' list history says there was an 'internal error'. this was evidently the program that was recording at the time.
> 
> so this makes the 4th time i've had an incident since i connected the fap750, but each time i've had some external event to point to. i'm a computer tech, but i can't think of a reason the laser would have affected a hard drive. an optical drive, sure, but not a magnetic hard drive. of course, i'm not up-to-speed on modern hard drive technology either.
> 
> so, should i blame the fap yet? or write it off as an anomaly yet again? i'm way too spooked to fire up the laser again to see if the incident is reproducible.
> 
> oh, btw: the temperature was up to 50c/122f in the hottest spot at the base of the platform and 40c/104f in the coolest. i think that was what my guesses were already using my $9 coffee thermometer, so i really didn't learn anything i didn't already know, but hey, i got a new gadget!
> 
> /guy


 Wow!  Now _that's _ an interesting story! I've no idea what may be causing all of your adventures, but thanks for sharing. :up:

I'm wondering though if the laser might affect TiVo's Infrared receiver. I know they are different light spectrums but do you think it could have confused it somehow?

Could having a laser generating device, i.e. your DVD recorder or thermometer, somehow upset TiVos cosmos?

What if its something to do with people having a DVD player near their new eSATA drives? Or maybe its the whole 750GB drive thing. Who knows?

As Alice once said: This keeps getting curiouser and curiouser (she was so much surprised, that for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English).

Keep up the good...and interesting work!


----------



## gteague

richsadams said:


> Wow!  Now _that's _ an interesting story! I've no idea what may be causing all of your adventures, but thanks for sharing. :up:
> 
> I'm wondering though if the laser might affect TiVo's Infrared receiver. I know they are different light spectrums but do you think it could have confused it somehow?
> 
> Could having a laser generating device, i.e. your DVD recorder or thermometer, somehow upset TiVos cosmos?
> 
> What if its something to do with people having a DVD player near their new eSATA drives? Or maybe its the whole 750GB drive thing. Who knows?
> 
> As Alice once said: This keeps getting curiouser and curiouser (she was so much surprised, that for the moment she quite forgot how to speak good English).
> 
> Keep up the good...and interesting work!


i think you just hit upon the word ... INFRARED. it's an infrared thermometer after all. i emphasized the laser component but i think you have it right.

now, how a rogue infrared signal managed to make the tivo and the fap miss a beat, i have no idea. but what you're saying makes more sense than that a laser could affect a magnetic-head hard drive.

this is quite the education isn't it? we have two strange things (along with the common sense ones) to put in the faq to avoid: draping the sata cable over a subwoofer or power adaptor and using an infrared device or laser around the tivo.

i have no doubt there was a cause and effect due to my fooling around, so i'm not blaming the fap for this one either. perhaps if i had a spare tivo to play with i'd document whether i could control it using the infrared thermometer! [g]

/guy


----------



## jlib

gteague said:


> i think you just hit upon the word ... INFRARED. it's an infrared thermometer after all...


 It is a passive infrared device. That means it only receives infrared.


> ...I have no doubt there was a cause and effect due to my fooling around...


I have complete doubt. In fact, I blasted my Raytek right into the S3's IR port. Go ahead, try it.


----------



## fred2

You mentioned aiming the laser at the FAP's base.

I don't want to try it, but is the FAP's POWER Switch an actual PHYSICAL PUSH type switch or more of a pressure/touch/electro-sensitive pad? Maybe the laser triggered the FAP's power on/off?


----------



## richsadams

gteague said:


> i think you just hit upon the word ... INFRARED. it's an infrared thermometer after all. i emphasized the laser component but i think you have it right.
> 
> now, how a rogue infrared signal managed to make the tivo and the fap miss a beat, i have no idea. but what you're saying makes more sense than that a laser could affect a magnetic-head hard drive.
> 
> this is quite the education isn't it? we have two strange things (along with the common sense ones) to put in the faq to avoid: draping the sata cable over a subwoofer or power adaptor and using an infrared device or laser around the tivo.
> 
> i have no doubt there was a cause and effect due to my fooling around, so i'm not blaming the fap for this one either. perhaps if i had a spare tivo to play with i'd document whether i could control it using the infrared thermometer! [g]
> 
> /guy


 I dunno  ...I'm all for putting an aluminum foil hat over everything to keep the aliens from messing with it!


----------



## BruceShultes

I have an MX-1 case connected with the esata cable that came with the case.

I have gotten the GSOD twice within the last week.

I have ordered new cables from both monoprice and SIIG.

Hopefully one or the other will fix the problem.


----------



## T-Shee

BruceShultes said:


> I have an MX-1 case connected with the esata cable that came with the case.
> 
> I have gotten the GSOD twice within the last week.
> 
> I have ordered new cables from both monoprice and SIIG.
> 
> Hopefully one or the other will fix the problem.


Just out of curiousity (I'm sure other's would want to know, too), what is the *size* and *make* of the HD mechanism you installed inside the MX.

FYI, my MX-1 w/Samsung HD-501LJ 500gig has been flawless for over 5 weeks now, also using the MX-1's cable; no GSODs, no glitches, no hitches, no gotchas.

(will be performing a ritual to ward off evil electronic spirits after I write this.)


----------



## gteague

fred2 said:


> You mentioned aiming the laser at the FAP's base.
> 
> I don't want to try it, but is the FAP's POWER Switch an actual PHYSICAL PUSH type switch or more of a pressure/touch/electro-sensitive pad? Maybe the laser triggered the FAP's power on/off?


i was pointing it within an inch of that switch (a touch switch) at the time, but the drive didn't power down.

that's not to say it couldn't have tried to power down and the tivo overrode it so quickly i wouldn't have noticed it.

/guy


----------



## FrogGremlin

T-Shee said:


> Just out of curiousity (I'm sure other's would want to know, too), what is the *size* and *make* of the HD mechanism you installed inside the MX.


My MX-1 holds a 750GB Seagate SCE drive. My GSOD rate has gotten much better lately. Could it be that the default low-level format on some drives in some way is slightly incompatible with the TiVo usage pattern, and this is the cause of all (or at least many) of the problems? If so, there's hope that, one drive at a time, they eventually learn to play together nicely, and the problems go away.


----------



## DN325Ci

DN325Ci said:


> An update: A quick note for those who were interested, after two hard days of S3 usage it seems that simply changing the eSATA cable from the one supplied with the Antec MX-1 to the SIIG 1 meter cable has made the difference. My S3 has not rebooted since I made the change.
> 
> I'd like to get a few more days on it before judging it a success, but my initial take away is that (as many have said) the whole external eSATA arrangement is extremely sensitive to the cable. Even the supplied MX-1 cable, which has been widely reported as a good one, may have some variability that can cause malfunction.
> 
> Don


Final Update: it's been several days now. I have had zero re-boots on my MX-1/DB35 setup since I installed the SIIG cable. I think it's solved now. Thanks for all the help, guys.

Don


----------



## Michael Gwynn

successful on the first try!

97 hd hrs and 927 sd hours!


----------



## oldnacl

BruceShultes said:


> I have an MX-1 case connected with the esata cable that came with the case.
> 
> I have gotten the GSOD twice within the last week.
> 
> I have ordered new cables from both monoprice and SIIG.
> 
> Hopefully one or the other will fix the problem.


I have all the cables you mentioned. The uninsulated portion of the connector on my monoprice cable is shorter than the Tripp-Lite, which is slightly shorter than the SIIG cable. As I have only one SIIG cable and 2 of the others, this comparison might not be valid due to manufacturing tolerances. I would suggest using the cable with the longest uninsulated connector - size does count.

BTW, my system; currently a Rosewill case and 320 GB drive had 2 freezes in a week of hard use - an improvement over multiple freezes and GSODs with other drive/enclosure/cable combinations. Currently (after the most recent freeze), I switched to a 36" Tripp-Lite from the 72" SIIG to see if cable length has an effect.


----------



## maynerd

I have my MX-1 in hand and my DB35 is scheduled to arrive today. Any additional tips that aren't on the FAQ? 

Also, I am considering purchasing an additional eSata cable. 

Is there any real difference between the Tripp-Lite P950 and the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 all I can see is that the SIIG is much more expensive.

Thanks!


----------



## T-Shee

maynerd said:


> I have my MX-1 in hand and my DB35 is scheduled to arrive today. Any additional tips that aren't on the FAQ?
> 
> Also, I am considering purchasing an additional eSata cable.
> 
> Is there any real difference between the Tripp-Lite P950 and the SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 all I can see is that the SIIG is much more expensive.
> 
> Thanks!


The cable that's included w/MX-1 should be fine. If you run into problems, and you shouldn't, consider an alternative. No reason to spend $ before you need to.

My guess is that the overwhelming majority of MX-1 ESATA cables deployed have been working without issues.

Drive/Case assembly is easy, straightforward. Be mindful of the LED wires as you close up. Don't overtighten the drive mount screws to the sled/fan. Have fun and enjoy it!


----------



## richsadams

T-Shee said:


> The cable that's included w/MX-1 should be fine. If you run into problems, and you shouldn't, consider an alternative. No reason to spend $ before you need to.
> 
> My guess is that the overwhelming majority of MX-1 ESATA cables deployed have been working without issues.
> 
> Drive/Case assembly is easy, straightforward. Be mindful of the LED wires as you close up. Don't overtighten the drive mount screws to the sled/fan. Have fun and enjoy it!


 Agreed. Ours has worked flawlessly for over a month now.

Here's a good Antec MX-1 assembly video tutorial if needed.

Enjoy!


----------



## GooberMan

What is the technical reason that the kickstart 62 procedure won't work on any already upgraded internal drive? How does it know it's not the original drive and why does it matter?


----------



## 1283

GooberMan said:


> What is the technical reason that the kickstart 62 procedure won't work on any already upgraded internal drive? How does it know it's not the original drive and why does it matter?


Partition structures are different.


----------



## George Cifranci

DN325Ci said:


> Final Update: it's been several days now. I have had zero re-boots on my MX-1/DB35 setup since I installed the SIIG cable. I think it's solved now. Thanks for all the help, guys.
> 
> Don


That's good to hear. I just installed the SIIG cable on my MX-1 setup after I had a reboot a week ago and a lockup the other day using the cable that came with my MX-1.


----------



## GooberMan

c3 said:


> Partition structures are different.


My internal drive is one of those "drop in" drives that already had Tivo software preloaded. Is there a possibility that it will have the correct partition structure to work with kickstart 62?


----------



## George Cifranci

GooberMan said:


> My internal drive is one of those "drop in" drives that already had Tivo software preloaded. Is there a possibility that it will have the correct partition structure to work with kickstart 62?


Nope. I have one of those too (a Weakness preloaded 750GB Seagate DB35). I had to hook up both drives to my PC and used the MFSLive v1.2 CD. A fairly simple process.


----------



## bonnie_raitt

Got my second GSOD on a Seagate 750 GB drive and Icy Dock enclosure combo. It's been 4 weeks since the last one. That one occurred 3 weeks after initial install.

I turned off Tivo waited 30 seconds and plugged it back in. Everything came back fine after about 15 minutes.

Que sera, sera


----------



## BruceShultes

T-Shee said:


> Just out of curiousity (I'm sure other's would want to know, too), what is the *size* and *make* of the HD mechanism you installed inside the MX.
> 
> FYI, my MX-1 w/Samsung HD-501LJ 500gig has been flawless for over 5 weeks now, also using the MX-1's cable; no GSODs, no glitches, no hitches, no gotchas.
> 
> (will be performing a ritual to ward off evil electronic spirits after I write this.)


1TB Hitachi Deskstar.


----------



## BruceShultes

T-Shee said:


> The cable that's included w/MX-1 should be fine. If you run into problems, and you shouldn't, consider an alternative. No reason to spend $ before you need to.
> 
> My guess is that the overwhelming majority of MX-1 ESATA cables deployed have been working without issues.
> 
> Drive/Case assembly is easy, straightforward. Be mindful of the LED wires as you close up. Don't overtighten the drive mount screws to the sled/fan. Have fun and enjoy it!


Two things to mention about the case assembly, drive installation.

1. Make sure you have some container to hold all the pieces as you remove and then replace them in the case (I spent half an hour finding a screw that rolled on the floor).

2. You need either a screwdriver with a clamp on the end to hold the screw in place or a spring loaded screw holder (included in many PC tool sets) to perform the same function (Unless you have really narrow fingers, there is no way to fit your fingers between the edge of the drive sled and the drive to re-attach the sled).


----------



## richsadams

BruceShultes said:


> 2. You need either a screwdriver with a clamp on the end to hold the screw in place or a spring loaded screw holder (included in many PC tool sets) to perform the same function (Unless you have really narrow fingers, there is no way to fit your fingers between the edge of the drive sled and the drive to re-attach the sled).


 That part's a real bugger indeed. I had neither, nor are my fingers particularly narrow. It took me about a half-dozen times of dropping the tiny screws into the case and retrieving them before I could get them back into either side. That's a little part they gloss over in their tutorial.

But that's probably the worst of it. All-in-all I think the MX-1 is one of the best external drive enclosures I've worked with to date. Its solid, cool and very quiet...looks nice too! :up:


----------



## T-Shee

BruceShultes said:


> Two things to mention about the case assembly, drive installation.
> 
> 1. Make sure you have some container to hold all the pieces as you remove and then replace them in the case (I spent half an hour finding a screw that rolled on the floor).
> 
> 2. You need either a screwdriver with a clamp on the end to hold the screw in place or a spring loaded screw holder (included in many PC tool sets) to perform the same function (Unless you have really narrow fingers, there is no way to fit your fingers between the edge of the drive sled and the drive to re-attach the sled).


He's right. Consider it the 1st Law of All Projects - *USE THE RIGHT TOOLS*, and you'll do it right. Small containers, coffee cups, whatever's handy, are a must.

I didn't find the sled screws difficult at all, perhaps because I'm a retired IT tech and doing assem/disassem of this type for years. A complete set of good quality jeweler's screw drivers helps alot - I usually find that one size will allow you "attach" the screw to the driver head without it falling off - then pop it in and tighten. Magnetic drivers are indespensible for narrow access work like the MX-1.

Ask pretty much any tech and they'll tell you that for this type of work, especially laptop reassembly, you put the screw on the screwdriver, then to the workpiece. Makes it about 10X easier.


----------



## maynerd

Installed my DB35 into my MX-1. Hooked it up to my tivo and followed all the instructions. After a few minutes my external HD was recognized and everything seems to be working. Awesome!

Thanks for your help folks!


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> Installed my DB35 into my MX-1. Hooked it up to my tivo and followed all the instructions. After a few minutes my external HD was recognized and everything seems to be working. Awesome!
> 
> Thanks for your help folks!


Congrats and enjoy!


----------



## GooberMan

What is the difference between the Seagate ST3750640AS and the ST3750640NS? The NS is on the list of "confirmed working" drives, but the AS is not. Would the AS work just as well?


----------



## maynerd

GooberMan said:


> What is the difference between the Seagate ST3750640AS and the ST3750640NS? The NS is on the list of "confirmed working" drives, but the AS is not. Would the AS work just as well?


I believe the NS is rated for 24/7 operation while the AS is not.


----------



## GooberMan

maynerd said:


> I believe the NS is rated for 24/7 operation while the AS is not.


Thanks for that reply. Another question I had is on the FAQ it lists whether to drive is made for DVRs in a separate column from 24/7 operation. Other than 24/7, what makes a drive suitable for a DVR? I have so much noise (fans, receivers, etc.) in my enclosed case that noise isn't an issue. I could save money and get a drive certified for 24/7 that is not "made for a DVR," if noise is the only other factor.


----------



## maynerd

GooberMan said:


> Thanks for that reply. Another question I had is on the FAQ it lists whether to drive is made for DVRs in a separate column from 24/7 operation. Other than 24/7, what makes a drive suitable for a DVR? I have so much noise (fans, receivers, etc.) in my enclosed case that noise isn't an issue. I could save money and get a drive certified for 24/7 that is not "made for a DVR," if noise is the only other factor.


I believe, and someone can correct me here, that 24/7 is intended for enterprise solutions where companies run them all the time (no sleep state) while the drives are intended for DVR may be quieter on top of the 24/7 operation.

Here's a comparision from the segate website.

DB35


> The Seagate DB35 Series hard drive delivers the performance, power efficiency and reliability DVR manufacturers need to design superior products. Featuring DynaPlay Technology, DB35 Series drives address many DVR-specific challenges such as power consumption, video streaming performance, acoustics and reliability. The DB35 Series hard drive is optimized to deliver smooth video playback and recording and is ideal for DVRs and home media servers.
> 
> Key Features and Benefits
> Broad range of capacitiesfrom 80 GB to 750 GB
> ATA/100 and SATA interfaces
> Multiple stream recording capabilityup to 10 television streams at once
> Up to 750 hours of storage for standard television or 140 hours for high-definition content (DB35.3 Series)
> Operating acoustics as low as 2.7 bels for near-silent operation
> Unmatched reliability for extended system field life
> 5-year warranty


NS drives



> Barracuda ES and ES.2 enterprise drives are designed for RAID and nearline applications where high capacity, high reliability, low power consumption and tolerance to rotational vibration (RV) are primary requirements.
> 
> Barracuda ES and ES.2 drives are available with a SATA interface. The Barracuda ES.2 drive also comes with an optional dual-ported SAS interface for 100 percent full duplex and multi-initiator compatibility with a mission-critical SAS host.
> 
> Key Features and Benefits
> Capacities from 250 GB to 1 TB
> Perpendicular recording technology
> SATA interface (SAS available on Barracuda ES.2 drive)
> High broadband RV tolerance for multi-drive environments
> Low power consumption
> PowerTrim technology on the Barracuda ES.2 drive provides power savings in all operational modes with no host interaction or loss of performance.
> 10x improvement in unrecoverable error rate compared to desktop product.
> 5-year limited warranty


----------



## GooberMan

So how easy is using the MFSLIVE procedure to add eSATA? Connect original drive to SATA A, eSATA to SATA B (will eSATA cable work internally?), boot from MFSLIVE CD, type "mfsadd -ex -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb"? Is that it? What else do I need to know?


----------



## maynerd

GooberMan said:


> So how easy is using the MFSLIVE procedure to add eSATA? Connect original drive to SATA A, eSATA to SATA B (will eSATA cable work internally?), boot from MFSLIVE CD, type "mfsadd -ex -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb"? Is that it? What else do I need to know?


I can't help you man you're talkin greek to me.  I just got a DB35 drive and an MX-1 external enclosure and hooked it up and it worked in minutes!


----------



## moxie1617

GooberMan said:


> So how easy is using the MFSLIVE procedure to add eSATA? Connect original drive to SATA A, eSATA to SATA B (will eSATA cable work internally?), boot from MFSLIVE CD, type "mfsadd -ex -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb"? Is that it? What else do I need to know?


Only needed if you have added a larger HD to the S3. If it's the orginal drive just plug the e-sata drive in and use the kickstart 62.
Check here.
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5233788&&#post5233788
and here.
http://www.mfslive.org/softwareguidep5.htm


----------



## oldnacl

I'm now on my 3rd day without problems using the Rosewill case and Tripp-Lite 36" cable (switched from 72" SIIG cable. I also moved the TiVo and eSATA drive further from my UPS (no mean feat). Yesterday the replacement FAP750 arrived so tonight I'll connect it. The saga continues.


----------



## GooberMan

moxie1617 said:


> Only needed if you have added a larger HD to the S3. If it's the orginal drive just plug the e-sata drive in and use the kickstart 62.
> Check here.
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5233788&&#post5233788
> and here.
> http://www.mfslive.org/softwareguidep5.htm


The internal drive has been upgraded. I have read the inscrutions on the MFSLIVE site, but was just asking for clarification. Is that all there is to it?


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> I'm now on my 3rd day without problems using the Rosewill case and Tripp-Lite 36" cable (switched from 72" SIIG cable. I also moved the TiVo and eSATA drive further from my UPS (no mean feat). Yesterday the replacement FAP750 arrived so tonight I'll connect it. The saga continues.


 Cheers for keeping us posted! :up:


----------



## moxie1617

GooberMan said:


> The internal drive has been upgraded. I have read the inscrutions on the MFSLIVE site, but was just asking for clarification. Is that all there is to it?


That's why I also linked to the TCF thread where they discuss adding an external e-SATA drive to an expanded internal drive. From what I read there, that's all there is to it.

I haven't done it myself and don't know if the folks that post on that thread bother checking this thread out. If you feel unsure after reading that thread you should post your concerns there.


----------



## jlib

oldnacl said:


> I'm now on my 3rd day without problems using the Rosewill case and Tripp-Lite 36" cable (switched from 72" SIIG cable. I also moved the TiVo and eSATA drive further from my UPS (no mean feat). Yesterday the replacement FAP750 arrived so tonight I'll connect it. The saga continues.


I hereby nominate you for the _*"Boldy goes where no man has gone before"*_ award for your fearless experimentation and tenacious empiricism. Your careful observations over the last many weeks are of great value.


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> I hereby nominate you for the _*"Boldy goes where no man has gone before"*_ award for your fearless experimentation and tenacious empiricism. Your careful observations over the last many weeks are of great value.


 Seconded! :up:


----------



## oldnacl

I'm humbled - and somewhat saddened that this morning's attempt to marry the replacement FAP750 has been, so far, unsuccessful. First plug-in gave me a GSOD that lasted just long enough to brew my morning coffee, but came up with 32 hours of HD after rebooting. A soft restart and the 62 kickstart procedure (now that I relocated the TiVo further from the UPS, plugging the cord in whilst aiming the remote is nearly impossible without growing an extra foot or two on each arm) went through the motinons including a second boot, but, alas, still 32 hours and no message that the second drive was recognised. Tonight I'll move some hardware so I can plug and pause simultaneously and report my results in a few days. This is a great place - good information and a place to vent frustrations.


----------



## bown

oldnacl said:


> I'm humbled - and somewhat saddened that this morning's attempt to marry the replacement FAP750 has been, so far, unsuccessful. First plug-in gave me a GSOD that lasted just long enough to brew my morning coffee, but came up with 32 hours of HD after rebooting. A soft restart and the 62 kickstart procedure (now that I relocated the TiVo further from the UPS, plugging the cord in whilst aiming the remote is nearly impossible without growing an extra foot or two on each arm) went through the motinons including a second boot, but, alas, still 32 hours and no message that the second drive was recognised. Tonight I'll move some hardware so I can plug and pause simultaneously and report my results in a few days. This is a great place - good information and a place to vent frustrations.


I don't think the pause at power on issue is your problem. Technically you don't have to press the pause button until the Tivo is at that specific part of the boot up process. Since there isn't a lot of feedback where the Tivo is in the boot up process, holding down the pause just ensures that you don't go past that point.

Check your FAP750. Make sure that it is plugged in already. When you plug in the Tivo the drive should power on automatically. If it doesn't then you should probably check the ESATA cable.

I'm also not sure if a soft restart will work for the kickstart62 procedure.


----------



## T-Shee

bown said:


> ...I'm also not sure if a soft restart will work for the kickstart62 procedure.


Soft restarts are no different to the software boot process than "pulling the plug". The kickstart 62 works the same as a cold (power cord pulled out) restart.


----------



## oldnacl

bown said:


> I don't think the pause at power on issue is your problem. Technically you don't have to press the pause button until the Tivo is at that specific part of the boot up process. Since there isn't a lot of feedback where the Tivo is in the boot up process, holding down the pause just ensures that you don't go past that point.
> 
> Check your FAP750. Make sure that it is plugged in already. When you plug in the Tivo the drive should power on automatically. If it doesn't then you should probably check the ESATA cable.
> 
> I'm also not sure if a soft restart will work for the kickstart62 procedure.


The FAP was plugged in and running when I began the process and on the initial try (that gave me the GSOD) I pressed the pause button from the second the lights went out until the orange light came on. Then I did the 6 2 button push. On the restart from the TiVo menu, I held the pause button down throughout the boot to the orange light and it acted like the kickstart was going to "take". It rebooted as expected, but when I checked settings, there were still only 32 hours available.
I didn't have time to fool with it more, but will do so tonight. I've successfully kickstarted the unit several times with different drives/cable combinations/unplugging/restarting, so I doubt it's pilot error although my timing may have been off considering I have a big project at work that's shipping and that was on my mind.


----------



## oldnacl

T-Shee said:


> Soft restarts are no different to the software boot process than "pulling the plug". The kickstart 62 works the same as a cold (power cord pulled out) restart.


I wonder if that's realy true - for example, cold booting a computer is a different animal than a warm boot, i.e. shut down and wait 10 seconds or longer and start vs a restart. I might expect this to be similar although I have personally seen the same results doing a wedding or divorce whether I rebooted or pulled the plug.


----------



## FrogGremlin

oldnacl said:


> ... Then I did the 6 2 button push. On the restart from the TiVo menu, I held the pause button down throughout the boot to the orange light and it acted like the kickstart was going to "take". It rebooted as expected, but when I checked settings, there were still only 32 hours available.


The second "Pause" isn't necessary. Perhaps it's overriding the previous "Pause 6-2"? (Or did I misunderstand, and you were doing two separate tests?)


----------



## oldnacl

FrogGremlin said:


> The second "Pause" isn't necessary. Perhaps it's overriding the previous "Pause 6-2"? (Or did I misunderstand, and you were doing two separate tests?)


Yes, I made two attempts this morning, one from an unplugged state and the other a reboot. Tonight I tried at least 10 times, varying between cold and warm boots, 3 different cables, tripp-lite, SIIG and most recently, a trimmed monoprice. With each cable I tried the FAP, a Rosewill case (that had been working well the past few days) and a third case/drive combination. The Rosewill and the third case had also been used successfully with a couple SA 8300 HD STBs that I had before I bought the S3.
Bottom line is that the S3 will not recognise any external drive/cable combination I've thrown at it today. In each case, after the pause/6/2 trick (that worked for me several times before today), the TiVo reboots (indicating, from what I've read, that the kick start "took") but never shows the "external drive found" message. I even tried unplugging the S3 and leaving it unplugged for a half hour before trying a kick start. No Joy. Bummer.


----------



## FrogGremlin

Only three thoughts come to mind:

1. The problem is at the TiVo-connection point. Might some physical residue from your experiments (e.g., from the trimmed plug) be ever-so-slightly corrupting the connection between the TiVo and the eSATA cable?

2. The TiVo has gotten confused, and thinks it's married to a 0-GB drive. Did you try a divorce, or won't it give you that option?

3. Silly, but to be complete: Is the external drive getting power? My first expansion failed (in precisely the way yours is failing) because, when I reached around blindly to plug in my MX-1, I was off by a half-inch and only got one plug prong into the power strip. ;p


----------



## bown

have you tried hooking the FAP750 to your computer to see if it connects and works properly?


----------



## fred2

I never saw "external drive found" type message either. It was just there when I checked the Settings/Info Menu. 

I've got a FAP750 with a trimmed monoprice.

The thing is, since this is NOT tivo sanctioned, if it were a problem with your tivo, there is no way to deal with it, I'd guess. For all intents and purposes, there is NO esata connection on the Tivo. Which is interesting since under warranty, there was no official way a user could tell if the unit was defective.


----------



## oldnacl

I'm close to giving up on the external drive. I must have rebooted the TiVo no less than 20 times in the past 12 hours with nary a successful marriage to any one of 5 drives / 3 cable combinations. I also did a programming reset and am now in the midst of a complete reset as a swan song attempt. Note (for anyone who hasn't been following this thread) that all the drive/cable combinations have worked previously (albeit imperfectly) with this TiVo.
No residual clipping detritus is lodged in the eSATA opening of the Tivo nor any of the drives. All drives function properly when connected to a PC. The only check I haven't made is to connect them to a PC using eSATA as I haven't yet put the card in my computer. 2 of the 5 drives were previously in service as external storage on SA 8300 HD STBs provided by Adelphia before they went to jail and I went to TiVo. I guess it's time for a sane person to throw in the towel and watch my TiVo approved 30 hours of recording capacity (not that I will give up so easily)
Actually, I think my next move will be to open the FAP750, remove the drive and put it inside the TiVo. Where's the page with the procedure for doing that?
Thanks to everyone for their suggestions and sympathy for my plight. If only there was a clear resolution, this wouldn't have been in vain.


----------



## NOD

BruceShultes said:


> 1TB Hitachi Deskstar.


i have the exact same setup (1TB Hitachi in an MX-1), and I've had it attached for a little more than a month.

I've gotten 3 GSOD's in that period of time. Each time it took the s3 about 10 minutes to boot back up and work fine again.

I haven't tried ordering another set of cables yet, but I would be very appreciative if you would report your results after you try it w/ new cables (in part b/c I got another mx-1 for my other series 3, but haven't opened it up and slapped a drive in it yet).


----------



## KustomMerc

looking for a Antec MX-1 encloser......anybody know where I can get one??

Thanks


----------



## richsadams

KustomMerc said:


> looking for a Antec MX-1 encloser......anybody know where I can get one??
> 
> Thanks


 Excaliberpc.com say they have 10 in stock at the moment. You could call ahead to verify. We've used them a number of times and they offer excellent service. We usually receive our orders within 72 hours often less. :up:


----------



## KustomMerc

thanks, I just ordered it. These are great enclosers..!


----------



## drewpydog

oldnacl said:


> I'm close to giving up on the external drive. I must have rebooted the TiVo no less than 20 times in the past 12 hours with nary a successful marriage to any one of 5 drives / 3 cable combinations. I also did a programming reset and am now in the midst of a complete reset as a swan song attempt. Note (for anyone who hasn't been following this thread) that all the drive/cable combinations have worked previously (albeit imperfectly) with this TiVo.


Holy crap - if I had that type of trouble I would be shooting something (the drive, the TiVO, or myself). I've had the FAP750 with tripp-lite cable up and running for 3 weeks with no hitches at all.

More power to you.


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> I'm close to giving up on the external drive. I must have rebooted the TiVo no less than 20 times in the past 12 hours with nary a successful marriage to any one of 5 drives / 3 cable combinations. I also did a programming reset and am now in the midst of a complete reset as a swan song attempt. Note (for anyone who hasn't been following this thread) that all the drive/cable combinations have worked previously (albeit imperfectly) with this TiVo.
> No residual clipping detritus is lodged in the eSATA opening of the Tivo nor any of the drives. All drives function properly when connected to a PC. The only check I haven't made is to connect them to a PC using eSATA as I haven't yet put the card in my computer. 2 of the 5 drives were previously in service as external storage on SA 8300 HD STBs provided by Adelphia before they went to jail and I went to TiVo. I guess it's time for a sane person to throw in the towel and watch my TiVo approved 30 hours of recording capacity (not that I will give up so easily)
> Actually, I think my next move will be to open the FAP750, remove the drive and put it inside the TiVo. Where's the page with the procedure for doing that?
> Thanks to everyone for their suggestions and sympathy for my plight. If only there was a clear resolution, this wouldn't have been in vain.


 Aurgh!  We all feel your pain...and appreciate all of the hard work you've put into this.

I have to believe that at some point the whole thing will just work and that will be that. There are too many people with good stories to tell...so it's just gotta happen!

Hang in there! :up:


----------



## oldnacl

Thanks for the kind words. I'm on eSATA hiatus now; cables, drives disconnected and starting to restore season passes while weeding out the home shopping channels from the program lineup after the factory reset (which, incidentally, didn't help). 
I did put the eSATA card in my PC and connected the FAP successfully confirming that cable and drive work. 
Someone suggested that divorcing the previously connected eSATA drive had left the TiVo in a state thinking a 0GB capacity drive was connected. I searched both the web and this forum for more info on that possibility but came up empty handed. One thing I did read was that I may be unsuccessful in using the current factory drive to format a new, larger internal HDD now that I've divorced an eSATA drive. If anyone knows more about that possibility and can post a link to to information on the issue, I'd appreciate it, as I believe that's the path I'm going to follow.


----------



## spike2k5

oldnacl said:


> Thanks for the kind words. I'm on eSATA hiatus now; cables, drives disconnected and starting to restore season passes while weeding out the home shopping channels from the program lineup after the factory reset (which, incidentally, didn't help).
> I did put the eSATA card in my PC and connected the FAP successfully confirming that cable and drive work.
> Someone suggested that divorcing the previously connected eSATA drive had left the TiVo in a state thinking a 0GB capacity drive was connected. I searched both the web and this forum for more info on that possibility but came up empty handed. One thing I did read was that I may be unsuccessful in using the current factory drive to format a new, larger internal HDD now that I've divorced an eSATA drive. If anyone knows more about that possibility and can post a link to to information on the issue, I'd appreciate it, as I believe that's the path I'm going to follow.


Sorry to hear that.
I was never able to work FAP well on my S3 either so it's off my recommended list.

If you want to upgrade internal drive after divorcing eSATA, you have to run a utiltiy called fixdivorce. You can get that from mfslive.org site. Download the latest iso which is 1.2.


----------



## oldnacl

spike2k5 said:


> Sorry to hear that.
> I was never able to work FAP well on my S3 either so it's off my recommended list.
> 
> If you want to upgrade internal drive after divorcing eSATA, you have to run a utiltiy called fixdivorce. You can get that from mfslive.org site. Download the latest iso which is 1.2.


THANK YOU! THANK YOU! That's the information I need. The last thing I want to do after this exercise is have problems upgrading the internal drive. I DL-ed 1.2 yesterday but didn't read the release notes until just now, after reading your post. Hopefully the only decision remaining is whether to buy the DB35 DVR version or just pull the drive from the FAP case. I suppose I'll void the warranty doing that and there goes the 5 year guarantee. Still, I hate having so much invested in this project if I buy the DB35.
A Comcast rep I spoke to this morning says they're revising their price schedule given the changes mandated by the FCC on STBs effective July 1. I wonder what that is going to do to the CC fees for our S3s. The rep I spoke with indicated they were going to add a new and so far undisclosed "service fee" for cable cards. I may not even need any extra storage space if I give Comcast their CCs back and just record OTA!


----------



## Ilene

3rd GSOD. Still not sure why. Things seemed to be working fine. I had recorded the entire Concert for Diana on MTV-HD and the 1 hour prime time of the same.


----------



## FrogGremlin

oldnacl said:


> Actually, I think my next move will be to open the FAP750, remove the drive and put it inside the TiVo. Where's the page with the procedure for doing that?
> Thanks to everyone for their suggestions and sympathy for my plight. If only there was a clear resolution, this wouldn't have been in vain.


Official TiVofolk follow these boards. Maybe one will help compensate you for your efforts by offering a replacement Series 3. It certainly sounds like the eSATA connection has gone bad at the TiVo end of the path.


----------



## gbm

Hi,

I have my Antec MX-1 and I'm waiting on the release of the Hitachi Cinemastar 1TB(not the Deskstar). It was supposed to be released in the second quarter of 2007. Any info on when it may be available?

Thanks,

gbm


----------



## S3-2501

Well, it's already been a month since I added my FAP 750, and I just paid the charge bill for it. 

No problems yet. Hopefully it'll continue to work smoothly now that I've literally passed the point of no return(s)


----------



## hunts

gbm said:


> Hi,
> 
> I have my Antec MX-1 and I'm waiting on the release of the Hitachi Cinemastar 1TB(not the Deskstar). It was supposed to be released in the second quarter of 2007. Any info on when it may be available?
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> gbm


I believe the MX-1 will only support up to 750GB. Can anyone confirm this?

Edit: Confirmed that 750 GB is the max.
http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150


----------



## RoundSparrow

Has this been mentioned, it does not seem to get reference on the first page.

the eSATA interface on the FreeAgent Pro 750GB has many reports of problems. It is slower than the USB in many cases (Tested on a Windows XP or Vista sytem) and under Linux has timeout and disconnect issues.

It seems the FreeAgent Pro uses a "SATA to SATA" bridge and isn't just a straight cable into the internal drive.

Anyway, today I found reference to a firmware update!!

google FA_Pro_eSATA_Update.zip

You have to use Windows and the USB interface to update it... Testing myself.


----------



## maynerd

hunts said:


> I believe the MX-1 will only support up to 750GB. Can anyone confirm this?
> 
> Edit: Confirmed that 750 GB is the max.
> http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150


I'm not sure that this is definitive, that the enclosure won't support a 1TB drive. It is possible that the info was written up before 1TB drives. I dunno though..just saying...anyone try and put a big mamma jamma HD in it?



RoundSparrow said:


> Has this been mentioned, it does not seem to get reference on the first page.
> 
> the eSATA interface on the FreeAgent Pro 750GB has many reports of problems. It is slower than the USB in many cases (Tested on a Windows XP or Vista sytem) and under Linux has timeout and disconnect issues.
> 
> It seems the FreeAgent Pro uses a "SATA to SATA" bridge and isn't just a straight cable into the internal drive.
> 
> Anyway, today I found reference to a firmware update!!
> 
> google FA_Pro_eSATA_Update.zip
> 
> You have to use Windows and the USB interface to update it... Testing myself.


This is interesting and I'm sure many look forward to your results.


----------



## oldnacl

RoundSparrow said:


> Has this been mentioned, it does not seem to get reference on the first page.
> 
> the eSATA interface on the FreeAgent Pro 750GB has many reports of problems. It is slower than the USB in many cases (Tested on a Windows XP or Vista sytem) and under Linux has timeout and disconnect issues.
> 
> It seems the FreeAgent Pro uses a "SATA to SATA" bridge and isn't just a straight cable into the internal drive.
> 
> Anyway, today I found reference to a firmware update!!
> 
> google FA_Pro_eSATA_Update.zip
> 
> You have to use Windows and the USB interface to update it... Testing myself.


That's interesting - in testing the eSATA connection on my PC, I made no bench tests, just confirmed that it was working and file transfers successful. Given the PC/Windows penchant for BIOS issues, I think I'll run a few rudimentary tests on the PC and then try the same tests with it connected to a Mac and see if the transfer results match before messing with the drive firmware.
In my case, I'm about over the eSATA debacle, so it no longer matters, but it would be good information. Of course, without reformatting, I'll only be able to read from the FAP since it's by default formatted NTFS. I can reformat it FAT 32 so both PC and Mac and write to it.


----------



## BruceShultes

hunts said:


> I believe the MX-1 will only support up to 750GB. Can anyone confirm this?
> 
> Edit: Confirmed that 750 GB is the max.
> http://www.antec.com/us/productDetails.php?ProdID=77150


Interesting, since I have been using a 1TB Deskstar in mine.

Other than an occasional GSOD, it has given no problems. These could have been caused by power problems in my area. My UPS's beep quite often, however until I get another UPS, the MX-1 and S3 are not connected to one.


----------



## gbm

I'm not going to go back and find them, but in addition to BruceShultes there were others who verified that the MX-1 would work with the Hitachi 1TB Deskstar drive. I figured that for an external drive enclosure, it was form factor and the connection cable (eSATA) that would determine what would work. If I'm wrong about that, no big deal, I'll use the enclosure with one of my PCs and find one that does.

But does anyone have any info about when the Cinemastar drive will be out? If it's been delayed for awhile, I may get one of the 750 GB Seagates instead. I want a DVR certified drive and I hate the thought of adding a different (larger) one later because once the drive has been connected for awhile it will be hard to upgrade to a new drive without losing a lot of shows (stored on the removed drive).

gbm


----------



## maynerd

gbm said:


> But does anyone have any info about when the Cinemastar drive will be out? If it's been delayed for awhile,
> gbm


Give em a call and see what they say...

Contacts
U.S.A.
Karin Gilles
Hitachi Global Storage Technologies
408-717-7676
[email protected]


----------



## jlib

gbm said:


> I have my Antec MX-1 and I'm waiting on the release of the Hitachi Cinemastar 1TB(not the Deskstar). It was supposed to be released in the second quarter of 2007. Any info on when it may be available?


No problem waiting but realize the S3 is not going to use any of the advanced DVR features the CinemaStar provides. It is an OEM drive intended for a mfr to build a system around it. The S3 will interface with it like a regular drive. It will be cheaper to just get one of the readily available commodity DeskStar drives and simply put it in quiet mode.


----------



## RoundSparrow

Some more info on the Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB. I purchased mine from BestBuy when they had the $199 sale...

The firmware is for the Silicon Storage Technology SST39xF020 

Before update: 0.34.0010
After update: 0.34.0011


----------



## IronTemple

Anyone have any insights on Western Digital's "My Library Video Edition DVR Expander 
(WDG1S5000)"?

500G w/enclosure for $199 specifically designed for DVR storage expansion


----------



## nuttzy06

BruceShultes said:


> Interesting, since I have been using a 1TB Deskstar in mine.
> 
> Other than an occasional GSOD, it has given no problems. These could have been caused by power problems in my area. My UPS's beep quite often, however until I get another UPS, the MX-1 and S3 are not connected to one.


You sound like just the guy I want to talk to  Since I don't want to lose what's on my original internal drive, I'd like to go as large as possible with the external. Is your 1TB Deskstar working well enough for you to recommend?

I assume you have the Deskstar, Antec MX-1, and use the cable from the Antec. I assume you'd also recommend a UPS be added. Is it quiet? Did you need to mess with any of the drive's options? You seem pretty certain that you occasional GSODs are related more to the environment, and not the components, correct?

Lastly, do you know the Manufacturer's Part Number (MPN)? Pricegrabber,com has a 0A34915 and a 0A34193 and there's about a $20 difference ($363 v. $384). No biggie if you're not sure.

I'd appreciate any info you would like to share. Thanks!
-Nuttzy


----------



## lkinley

RoundSparrow said:


> Some more info on the Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750GB. I purchased mine from BestBuy when they had the $199 sale...
> 
> The firmware is for the Silicon Storage Technology SST39xF020
> 
> Before update: 0.34.0010
> After update: 0.34.0011


It sure solved the eSATA problems with my drive. Transfers under XP were far, far slower than using the USB interface. With the firmware upgrade, I'm seeing 59MB/s using hdparm -t under Linux. Upgrading the firmware resets the spindown and lights settings, so if you turned those off you will need to do it again.

I am not using the drive with my S3, although I bought it with that purpose in mind. I decided to use it on my PC instead and buy a DB35 drive for the S3 instead. I've had too many drive failures in the past to take any undue risk with my S3.

-Lance


----------



## wilhouse

2 questions:

is there a link where people have listed esata drives that work flawlessly? If not, should we start one?

does the drive have to be formatted first or do you just attach it? I posted that question elsewhere too.

wilhouse


----------



## Fofer

1) The first post of this thread

2) just attach it, the formatting is taken care of by the built-in procedure. this is also explained in the first post of this thread.


----------



## BruceShultes

nuttzy06 said:


> I assume you have the Deskstar, Antec MX-1, and use the cable from the Antec. I assume you'd also recommend a UPS be added. Is it quiet? Did you need to mess with any of the drive's options? You seem pretty certain that you occasional GSODs are related more to the environment, and not the components, correct?
> 
> Lastly, do you know the Manufacturer's Part Number (MPN)? Pricegrabber,com has a 0A34915 and a 0A34193 and there's about a $20 difference ($363 v. $384). No biggie if you're not sure.
> 
> I'd appreciate any info you would like to share. Thanks!
> -Nuttzy


The drive is the 0A34915. I purchased it from newegg.com and the price at that time was $399 with no shipping charge.

Yes I have both the S3 and the MX-1 powered via UPS. I am currently using the cable that came with the MX-1, but have since purchased additional cables from monoprice and SIIG.

The connector on the monoprice one looks like it would require trimming before it would work, but if I get another GSOD, I plan to try the SIIG cable.

I did not do anything special to the drive before installing it in the MX-1 case. It is quiet enough that I can not hear it unless I am within two feet of the case.


----------



## wilhouse

Fofe, thanks, I was working backwards on the thread. Next time I'll start with the first post!

wilhouse


----------



## inaka

*Maxtor 500GB Serial ATA/300 16MB Buffer - L01F500 Retail Hard Drive Kit. *
(actually rebranded seagate)
http://shop3.outpost.com/product/4551377
*$89.99 w/free shipping*

I have this exact same drive on my S3 with an external apricorn enclosure...works perfectly.

Just passing along the info to anyone looking for a deal on a solid SATA drive.


----------



## gteague

inaka said:


> *Maxtor 500GB Serial ATA/300 16MB Buffer - L01F500 Retail Hard Drive Kit. *
> (actually rebranded seagate)
> http://shop3.outpost.com/product/4551377
> *$89.99 w/free shipping*
> 
> I have this exact same drive on my S3 with an external apricorn enclosure...works perfectly.
> 
> Just passing along the info to anyone looking for a deal on a solid SATA drive.


i'm not carping here or trying to discourage anyone from taking advantage of this deal, but would like to share what i personally experienced inre maxtor drives:

when i got my new mac pro and was populating my hd bays i found a maxtor 500gb onsale at fry's (outpost.com) for $119 and bought it. when i got it home i found it was a maxline pro model which i researched and found was one of their enterprise models--designed for a little heavier use than their consumer models. also, in tests at toms hardware and lowendmac this drive performed consistently in the top tier of comparable drives of all brands. i'm extremely pleased with this drive in my mac pro--it is silent and fast.

when the tivo s3 sata hack was announced, i was in a hurry to get a drive for external use on my tivo so i ran into fry's and grabbed the first cheap 500gb drive and sata enclosure i could find.

the drive was a 500gb maxtor, but unboxing revealed it to be a 'diamondmax' model. i mounted it into the nexstar3 enclosure and although it functioned perfectly for a tivo external drive it was very loud, very loud indeed and ran hot in that fanless enclosure in spite of the enclosure being out in the open.

to be fair about it, i didn't try hooking up the drive to a pc and running the supplied software to tweak the settings. that might have made all the difference in the world.

but when the deal came along for the fap750 for $176 about 10 days later i immediately replaced the maxtor/nexstar combo with the fap750 which is silent and runs only warm-ish.

i relegated the maxtor to backup use where i only turn it on for an hour or two a week when i do backups. it works fine for this use and the computer fan masks the noise.

/guy


----------



## inaka

As I posted, the drive is actually a rebranded seagate.
*It's a Seagate drive.*


----------



## CIP54

Been 2 weeks with Apricorn 500 gb drive. Had several reboots with GSOD.

I'm considering buying a new cable based on this forum. Has anyone experienced reboots with the SIIG 1 m cable?


----------



## gteague

inaka said:


> As I posted, the drive is actually a rebranded seagate.
> *It's a Seagate drive.*


well, i couldn't turn up any evidence that this is a diamondmax drive.

otoh, the drive with that code# is located at a maxtor page, not the seagate page:

http://www.maxtorsolutions.com/en/catalog/Internal_SATA/

but all i'm saying is that it pays to check the specs as some of the low-end, economy drives work better than others for tivo externals.

/guy


----------



## inaka

gteague said:


> well, i couldn't turn up any evidence that this is a diamondmax drive.
> 
> otoh, the drive with that code# is located at a maxtor page, not the seagate page:
> 
> http://www.maxtorsolutions.com/en/catalog/Internal_SATA/
> 
> but all i'm saying is that it pays to check the specs as some of the low-end, economy drives work better than others for tivo externals.
> 
> /guy


gteague, no offense, but if you're going to threadcap, at least know what you're talking about. You do know that Maxtor has been acquired by Seagate Technology, right?

The drive is a rebadged seagate drive sold under the Maxtor name.
Exactly as I originally posted.

The exact drive is a brand new seagate 7200.10 drive.

I have one. Take my word for it, or if you don't believe me, then kindly find an alternate HD deal and please don't threadcap for those who may be interested. 
Thank you.


----------



## nuttzy06

BruceShultes said:


> The connector on the monoprice one looks like it would require trimming before it would work, but if I get another GSOD, I plan to try the SIIG cable.


Thanks for the great info! Very helpful  Please let us know if you encounter more GSODs (I'm probably about 30 days out from taking on this project).

-Nuttzy


----------



## bp888

I have bought all the recommended hardware pieces (MX-1, DB35 and Tripp-Lite eSATA cable) ready to be put together for my S3. I was going to set them up this weekend in time for a long busines trip next week. I even upgraded my DSL connection so I can get decent upload speed (was 400 kbps, now 650kbps). But then I keep reading about GSODs. 

I plan on watching the S3 recorded programs remotely from my hotel rooms via my Slingbox Pro. My concern is whether I'll be able to recover from a GSOD remotely. Does an S3 recover from a GSOD by itself or is human intervention such as unplugging power needed?

Appreciate any insight.


----------



## dougdingle

inaka said:


> gteague, no offense, but if you're going to threadcap, at least know what you're talking about.


What does "threadcap" mean?


----------



## richsadams

bp888 said:


> I have bought all the recommended hardware pieces (MX-1, DB35 and Tripp-Lite eSATA cable) ready to be put together for my S3. I was going to set them up this weekend in time for a long busines trip next week. I even upgraded my DSL connection so I can get decent upload speed (was 400 kbps, now 650kbps). But then I keep reading about GSODs.
> 
> I plan on watching the S3 recorded programs remotely from my hotel rooms via my Slingbox Pro. My concern is whether I'll be able to recover from a GSOD remotely. Does an S3 recover from a GSOD by itself or is human intervention such as unplugging power needed?
> 
> Appreciate any insight.


 TiVo should automatically recover from a GSOD...that's its built-in "check disk" program...however there are no guarantees if it cannot resolve the problem which is generally corrupted data. If the connection with your eSATA drive is lost TiVo will idle at a divorce screen and no programs will be recorded until it is given manual instructions. As long as you have a good cable, connection, etc. you shouldn't have any worries.

We've had our 500GB DB35/MX-1 up and running w/o any issues since May 12th. :up:

Travel safely!


----------



## zob

Does the cable that is provided with MX-1 do a good job or should it be replaced with an aftermarket recommended cable? I don't need any problems. Thanks.


----------



## gteague

dougdingle said:


> What does "threadcap" mean?


i haven't the faintest idea. the poster misinterpreted the intent of my response so badly i decided the good of the group was not being served by continuing to reply.

/guy


----------



## richsadams

zob said:


> Does the cable that is provided with MX-1 do a good job or should it be replaced with an aftermarket recommended cable? I don't need any problems. Thanks.


 Our Antec MX-1 supplied eSATA II cable has been flawless.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> What does "threadcap" mean?


 "Threadcaps" are posts that go off topic. It can also mean arguing about the topic or subject or postings that are intended to discourage additional discussion.

Then there's "threadcrap". That's when a member comes in to post some negative comments about the topic.

I don't think either applies in this case.


----------



## T-Shee

zob said:


> Does the cable that is provided with MX-1 do a good job or should it be replaced with an aftermarket recommended cable? I don't need any problems. Thanks.


My MX-1 has been running with the supplied cable for over two months now - no issues whatsoever. It's perfect. It's a high quality cable that matches the top-notch MX-1.

So far, my ESATA drive experience has been 100% positive. I've gotten to the point where I am no longer aware that the drive is there. That's as good as it gets.


----------



## Bighouse

My MX-1 and Seagate 750 DB35 has worked very well and I've had it quite a while now. I've had two GSODs but each seemed to resolve itself and I haven't noticed any lost programs or messed up recordings.


----------



## Mike Malter

I got a 750GB DB35/MX-1 setup installed this week on my S3 and I have over 100 hours of space for HD programs.

I really like the MX-1 as it has a silicone base the HDD sits on and even the screws that hold the drive in have large washers that rest against thick silicone washers. No sound from the drive at all, and the fan is very quiet too.

Seems like selecting programs for recording is much faster now. I am tempted to see how many programs I can record before I run out of space.


----------



## RoundSparrow

lkinley said:


> It sure solved the eSATA problems with my drive. Transfers under XP were far, far slower than using the USB interface. With the firmware upgrade, I'm seeing 59MB/s using hdparm -t under Linux. Upgrading the firmware resets the spindown and lights settings, so if you turned those off you will need to do it again.
> -Lance


Good to hear. It has fixed all my stability issues under Windows and Linux. I don't own a Tivo, but figured lots of people would be interested.

Again, google search: FA_Pro_eSATA_Update.zip


----------



## l_emmerdeur

I added a Seagate 750Gb Freeagent Pro and a SIIG eSATA Cable a few days after the kickstart 62 method was published on the interwebs. Until a few days ago, I had absolutely no problems with my setup. In fact, since installing the drive, I noticed that the UI was much more responsive.

A few days ago, I started getting pauses during playback. About 1-3 times per 1 hour of viewing a recorded show, the playback would just halt for about 5 seconds or so. A couple of days ago, I got a GSOD, but the Tivo recovered from this in about 15 minutes. This happened while I was removing some Tivocast Season Passes. I proceeded to remove the remaining Tivocasts after the GSOD, thinking that messing with this feature may have caused the GSOD.

I still get the infrequent pauses during playback. If I rewind and play the spot where the pause occurred again, the pause does not repeat (so it isn't the recording that is damaged, it is the Tivo that is choking up temporarily).

I will try upgrading the firmware of the Seagate, see if this fixes this issue.


----------



## oldnacl

A final note that may be of interest to others regarding my inability to get ANY eSATA drive recognized by the S3. (Synopsis - I had many issues with several drive/cable combinations and finally decided to skip the external drive, planning to put an internal upgrade in. That was followed by Comcast (in S FL anyway) initiating a new price structure July 1 that penalizes S3 owners - they raised my rates from $5.50/month for 2 cards to $17.90/month which included 2 CCs AND an additional charge for "HD-Digital service" that applies ONLY to CC installations. I subscribe to a premium digital service package already and THAT went up $5.50)
Today I unplugged and pulled the CCs from my TiVo and when it rebooted, it asked if I wanted to divorce the external drive. The external hadn't been connected for 2 weeks and the TiVo has been running fine - well, except for the Comcast issues! In that period I'd rebooted the TiVo several times and completely reset it twice. Why the divorce screen appeared after pulling the CCs, I don't know, but apparently it was an TiVo OS snafu. If anyone has a problem getting an external drive recognized, this might be the cause. I have no idea how one would fix the problem as the divorce screen appeared spontaneously after doing the same thing I'd done several times previously - except for pulling the cards so maybe that would be a remedy. Perhaps this evening, before I box up the TiVo to return to Costco, I'll see if I can get an external drive recognized.
I'm not dumping TiVo, just switching to a series 2 dual tuner and a cable box. Comcast has done me in.


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> A final note that may be of interest to others regarding my inability to get ANY eSATA drive recognized by the S3. (Synopsis - I had many issues with several drive/cable combinations and finally decided to skip the external drive, planning to put an internal upgrade in. That was followed by Comcast (in S FL anyway) initiating a new price structure July 1 that penalizes S3 owners - they raised my rates from $5.50/month for 2 cards to $17.90/month which included 2 CCs AND an additional charge for "HD-Digital service" that applies ONLY to CC installations. I subscribe to a premium digital service package already and THAT went up $5.50)
> Today I unplugged and pulled the CCs from my TiVo and when it rebooted, it asked if I wanted to divorce the external drive. The external hadn't been connected for 2 weeks and the TiVo has been running fine - well, except for the Comcast issues! In that period I'd rebooted the TiVo several times and completely reset it twice. Why the divorce screen appeared after pulling the CCs, I don't know, but apparently it was an TiVo OS snafu. If anyone has a problem getting an external drive recognized, this might be the cause. I have no idea how one would fix the problem as the divorce screen appeared spontaneously after doing the same thing I'd done several times previously - except for pulling the cards so maybe that would be a remedy. Perhaps this evening, before I box up the TiVo to return to Costco, I'll see if I can get an external drive recognized.
> I'm not dumping TiVo, just switching to a series 2 dual tuner and a cable box. Comcast has done me in.


 Thanks very much for the update. TiVo's thinking it still had an eSATA drive connected explains why it wouldn't accept a new one...but the divorce screen coming up on CC removal is a puzzle.

Sorry to hear about your Comcast experience...and that's a worry. We pay $1.50/mo. for our two cable cards plus the "normal" digital bits. Have you thought about going with OTA for your HD content? There are a lot of S3 owners here that rave about it. It's free of course and I've read here and on other forums that OTA HD quality is even better than cable or satellite because of how much compression is used. If you go to TVFool.com you can enter your address and it will give you a chart telling you how many HD/digital signals are available in your area and how strong they are. They also tell you exactly how far the broadcast antennas are from your house. The antenna farm here is only 11 miles away and our ability to get the signals is very strong...all green. So I'm thinking about getting an antenna anyway ($25 - $35) if the PQ is better.

If Comcast tried that pricing structure with us we'd opt out of all the HD/digital to go to OTA. We would miss some of the other HD we get, HBO, Discovery, etc., but your new pricing is pretty much highway robbery. FIOS is supposed to be coming to our neighborhood one daywhen that happensbye, bye Comcast!

Thanks again for keeping us posted and let us know how you get on. :up:


----------



## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> Have you thought about going with OTA for your HD content? There are a lot of S3 owners here that rave about it. It's free of course and I've read here and on other forums that OTA HD quality is even better than cable or satellite because of how much compression is used


While it's true that both U.S. satellite suppliers compress the living hell out of all signals, HD included, Time Warner (at least in Southern California) simply passes along the full HD transport stream it gets from the originators, so their HD feed is identical to what goes OTA. Much of the compression artifacting that people complain about on cable originates at the source, and TW just passes it along.

As a longtime DTV customer, when it came time to gear up for HD, I looked at their HD offering carefully, then looked at TW's HD signal quality, and it was no contest at all.


----------



## dougdingle

Anyone running this combo successfully?

If so, for how long? Any issues?

I'm torn between using the simpler external drive solution, and just biting the bullet and upgrading the internal drive. 

I would be mighty unhappy if after a few weeks of recording programs the external drive failed to be recognized.


----------



## moxie1617

Check with T-Shee. Should be up around two months with this combo by now.

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5270306&&#post5270306


----------



## T-Shee

dougdingle said:


> Anyone running this combo successfully?
> 
> If so, for how long? Any issues?
> 
> I'm torn between using the simpler external drive solution, and just biting the bullet and upgrading the internal drive.
> 
> I would be mighty unhappy if after a few weeks of recording programs the external drive failed to be recognized.


I've been running a Samsung HD-501LJ mechanism inside a MX-1 enclosure (with MX-1 supplied cable) for about 9 weeks, 1400+ continuous hours, without the slightest problem.

This combo was recognized by the S3 immediately and has been thru several INTENTIONAL reboots without problems. No GSODs. Not one.

If you have a PC or Mac with a USB port, or ESATA, then the worst case scenario would be winding up a 500gig backup hard drive. But don't worry. It'll work just fine.

BTW, the Samsung drives are great: cool, quiet, not expensive. I've been running a Samsung drive in my S1 for several years and never had a problem there either.

Go for it. Enjoy. And keep us posted as to your decision and experience ESATA-wise.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> While it's true that both U.S. satellite suppliers compress the living hell out of all signals, HD included, Time Warner (at least in Southern California) simply passes along the full HD transport stream it gets from the originators, so their HD feed is identical to what goes OTA. Much of the compression artifacting that people complain about on cable originates at the source, and TW just passes it along.
> 
> As a longtime DTV customer, when it came time to gear up for HD, I looked at their HD offering carefully, then looked at TW's HD signal quality, and it was no contest at all.


 Good point. I've no idea what Comcast does to their HD signals. I hate bashing them, but to be honest if there's a way to do something on the cheap...they seem to head in that direction. I'll have to do some research to find out what their HD signal quality is. Where did you find the info about TW's signal?


----------



## oldnacl

richsadams said:


> Thanks very much for the update. TiVo's thinking it still had an eSATA drive connected explains why it wouldn't accept a new one...but the divorce screen coming up on CC removal is a puzzle.
> 
> Sorry to hear about your Comcast experience...and that's a worry. We pay $1.50/mo. for our two cable cards plus the "normal" digital bits. Have you thought about going with OTA for your HD content? There are a lot of S3 owners here that rave about it. It's free of course and I've read here and on other forums that OTA HD quality is even better than cable or satellite because of how much compression is used. If you go to TVFool.com you can enter your address and it will give you a chart telling you how many HD/digital signals are available in your area and how strong they are. They also tell you exactly how far the broadcast antennas are from your house. The antenna farm here is only 11 miles away and our ability to get the signals is very strong...all green. So I'm thinking about getting an antenna anyway ($25 - $35) if the PQ is better.
> 
> If Comcast tried that pricing structure with us we'd opt out of all the HD/digital to go to OTA. We would miss some of the other HD we get, HBO, Discovery, etc., but your new pricing is pretty much highway robbery. FIOS is supposed to be coming to our neighborhood one daywhen that happensbye, bye Comcast!
> 
> Thanks again for keeping us posted and let us know how you get on. :up:


I have an indoor antenna connected to the Tivo for HD and I have QAM tuners in both my TVs and a DVD recorder, so I'll be able to watch OTA HD and the couple channels on cable that are, as yet, unscrambled. I'll miss HBO HD and ESPN HD, but raising prices more than 50% is just too much for me to take from Comcast. I already signed for DSL service with a $200 rebate from Bellsouth @ $35/mo so I'll have$45 per month to spend on Netflix while I wait for the shoe to drop on Comcast's outrageous price increases. I also have a lot of good books that I haven't yet read.


----------



## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> Where did you find the info about TW's signal?


I happen to know an industry insider casually, and when I mentioned I was gearing up for HD, he suggested I have a look at TW's offering. He was the one who said that they were passing along the transport stream, and that it was pretty much a matter of economics that they decided to do so, saying that it would cost more and take more time to decompress and recompress the stream (along with the audio sync issues) than to simply pass the stream along to the user. I have since gotten confirmation from others that this is the case.

In services where they do recompress the HD feed, audio sync issues are a nightmare. Ask any DTV HD subscriber.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> I happen to know an industry insider casually, and when I mentioned I was gearing up for HD, he suggested I have a look at TW's offering. He was the one who said that they were passing along the transport stream, and that it was pretty much a matter of economics that they decided to do so, saying that it would cost more and take more time to decompress and recompress the stream (along with the audio sync issues) than to simply pass the stream along to the user. I have since gotten confirmation from others that this is the case.
> 
> In services where they do recompress the HD feed, audio sync issues are a nightmare. Ask any DTV HD subscriber.


 Much appreciated...wonder what Comcast is up to? I've seen some audio sync problems...but it's fairly rare so we might assume they are passing an uncompressed signal along. I might still have a go with OTA just to see the PQ difference (if any).


----------



## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> Much appreciated...wonder what Comcast is up to? I've seen some audio sync problems...but it's fairly rare so we might assume they are passing an uncompressed signal along. I might still have a go with OTA just to see the PQ difference (if any).


Be a little careful with the terminology . The OTA signal being squirted out by broadcasters and the transport stream being sent by Time Warner are already compressed as hell. It's the only way to get HD into the home without redesigning the universe. There is an enormous difference between those and what gets laid down to tape or uncompressed disk in the original production. Broadcasting a single channel fully uncompressed would take up ENORMOUS bandwidth. So everything we see at home is compressed.

The difference is, outfits like TW get handed an OTA quality signal, and pass it on, while outfits like DTV compress it further, making a mess in the process.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> Be a little careful with the terminology . The OTA signal being squirted out by broadcasters and the transport stream being sent by Time Warner are already compressed as hell. It's the only way to get HD into the home without redesigning the universe. There is an enormous difference between those and what gets laid down to tape or uncompressed disk in the original production. Broadcasting a single channel fully uncompressed would take up ENORMOUS bandwidth. So everything we see at home is compressed.
> 
> The difference is, outfits like TW get handed an OTA quality signal, and pass it on, while outfits like DTV compress it further, making a mess in the process.


 Makes sense. Guess we'll still have to go to the theater to see the real deal.


----------



## A J Ricaud

dougdingle said:


> The difference is, outfits like TW get handed an OTA quality signal, and pass it on, while outfits like DTV compress it further, making a mess in the process.


That's why I dumped DTV and went to TW. The PQ is loads better.


----------



## slimm

And now, back on topic


----------



## patroldawg

I am sick of DTV boasting about all their soon to be "150 million HD channels by the end of the year" advertising. All of it is compressed garbage. It is misleading. They just will never be allocated enough bw to compete head to head with cable. And their interim fix is compression technologies. great for non video communication applications, but poor for this war. i'm venting, sorry.

back on topic: my MX-1 and Deskstar 500gb combo has been working outstanding for 1 1/2 months now!!!!


----------



## jfh3

zob said:


> Does the cable that is provided with MX-1 do a good job or should it be replaced with an aftermarket recommended cable? I don't need any problems. Thanks.


I've been running with the cable that came with the MX-1 since for about 2 months now. No problems (that I'm aware of).

(750GB DB35 drive in the MX-1, with the MX-1 cable)


----------



## alyssa

most people have no problems with the mx-1 cable. I've had my mx-1 installed for 2 months now.
Since I added my external drive I've had 3 GSODths. I can not say if they are cable, power or bad sector related.


----------



## zob

What does GSOD stand for? Since I haven't seen this yet, I really don't know what it is. Thanks.


----------



## jlib

It is TiVo's Green Screen Of Death. It means the system is recovering itself.


----------



## FrogGremlin

alyssa said:


> Since I added my external drive I've had 3 GSODths. I can not say if they are cable, power or bad sector related.


Last night, I had another "There seems to have been no signal" message when trying to watch a recent recording. As usual, after a forced reboot, that program was there, just fine.

My MX-1+750GB Seagate SCE made it to 12 days without a reboot recently, but there still seems to be these little glitches.


----------



## greg_burns

alyssa said:


> most people have no problems with the mx-1 cable. I've had my mx-1 installed for 2 months now.
> Since I added my external drive I've had 3 GSODths. I can not say if they are cable, power or bad sector related.


I've had 1 GSOD myself since installing a month ago or so. I am running an Antec too. Not blaming the Antec, I'm loving it.


----------



## richsadams

FrogGremlin said:


> Last night, I had another "There seems to have been no signal" message when trying to watch a recent recording. As usual, after a forced reboot, that program was there, just fine.
> 
> My MX-1+750GB Seagate SCE made it to 12 days without a reboot recently, but there still seems to be these little glitches.


 We had seen that same message prior to adding our eSATA drive so it doesn't seem likely that one has anything to do with the other.

If you're using an HDMI connection (or made a change to/from HDMI) it probably has to do with the HDCP (High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection) signal that's carried over HDMI. A reboot would reconfigure the HDMI connection and provide a new "handshake" for the HDCP. You can confirm that HDCP is active by viewing your TiVo account information screen.

If it continues to be a problem you could try switching over to TiVo's component (Y/Pb/Pr) connection. (HDCP is not carried on a component connection.)

Any time you make a change to your connections, audio, video, etc., it's best to reboot TiVo to allow it to read the new configuration.

Thanks for posting and let us know how it goes. :up:


----------



## oldnacl

Returned the S3 to Costco, the CCs to Comcast and came out with a SA8300HD for $11.95/mo, (including HD programming) as opposed to the $17.90 I was paying to Comcast for 2 cards and HD service (plus the Tivo subscription fee) for the S3. Maybe some day, when my ship comes in, the cost won't be an issue.
The cable companies sure have us at their mercy.


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> Returned the S3 to Costco, the CCs to Comcast and came out with a SA8300HD for $11.95/mo, (including HD programming) as opposed to the $17.90 I was paying to Comcast for 2 cards and HD service (plus the Tivo subscription fee) for the S3. Maybe some day, when my ship comes in, the cost won't be an issue.
> The cable companies sure have us at their mercy.


Sometimes ya gotta do what ya gotta do. 

At least your cableco offers an SA box and not one of those Motorola fire hazards!


----------



## FrogGremlin

richsadams said:


> We had seen that same message prior to adding our eSATA drive so it doesn't seem likely that one has anything to do with the other.
> 
> If you're using an HDMI connection (or made a change to/from HDMI) it probably has to do with the HDCP (High-Bandwidth Digital Content Protection) signal that's carried over HDMI.


I believe you're wrong. Sure, the message can come up at other times. However, I ran for nine months without seeing such a message before adding the eSATA ... and other, older recordings _are_ viewable while the new ones aren't (until after the reboot).

I'm beginning to think there might be a buffering problem somewhere in the eSATA-related software, since my since-adding-the-external-drive problems seem related to my business trips, i.e., to times when I haven't used the TiVo for a while. Perhaps actively using the TiVo on a regular basis refreshes something that gets overloaded if no buttons are pushed for a while.

Has anyone else with a 750GB (or larger) eSATA drive (and with suggestions turned on) left their TiVo for a week or so and then returned to a problem requiring a reboot (or to a TiVo that rebooted in their absence)?


----------



## richsadams

FrogGremlin said:


> I believe you're wrong. Sure, the message can come up at other times. However, I ran for nine months without seeing such a message before adding the eSATA ... and other, older recordings _are_ viewable while the new ones aren't (until after the reboot).
> 
> I'm beginning to think there might be a buffering problem somewhere in the eSATA-related software, since my since-adding-the-external-drive problems seem related to my business trips, i.e., to times when I haven't used the TiVo for a while. Perhaps actively using the TiVo on a regular basis refreshes something that gets overloaded if no buttons are pushed for a while.
> 
> Has anyone else with a 750GB (or larger) eSATA drive (and with suggestions turned on) left their TiVo for a week or so and then returned to a problem requiring a reboot (or to a TiVo that rebooted in their absence)?


 First, making someone "wrong" that is trying to help you is certainly your prerogative, however IMO it is fairly rude.

You're trying to connect the error you've seen to your new eSATA drive simply because you've never seen the error before. Thats no different than saying you bought a new set of tires for your car and a week later your radio wont work. The two may be connected somehow, but there is also good cause to look elsewhere. Youve acknowledged that the error does happen to non-eSATA equipped TiVo's. From your description it sounds as if the two might be connected, but jumping to a conclusion and looking for validation without exploring alternatives isn't meaningful.

Many of us have worked on this issue for months now and have attempted to help others along the way with our experiencesand they have been many. Yours is just one and having followed this entire thread from day one, I can say its the first of its kind that Ive seen. Again it may or may not be related to the topic but its certainly worth a look.

If you want some assistance my advice would be to use a little more honey than vinegar by being a little more open to new ideas and treating others here with a bit more respect.


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## FrogGremlin

<flamewar>Dear "Director of Opinions,"

Please read carefully: All I expressed was an opinion. My belief.</flamewar>

And I explained why that was my belief: Older recordings are viewable, while newer ones aren't until after a reboot. Now, I'd be happy if that turns out to be consistent with your explanation concerning HDMI handshaking. In the meantime, I offer the "buffering" suggestion as yet another possible explanation for the problem. I figure that the more we share details about our problems and guesses, the better the chance we find solutions. (And the process of group exploration certainly requires occasionally expressing reasoned doubt about some offered explanations.)


----------



## richsadams

FrogGremlin said:


> <flamewar>Dear "Director of Opinions,"
> 
> Please read carefully: All I expressed was an opinion. My belief.</flamewar>
> 
> And I explained why that was my belief: Older recordings are viewable, while newer ones aren't until after a reboot. Now, I'd be happy if that turns out to be consistent with your explanation concerning HDMI handshaking. In the meantime, I offer the "buffering" suggestion as yet another possible explanation for the problem. I figure that the more we share details about our problems and guesses, the better the chance we find solutions. (And the process of group exploration certainly requires occasionally expressing reasoned doubt about some offered explanations.)


 I took the time to respond to your request for help with a thoughtful suggestion. A Thank you, but I disagree would have been more than sufficient. If you choose to ignore my thoughts, I'm perfectly fine with that. Ask my wife, it wouldn't be the first time.  Even if you ignore an idea, it's not always about you and someone else reading the posts might benefit.

I dont doubt your theory and understand why you're thinking is what it is and I agree we need to know as much as possible about the subject. However the fact of the matter is that AFIK no one else has reported your particular issue to date. Plus the trouble you're reporting can clearly be attributed to other causes.

Okay that said, you "believe" my suggestion to be "wrong" yet you've done nothing about it other than to ask for more help? I can think of several other things that could be causing the problem youve outlined and what you might do to fix itsome of them to do with external eSATA drives. Perhaps others can too.


----------



## oldnacl

On a final note regarding the thread topic, I connected the FAP750 to the SA8300HD and it wasn't recognized. This is telling me, since it was a replacement for the first one I bought, (which had errors on the disk) that the FAP quality control is less than adequate. I'm currently using it connected to one of my computers by USB and even that has been flakey - not condemming the device completely yet as there are other issues that could be affecting it, but it doesn't look good. Two other drives connected to the SA8300HD, using the same cables, without any problem.


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> On a final note regarding the thread topic, I connected the FAP750 to the SA8300HD and it wasn't recognized. This is telling me, since it was a replacement for the first one I bought, (which had errors on the disk) that the FAP quality control is less than adequate. I'm currently using it connected to one of my computers by USB and even that has been flakey - not condemming the device completely yet as there are other issues that could be affecting it, but it doesn't look good. Two other drives connected to the SA8300HD, using the same cables, without any problem.


 Thanks very much for the update.  :up:

That is interesting. I was assuming that there were more complaints about the FAP750 simply because more people had gone with that option. Perhaps there's more to their problems than just a poor eSATA connection? Hope you're still able to take that one back.

Also hope that hasn't soured you completely on the eSATA feature. Our MX-1/Seagate 500GB DB35 has been running flawlessly since day one (over two months now). It appears that we have enough space for about 275 to 300 recordings. Our "Recently Deleted" folder hovers between 200 and 205 recordings. Many are movies, others are TiVoCasts (the Onion, etc.) but a majority are half and one hour TV shows...about 50% SD and 50% HD right now (as most of the "good/HD" shows are off for the summer). So for our money, the capacity to have 300 or so recordings on our S3 is more than enough! 

Anyway, keep us up to date if you decide to jump back in and thanks again for all of your hard work. Your medal is in the mail.


----------



## sharp1

I had the FAP750 working flawlessly for about 2 months. It and the TiVo are on UPS, and we have never had any indication of an issue.

Yesterday, it stopped. I got the "second drive not responding" screen. I disconnected and tried to USB it on my PC. Again, it would not respond. I eventually resigned myself to the fact that I needed to divorce the drive, and get a replacement.

It is now on it's way for warranty replacement, but it's irritating. I would be cautious about getting this particular drive again if mine were still returnable. Since I am stuck with it, I will try again.

The one caveat is that my wife was cleaning the shelf with the TiVo when I first noticed the Tivo logo on the LCD. I originall thought that she had inadvertantly shut the drive down. But I would be surprised if that were enough to cause a total drive failure. Still, that's a possibility. Hmmm...

Anyway, when I eventually get a replacement and connect it, I am going to cover the "power" button on the drive to hopefully avoid it accidentally getting shut down, in case that actually was the root cause.


----------



## sfhub

richsadams said:


> Also hope that hasn't soured you completely on the eSATA feature. Our MX-1/Seagate 500GB DB35 has been running flawlessly since day one (over two months now). It appears that we have enough space for about 275 to 300 recordings. Our "Recently Deleted" folder hovers between 200 and 205 recordings. Many are movies, others are TiVoCasts (the Onion, etc.) but a majority are half and one hour TV shows...about 50% SD and 50% HD right now (as most of the "good/HD" shows are off for the summer). So for our money, the capacity to have 300 or so recordings on our S3 is more than enough!
> 
> Anyway, keep us up to date if you decide to jump back in and thanks again for all of your hard work. Your medal is in the mail.


I think his nightmare Comcast CC install and billing soured him enough to return the S3.


----------



## richsadams

sfhub said:


> I think his nightmare Comcast CC install and billing soured him enough to return the S3.


Looks that way.  Well...I have to admit that something going wrong with my eSATA drive is always in the back of my mind. Well...not _always_, but once in a while. If money were no object and I had it to do over again I think I might opt for a big internal drive replacement. But hey...what's life without a few challenges and adventures!


----------



## richsadams

sharp1 said:


> I had the FAP750 working flawlessly for about 2 months. It and the TiVo are on UPS, and we have never had any indication of an issue.
> 
> Yesterday, it stopped. I got the "second drive not responding" screen. I disconnected and tried to USB it on my PC. Again, it would not respond. I eventually resigned myself to the fact that I needed to divorce the drive, and get a replacement.
> 
> It is now on it's way for warranty replacement, but it's irritating. I would be cautious about getting this particular drive again if mine were still returnable. Since I am stuck with it, I will try again.
> 
> The one caveat is that my wife was cleaning the shelf with the TiVo when I first noticed the Tivo logo on the LCD. I originall thought that she had inadvertantly shut the drive down. But I would be surprised if that were enough to cause a total drive failure. Still, that's a possibility. Hmmm...
> 
> Anyway, when I eventually get a replacement and connect it, I am going to cover the "power" button on the drive to hopefully avoid it accidentally getting shut down, in case that actually was the root cause.


  Ouch! I'm now wondering if this boils down to a "DVR dedicated" drive Vs all others. Although plenty of people are having good experiences with various setups, I haven't seen many (if any) complaints from people using the Seagate DB35 drives or the DVR Xtender drives from Apricorn. Perhaps there is more to these drives than just being quiet and able to handle 24/7 operations. 

Anyway, best of luck with the new one...keep us posted! :up:


----------



## oldnacl

sfhub said:


> I think his nightmare Comcast CC install and billing soured him enough to return the S3.


You're right. The amazing thing is the initial install went flawlessly a couple months ago and even though I was getting charged for 2 CCs and 2 "extra outlet" fees, I was willing to accept it for the S3 functionality. When the $5.50 CC charges jumped to $17.90 in addition to the $5.00 "bundle" increase and the CSR told me that price was increasing another (approx) $7.00, it put me over the edge with Comcast. Added to that was the deauthorizing of the CCs with the July 1 price change and the fact I had to take 2 separate days off work so the Cable guys could make a phone call from my living room and even then I wasn't getting the channels I was paying for... Well, enough. 
And, while I've beat this horse as much as I care to, I do enjoy reading the posts from others.
Someday my ship will come, and, hopefully, my eBay purchased Series 2 DT will arrive tomorrow.


----------



## slimm

oldnacl said:


> You're right. The amazing thing is the initial install went flawlessly a couple months ago and even though I was getting charged for 2 CCs and 2 "extra outlet" fees, I was willing to accept it for the S3 functionality. When the $5.50 CC charges jumped to $17.90 in addition to the $5.00 "bundle" increase and the CSR told me that price was increasing another (approx) $7.00, it put me over the edge with Comcast. Added to that was the deauthorizing of the CCs with the July 1 price change and the fact I had to take 2 separate days off work so the Cable guys could make a phone call from my living room and even then I wasn't getting the channels I was paying for... Well, enough.
> And, while I've beat this horse as much as I care to, I do enjoy reading the posts from others.
> Someday my ship will come, and, hopefully, my eBay purchased Series 2 DT will arrive tomorrow.


Sorry about the problems that you've been having. I've had my DB35/MX1 combo running without a hitch since I installed it but I'm not using cable cards with my unit. I'm curious as to whether the folks who are having problems are using cable cards or whether this should make any difference. richsadams: are you using cable cards?


----------



## GooberMan

I have a question about the MX-1 enclosure. I have one on order to arrive toward the end of this month. Does it have the correct connection to power a SATA drive that doesn't have the "standard" power plug? I've never really dealt with SATA drives before and didn't realize that some of them come with no standard (IDE-type 4 prong) power plug. Well, the drive I ordered came with no standard power plug so I'm hoping the MX-1 enclosure will still be useful.


----------



## slimm

GooberMan said:


> I have a question about the MX-1 enclosure. I have one on order to arrive toward the end of this month. Does it have the correct connection to power a SATA drive that doesn't have the "standard" power plug? I've never really dealt with SATA drives before and didn't realize that some of them come with no standard (IDE-type 4 prong) power plug. Well, the drive I ordered came with no standard power plug so I'm hoping the MX-1 enclosure will still be useful.


If you're talking about the 4 pin *********** plug, yes it does.


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## GooberMan

slimm said:


> If you're talking about the 4 pin *********** plug, yes it does.


The drive I have in hand does NOT have that 4 pin *********** plug.


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## slimm

GooberMan said:


> The drive I have in hand does NOT have that 4 pin *********** plug.


You will be fine. the MX1 doesn't use the *********** plug.


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## GooberMan

slimm said:


> You will be fine. the MX1 doesn't use the *********** plug.


Okay, thanks! I appreciate your help. When it arrives, I'll be trying the MFSTOOLS method to marry it to the existing drive (it has been upgraded already). Hopefully, I won't have too much trouble with that.


----------



## richsadams

slimm said:


> Sorry about the problems that you've been having. I've had my DB35/MX1 combo running without a hitch since I installed it but I'm not using cable cards with my unit. I'm curious as to whether the folks who are having problems are using cable cards or whether this should make any difference. richsadams: are you using cable cards?


 Yes, we have two Comcast cable cards...and like you no issues.


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## slimm

GooberMan said:


> Okay, thanks! I appreciate your help. When it arrives, I'll be trying the MFSTOOLS method to marry it to the existing drive (it has been upgraded already). Hopefully, I won't have too much trouble with that.


No problem, if you do have problems with MFSTOOLS there are plenty of folks around here who can help you.


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## slimm

richsadams said:


> Yes, we have two Comcast cable cards...and like you no issues.


Thanks, just a thought


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## oldnacl

Incidentally, now that I don't need the FAP750 for my TiVo, I've assigned it 24/7 NAS duty attached to my router via USB. This will give us a taste of whether it can hold up to that kind of use. Given the five year warranty, I'll just be sure it's backed up and we'll see how long it lasts.


----------



## Sadara

Just wanted to post and share what I'm seeing with my Seagate Free Agent Pro 750gb drive.

I love the we have it now, but one thing I've seen that is slightly annoying but hasn't given us any real problems is that television shows will pause for about 15 seconds, then they start playing again. Kinda annoying, but it's something we can live with too.


----------



## richsadams

Sadara said:


> Just wanted to post and share what I'm seeing with my Seagate Free Agent Pro 750gb drive.
> 
> I love the we have it now, but one thing I've seen that is slightly annoying but hasn't given us any real problems is that television shows will pause for about 15 seconds, then they start playing again. Kinda annoying, but it's something we can live with too.


 Hmmm...that's a new one. I don't believe that's been reported before. I think you have a high tolerance level.  It would be more than annoying to me.

Have you tried restarting TiVo recently? Rather than a "hard reboot" (unplugging and plugging it back in), try going to "Messages and Setup" > "Account and System Information" > "Restart the TiVo Digital Media Recorder". That will give it a soft reboot and the ability to reconfigure anything that might be wrong.

Doing that will often cure a number of smaller glitches and annoying little problems.

Thanks for sharing (really  ) and please let us know how it goes.


----------



## donaudio

FAP Story. I had a FAP 750 hooked up and it worked fine for about two weeks then the Tivo started rebooting again and again. I took it to my computer and the diagnostics program said it was defective. Returned it to Seagate and they sent me another one. It looks the same as the first one but the model # is different. Just got it hooked up today and the the install went fine. I'll know more in a few weeks if it keeps working. By the way in utilities I turned off the lights but after hooking it up to Tivo the lights went on. Don


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## richsadams

donaudio said:


> FAP Story. I had a FAP 750 hooked up and it worked fine for about two weeks then the Tivo started rebooting again and again. I took it to my computer and the diagnostics program said it was defective. Returned it to Seagate and they sent me another one. It looks the same as the first one but the model # is different. Just got it hooked up today and the the install went fine. I'll know more in a few weeks if it keeps working. By the way in utilities I turned off the lights but after hooking it up to Tivo the lights went on. Don


 Thanks for that Don. Keep us posted. :up:

BTW, we've read before that alterations to the FAP750's utilities program made on a PC have been lost after connecting it to TiVo so it may be that the TiVo formatting wipes everything anyway.


----------



## Revolutionary

Has anyone else had their Tivo effectively crap out on them since installing an eSATA drive?

Last month my S3 -- to which I had connected a 500gb Seagate eSATA drive (not the FAP, the silver one, don't remember the model and too lazy to google right now) -- crapped out big time. Based on the symptoms, which I will describe, I suspect that the boot drive or firmware was corrupted, and not the eSATA drive. However, I am suspicious enough that I'm not sure I want to reconnect the drive to my (stellar) replacement S3.

Symptoms were these. It started out simply: I would get frequent massive pixelation (more like macroblocking than the usual pixelation I am used to from OTA reception), even on QAM-source recordings, or recordings from very strong signal OTA channels. 

As this symptom got progressively worse, Tivo several times "froze" mid-playback -- video would pixelate and freeze, audio would drop out, and then playback would resume a few seconds later -- naturally having jumped several seconds in the playback and forcing me to rewind.

Finally, one evening it froze just as the "delete this recording?" dialogue appeared at the end of a recording. I left it be and it sat there for 20 minutes before I hard rebooted it. From that moment on, it was pretty much unusable. Menus took MINUTES to load and frequently froze--triggering a reboot--the animated menu backgrounds stuttered and froze, and there was no audio in the menus. It also could not tune live TV unless a scheduled recording happened along; in other words, Tivo could change the channel itself, but I couldn't change it manually. Oddly, during this time recordings continued without a hiccup, and if I was patient and the Tivo didn't reboot, playback was mostly normal (except that it still had the above freezing/macroblocking/audio issues).

Of course, my first thought was that the eSATA drive went bad on me, but divorcing it made no difference. I performed a GSOD kickstart, but no drive errors were found. Finally, I called Tivo, and they promptly advance-shipped me a replacement at no cost (even though I am well outside the "no cost replacement" window).

So, do I dare connect the eSATA drive to this Tivo? The old one ran for a couple of months before these problems started -- but that doesn't mean that it wasn't the drive that was to blame.

Or am I being paranoid?


----------



## rjom

Sadara said:


> Just wanted to post and share what I'm seeing with my Seagate Free Agent Pro 750gb drive.
> 
> I love the we have it now, but one thing I've seen that is slightly annoying but hasn't given us any real problems is that television shows will pause for about 15 seconds, then they start playing again. Kinda annoying, but it's something we can live with too.


As one poster said, you have a high tolerance level. You don't have to put up with that as most drives have been ok. I have had my Calvary 500 for over two months now. Not a single hiccup. I would return for another drive.


----------



## dougdingle

Revolutionary said:


> So, do I dare connect the eSATA drive to this Tivo? The old one ran for a couple of months before these problems started -- but that doesn't mean that it wasn't the drive that was to blame.
> 
> Or am I being paranoid?


Your symptoms certainly sound like your internal drive was dying, and I believe you would have undergone the identical issues even if you hadn't hooked an external drive to it.

The fact it began to act up after the external drive was connected is quite likely a coincidence.


----------



## oldnacl

oldnacl said:


> Incidentally, now that I don't need the FAP750 for my TiVo, I've assigned it 24/7 NAS duty attached to my router via USB. This will give us a taste of whether it can hold up to that kind of use. Given the five year warranty, I'll just be sure it's backed up and we'll see how long it lasts.


That was short lived. Connected using USB, the drive ran for about 20 hours, copying some 400GB of music and picture files, then refused to mount when I moved it to the new computer. It was quite warm (actually, hot even though in the open air). I unplugged it for an hour and reconnected it once cool and it mounted. I started an 7x erase procedure and I'll run Seagate diagnostics tonight, but I'm sure it's another goner. This is the drive that the TiVo reported as having problems (I don't remember the exact message) when I tried connecting it and it also failed to connect to my replacement SA8300HD while two other drives connected immediately and one of them, a Cavalry 500, is working fine after 5 days - something I couldn't accomplish on the TiVo with any drive.
I received my eBay purchased Series 2 DT TiVo and I'm using that to record the SD shows I watch regularly, so my 3 year prepaid subscription isn't being completely wasted (well, considering I also have 3 lifetime ReplayTVs, maybe that's not completely true). I miss the S3 though.


----------



## analog4

I wonder if this will work with Series 3 Lite ones? Otherwise I'll be very tempted to pick up a 1TB and throw it into an eSata enclosure.


----------



## richsadams

analog4 said:


> I wonder if this will work with Series 3 Lite ones? Otherwise I'll be very tempted to pick up a 1TB and throw it into an eSata enclosure.


 Good question...but my guess is no. I'd wager that everything that can be removed from an S3 to make an S3 Lite" while still providing basic record/playback capabilities will be. An eSATA connection means more hardware and software configurations = mo' money.


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> That was short lived. Connected using USB, the drive ran for about 20 hours, copying some 400GB of music and picture files, then refused to mount when I moved it to the new computer. It was quite warm (actually, hot even though in the open air). I unplugged it for an hour and reconnected it once cool and it mounted. I started an 7x erase procedure and I'll run Seagate diagnostics tonight, but I'm sure it's another goner. This is the drive that the TiVo reported as having problems (I don't remember the exact message) when I tried connecting it and it also failed to connect to my replacement SA8300HD while two other drives connected immediately and one of them, a Cavalry 500, is working fine after 5 days - something I couldn't accomplish on the TiVo with any drive.
> I received my eBay purchased Series 2 DT TiVo and I'm using that to record the SD shows I watch regularly, so my 3 year prepaid subscription isn't being completely wasted (well, considering I also have 3 lifetime ReplayTVs, maybe that's not completely true). I miss the S3 though.


 What an adventure you've had!  Hopefully one of these days you can get back to using an S3 with lots of HDD space. We'd have a terrible time living w/o our S3 now...we're so spoiled!

In the meantime enjoy your new DT S2 and thanks again for keeping us up to date on your trials and tribulations. Have you received your medal of TiVoValor in the mail yet?


----------



## moxie1617

richsadams said:


> Good question...but my guess is no. I'd wager that everything that can be removed from an S3 to make an S3 Lite" while still providing basic record/playback capabilities will be. An eSATA connection means more hardware and software configurations = mo' money.


I read that the lite will only have a 160GB drive, if it can't be expanded with an e-sata drive it won't offer much in HD storage. I already have 62 HD hours saved on my S3, that doesn't even include my deleted folder. I can't imagine what it would be like during the normal broadcast season.


----------



## richsadams

moxie1617 said:


> I read that the lite will only have a 160GB drive, if it can't be expanded with an e-sata drive it won't offer much in HD storage. I already have 62 HD hours saved on my S3, that doesn't even include my deleted folder. I can't imagine what it would be like during the normal broadcast season.


 Good point/questions. :up:

With the price of HDD's plummeting these days I can't imagine TiVo scrimping too much in that area. But then my first S1 had a tiny HDD compared to the standards of the day. It seems like it would be easier to initially install a larger drive than to have to deal with the additional work of an eSATA configuration...but if they ever make eSATA's "official" it might be an additional selling point.

I always thought that if/when TiVo gets around to sanctioning the eSATA option that they could instantly create a new revenue stream by offering TiVo branded external drives...making it the only one they would support.

It'll be interesting to see what the S3 (S3.L?) looks like for sure.


----------



## zob

I recently purchased the Antec MX-1 & a Segate DB35 500 GB drive, the install was a very painless experience. Everthing is working fine at this time. I will update, if there is any change.


----------



## richsadams

zob said:


> I recently purchased the Antec MX-1 & a Segate DB35 500 GB drive, the install was a very painless experience. Everthing is working fine at this time. I will update, if there is any change.


Thanks for that. :up: That's the same setup we have and it's been flawless for over two months now...knock on wood (touching head).


----------



## S3-2501

We had a brief power outage today, and when the power was restored, the FAP's orange light came back with it. Has anyone figured out a way to get the light's off setting to stick through a hard power cycle?


----------



## T-Shee

MyESATA add-on drive has been installed and running for exactly *ten weeks* today - it's been *100% perfect* the whole time.

I'm one happy camper - I love the MX-1 drive enclosure, but it's really the Samsung drive that's the icing on the cake; it's quiet (you can't hear it unless you put your ear on the exclosure) and cool running (the MX-1's fan exhaust port measures about 8 deg. F above ambient).


----------



## jfh3

analog4 said:


> I wonder if this will work with Series 3 Lite ones? Otherwise I'll be very tempted to pick up a 1TB and throw it into an eSata enclosure.


Since the leaked pictures of the S3lite have an eSATA connection and they will use the same software, I expect that the current kickstart method will work on the new boxes and I'm betting that Tivo will officially bless external expansion when the new boxes are released ...


----------



## richsadams

jfh3 said:


> Since the leaked pictures of the S3lite have an eSATA connection and they will use the same software, I expect that the current kickstart method will work on the new boxes and I'm betting that Tivo will officially bless external expansion when the new boxes are released ...


 From your post to TiVo's ears! :up:


----------



## bareyb

I'm thinking I may take the plunge and try this. Is there a particular drive people are recommending? I'm sure there's a list in this 28 page thread, but honestly I'd like to keep this simple and not research this out for days (like I usually do). So. What drive do I get? I want quiet,reliable, and as small a footprint as possible. Price is last on my list of priorities. I just want something that will WORK. Any advice greatly appreciated.


----------



## moxie1617

The 1st post in this thread is updated regularly and contains what has been used successfully and what units are having problems. It's a good guide.


----------



## nuttzy06

Must.... resist... urge... for sarcasm....

The list appears in the first post, number 29.


-Nuttzy


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> I'm thinking I may take the plunge and try this. Is there a particular drive people are recommending? I'm sure there's a list in this 28 page thread, but honestly I'd like to keep this simple and not research this out for days (like I usually do). So. What drive do I get? I want quiet,reliable, and as small a footprint as possible. Price is last on my list of priorities. I just want something that will WORK. Any advice greatly appreciated.


How brave! 

Well...here's where you need to start:

Series3 eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion

A lot of people are using a lot of different drives and combinations. The one combination that seems to have the least amount of issues is quiet and runs cool:

Antec MX-1 eSATA Drive Enclosure Comes with the proper eSATA II cable.
Seagate DB35 7200.3 Hard drive  (specifically designed for DVR use) - 500GB ST3500830SCE or 750GB ST3750640SCE

I may be biased because that's what we have, but again there are very few if any reports of problems with this combination and ours has been flawless.

You can pick them up together from a number of online retailers including:

www.newegg.com
www.excaliberpc.com

We've purchased products from both, and both have very competitive prices.

Others are using even larger drives...1TB is the max TiVo will accept...Samsung and Hitachi are mentioned as being good options.

Let us know how it goes!


----------



## Kenji

bareyb said:


> I'm thinking I may take the plunge and try this. Is there a particular drive people are recommending?


If you want a setup that's completely plug-and-play, it's hard to beat the Apricorn DVR Xpander.


----------



## richsadams

Kenji said:


> If you want a setup that's completely plug-and-play, it's hard to beat the Apricorn DVR Xpander.


 Agreed, that's a good option. Apricorn products and service are very good and they do make quality equipment. :up:

However we had the DVR Xpander originally and eventually returned it as it ran _very _ hot. It may have just been the one we had however. They use WD HDD's and they run hot as it is, but the Apricorn enclosure didn't seem to be able to cool it down enough for my tastesplus we have ours in an enclosed cabinet with some minor ventilation which doesnt help. Our MX-1 runs quite cool by comparison...how does your Xpander do?


----------



## bareyb

Kenji said:


> If you want a setup that's completely plug-and-play, it's hard to beat the Apricorn DVR Xpander.


This seems like the simplest solution and it appears to have a much smaller footprint than some of the others (maybe why it seems to run hotter?). It also seems to have a built-in fan so maybe this model is better?

My main question is "is it quiet"? I hate noisy drives and/or noisy fans... If it runs a little hot, that won't bother me as much as if it's noisy. I assume Antec runs the drive within the published heat specs and that's going to be good enough for me if if the drive is quiet.

Are there any other "plug and play" solutions out there?


----------



## gteague

bareyb said:


> This seems like the simplest solution and it appears to have a much smaller footprint than some of the others (maybe why it seems to run hotter?). It also seems to have a built-in fan so maybe this model is better?
> 
> My main question is "is it quiet"? I hate noisy drives and/or noisy fans... If it runs a little hot, that won't bother me as much as if it's noisy. I assume Antec runs the drive within the published heat specs and that's going to be good enough for me if if the drive is quiet.
> 
> Are there any other "plug and play" solutions out there?


the seagate free agent pro is not plug'n'play as it includes no esata cable, but many (?) people are using them due to their storage/cost ratio (they go on sale quite often) and (local) availability.

although i have had no issues with mine that i could unequivocally claim was a fault of the drive, others have not been as lucky and i suspect a quality/consistency problem with the drives or perhaps some or most of those folks got an 'iffy' cable.

i like the drive because it is small, sleek, aesthetically pleasing (i happen to love the gold/orange light) runs less than 10degrees hotter than the ambient temperature and is silent as a ghost. it also elegantly survives power outages.

i have no evidence to back this, but i seriously doubt this series of drives is designed to run 24/7, but it does have a 5-year warranty and there does not seem to be any language in the drive documentation discouraging such use.

/guy


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> ...However we had the DVR Xpander originally and eventually returned it as it ran _very _ hot.


Since it has an aluminum shell it may have been acting as a heat sink removing heat from the drive. The only way to compare it to a plastic enclosure would be to immediately open the enclosures after equivalent use and read the temperature off the drive with a instant thermometer.


----------



## gteague

jlib said:


> Since it has an aluminum shell it may have been acting as a heat sink removing heat from the drive. The only way to compare it to a plastic enclosure would be to immediately open the enclosures after equivalent use and read the temperature off the drive with a instant thermometer.


before i got my current fap750 i had a vantec nexstar enclosure with a maxtor diamondmax inside. the vantec was an aluminum enclosure w/o a fan and ran so hot it would burn your fingers which, along with the noise, is why i 'retired' it from tivo use after only a week of use.

the fap750 is also an aluminum shell w/o a fan and seems to rely on the same heat exchange principal, but run 10's of degrees cooler.

/guy


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> This seems like the simplest solution and it appears to have a much smaller footprint than some of the others (maybe why it seems to run hotter?). It also seems to have a built-in fan so maybe this model is better?
> 
> My main question is "is it quiet"? I hate noisy drives and/or noisy fans... If it runs a little hot, that won't bother me as much as if it's noisy. I assume Antec runs the drive within the published heat specs and that's going to be good enough for me if if the drive is quiet.
> 
> Are there any other "plug and play" solutions out there?


 The "footprint" between the MX-1 and Xpander is hardly any different when it comes to taking up space; you can place them either in a horizontal or vertical position. Both are very quiet.

It's become apparent that heat has become a problem for some of the eSATA drives people are using; overheating will corrupt the data and cause reboots. A fan is essential for us as the drive runs 24/7, never spinning down and does heat up when active. The fan in the MX-1 is larger and moves more air and it would seem correct that the Xpander depends more on the aluminum case to dissipate heat build-up. The MX-1 also uses silicon mats and washers to further isolate any HDD or fan noise making it very quiet.

I'd say youre safe with either option. :up:


----------



## Kenji

My Apricorn DVR Xpander lives inside a stereo cabinet behind glass doors. The cabinet has a cutout in the back, but the doors are always closed, so while there is some ventilation, it's limited. That said:

bareyb: the Apricorn unit is quiet, but not silent. If you are near the cabinet and there are no other sounds in the room, you can hear the unit's fan if you listen for it. However, you will definitely *not* hear the fan while your TV is on.

richsadams: the Apricorn unit runs a little warm, but it does definitely not run hot.

Let me know if you have any more questions about the Apricorn unit. It's run without a single incident since I installed it 6 weeks ago.


----------



## richsadams

Kenji said:


> My Apricorn DVR Xpander lives inside a stereo cabinet behind glass doors. The cabinet has a cutout in the back, but the doors are always closed, so while there is some ventilation, it's limited. That said:
> 
> bareyb: the Apricorn unit is quiet, but not silent. If you are near the cabinet and there are no other sounds in the room, you can hear the unit's fan if you listen for it. However, you will definitely *not* hear the fan while your TV is on.
> 
> richsadams: the Apricorn unit runs a little warm, but it does definitely not run hot.
> 
> Let me know if you have any more questions about the Apricorn unit. It's run without a single incident since I installed it 6 weeks ago.


 Good to know. Ours is also in a cabinet w/glass doors, etc. I suspected that the Xpander we returned was an exception as the other Apricorn drives we've purchased were of sound quality. Still happy with what we have too...can't really hear the MX-1 outside of the cabinet at all (but I don't think we could hear the Xpander either.)

It's all good!


----------



## bareyb

richsadams said:


> The "footprint" between the MX-1 and Xpander is hardly any different when it comes to taking up space; you can place them either in a horizontal or vertical position. Both are very quiet.
> 
> It's become apparent that heat has become a problem for some of the eSATA drives people are using; overheating will corrupt the data and cause reboots. A fan is essential for us as the drive runs 24/7, never spinning down and does heat up when active. The fan in the MX-1 is larger and moves more air and it would seem correct that the Xpander depends more on the aluminum case to dissipate heat build-up. The MX-1 also uses silicon mats and washers to further isolate any HDD or fan noise making it very quiet.
> 
> I'd say youre safe with either option. :up:












Well you talked me into it! Actually my Wife helped. She likes the "looks" of the MX-1 enclosure and thinks it "matches the TiVo better". Whatever... I suppose I can see her point. 

We have two S3's so I ordered up two of the MX-1 enclosures and two of the 500 Gig DB35 drives from ExCaliburPC (thank you all for the links!).

My only question is, does the enclosure and drive come with all the cables I need to get this hooked up to the S3? I am hoping the enclosure has the necessary cables to attach the drive internally and the drive comes with the appropriate cable to attach to the TiVo. Is there anything missing that I need to get this working?

Lastly, is it very difficult to figure out how to install the drive in the enclosure? I remember there used to be jumper settings on my old APS enclosures, but it's been years since I installed a bare drive into an enclosure. I guess I'm committed now either way...


----------



## LHMPDX

Installing the MX-1 is easy. But much easier with a magnetic screwdriver.


----------



## moxie1617

bareyb said:


> My only question is, does the enclosure and drive come with all the cables I need to get this hooked up to the S3? I am hoping the enclosure has the necessary cables to attach the drive internally and the drive comes with the appropriate cable to attach to the TiVo. Is there anything missing that I need to get this working?


Everything you need comes with the enclosure.



> Lastly, is it very difficult to figure out how to install the drive in the enclosure? I remember there used to be jumper settings on my old APS enclosures, but it's been years since I installed a bare drive into an enclosure.


There is a drive sled in the enclosure that the drive mounts on, the connectors for power and sata are built into the sled. The hardest part is getting the screws that mount the sled to the case started. Hence the need for a magnetic screwdriver. I didn't have one and had to hold the sled and drive upside down, fix the screw to the tip of the screwdriver and then go straight up to get the screw started. There is a video at the Antec site linked above that helps with the rest of the gotchas. The directions that come with the enclosure are really, really poor.

With SATA there are no jumpers to worry about.


----------



## blabes

I ordered an MX-1 and DB35 500GB from excaliberpc on 7/13. The enclosure arrived on 7/18 and the drive showed up on 7/20 (shipped from different warehouses, I guess) at a total cost of $213.16.

The installation went without a hitch thanks to the magic magnetic screwdriver and the instructions from the first post of this thread.

A big "thank you" to all the pioneers who posted their research and experiences!


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> Well you talked me into it! Actually my Wife helped. She likes the "looks" of the MX-1 enclosure and thinks it "matches the TiVo better". Whatever... I suppose I can see her point.
> 
> My only question is, does the enclosure and drive come with all the cables I need to get this hooked up to the S3? I am hoping the enclosure has the necessary cables to attach the drive internally and the drive comes with the appropriate cable to attach to the TiVo. Is there anything missing that I need to get this working?
> 
> Lastly, is it very difficult to figure out how to install the drive in the enclosure? I remember there used to be jumper settings on my old APS enclosures, but it's been years since I installed a bare drive into an enclosure. I guess I'm committed now either way...


 Ohhhhh...noooooo...don't blame me for this!  Everyone here disavows any responsibility for your questionable decisions. 

As already mentioned, the MX-1 comes with the proper eSATA II cable to connect it to TiVo and everything else you need to install your new drivealmost plug n pray. From opening the boxes to final TiVo boot-up probably took 20 or 30 minutes.

It would have been quicker but I didn't have a magnetic screwdriver or a jeweler's screwdriver to install the two screws for the drive sled either but managed to get them in after a half-dozen tries or so. That and the fact that the sled "snaps" in place with some pressure are the only two things that I'd probably redesign...otherwise it's a...um...snap!

Enjoy and let us know how things go!


----------



## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> 1TB is the max TiVo will accept...


Maybe not .

Since no one is shipping a drive larger than that, I wonder if anyone who has hooked an external RAID box to theirs has tried a larger total capacity setup...


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> Maybe not .
> 
> Since no one is shipping a drive larger than that, I wonder if anyone who has hooked an external RAID box to theirs has tried a larger total capacity setup...


 You'll have to read back through the posts or do a search but the 1TB limit has been confirmed.

There is at least one person running a RAID setup as well.


----------



## bareyb

Thanks for the help everyone. It was a hard decision not to get the Apricorn because of simplicity and ease of return, but now that I've ordered the MX-1 and DB35 I feel pretty good about it. They both seem like top of the line components. 

So far things have gone pretty smooth with the order process. The warehouse they ship from is in Fremont (very close by) so the parts will be here very soon. Hopefully this will continue to be fairly painless. I will have my magnetic screwdriver standing by... I'll keep you posted. :up:


----------



## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> There is at least one person running a RAID setup as well.


Yeah, I saw that a while back, but I believe that person had a pair of 500 gig drives. I don't think I've seen anyone write that they put two 750's in a raid box and only 1TB was recognized, but maybe I missed it.


----------



## bareyb

I'm really excited about this and yes, I DID end up researching the heck out of this thing after-all. I read all 29 pages of posts here and pretty much anything else I could find.  

I'm gonna head out to Fry's and Microcenter today with my Daughter and see if we can locate some SIIG or Triplite 18 inch eSATA cables. I think the Triplites are only about 3 or 4 bucks each for the short ones. 

I know the cables that come with the MX-1 have been great for most people, but it seems like I read somewhere along the way that a couple folks had had troubles with them and replaced them. Since cables seem to be so critical I thought I wouldn't take any chances (Dajad was my inspiration on this, thanks Dajad). 

The shorter the cable the better no? Probably overkill, but that's just how I roll. At least then if it screws up I can say I did "the best I could do".  I've only got two weeks to troubleshoot this thing. After that I'm gonna own two 500 Gig hard drives with really nice enclosures that I don't need.


----------



## bareyb

I found a couple of shorter length eSATA to eSATA (SATA II) cables that folks may be interested in. If you are planning to place your new enclosure directly above or on top of your TiVo like I am, then you might consider a shorter cable than the standard 3 foot ones. Many problems seem directly traceable to cables so it's good to go as short as you can and with the best quality eSATA II (not I) cables you can find. There are ZERO 18 inch SIIG cables available (they start at 3.25 feet) so I went for the 18 inch Triplite cables from Provantage.com and they cost about 6 bucks each. 








*18 INCH TRIPPLITE CABLE *

I also found a 2 foot eSATA to eSATA made by Satagear.com for about 8 bucks each. They are supposed to be triple shielded (vs double shielded on most of the others I believe) and use a larger diameter conductor than "standard" cables (whatever that means). They look pretty beefy and at 24 inches, are also a good length if you are planning to set your hard drive right above your Tivo. Here's a pic: 








*24 INCH SATAGEAR CABLE*


----------



## miken

Anyone read Engadget today?

Lots of TiVo news. New cheaper version of the Series 3 hitting shelves soon. TiVoToGo enabled on Series 3 and last but what this whole thread is about, the Official Announcement that eSATA port will be enabled for external storage. Supposably and Best Buy will have the retail exclusive on the external drive.

I hope all previous working drives continue to work and that they don't send out an update that will only enable the Best Buy drive.

If anyone have anymore info on this, please post it. Especially on the Best Buy drive cost and storage capacity.


----------



## bareyb

miken said:


> Anyone read Engadget today?
> 
> Lots of TiVo news. New cheaper version of the Series 3 hitting shelves soon. TiVoToGo enabled on Series 3 and last but what this whole thread is about, the Official Announcement that eSATA port will be enabled for external storage. Supposably and Best Buy will have the retail exclusive on the external drive.
> 
> I hope all previous working drives continue to work and that they don't send out an update that will only enable the Best Buy drive.
> 
> If anyone have anymore info on this, please post it. Especially on the Best Buy drive cost and storage capacity.


Are you frickin' kidding me? I just this second got both my 500 Gig drives mounted in their cases... I was planning on hooking them up tomorrow... Now I wonder if I should just return the whole mess. Oh well. I guess I have two weeks to find out. Anyone heard any other news on this?


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> I found a couple of shorter length eSATA to eSATA (SATA II) cables that folks may be interested in. If you are planning to place your new enclosure directly above or on top of your TiVo like I am, then you might consider a shorter cable than the standard 3 foot ones.


Cables for the MX-1 and TiVo _must _ be e-SATA II to eSATA II - do NOT use eSATA to eSATA II cables. Shorter is always better. The standard 1 meter cable supplied with the MX-1 has worked for all but two and those may have been other issues. To reduce heat induction the ideal situation is to place the external drive away from and not on TiVo; also away from any power supplies (UPS, etc.).


----------



## bareyb

richsadams said:


> Cables for the MX-1 and TiVo _must _ be e-SATA II to eSATA II - do NOT use eSATA to eSATA II cables. Shorter is always better. The standard 3 meter cable supplied with the MX-1 has worked for all but two and those may have been other issues. To reduce heat induction the ideal situation is to place the external drive away from and not on TiVo; also away from any power supplies (UPS, etc.).


The Tripplite cable I linked to is an eSATA II to eSATA II cable no? It better be...


----------



## richsadams

miken said:


> Anyone read Engadget today?
> 
> Lots of TiVo news. New cheaper version of the Series 3 hitting shelves soon. TiVoToGo enabled on Series 3 and last but what this whole thread is about, the Official Announcement that eSATA port will be enabled for external storage. Supposably and Best Buy will have the retail exclusive on the external drive.
> 
> I hope all previous working drives continue to work and that they don't send out an update that will only enable the Best Buy drive.
> 
> If anyone have anymore info on this, please post it. Especially on the Best Buy drive cost and storage capacity.


 Interesting stuff.

Here is the link to the Engadget article.

If the "new" external TiVo drive is slated to be run in RAID 0 (striped without parity) that should be good news. It shouldn't impact the drives that have been installed previously as it appears that they are functioning as RAID 0 already.

The only thing I would be concerned with is an update to the FW which will allow TiVo to immediately recognize a new drive installation. That will be a must as TiVo certainly wont expect normal folks to go through the Kickstart process. An update may or may not reconfigure existing external drives...and impact existing content. 

This was all to be expected as its another marketing feature that the S3 was not taking advantage of and (as I so smartly predicted long ago  ) a new revenue stream for TiVoalthough BB isnt noted for their discounted pricing business model.

Keep your fingers crossed!


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> The Tripplite cable I linked to is an eSATA II to eSATA II cable no? It better be...


It doesn't appear to be. Note the shorter end on the right side connector as compared to the left side connector. The shorter end is the old eSATA version.  Could be my eyes though. Some folks have had success by cutting away the extra plastic, but it's best to get the correct cable to start with.

Here's a pic of the proper SATA II cable from www.satacable.com:










This is a photo of the eSATA cable that comes with the MX-1:










Edit: Updated left/right reference error and added photos.


----------



## bareyb

richsadams said:


> It doesn't appear to be. Note the shorter end on the left side connector as compared to the right side connector. The shorter end is the old eSATA version.


I guess I'll have to wait until it gets here to make sure. I have a feeling that picture is wrong as the description of the item clearly states it's got the same connector on both ends.


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> I guess I'll have to wait until it gets here to make sure. I have a feeling that picture is wrong as the description of the item clearly states it's got the same connector on both ends.


 You're right...I took a look at the web page and it does indeed say eSATA II, so you should get the correct cable. I'm sure it'll be fine. :up:


----------



## 1283

richsadams said:


> If the "new" external TiVo drive is slated to be run in RAID 0 (striped without parity) that should be good news. It shouldn't impact the drives that have been installed previously as it appears that they are functioning as RAID 0 already.


If the TiVo external drive is RAID 0, that's *BAD* news -- more chance for the external system to fail. The internal-external combination is *NOT* RAID 0.


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> If the TiVo external drive is RAID 0, that's *BAD* news -- more chance for the external system to fail. The internal-external combination is *NOT* RAID 0.


 Youre correct in that it doesnt behave strictly like a RAID 0 setup currently, but for all intents it behaves like one with the difference being that the FW is held in a separate partition on the A (internal) drive. If the eSATA drive fails (or is disconnected), all of the programming that was recorded _since _ the eSATA drive was connected is generally lost.

However if the FW is still held in a separate partition on the "A" drive it should allow TiVo to recover from an external drive failure as it does already correct? I can't imagine a change that would stripe the FW across both drives. So I wouldn't think there would be any difference going forwardbut Im ready to be educated.


----------



## 1283

The behavior is more like concatenation, not stripping.

I expect the supported external drive to behave just like the current kickstart expansion.


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> It doesn't appear to be. Note the shorter end on the right side connector as compared to the left side connector. The shorter end is the old eSATA version.  Could be my eyes though.


No, the ends are flipped. That is why they appear different. Shadows and perspective are also misleading you as far as length.


----------



## wackymann

OK - so I feel like an idiot, but I can't get this to work... Here is what I did:

1. Hooked up my old 750 GB drive to SATA port 1, new 750 GB drive to SATA port 2.
2. Booted up to latest mfslive.org bootable CD.
3. Checked to make sure /dev/sda and /dev/sdb were being seen OK by scrolling up (looked good)
4. Typed command: mfsadd -ex -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb (quickly returned with "Success" message)
5. Powered off PC
6. Reassembled Tivo
7. Mounted new drive in Antec MX-1 case and plugged it in and turned it on (see blue light)
8. Hooked everything back up to my Tivo S3, and then hooked up eSATA cable.
9. Plugged Tivo back in.

It booted up fine, but still reports 98 hours of HD. I tried another soft restart using the remote, and nothing changed. It's acting as though nothing has changed. Did I forget to do something? Am I an idiot?


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> No, the ends are flipped. That is why they appear different. Shadows and perspective are also misleading you as far as length.


Okay, sounds good.


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> The behavior is more like concatenation, not stripping.
> 
> I expect the supported external drive to behave just like the current kickstart expansion.


Sounds logical to me too. If the "string theory" is correct I don't think there will be an issue with the external drives that have already been added do you? (Other than a FW update that might format the external drive again.) I'm always interested in hearing everyone else's thoughts. :up:


----------



## bareyb

richsadams said:


> Sounds logical to me too. If the "string theory" is correct I don't think there will be an issue with the external drives that have already been added do you? (Other than a FW update that might format the external drive again.) I'm always interested in hearing everyone else's thoughts. :up:


I am hoping there will be some code that will tell TiVo to leave a currently installed drive as is. If not, and it reformats I guess I could live with that. As long as I can still use the drives I bought I'll be cool. I feel pretty certain that will be the case.

That being the case... As soon as my cables come I'm hooking up! I really like the MX-1 enclosure by the way. It's really nicely put together and yep, it's quiet as can be.

Thanks to all for the recommendations. The drive is the quietest I've ever heard and the enclosure moves a
a lot of air. I have to ask though... Does the LED Flash during use and if so, is it bothersome? Has anyone disconnected their LED?


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> I am hoping there will be some code that will tell TiVo to leave a currently installed drive as is. If not, and it reformats I guess I could live with that. As long as I can still use the drives I bought I'll be cool. I feel pretty certain that will be the case.


 Ha! That would be far to easy for us...not likely. 



bareyb said:


> That being the case... As soon as my cables come I'm hooking up! I really like the MX-1 enclosure by the way. It's really nicely put together and yep, it's quiet as can be.
> 
> Thanks to all for the recommendations. The drive is the quietest I've ever heard and the enclosure moves a
> a lot of air. I have to ask though... Does the LED Flash during use and if so, is it bothersome? Has anyone disconnected their LED?


 Yep, MX-1's and the rest of Antec's computer cases, fans, power supplies, etc. are all first-rate.

You shouldn't have any trouble with the Antec eSATA cable that was supplied. Ours has never given us any problems since day one...more than two months now. But of course if you'd feel more comfortable with another cable no worries.

I've never seen the blue light flicker during a recording. It might, but the light isn't very bright at all so I never notice it from across the room anyway. :up:


----------



## bareyb

Thanks Rich. :up:


----------



## jazzys

Do people think it's safe to assume the TiVo HD's eSATA port will behave like the TiVo 3's? Thanks.


----------



## bkdtv

jazzys said:


> Do people think it's safe to assume the TiVo HD's eSATA port will behave like the TiVo 3's? Thanks.


At least one review claims the TivoHD software does not support the method to enable eSATA. I'm going to wait for confirmation from forum members before updating the FAQ.

Tivo has promised to activate eSATA on the TivoHD later this year.


----------



## Adam1115

jazzys said:


> Do people think it's safe to assume the TiVo HD's eSATA port will behave like the TiVo 3's? Thanks.


Yes, as of right now it runs the same software. (Not for sure, but I think it's safe to assume.)


----------



## bkdtv

Tivo asked me to clarify that this expansion method does not function on the TivoHD. Tivo is working to bring that functionality to the TivoHD with a future update.

See FAQ #2.


----------



## bareyb

SUCCESS!!! :up: 

Man that was easy! I just added the new hard drives to both my S3's without a hitch. I followed the instructions bkdtv put on the first page of this thread and added the second drive to both units on the first try. 

I'm using the highly recommended MX-1 enclosures with Seagate DB35 500 Gig Hard drives and the 18 inch Tripplite eSATA II cables. I used some tie wrap anchors and ties to hold the power and eSATA II cables in place so they will be less likely to fall out. I think I"ve done all I can and I'm very happy with the installation and the way everything looks. 

I know I'm not out of the woods yet, but things are looking very good. System info shows 98 HD hours and over 900 hours of SD!!! Thanks again to all the brave pioneers. I couldn't be more delighted. This was a fun project. I recommend it to anyone.


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> SUCCESS!!! :up:
> 
> Man that was easy! I just added the new hard drives to both my S3's without a hitch. I followed the instructions on the first page of this thread and added the second drive to both units on the first try.
> 
> I'm using the highly recommended MX-1 enclosures with Seagate DB35 500 Gig Hard drives and the 18 inch Tripplite eSATA II cables. I used some tie wrap anchors and ties to hold the power and eSATA II cables in place so they will be less likely to fall out.
> 
> I think I"ve done all I can and I'm very happy with the installation and the way everything looks. I know I'm not out of the woods yet, but things are looking very good. System info shows 98 HD hours and over 900 hours of SD!!! Thanks again to all the brave pioneers. I couldn't be more delighted. This was a fun project. I recommend it to anyone.


 Congrats! Now enjoy all of that new real estate! :up:


----------



## richsadams

bkdtv said:


> Tivo asked me to clarify that this expansion method does not function on the TivoHD. Tivo is working to bring that functionality to the TivoHD with a future update.
> 
> See FAQ #2.


It doesn't get said often enough...THANKS for keeping the FAQ/Troubleshooting post up to date! :up: :up: :up:


----------



## wackymann

So I hooked the drives back up to my computer and determined that I had mixed up which drive was sda/sdb (thanks to some help from spike2k5). I assumed I could just rerun the appropiate command using the correct notation and all would be well, so I went ahead and did that. I got a long printout that seemed to suggest everything worked, and that my storage space had been doubled. Then I hooked my Tivo back up and everything seemed to work. It said I have 198 hours of HD as expected... But alas, all was not well. At first I had trouble tuning some channels - I would just get a blank black screen until I switched tuners (Live-TV button) and then switched back. So I restarted the Tivo again and that problem went away. But... just now, I was going through some menus and the system sponaneously rebooted, and I got the dreaded Green Screen of Death.

So my question is - did I need to so something else to recover from my first error, or is it more likely that I just have a bad drive?

And do I really need to let it do its thing for 3 hours??



wackymann said:


> OK - so I feel like an idiot, but I can't get this to work... Here is what I did:
> 
> 1. Hooked up my old 750 GB drive to SATA port 1, new 750 GB drive to SATA port 2.
> 2. Booted up to latest mfslive.org bootable CD.
> 3. Checked to make sure /dev/sda and /dev/sdb were being seen OK by scrolling up (looked good)
> 4. Typed command: mfsadd -ex -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb (quickly returned with "Success" message)
> 5. Powered off PC
> 6. Reassembled Tivo
> 7. Mounted new drive in Antec MX-1 case and plugged it in and turned it on (see blue light)
> 8. Hooked everything back up to my Tivo S3, and then hooked up eSATA cable.
> 9. Plugged Tivo back in.
> 
> It booted up fine, but still reports 98 hours of HD. I tried another soft restart using the remote, and nothing changed. It's acting as though nothing has changed. Did I forget to do something? Am I an idiot?


----------



## moxie1617

richsadams said:


> It doesn't get said often enough...THANKS for keeping the FAQ/Troubleshooting post up to date! :up: :up: :up:


Well said, thanks bkdtv for all your work. Made life a lot easier and nicer for a lot of us. :up:


----------



## bareyb

moxie1617 said:


> Well said, thanks bkdtv for all your work. Made life a lot easier and nicer for a lot of us. :up:


True that. :up:


----------



## jon96cobra

Has anyone had problems where the tivo locks up and sometimes needs to reboot with the ESATA drive. I have noticed just before it reboots it shows some programing unavailable or freezes while playing.


----------



## FrogGremlin

jon96cobra said:


> Has anyone had problems where the tivo locks up and sometimes needs to reboot with the ESATA drive. I have noticed just before it reboots it shows some programing unavailable or freezes while playing.


Yes, I and others have had precisely the same problem. The "programming unavailable" message - when, after the reboot, it IS available on the disk - seems to be an important clue, but the mystery itself remains unsolved. What size drive did you add?


----------



## jon96cobra

I have a 500gb drive in the antec MX-1


----------



## Flappjakk

Does anyone think there would be speed issues with using an external drive enclosure that can house a parallel ata drive (see cooldrives website and search for combo sata drive enclosure firewire and usb, I'd post the link but it won't let me) which has sata, firewire and usb connectors then use a cable that converts sata to esata to connect to the Tivo? I have a 300GB Seagate Drive (ST3300831A) that would just about double the capacity of my Series 3 if I could hook it up and get it to work. And this enclosure costs less than 60 bucks!

Opinion anyone?


----------



## Flappjakk

Looks like i reached my 5 posts, here's the link: http://www.cooldrives.com/combo-sata-drive-enclosure-firewire-and-usb.html


----------



## jlib

Flappjakk said:


> Does anyone think there would be speed issues with using an external drive enclosure that can house a parallel ata drive (see cooldrives website and search for combo sata drive enclosure firewire and usb, I'd post the link but it won't let me) which has sata, firewire and usb connectors then use a cable that converts sata to esata to connect to the Tivo?


There are no technical or performance problems doing that. Note: make sure you get the newer model (the last picture) which has the external eSATA interface rather than SATA. Looks like the earlier pictures are of the previous model. So, you'll actually need eSATA to eSATA cable.


----------



## FrogGremlin

jon96cobra said:


> I have a 500gb drive in the antec MX-1


Thanks for the information. I have a Seagate 750GB drive in an Antec MX-1, and wasn't sure (until now) whether the problem was related to drive size. Apparently it isn't. A follow-up question: Have your problems occurred after relatively long (full day or more, for example) periods during which the TiVo was unaccessed via the remote, or have they occurred over shorter time intervals? (My problems seem to occur after the TiVo runs on its own for a day or more.)


----------



## zob

jon96cobra said:


> Has anyone had problems where the tivo locks up and sometimes needs to reboot with the ESATA drive. I have noticed just before it reboots it shows some programing unavailable or freezes while playing.


I have had 1 reboot since I installed the ESATA drive, this was during a thunder storm/power outage, but have the S3 & ESATA drive on an UPS unit. It split the scheduled recording into 2 recorded segments & lost about 5 minute of the show durning the reboot. I will keep an eye on it for futher reboots & post if there is any more problems.


----------



## T-Shee

Flappjakk said:


> Does anyone think there would be speed issues with using an external drive enclosure that can house a parallel ata drive (see cooldrives website and search for combo sata drive enclosure firewire and usb, I'd post the link but it won't let me) which has sata, firewire and usb connectors then use a cable that converts sata to esata to connect to the Tivo? I have a 300GB Seagate Drive (ST3300831A) that would just about double the capacity of my Series 3 if I could hook it up and get it to work. And this enclosure costs less than 60 bucks!
> 
> Opinion anyone?


My biggest concern with an enclosure like the cooldrive you've linked to is: HEAT.
I doubt that drive speed would be the limiting factor here.

I own a Cooldrive enclosure for a 2.5" laptop drive (FW + USB 2.0) and it is good enclosure but it is anything but cool. It gets hot enough on the outside to make you wonder how long your drive will survive on the inside. 120 deg. F typical. I use this drive to backup my laptop, so it gets infrequent use; I can't imagine it running 24x7.

If you opt for this enclosure, make sure that you can place it where is there is ample air circulation, or better yet, aim a small fan directly at the enclosure.

I know that you are attempting to double(+) your S3's storage by utilizing/recycling an older pata drive that you already have on hand - a great concept indeed and seemingly cost effective - but if it "burns up" in the process, how much have you really saved.

I have 5 or 6 pata drives sitting idle. I'd love to raid 'em all and put 'em back to work on the S3, but without a well-ventilated, fan equipped enclosure to do so, I simply won't chance it. These "idle" drives may not be worth much, but if I turn them into "doorstops" by burning them up, they become worthless.

If someone out there has one of these drives enclosures (I only have it's cousin) they could speak to the heat issue better than I can. I'm all ears.


----------



## gbrown

I have been running a Seagate 500GB in a MX-1 enclosure using the supplied MX-1 eSata cable for over a month now. Only 1 freeze/reboot - but I was playing around at the time: downloading, navigating, etc.

Couldn't have done it without all the excellent advice on this thread. And a special thanx to bktv.


----------



## MikeMacMan

I just wanted to report that I successfully added a 1TB external drive to my Tivo 3. I used a MX-1 enclosure and HITACHI Deskstar 7K1000. The only problem I had was the first MX-1 I got was defective. A quick swap at Best Buy solved that. Words can not describe how happy I am to have 165 HD or 1561 SD hours.  Thanks for the information in this FAQ!


----------



## KustomMerc

I have done 2 upgrades both with the Seagate 500 gb DB35 and the Antec MX-1 enclosures. I couldn't have ased for a better enclosed and drive combo. I did the first one with great success!. no problems. after that I bought my second series 3 and then did the same upgrade to that one. the only differnce is that I used a 3' esata cable on the first upgrade and I used the esata cable that came with the encloser on the second. the second upgrade keeps rebooting which I now understand isn't normal.............help!


----------



## jlib

You have a perfect opportunity to discover if the cable is the culprit since you can just swap the cables keeping all other conditions the same. That would be very valuable information to publish here.


----------



## bkdtv

Has anyone tried the new Western Digital "My DVR Expander" ?

http://www.westerndigital.com/en/products/Products.asp?DriveID=334

This is one of the first eSATA solutions I've seen from a manufacturer that actually uses a drive (WD5000AVJS) intended for DVRs. It might be a good alternative for those members who don't feel they are up to the task of mounting a Seagate DB35 in an Antec MX-1 case.


----------



## nuttzy06

bkdtv said:


> Has anyone tried the new Western Digital "My DVR Expander" ?


Wow, and it's only $200, which has the DB35 and MX-1 beat.

-Nuttzy


----------



## richsadams

bkdtv said:


> Has anyone tried the new Western Digital "My DVR Expander" ?
> 
> http://www.westerndigital.com/en/products/Products.asp?DriveID=334
> 
> This is one of the first eSATA solutions I've seen from a manufacturer that actually uses a drive (WD5000AVJS) intended for DVRs. It might be a good alternative for those members who don't feel they are up to the task of mounting a Seagate DB35 in an Antec MX-1 case.


The Segate DB35 7200.3 and Apricorn DVR Xpander HDD's are specifically built for DVR use. Both have been on the market for a couple of years now.

An MX-1 and a Seagate 500GB DB35 DVR drive can be purchased from www.excaliberpc.com for $203 and the Apricorn DVR Xpander  (which also uses the WD HDD but includes a fan) is also $199, so the three are priced equally...although you do have to snap the DB35 drive into the MX-1 enclosure; about 10 minutes time.

My biggest concern with the new WD eSATA drive is the lack of a fan. WD drives are notorious for running hot. This one may have been "tuned" but I'd wager it still runs hotter than most Seagates (the operating temp specs are certainly higher). For external/open air use it might be okay but I wouldn't place it inside a cabinet.

Also the DB35 drives have a 5 year warranty and the DVR Xpander a 1 year warranty. I couldn't find anything listed for the WD drive other than a 30 day money-back guarantee and a link to "starting the setup" for a warranty.  Maybe I just missed that part though.

IMHO for the money the Seagate DB35 and MX-1 are a "best buy" and the Apricorn DVR Xpander is a "good buy"; both being a better investment as both have fans and possibly equal or better warranties.

But then maybe folks want to wait for the "official" TiVo eSATA expansion drive? Whenever it shows up that is.


----------



## nuttzy06

Great info, Rich. Thanks!

Yeah, I had been wondering if I should hold off for the "official" drive to come out, but the Fall Season is not that far off and I'd like to use the remaining time to work out any kinks. My only fear would be our expanded drives being disrupted when the "official" support comes. The prevailing thought seems to be that there won't be a problem, and given that I'd prefer a terabyte drive anyway, I'll probably take the plunge ASAP.

Thanks!
-Nuttzy


----------



## KustomMerc

thank you Jlib, seems as if after taking to heart some of the infomation about interference problems and reseating the cables after a new placement of the MX-1 encloser. everything seems to be back to normal....no more rebooting. thank you for your help.

I still think the Mx-1 and the Seagate DB-35 500gb are a great combo. those enclosers were gone for awhile but there back now. good luck all

KustomMerc


----------



## richsadams

nuttzy06 said:


> Great info, Rich. Thanks!
> 
> Yeah, I had been wondering if I should hold off for the "official" drive to come out, but the Fall Season is not that far off and I'd like to use the remaining time to work out any kinks. My only fear would be our expanded drives being disrupted when the "official" support comes. The prevailing thought seems to be that there won't be a problem, and given that I'd prefer a terabyte drive anyway, I'll probably take the plunge ASAP.
> 
> Thanks!
> -Nuttzy


----------



## GooberMan

When I tried to do the MFSTOOLS add procedure on my MX-1 enclosure and my 750gb upgraded Tivo drive, I discovered that the drive inside the Tivo doesn't have a "standard" 4 pin power connection, so I was unable to power the drive with the power supply in my PC. Do I just need to get a cable that has the "big" connector on it (like the one inside Tivo) or is it more complicated than that?


----------



## sfhub

You can use standard sata cable and sata power connector on your PC. Usually retail HD upgrade packages will include a standard 4-pin power connector to SATA power connector converter cable. It is passive, just changes the form factor of the connector. It is probably a $2 part at your local PC shop.


----------



## GooberMan

Okay, thanks. I found one of those adapters online for $1. When it arrives, hopefully I'll be successful with the procedure. Thanks again.


----------



## MikeMacMan

MikeMacMan said:


> I just wanted to report that I successfully added a 1TB external drive to my Tivo 3. I used a MX-1 enclosure and HITACHI Deskstar 7K1000. The only problem I had was the first MX-1 I got was defective. A quick swap at Best Buy solved that. Words can not describe how happy I am to have 165 HD or 1561 SD hours.  Thanks for the information in this FAQ!


Perhaps I spoke too soon. Since I added the external drive my S3 has been restarting alot. It will restart, bring up a GSOD for a few minutes, then go back to normal. It is really frustrating because I am not sure what to check.

I used the eSata cable supplied with the MX-1. My sub was about 1 foot in front of the S3 and my center channel speaker was about 1 foot to the left. These were not very close to the eSata cable though. I moved the speakers farther apart. Does anyone have any other ideas on how to troubleshoot my restarting problem? Could my HD be going into "Sleep" mode? I read the "Hitachi Feature Tool" manual and it says that power management is disabled by default.


----------



## richsadams

MikeMacMan said:


> Perhaps I spoke too soon. Since I added the external drive my S3 has been restarting alot. It will restart, bring up a GSOD for a few minutes, then go back to normal. It is really frustrating because I am not sure what to check.
> 
> I used the eSata cable supplied with the MX-1. My sub was about 1 foot in front of the S3 and my center channel speaker was about 1 foot to the left. These were not very close to the eSata cable though. I moved the speakers farther apart. Does anyone have any other ideas on how to troubleshoot my restarting problem? Could my HD be going into "Sleep" mode? I read the "Hitachi Feature Tool" manual and it says that power management is disabled by default.


Hmmm...hard to say.

I'd start here  at #3 under troubleshooting.


----------



## maynerd

Bad news with my MX-1 & Segate 500GB DB35 set up.

My MX-1 began making noise. It appears to be the fan. As I was checking to see if it was the case fan, the power cable came unplugged from the device. The Tivo was of course recording at the time. I was able to rehook the drive with my tivo and it worked then I got the yellow screen message a couple of hours later. I then rebooted my Tivo and it started working again. This morning I got up and the tivo had bombed again. This has caused about 3 reboots since last night.

Now my hard drive doesn't appear to be spinning up. It starts to fire up then it stops and a beep noise comes from the drive. The beep occurs about every 5 seconds and my drive appears to be dead.

I'm not sure why things have gone from so good to so bad in a very short period of time.

I think the drive is hosed, any ideas?

That being said my data is gone if I need to replace the HD right?


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> Bad news with my MX-1 & Segate 500GB DB35 set up.
> 
> My MX-1 began making noise. It appears to be the fan. As I was checking to see if it was the case fan, the power cable came unplugged from the device. The Tivo was of course recording at the time. I was able to rehook the drive with my tivo and it worked then I got the yellow screen message a couple of hours later. I then rebooted my Tivo and it started working again. This morning I got up and the tivo had bombed again. This has caused about 3 reboots since last night.
> 
> Now my hard drive doesn't appear to be spinning up. It starts to fire up then it stops and a beep noise comes from the drive. The beep occurs about every 5 seconds and my drive appears to be dead.
> 
> I'm not sure why things have gone from so good to so bad in a very short period of time.
> 
> I think the drive is hosed, any ideas?
> 
> That being said my data is gone if I need to replace the HD right?


 Aurgh!  That doesn't sound good. It does indeed sound like there's a problem with the drive. You say it beeps? To my knowledge there's no audio on board the MX-1 or any HDD. 

To start you might want to try Kickstart 57. That will force TiVo's GSOD. Kickstart 57 will run TiVo's version of "check disk" to determine if there are bad sectors on the HDD's (and isolate them) and verify the configuration/software settings. If it can't rectify the problem this way you'll continue to get reboots.

If Kickstart 57 doesn't change anything I'd go ahead and power TiVo down, remove the drive, open the enclosure, plug it in, turn it on and see if it's indeed the fan or if it sounds like the drive will not spin up.

If it's the enclosure fan you can get a new enclosure, slip your drive back in and hook it back up without losing any recordings...if you can live w/o TiVo until you can get a new MX-1. If you contact the retailer they might be able to ship a new one right away and give you credit on return of the defective unit. However if you power up TiVo w/o the drive you'll need to divorce it and yes, you will lose the recordings made since you installed the drive.

If the fan seems okay and the drive won't spin up normally I'd replace the Seagate drive (it has a five-year warranty).

Another option would be to replace the eSATA II cable. There is constant communication between TiVo and the eSATA drive...a problem with the cable could cause issues on either end as well.

It's not unexpected to have some defective units (drives, enclosures, cables, etc.) but it is frustrating if it happens to you. 

Good luck and keep us posted! :up:


----------



## maynerd

richsadams said:


> Aurgh!  That doesn't sound good. It does indeed sound like there's a problem with the drive. You say it beeps? To my knowledge there's no audio on board the MX-1 or any HDD.
> 
> To start you might want to try Kickstart 57. That will force TiVo's GSOD. Kickstart 57 will run TiVo's version of "check disk" to determine if there are bad sectors on the HDD's (and isolate them) and verify the configuration/software settings. If it can't rectify the problem this way you'll continue to get reboots.
> 
> If Kickstart 57 doesn't change anything I'd go ahead and power TiVo down, remove the drive, open the enclosure, plug it in, turn it on and see if it's indeed the fan or if it sounds like the drive will not spin up.
> 
> If it's the enclosure fan you can get a new enclosure, slip your drive back in and hook it back up without losing any recordings...if you can live w/o TiVo until you can get a new MX-1. If you contact the retailer they might be able to ship a new one right away and give you credit on return of the defective unit. However if you power up TiVo w/o the drive you'll need to divorce it and yes, you will lose the recordings made since you installed the drive.
> 
> If the fan seems okay and the drive won't spin up normally I'd replace the Seagate drive (it has a five-year warranty).
> 
> Another option would be to replace the eSATA II cable. There is constant communication between TiVo and the eSATA drive...a problem with the cable could cause issues on either end as well.
> 
> It's not unexpected to have some defective units (drives, enclosures, cables, etc.) but it is frustrating if it happens to you.
> 
> Good luck and keep us posted! :up:


Thanks Rich.

Here's a little more info and I'll try to lay it out better.

This is what occured in order (as best I remember it)

1. The ext drive is being loud. I pull it out to get a better listen to it. When I do that it comes unplugged. (It was recording at the time).
2. Since it has already been separated from my tivo I decide to go ahead and open up the enclosure.
3. I determine that the bottom (main) fan of the enclosure is making noise.
4. Deciding that I can't fix the fan I decide to put it back together for the time being so I can at least use my tivo until I can get a replacement HD case.
5. Tivo has the orange screen asking me if I want to divorce the drive.
6. I reboot the tivo and it recognizes the drive again and goes through the GSOD it takes about 20 minutes before it is working again.
7. I watch some shows for a couple of hours things seem ok. I turn off my tv.
8. About an hour later I notice that the tivo lcd is blank and turn on my tv and the tivo is on the orange screen again.
9. I check my connections reboot the tivo and the GSOD occurs again.
10. It runs and a bit of time later it is working again. It's bedtime.
11. I wake up and sure enough the lcd is blank I turn on the tv and the orange screen is up again.
12. I check the connections and reboot.
13. Orange screen is up again no GSOD still not recognizing the HD.
14. I pop open the drive and listen closely to the HD and it isn't spinning up right and there is a beeping noise coming from the HD. I'm 99% sure it's the HD and not the enclosure.

That's pretty much a summary of what happened and where I am today.


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> Thanks Rich.
> 
> Here's a little more info and I'll try to lay it out better.
> 
> This is what occured in order (as best I remember it)
> 
> 1. The ext drive is being loud. I pull it out to get a better listen to it. When I do that it comes unplugged. (It was recording at the time).
> 2. Since it has already been separated from my tivo I decide to go ahead and open up the enclosure.
> 3. I determine that the bottom (main) fan of the enclosure is making noise.
> 4. Deciding that I can't fix the fan I decide to put it back together for the time being so I can at least use my tivo until I can get a replacement HD case.
> 5. Tivo has the orange screen asking me if I want to divorce the drive.
> 6. I reboot the tivo and it recognizes the drive again and goes through the GSOD it takes about 20 minutes before it is working again.
> 7. I watch some shows for a couple of hours things seem ok. I turn off my tv.
> 8. About an hour later I notice that the tivo lcd is blank and turn on my tv and the tivo is on the orange screen again.
> 9. I check my connections reboot the tivo and the GSOD occurs again.
> 10. It runs and a bit of time later it is working again. It's bedtime.
> 11. I wake up and sure enough the lcd is blank I turn on the tv and the orange screen is up again.
> 12. I check the connections and reboot.
> 13. Orange screen is up again no GSOD still not recognizing the HD.
> 14. I pop open the drive and listen closely to the HD and it isn't spinning up right and there is a beeping noise coming from the HD. I'm 99% sure it's the HD and not the enclosure.
> 
> That's pretty much a summary of what happened and where I am today.


 Yuck!  Since TiVo has already gone through the GSOD a couple of times there is data corruption of some sort that it can't resolve at the moment.

If you haven't already, I'd unplug TiVo and unplug the eSATA drive. Disconnect the eSATA drive from TiVo and then plug it in free and clear of any connections (except electrical), turn it on and see how the fan and drive act. You should be able to hear the drive spin up...and of course the fan shouldn't be making any unusual noises.

If the drive spins up okay when it's disconnected from TiVo I'd suspect the eSATA II cable.

If it doesn't spin up when disconnected from TiVo then I'd suspect the drive.

The enclosure fan may be a problem, but unless it's stopped completely and the drive overheated it shouldn't enter into the mix.

So IMO it's narrowed down to the cable or the drive. If it's a cable your recordings may be okay...if not and its the drive... 

There is a remote chance that it is TiVo itself and having an external drive is coincidental to whats going on. But from your description it does indeed sound like an external drive issue. That's the problem with adding peripherals...you never know exactly what's causing a problem until you eliminate things one-by-one. If you replace the cable and/or the drive and still have problems, then I'd divorce the drive and run TiVo without it to see if there are still issues.

Hope that helps!


----------



## MikeMacMan

richsadams said:


> Hmmm...hard to say.
> 
> I'd start here  at #3 under troubleshooting.


I've checked those.

1.) I'm using the eSata cable that came with my MX-1. From what I've read that should be a "good" cable.

2.) The MX-1 is a quality enclosure.

3.) I guess the drive could be faulty. To check that I think I'd have to hook the drive up to my computer and destroy all my recordings. Its not overheating though because the MX-1's fan is working.

4.) I've moved my speakers away from my Tivo and I don't have any power cables near it.

Any other ideas? 
Thanks!


----------



## 1283

Keep in mind that *anything* can be defective.


----------



## bareyb

Can you divorce the external drive and "re-marry" it again? Might be worth a try...


----------



## richsadams

MikeMacMan said:


> I've checked those.
> 
> 1.) I'm using the eSata cable that came with my MX-1. From what I've read that should be a "good" cable.
> 
> 2.) The MX-1 is a quality enclosure.
> 
> 3.) I guess the drive could be faulty. To check that I think I'd have to hook the drive up to my computer and destroy all my recordings. Its not overheating though because the MX-1's fan is working.
> 
> 4.) I've moved my speakers away from my Tivo and I don't have any power cables near it.
> 
> Any other ideas?
> Thanks!


 You didnt mention if you had disconnected the drive from TiVo completely as suggested. Have you tried that yet? You could connect it to your PC but you may risk losing your recordings. Just turning it on and listening to it while it is not connected to TiVo (via the eSATA cable) should tell you if its spinning up or not. If it doesnt sound like its spinning up to full speed when you turn it on (or continues to beep ) then you have your answera bad drive.

I'm using the MX-1's supplied eSATA cable with no problems (along with many others) however there was one report of one that was bad. They replaced it with a new one that was recommended on the original post and that seemed to have cured it. So I wouldn't discount the cable...or any cable for that matter; they can go bad as c3 mentioned.

If the drive sounds good Id certainly try a new cablethey are fairly inexpensive, less than $10 I think. If that doesnt do the trick then Id divorce the drive and focus on TiVo itself.



bareyb said:


> Can you divorce the external drive and "re-marry" it again? Might be worth a try...


 If he divorces the drive all of the recordings made since the drive was installed will be lost, but it might be worth a last-ditch effort.

Let us know how it goes.


----------



## George Cifranci

I had issues with my eSATA cable that came with my MX-1. When I would turn on my TV the S3 would reboot sometimes. That never happened before I connected an external drive. I replaced the cable with the suggested SIIG cable. This one...

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16812191016

However, once in a while I will turn on my system (Sony R60XBR1 HDTV, Yamaha RX-V2600 Receiver) and whatever is live on my S3 will freeze. It will come back after a bit of hitting the Tivo button and then going back to LIVE tv but if I try to play back a any prerecorded program I will get an error saying that the TIVO was unable to record the show because of signal or whatever. After I reboot the Tivo I can play those programs fine. It is a crapshoot if it will happen or not. It happens once every week or two since I replaced the eSATA cable on my MX-1.


----------



## nuttzy06

I have a general question. Why does the eSATA setup seem to be a bit fragile? I know people have had good success when the environment is right, but the environment does seem to be pretty darn important.

I can understand the need to keep it in a well ventilated area, away from a lot of heat. But keeping it away from a power source and taking care not to bump it seem pretty important also, and I'm not sure why that is. Is the cable unshielded and subject to interference? I have a wifi access point about 3ft from where the drive will go... I assume that won't be a problem (2.4Mhz), correct? I'm not super knowledgeable about these things so any tips for making a good environment would be great.

Thanks!
-Nuttzy 

edit: fixed a typo


----------



## fred2

Nuttzy06:

I would suggest that part of the problem is the poor connectors now used in "modern" devices. They basically use friction fittings to hold them in place. A slight jostling and the connection is intermittantly broken - this goes for the esata cable, usb and mini-usb connections. Remember the old screw connectors for serial cables both 25 and 9 pin? Similar for monitor cables. The spring clip for parallel cables?

I can almost say that the first esata cable that I had for the Seagate FAP fell out of the socket if you looked at it wrong. And since I have purchased an mx-1 enclosure as insurance, that cable worked NO better with the FAP ***ON THE FAP SIDE*** All fittings appeared tighter on the Tivo side. So in my opinion the FAP's socket may have been a bit larger or shallower so that the cable did not seat all that well.

Then add in the fact that these devices spin faster and do more and you have greater heat production. That heat has to be shed and it may not work well in nice enclosed furniture cabinets or seated on top of other hot components.

Now you can throw in the fact that a component on the Tivo has been there for 9 or more months and had no real testing until the backdoor method for installation was revealed. Users may have thoroughly tested their hard drives, and other circuits during the initial 90 day ownership but no one was really able to test the esata port - could that be an issue? Or the Tivo software that allows esata - how much testing? Only speculation.

My FAP has been running well since some initial problems (moving the drive to see its serial number), trying the mx-1 cable, vacuuming near the setup (cable again) and one or two other early incidents which I, too, attribute to cable issues. I'd say it has been working for at least the last 7 or 8 weeks, three weeks with only recording as I as in Europe and NO-PLAYBACK. Mine is on an open shelf right next to the tivo. The cable is one I got from Frys and trimmed of "excess" plastic insulator. 

Anyone is free to critique my "thoughts!"


----------



## FrogGremlin

George Cifranci said:


> However, once in a while I will turn on my system (Sony R60XBR1 HDTV, Yamaha RX-V2600 Receiver) and whatever is live on my S3 will freeze. It will come back after a bit of hitting the Tivo button and then going back to LIVE tv but if I try to play back a any prerecorded program I will get an error saying that the TIVO was unable to record the show because of signal or whatever. After I reboot the Tivo I can play those programs fine. It is a crapshoot if it will happen or not. It happens once every week or two since I replaced the eSATA cable on my MX-1.


George - You're not alone, and no-one seems to have yet come up with a definitive explanation. For a while I was suspicious that it was linked to the TiVo sitting idle for "too long," but my recent trip seems to disconfirm that: My eSATAed TiVo ran just fine for 15 straight days while I was in Hong Kong, and then yielded the false "no signal" message and rebooted about 24 hours after I got home Sunday.

I also have a 60" Sony (although a KDS-A2000, and an HDMI cable running straight from the TiVo to the TV, with digital sound piped from the TiVo through a receiver). It would be interesting if others with the same problem have similar Sony TVs ...


----------



## richsadams

George Cifranci said:


> I had issues with my eSATA cable that came with my MX-1. When I would turn on my TV the S3 would reboot sometimes. That never happened before I connected an external drive. I replaced the cable with the suggested SIIG cable. This one...
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16812191016
> 
> However, once in a while I will turn on my system (Sony R60XBR1 HDTV, Yamaha RX-V2600 Receiver) and whatever is live on my S3 will freeze. It will come back after a bit of hitting the Tivo button and then going back to LIVE tv but if I try to play back a any prerecorded program I will get an error saying that the TIVO was unable to record the show because of signal or whatever. After I reboot the Tivo I can play those programs fine. It is a crapshoot if it will happen or not. It happens once every week or two since I replaced the eSATA cable on my MX-1.


Good info, thanks. :up: Quick question...how is your TV connected to TiVo?


----------



## GooberMan

fred2 said:


> Nuttzy06:
> 
> I would suggest that part of the problem is the poor connectors now used in "modern" devices. They basically use friction fittings to hold them in place. A slight jostling and the connection is intermittantly broken - this goes for the esata cable, usb and mini-usb connections.


Since you mention that, and this if off-topic but I gotta ask, has anyone else noticed how loosely the power cord fits into the S3? At least on mine, it doesn't get a very secure connection and if I turn the S3 around to get to the back or just move it a little, it falls out.


----------



## richsadams

fred2 said:


> Nuttzy06:
> 
> I would suggest that part of the problem is the poor connectors now used in "modern" devices. They basically use friction fittings to hold them in place. A slight jostling and the connection is intermittantly broken - this goes for the esata cable, usb and mini-usb connections. Remember the old screw connectors for serial cables both 25 and 9 pin? Similar for monitor cables. The spring clip for parallel cables?
> 
> I can almost say that the first esata cable that I had for the Seagate FAP fell out of the socket if you looked at it wrong. And since I have purchased an mx-1 enclosure as insurance, that cable worked NO better with the FAP ***ON THE FAP SIDE*** All fittings appeared tighter on the Tivo side. So in my opinion the FAP's socket may have been a bit larger or shallower so that the cable did not seat all that well.
> 
> Then add in the fact that these devices spin faster and do more and you have greater heat production. That heat has to be shed and it may not work well in nice enclosed furniture cabinets or seated on top of other hot components.
> 
> Now you can throw in the fact that a component on the Tivo has been there for 9 or more months and had no real testing until the backdoor method for installation was revealed. Users may have thoroughly tested their hard drives, and other circuits during the initial 90 day ownership but no one was really able to test the esata port - could that be an issue? Or the Tivo software that allows esata - how much testing? Only speculation.
> 
> My FAP has been running well since some initial problems (moving the drive to see its serial number), trying the mx-1 cable, vacuuming near the setup (cable again) and one or two other early incidents which I, too, attribute to cable issues. I'd say it has been working for at least the last 7 or 8 weeks, three weeks with only recording as I as in Europe and NO-PLAYBACK. Mine is on an open shelf right next to the tivo. The cable is one I got from Frys and trimmed of "excess" plastic insulator.
> 
> Anyone is free to critique my "thoughts!"


I'd say you're right on the money. There are various "perfect storm" scenarios in play...and no one silver bullet to address them all. Everyone's using different equipment with respect to not only the eSATA drives, but cables, TV's, receivers, etc. Taking all of those combinations into account while using an unsupported software activation method is asking for trouble.

Add to that the normal day-to-day issues that are caused by cablecos, storms, TiVo HDD and software corruption, hardware failures, etc. on a system where an eSATA drive has been added and its easy to see why the new drive becomes the scapegoat. We need to keep in mindparticularly those of us that have used TiVo since the early days of the S1that the S3 hasnt really been around that long. It is being asked to do much more complicated processing while supporting a multitude of new features that were unheard of in the old days. It shouldnt be surprising when things dont go as planned, especially when it comes to fooling around with back-door ideas like adding an unsupported feature.

According to posts that have appeared here and elsewhere (and some have disappeared!) TiVo is currently beta testing the eSATA feature as well as MRV. Both are expected to be supported on the S3 by the end of the year. Apparently there will be a TiVo branded eSATA drive which makes perfect sense. It will cut down on the issues we've been seeing with the various concoctions all of us have put together over the past few months. I'd be amazed if they haven't gotten the message that a solid connection with a quality, shielded eSATA cable isn't important.

In the meantime we can only succeed through trial and error. I think we've narrowed down the field as to what works a majority of the time and what to avoid, but it's still baby steps. I for one am glad I made the early leap, but for anyone faint of heart when it comes to losing their recordings...I think I'd wait for the official TiVo supported eSATA drive (and software upgrade) to arrive.

But heyits only TV right? 

Kudos to everyone for posting their experiences! :up:


----------



## richsadams

GooberMan said:


> Since you mention that, and this if off-topic but I gotta ask, has anyone else noticed how loosely the power cord fits into the S3? At least on mine, it doesn't get a very secure connection and if I turn the S3 around to get to the back or just move it a little, it falls out.


Ours is pretty tight on all of our boxes. Perhaps they skimped on the plastic the day they made your power cable?  I think I'd pick up a new one at Radio Shack, Fry's or order one to see if that takes care of it.


----------



## George Cifranci

richsadams said:


> Good info, thanks. :up: Quick question...how is your TV connected to TiVo?


Via HDMI.

I also had a weird issue (as well as others) back in January when I would sometimes turn on my TV the Tivo would green screen and lock up. The fix was to stop using the built in Ethernet and instead use a USB to ethernet adapter. After that the green screens stopped. It was like there was some sort of power surge or something that would freak out the Tivo when I powered on my TV (and receiver).


----------



## maynerd

I changed out the enclosure, tried kickstarting it and a bunch of different ways trying to get this damn HD to work. I think the drive is fried. I have contacted Seagate for a warranty replacement. There goes all of my cool shows and movies that I recorded. :-/

Thanks for your suggestions rich!


----------



## 1283

George Cifranci said:


> The fix was to stop using the built in Ethernet and instead use a USB to ethernet adapter.


Something is wrong with the TiVo unit. The same BCM7038 chip controls many other functions (HDMI, SATA, etc.). Perhaps something else (other than the Ethernet) is also affected.


----------



## richsadams

George Cifranci said:


> Via HDMI.
> 
> I also had a weird issue (as well as others) back in January when I would sometimes turn on my TV the Tivo would green screen and lock up. The fix was to stop using the built in Ethernet and instead use a USB to ethernet adapter. After that the green screens stopped. It was like there was some sort of power surge or something that would freak out the Tivo when I powered on my TV (and receiver).


 HDMI direct from TiVo to your TV? If so, you might want to try a component (YPbPr) connection. That will remove the HDCP signal from the equation which seems to cause some problems when the handshake between the TV and TiVo is lost. There would be virtually no difference in PQ.



c3 said:


> Something is wrong with the TiVo unit. The same BCM7038 chip controls many other functions (HDMI, SATA, etc.). Perhaps something else (other than the Ethernet) is also affected.


 That would explain a lot. :up:


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> I changed out the enclosure, tried kickstarting it and a bunch of different ways trying to get this damn HD to work. I think the drive is fried. I have contacted Seagate for a warranty replacement. There goes all of my cool shows and movies that I recorded. :-/
> 
> Thanks for your suggestions rich!


Bummer with a capital "B"!


----------



## George Cifranci

c3 said:


> Something is wrong with the TiVo unit. The same BCM7038 chip controls many other functions (HDMI, SATA, etc.). Perhaps something else (other than the Ethernet) is also affected.


My unit or the Series 3's in general?


----------



## 1283

George Cifranci said:


> My unit or the Series 3's in general?


Your unit.


----------



## danjw1

Subject says it all.


Response appreciated,


Dan


----------



## bkdtv

danjw1 said:


> Subject says it all.


See FAQ #2 in the first post of this thread.

Tivo hopes to officially support eSATA on the TivoHD and Series3 platforms before the end of the year. Until then, the eSATA interface on the TivoHD is not functional. The current, unofficial method to enable eSATA only works on the Series3, not the TivoHD.

TivoHD users who want to expand capacity must _currently_ upgrade the internal drive. DVRUpgrade and Weaknees offer 500Gb-1Tb replacements for the internal drive, or you can do it yourself using WinMFS. If you are going to upgrade the internal drive yourself, I would suggest using one of the drives listed in FAQ #30.


----------



## jrpeterson5

Ever since upgrading externally with the Antec MX1 (eSata cable from MX1) and a Seagate 500GB DB35 drive two months ago I've been plagued with sporadic restarts, partial recordings (interestingly always on the same program), and even a few green screens.  I've done everything the FAQ says to do for restarts, and it's hard to say if it's made any difference.  

My question is this: If I totally remove the external upgrade and do an internal upgrade only (to a 750GB or 1TB drive), do you all think this will this fix these problems I've described? If so, I've done an upgrade a LONG time ago on my Series 2 with InstantCake but never on the Series 3...is the upgrade any different?


----------



## jon96cobra

FrogGremlin said:


> Yes, I and others have had precisely the same problem. The "programming unavailable" message - when, after the reboot, it IS available on the disk - seems to be an important clue, but the mystery itself remains unsolved. What size drive did you add?


I think leaving a program paused for long periods of time also adds to this problem happening more often. I left a program paused over night I noticed the Tivo running really slow and freezing when I hit play again. Shortly after it rebooted and it was fine again. Just wanted to share the info.


----------



## nuttzy06

Just wanted to give a quick note of thanks to fred2 and richsadams.... some good info there 

Thanks!
-Nuttzy


----------



## richsadams

jon96cobra said:


> I think leaving a program paused for long periods of time also adds to this problem happening more often. I left a program paused over night I noticed the Tivo running really slow and freezing when I hit play again. Shortly after it rebooted and it was fine again. Just wanted to share the info.


I've run into the "sluggish mode" periodically and found that when I weeded out my Season Passes and Wish Lists plus permanently deleted everything in my Recenty Deleted folder TiVo started responding much faster. (With the 500GB eSATA the RD folder seemed to hover around 200 recordings before it began to purge any.) It seems that even removing all of the HD flotsom helped a great deal even if I didn't clean up anything else. A reboot after all of that makes it pretty perky.

I hate to make the comparison but it seems like TiVo is getting to be like Windows...when it bloats up it slows down. I added larger HDD's as well as second drives in my old S1 and it never seemed to faze it. But by adding the eSATA drive and filling it up with other memory requirements it's as if the S3 gets overwhelmed.

HD programming (which is a good deal of what we record and have on our SP's and WL's) employs a lot of data by comparison to SD and I think we're pushing the limit by adding more and more. Even just searching through available HD programming is quite slow by comparison.

TiVo is basically a computer after all so I guess I'm not surprised when things get a little more "buggy" as I continue to demand more from it, especially if it wasn't designed to handle what I (and all of the new TiVo innovations) are throwing at it. It's not that I accept the problems but I have plenty of recordings saved up with about 60 SP's and a little house cleaning seems to keep things humming a bit smoother in my case.


----------



## richsadams

nuttzy06 said:


> Just wanted to give a quick note of thanks to fred2 and richsadams.... some good info there
> 
> Thanks!
> -Nuttzy


And you believe everything you read?  OMG, what have we done?


----------



## richsadams

*Editorial Alert!*

IMHO it's easy to get caught up in believing that there are a lot of issues for everyone that's added an eSATA drive by reading the various posts here, but percentage-wise it would seem to be a small number in reality.

Based on an early poll there are at least a couple of hundred people that added an external drive since April...and plenty more since then. It seems that the number of complaints here are only a small percentage of the total. That's not to invalidate the issues that are occurring, they are real enough, but I wonder just how many can be attributed to TiVo's that were "border line" and adding an external drive to the mix pushed them over the edge or boxes that would have had some problems anyway. TiVo's aren't bullet proof and the more complicated they get and the more demands put on them (HD material, IP commands, programming and downloads, etc.), the more prone they are to things going wrong compared to the comfortable days of the S2's and certainly S1's.

Again, it seems that people having problems are more often than not those with larger external drives...but without hard numbers it's difficult to know if that's because there is less data for TiVo to deal with using smaller drives or if there are simply more people employing larger eSATA drives. As I mentioned earlier, could it be that we are overwhelming the current software? I know I can drive my computer to lock up by overloading it sometimes and it has 2GB of RAM and a pretty good processor.

It will be interesting to see what size(s) the new TiVo branded eSATA drive will be and how the updated software to support it will impact the issues were seeing now as well as how it will affect the equipment we already have. 

So maybe we need to take a deep breath, step back and understand that we here are a small minority of TiVo owners...specialists, hobbyists, TiVofiles, whatever...and that the issues that have come up are to be expected by using a back-door, unsupported method to add more disk space. Plus I have to believe that some glitches may be due to the day-to-day issues that come up with a TiVo anyway. TiVo's have had rebooting, audio/video, data corruption and a number of other problems for years...it's the nature of the beast. But thousands of them, by far a majority of them obviously run without a hitch.

Just thought I'd try to get some perspective and welcome anyone else's thoughts. Maybe its time for a new poll?

And thanks to everyone for posting their "wins" and ongoing issues. :up: Don't stop now!

Okay...back to our regular programming already in progress.


----------



## jon96cobra

richsadams said:


> I've run into the "sluggish mode" periodically and found that when I weeded out my Season Passes and Wish Lists plus permanently deleted everything in my Recenty Deleted folder TiVo started responding much faster. (With the 500GB eSATA the RD folder seemed to hover around 200 recordings before it began to purge any.) It seems that even removing all of the HD flotsom helped a great deal even if I didn't clean up anything else. A reboot after all of that makes it pretty perky.
> 
> I hate to make the comparison but it seems like TiVo is getting to be like Windows...when it bloats up it slows down. I added larger HDD's as well as second drives in my old S1 and it never seemed to phase it. But by adding the eSATA drive and filling it up with other memory requirements it's as if the S3 gets overwhelmed.
> 
> HD programming (which is a good deal of what we record and have on our SP's and WL's) employs a lot of data by comparison to SD and I think we're pushing the limit by adding more and more. Even just searching through available HD programming is quite slow by comparison.
> 
> TiVo is basically a computer after all so I guess I'm not surprised when things get a little more "buggy" as I continue to demand more from it, especially if it wasn't designed to handle what I (and all of the new TiVo innovations) are throwing at it. It's not that I accept the problems but I have plenty of recordings saved up with about 60 SP's and a little house cleaning seems to keep things humming a bit smoother in my case.


I agree after doing some cleaning it does speed up. I'm not to concerned with it this is probably why Tivo did not allow it to be added since the system isn't stable with the extra storage on the ESATA. I'm sure once they figure out how to keep it stable we will get the updates. I just hope the update won't erase the ESATA drive when it does come out for us that have one on our systems now.

For now I don't mind rebooting and cleaning since most of the shows it happens to aren't really that important or I can't find it again to record.


----------



## slimm

Mines been working great. Absolutely no problems :up:


----------



## T-Shee

jon96cobra said:


> ..the system isn't stable with the extra storage on the ESATA..


Not true. My ESATA expansion drive setup has been flawless since the moment it was added over 12 weeks ago.

My S3 is _very stable_. In fact, it's seems to have improved since adding an ESATA drive: fewer menu delays, fewer audio dropouts, less pixelization, etc. Granted, these gremlins were few and far between prior to the ESATA drive, but subjectively seem to have diminished since.

My ESATA upgrade experience has been a giant check in the "win" column: works as expected, no detrimental effects anywhere that I can see. It's all good, as they say.

As RICHSADAMS implied, we need numbers: I'm up for a new poll!


----------



## jrpeterson5

Instead of arguing who is right about wether it's stable or not, why don't we all help those that are having troubles (like me  ) solve them! I'm very happy that it works for the great majority of users but that fact doesn't make those of us having trouble feel any better nor does it help solve the problems we are having. Again, that's what these forums are all about. If everything worked great then we'd have nothing to talk about.  

As of right now, in my boat, I'd agree with those that say it's not stable because I'm having lots of issues I never had (not once) before I upgraded according to this very FAQ.

I too would love a poll to see if we could figure out if certain upgrades/combinations are causing the problems some of us are experiencing.


----------



## richsadams

jrpeterson5 said:


> Instead of arguing who is right about wether it's stable or not, why don't we all help those that are having troubles (like me  ) solve them! I'm very happy that it works for the great majority of users but that fact doesn't make those of us having trouble feel any better nor does it help solve the problems we are having. Again, that's what these forums are all about. If everything worked great then we'd have nothing to talk about.
> 
> As of right now, in my boat, I'd agree with those that say it's not stable because I'm having lots of issues I never had (not once) before I upgraded according to this very FAQ.
> 
> I too would love a poll to see if we could figure out if certain upgrades/combinations are causing the problems some of us are experiencing.


I don't think there's really an argument that there are problems with some folk's systems since adding an eSATA drive. And anyone that would like to structure a poll that would cover the dozens of eSATA combinations and home theater set-ups that would lead to a solution for even one person Im sure would be a hero!

Most everything here thats come up has been addressed in *bkdtv's * excellent  FAQ and Troubleshooting goldmine. Of course the remedies havent worked for everyone and anyone that has a new/unique problem or solution is more than welcome to make their thoughts known here.

However I'm really not seeing new posts discussing problems or cures; its mostly summer reruns. I'm really beginning to believe that after almost three months of this that we may be coming to a point where there just isn't much more that can be done. It may be that some combinations of drives, connections, receivers, televisions cablecos and how the planets are aligned have doomed some to not being able to take advantage of what's basically a hack unless they are willing to replace those same drives, connections, receivers and televisions to make it work. Not much can be done about the planets and its even more difficult to do anything about the cablecos. 

I for one and many others have spent quite a few hours on this forum for several months trying to help other pioneers get things right. Some solutions seem to work, some dont. Thats the way it goes. For better or for worse the good folks here aren't TiVo Tech Support and no one is paying anyone to solve anyone elses problems. We're here to help but you get what you pay for sometimes. Contributing helpful, detailed information about whats wrong, right or what might make a difference is everyones goal I hope.

As the time approaches for TiVo to begin supporting eSATA drives my gut feeling is that most of these issues will go away with the introduction of a software update (which may or may not require using their proprietary equipment)or it will render all of our hard work meaningless.  But heyit's only TV and everyone can always use an extra HDD right?


----------



## bareyb

I just hit the two week mark with my new 500 Gig DB35/MX-1 Combo. I put external drives on both of our TiVo S3's and so far they have been working without a hitch. Both drives have filled up nicely and seem happy. If that changes and they begin giving me problems then I will have to remove them and go back to not having as much space and hope that whatever TiVo comes up with will support my drives some time in the future. 

I knew I was taking a chance with this, but decided to roll the dice. Mainly because I think this kind of stuff is fun and yeah, I needed more HDD space. But not at the expense of a reliable TiVo. I got the best drive I could find with the best enclosure and I even used a short 18 inch Tripplite cable instead of the one that came with the MX-1. I feel I've done all I can at this point. If the new drives start causing me problems they are gone. I'll be bummed, but that doesn't mean that I won't have that extra storage some day. Just not now. 

In the meantime I will keep my fingers crossed and hope all stays well. I feel for the folks who are having ongoing and seemingly unsolveable problems and quite frankly, if it were me I'd pull the drives and just wait a few months until TiVo is officially on board with all this. Extra space is not worth giving up reliability for.


----------



## Flappjakk

Ok. So I posted a few days ago (maybe a week now) about an enclosure I found that I could put my older 300GB IDE drive in and convert it to eSATA (http://www.cooldrives.com/combo-sata-drive-enclosure-firewire-and-usb.html). There were some posts warning me about possible temperature issues, so I bought the enclosure, stuck my drive in, and hooked it up USB to my PC for a few days and used it for various saving of files I downloaded, defragged at every opportunity to try to give it some use. It got warm, but not hot. So I decided I'd hook it up to the Tivo.

At first I couldn't get the Tivo to recognize the drive, and I realized I was doing the whole Pause, 62 thing wrong. I can be dense at times. So once I got it right, the Tivo rebooted just like the posts describe and when it came back up it said it recognized the second drive and was configuring, just like the screen shots. When it finally booted all the way up (which takes FOREVER) it finally dumped me back at the "Tivo Central" menu. I started drilling down through the menus to find my new total capacity and right when I clicked on "System Information" Tivo freaked and rebooted. It almost immediately came to a green screen saying something like Tivo has detected a Serious Error and is trying to fix itself. It said it would take about 3 hours. It took about an hour and Tivo was running again (whew) but is still not using the new external drive.

I don't want to give up yet. I'm going to try again today to get this to work. If it does, great! If it doesn't I'll try a new eSATA cable and hopefully that will do the trick. If not, hey I got a nice new drive enclosure that will collect dust on top of my PC instead of on top of my Tivo.

Does anyone have any helpful tips or suggestions for me? Has anyone else had this happen to them?


----------



## richsadams

Flappjakk said:


> Ok. So I posted a few days ago (maybe a week now) about an enclosure I found that I could put my older 300GB IDE drive in and convert it to eSATA (http://www.cooldrives.com/combo-sata-drive-enclosure-firewire-and-usb.html). There were some posts warning me about possible temperature issues, so I bought the enclosure, stuck my drive in, and hooked it up USB to my PC for a few days and used it for various saving of files I downloaded, defragged at every opportunity to try to give it some use. It got warm, but not hot. So I decided I'd hook it up to the Tivo.
> 
> At first I couldn't get the Tivo to recognize the drive, and I realized I was doing the whole Pause, 62 thing wrong. I can be dense at times. So once I got it right, the Tivo rebooted just like the posts describe and when it came back up it said it recognized the second drive and was configuring, just like the screen shots. When it finally booted all the way up (which takes FOREVER) it finally dumped me back at the "Tivo Central" menu. I started drilling down through the menus to find my new total capacity and right when I clicked on "System Information" Tivo freaked and rebooted. It almost immediately came to a green screen saying something like Tivo has detected a Serious Error and is trying to fix itself. It said it would take about 3 hours. It took about an hour and Tivo was running again (whew) but is still not using the new external drive.
> 
> I don't want to give up yet. I'm going to try again today to get this to work. If it does, great! If it doesn't I'll try a new eSATA cable and hopefully that will do the trick. If not, hey I got a nice new drive enclosure that will collect dust on top of my PC instead of on top of my Tivo.
> 
> Does anyone have any helpful tips or suggestions for me? Has anyone else had this happen to them?


Your situation is not unique. What you've descrided has happened to a number of people. Some have been able to rectify the situation some have not. Your best bet is to read through the original FAQ and Troubleshooting information to learn more about what to do.

The fact that TiVo is taking a long time to do what it needs to do is a red flag. It shouldn't take very long for it to recognize the external drivel, reboot and be ready to go...10 or 15 minutes in most cases (if that).

You've already seen the GSOD (green screen of death). That indicates that there was data corruption and TiVo had to rectify it by running a disk and systems scan. That could have been caused by a bad eSATA cable, the connections between TiVo and your external drive or an actual problem with the drive you've connected.

There could be several issues with the enclosure and drive you're trying to use that may impact short-term and long-term use. TiVo external drives run 24/7 and never spin down. Constant operation will cause a drive to run warm to hot all of the time; hotter when they are recording data. When connected to your PC your drive likely spun down after a period of time to save energy, wear and tear so it wouldn't appear to run hot. Since the drive you're trying to use is not a dedicated DVR drive plus it's not an eSATA drive it's really hard to say how it will handle things.

The enclosure you've chosen has multiple outputs (Firewire, USB, eSATA) and may have bridging issues. It also doesn't have a fan and between having an old IDE drive that is likely to run hot and no fan it's not a good candidate for long-term work and may immediately or eventually give out...or it may not. But you're risking losing all recordings from the date you connected it to the day that it no longer works.

You can certainly proceed but at your own risk.  Some people that have what amounts to be the best combinations of drives, enclosures and cables are running into problems sometimes. With what you've cobled together you're playing with fire IMHO. But as long as you're willing to lose your recordings at any moment, it would be interesting to hear how it goes.

Bottom line, you're not likely to "hurt" TiVo and as you say you'll have an extra hard drive if things don't work out. Keep us posted. :up:


----------



## Flappjakk

Thanks Rich. I appreciate your reply. I know that my setup isn't ideal, but hey, it's worth a try. When I said FOREVER, I meant about 5 - 10 minutes. I realize that isn't really a long time for Tivo, but still seems like a long time for a computer to boot.

So here's another episode in my continuing saga to add another hard drive ... 

Today I've been trying again, with absolutely no luck. I've rebooted, held pause, entered the code, it reboots and finally loads all the way up with no screen saying it recognized the new drive and as would be expected no increased capacity. The eSATA cable I have is labeled as eSATA II and is the one that came with the package deal for my enclosure. In the drop down to order the enclosure it has "Enclosure and eSATA Cable (+4.99)", that's the one I have. Now I'm guessing it probably isn't the best cable in the world. Since the overwhelming majority of problems seem to be caused by the cable, I'm going to try to get another one. I'll stop by Best Buy today and try to get one there, if not I'll be visiting Provantage.com for a Tripp-Lite P950 eSATA and hopefully have better luck.

I do have another hard drive laying around, but it's only 120GB and still IDE. If the new cable doesn't work, I'll try this other drive to try to eliminate my 300GB drive as the source of the problem.

Thanks again for the help.


----------



## 1283

WD has announced a new line of "green" hard drives up to 1TB -- Caviar GP. Low power and extremely quiet at 25 dBA seek noise. That will probably be my top choice for TiVo usage when it comes out.


----------



## GooberMan

I finally got all the pieces together that I needed to try an external eSATA in my MX-1 enclosure. I hooked the eSATA drive to the PC via USB and the Tivo drive to an internal SATA port. I booted the MFSTOOLS CD and ran the command "mfsadd -ex -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb" and got a "success" message. I then shut it all down and hooked Tivo back up, with the eSATA connected. When I check the status screen, I still have 98 hours of HD capacity (750 GB internal drive). What step am I missing to get the additional 98 hours from the eSATA drive?


----------



## spike2k5

> I booted the MFSTOOLS CD and ran the command "mfsadd -ex -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb"


Which mfstools cd did you use and did you verify /dev/sda and /dev/sdb are mounted correctl? (sda is your TiVo drive and sdb is your new esata drive?)


----------



## Flappjakk

While I was out today I tried to pick up an eSATA cable. After 2 Best Buys, Comp USA and an electronics store, I came home empty handed. So I ordered one online from Provantage.com. Since I didn't have a new cable to try, I decided to try a different hard drive, my 120GB IDE that I mentioned in my last post. Something odd happened.

Before I put the 120 GB drive in the enclosure, I booted the Tivo with nothing attached to it, all worked fine as expected. I removed the 300GB drive from the enclosure, put the 120GB drive in, powered off the Tivo, hooked up the enclosure with the different drive, turned the Tivo back on. I entered the code again and this time I got an error telling me my external drive has stopped responding. Basically it's the "Divorce" screen I've seen described in the other posts. I don't understand why I got this if it never "Married" any of hard drives I attached to it. So I powered it back down and back up, and it came up ok this time, but still never found the drive. I tried a few more times, got no errors, but also no success.

My new eSATA II cable is on it's way. Hopefully I'll get it by mid-week so I can try it out and let everyone know what happens.


----------



## sfhub

Flappjakk said:


> Before I put the 120 GB drive in the enclosure, I booted the Tivo with nothing attached to it, all worked fine as expected. I removed the 300GB drive from the enclosure, put the 120GB drive in, powered off the Tivo, hooked up the enclosure with the different drive, turned the Tivo back on. I entered the code again and this time I got an error telling me my external drive has stopped responding. Basically it's the "Divorce" screen I've seen described in the other posts. I don't understand why I got this if it never "Married" any of hard drives I attached to it. So I powered it back down and back up, and it came up ok this time, but still never found the drive. I tried a few more times, got no errors, but also no success.


I have seen this before when I was swapping drives to test TiVo behavior.

Your TiVo is in an intermediate state where it thinks it is married and is a 2 drive system, but has locked out the second drive because it has errors. Basically your assumption that you weren't married is false. You were married but your 2nd drive got in an accident and is in a coma sitting in long term care. You are not divorced, but you don't really have a wife either.

What you need to do is allowed the divorce procedure to complete. Then you will be in a known state again, at which point you can marry using kickstart 62.


----------



## richsadams

Flappjakk said:


> While I was out today I tried to pick up an eSATA cable. After 2 Best Buys, Comp USA and an electronics store, I came home empty handed. So I ordered one online from Provantage.com. Since I didn't have a new cable to try, I decided to try a different hard drive, my 120GB IDE that I mentioned in my last post. Something odd happened.
> 
> Before I put the 120 GB drive in the enclosure, I booted the Tivo with nothing attached to it, all worked fine as expected. I removed the 300GB drive from the enclosure, put the 120GB drive in, powered off the Tivo, hooked up the enclosure with the different drive, turned the Tivo back on. I entered the code again and this time I got an error telling me my external drive has stopped responding. Basically it's the "Divorce" screen I've seen described in the other posts. I don't understand why I got this if it never "Married" any of hard drives I attached to it. So I powered it back down and back up, and it came up ok this time, but still never found the drive. I tried a few more times, got no errors, but also no success.
> 
> My new eSATA II cable is on it's way. Hopefully I'll get it by mid-week so I can try it out and let everyone know what happens.


When you installed the external drive initially TiVo did recognize it. Your earlier post said:



> So once I got it right, the Tivo rebooted just like the posts describe and when it came back up it said it recognized the second drive and was configuring, just like the screen shots.


 So TiVo recognized the drive it just isn't able to use it. Since you never divorced the drive TiVo thinks it's still connected but that there is a problem. You'll need to hook it back up and reboot TiVo (don't do a Kickstart). While it's hooked up unplug the eSATA cable and it should bring up the divorce screen. Follow the steps (three thumbs down, etc.) to divorce it. If you don't get it divorced you won't be able to get a new drive installed.

Keep up the good fight!


----------



## wackymann

GooberMan said:


> I finally got all the pieces together that I needed to try an external eSATA in my MX-1 enclosure. I hooked the eSATA drive to the PC via USB and the Tivo drive to an internal SATA port. I booted the MFSTOOLS CD and ran the command "mfsadd -ex -r 4 /dev/sda /dev/sdb" and got a "success" message. I then shut it all down and hooked Tivo back up, with the eSATA connected. When I check the status screen, I still have 98 hours of HD capacity (750 GB internal drive). What step am I missing to get the additional 98 hours from the eSATA drive?


Sounds like you made the same mistake I did - you mixed up which drives were sda and sdb. I have no clue why it gives that "success" message (did the same to me), but when you do it right in mfstools, you get a long listing that says how many hours you used to have, and how many hours you have now. The bottom line is the directions for doing this are not laid out very well, and it can be very confusing - especially if your 2 drives are identical models.

Also - even after I went back and did the expansion correctly, my Tivo was very unstable, so I ended up removing the external drive from it. I now have a 750 GB Seagate DB35 and an MX-1 sitting idle. I hope you have more luck than I did.

Here is the thread that chronicles my problems...

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5363262#post5363262


----------



## FrogGremlin

jon96cobra said:


> I think leaving a program paused for long periods of time also adds to this problem happening more often. I left a program paused over night I noticed the Tivo running really slow and freezing when I hit play again. Shortly after it rebooted and it was fine again. Just wanted to share the info.


That's incredibly encouraging! It certainly fits with both my original sense that "time left sitting alone" was related to the problem (i.e., that it was a buffering problem of some kind), and my subsequent observation that two-weeks'-worth of sitting alone _didn't_ crash my TiVo - It wasn't left on "pause"! We _do_ leave the expanded Series 3 paused, sometimes for a few days, while watching one of our other not-yet-expanded Series 3s.

Perhaps someone with a stable eSATA expansion, and a large, full expansion disk, can try an experiment and report on the results: Next time your house will be vacant for a couple of days, leave your TiVo on "pause." And then check the timer when you get home to see if it rebooted in your absence, or see if it encounters any other temporary problems soon after you start using it again. (Of course, both positive and negative reports would be useful.)


----------



## nuttzy06

FrogGremlin said:


> Next time your house will be vacant for a couple of days...


 And please post your address and in which room your plasma TV can be found 

-Nuttzy


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## dougdingle

FrogGremlin said:


> check the timer when you get home to see if it rebooted in your absence


Which timer is that?


----------



## Flappjakk

This morning I followed the "Divorce" process you described Rich. It took about 10 minutes and booted up and was good to go. I then put the 300GB drive back in the enclosure and hooked it up to the Tivo. I went through the Kickstart 62 stuff again and it did what it did last time when it found the drive only this time it worked better. It rebooted after the Kickstart 62, came back up, said it found the new Drive and came up to the "Tivo Central" Screen. It stayed there for about 30 seconds and rebooted. Once it came all the way back up, I went into the "System Information" screen and it now says I have 71 HD hours or 673 SD Hours.

But it keeps rebooting on it's own. I see others have had this problem and all seem to be related to the eSATA cable. Like I said before I have a confirmed working cable on order, so hopefully that will take care of the problem when it arrives.

I'm not out of the woods yet, but things are starting to look better. I really appreciate everyone's help and when I get my new cable, I'll let everyone know how it goes. I might even try that other drive again now that I know how to make it stop thinking it's supposed to use one that's not connected.


----------



## jfh3

Good deal on 1TB drive this week at Best Buy:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=361501


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## richsadams

Flappjakk said:


> This morning I followed the "Divorce" process you described Rich. It took about 10 minutes and booted up and was good to go. I then put the 300GB drive back in the enclosure and hooked it up to the Tivo. I went through the Kickstart 62 stuff again and it did what it did last time when it found the drive only this time it worked better. It rebooted after the Kickstart 62, came back up, said it found the new Drive and came up to the "Tivo Central" Screen. It stayed there for about 30 seconds and rebooted. Once it came all the way back up, I went into the "System Information" screen and it now says I have 71 HD hours or 673 SD Hours.
> 
> But it keeps rebooting on it's own. I see others have had this problem and all seem to be related to the eSATA cable. Like I said before I have a confirmed working cable on order, so hopefully that will take care of the problem when it arrives.
> 
> I'm not out of the woods yet, but things are starting to look better. I really appreciate everyone's help and when I get my new cable, I'll let everyone know how it goes. I might even try that other drive again now that I know how to make it stop thinking it's supposed to use one that's not connected.


A positive step in the right direction anyway. :up: I wouldn't be too upset if the new cable doesn't change things though...you're really in uncharted territory using the drive and enclosure that you have. But hey...it's interesting to know what happens when you try new things! Best of luck!


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## FrogGremlin

dougdingle said:


> Which timer is that?


Messages & Settings / Account & System Information / Diagnostics, then down a few screens to the cable card's "Time since OOB tune start", which typically lists (in seconds) the TiVo's "up"-time (i.e., time since the last reboot).


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## jimbob111

sorry if this is somewhere and i haven't seen it but when you link an outside storage device like an eSATA drive how does this show up on your tivo menu? do you name the storage like in the mrv options? is it easy and quick to navigate into the storage device and find your recordings?


----------



## bkdtv

jimbob111 said:


> sorry if this is somewhere and i haven't seen it but when you link an outside storage device like an eSATA drive how does this show up on your tivo menu? do you name the storage like in the mrv options? is it easy and quick to navigate into the storage device and find your recordings?


It's seamlessly integrated. The Tivo appears as if it has a single, larger hard drive.


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## jimbob111

that sounds awesome, i've gotta get me some of that.


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## richsadams

jimbob111 said:


> that sounds awesome, i've gotta get me some of that.


Start with this post. Be aware however that this is an unsupported backdoor "hack". There are no guarantees an external drive added now will work or will continue to work after TiVo begins supporting the eSATA drive feature on the Series 3 (expected by year end) although there's no reason to suspect that it won't. TiVo will eventually be offering its own external hard drive as well.


----------



## MikeMacMan

FrogGremlin said:


> George - You're not alone, and no-one seems to have yet come up with a definitive explanation. For a while I was suspicious that it was linked to the TiVo sitting idle for "too long," but my recent trip seems to disconfirm that: My eSATAed TiVo ran just fine for 15 straight days while I was in Hong Kong, and then yielded the false "no signal" message and rebooted about 24 hours after I got home Sunday.
> 
> I also have a 60" Sony (although a KDS-A2000, and an HDMI cable running straight from the TiVo to the TV, with digital sound piped from the TiVo through a receiver). It would be interesting if others with the same problem have similar Sony TVs ...


Interesting! I also have a 60" Sony (KDS-A2000 hooked up via HDMI). When my Tivo rebooted it seemed to happen when I turned on my TV. The OLED screen on the Tivo was current and I'd turn on my TV. Then my Tivo would reboot to a green screen. I have my Tivo hooked up with an optical cable to a Onkyo HT-R540.


----------



## MikeMacMan

richsadams said:


> You didnt mention if you had disconnected the drive from TiVo completely as suggested. Have you tried that yet? You could connect it to your PC but you may risk losing your recordings. Just turning it on and listening to it while it is not connected to TiVo (via the eSATA cable) should tell you if its spinning up or not. If it doesnt sound like its spinning up to full speed when you turn it on (or continues to beep ) then you have your answera bad drive.
> 
> I'm using the MX-1's supplied eSATA cable with no problems (along with many others) however there was one report of one that was bad. They replaced it with a new one that was recommended on the original post and that seemed to have cured it. So I wouldn't discount the cable...or any cable for that matter; they can go bad as c3 mentioned.
> 
> If the drive sounds good Id certainly try a new cablethey are fairly inexpensive, less than $10 I think. If that doesnt do the trick then Id divorce the drive and focus on TiVo itself.


The Tivo works after a reboot so I know the drive is spinning up. It was working but rebooting atleast twice a day. I moved my speakers away from the Tivo last week and it rebooted for about another day. Since then it hasn't rebooted. (Frustrating...) I'm going to let it run for a few more days to see if its "cured". After that I'll try moving my speakers closer to see if that was the cause.


----------



## Flappjakk

I got my Tripp-Lite cable today. It didn't help. Tivo finds the drive when I do the kickstart, and when it finally boots all the way up, stays up for about 30 seconds then reboots. Everytime. A friend lent me an adapter plate that converts internal SATA to an eSATA port on the back of my PC. I used 3 cables, my original CableMax.com cable, the Tripp-Lite cable, and a SIIG CB-SA0211-S1 he lent me. When I hooked the drive to my PC, the drive gets ~50MB/s with all 3 cables using HDTach. I think that's decent for an IDE drive converted to SATA, apparently my Tivo doesn't agree.

I still have my 120GB drive to try, but I doubt it will be any better.

Thanks to everyone that helped me out. Maybe I'll splurge on an SATA drive to stick in that enclosure and see if that works. Probably not anytime soon though.


----------



## MikeMacMan

FrogGremlin said:


> Messages & Settings / Account & System Information / Diagnostics, then down a few screens to the cable card's "Time since OOB tune start", which typically lists (in seconds) the TiVo's "up"-time (i.e., time since the last reboot).


Thats good to know. As a quick check I just see if the "30 second skip" still works. Every time my Tivo reboots I have to re-enter the "cheat code"...


----------



## richsadams

MikeMacMan said:


> Interesting! I also have a 60" Sony (KDS-A2000 hooked up via HDMI). When my Tivo rebooted it seemed to happen when I turned on my TV. The OLED screen on the Tivo was current and I'd turn on my TV. Then my Tivo would reboot to a green screen. I have my Tivo hooked up with an optical cable to a Onkyo HT-R540.


There may be a handshake problem between your TV and TiVo using the HDMI cable. Others are posting that they have an HDMI connection and their TiVo is rebooting when they turn their TV on or lose power.

As suggested in previous posts, try removing the HDMI cable from the mix and use a component (YPbPr) video connection. Be sure to reboot TiVo after you've switched cables. (No need to change the optical out). There will be little or no difference in PQ.

Let us know how you get on.


----------



## richsadams

Flappjakk said:


> I got my Tripp-Lite cable today. It didn't help. Tivo finds the drive when I do the kickstart, and when it finally boots all the way up, stays up for about 30 seconds then reboots. Everytime. A friend lent me an adapter plate that converts internal SATA to an eSATA port on the back of my PC. I used 3 cables, my original CableMax.com cable, the Tripp-Lite cable, and a SIIG CB-SA0211-S1 he lent me. When I hooked the drive to my PC, the drive gets ~50MB/s with all 3 cables using HDTach. I think that's decent for an IDE drive converted to SATA, apparently my Tivo doesn't agree.
> 
> I still have my 120GB drive to try, but I doubt it will be any better.
> 
> Thanks to everyone that helped me out. Maybe I'll splurge on an SATA drive to stick in that enclosure and see if that works. Probably not anytime soon though.


  Sorry to hear that...but not unexpected at this point. You've been a real trooper with your experimentation. :up:

Let us know if you have any success with the other drive!


----------



## Flappjakk

Just out of curiosity, has anyone that has gotten a Tivo to recognize a hard drive removed it from the Tivo and connected it to a PC? If so, what did Windows do? Did Windows at least recognize that there is a partition on the hard drive? I'm sure its a Linux based filesystem, but in my experience Windows has recognized Linux filesystems, it just says it is an unknown partition and requires that you repartition the drive with something it knows how to deal with.

After I get my Tivo to recognize my drive and Tivo has all kinds of problems, I hook it back up to my PC and Windows says its a new drive and I have to "initialize" it and then repartition. I'm starting to remember having partitioning problems with this drive before, but Windows always seems to be able to partition it and access it fine. I guess I thought that problem "went away". I'm wondering if Tivo is not so tolerant and a problem I had that doesn't bother Windows does bother the Tivo.

I'd be interested to know what others see when they connect their drive back to a PC. I'm going to try my 120GB drive now because I've never had problems with it.


----------



## TMontana

Hello Newbie here,

I just installed an MX-1 with Seagate DB35 750 Gb to my Series 3 a few days ago. Installation went without a hitch. 

The next day it restarted by itself - hmmm, no big deal....

The 2nd day however, my drive is making a clicking sound with the light on the enclosure flickering at the same rate as the sound. I guess the TiVo is recording to the eSATA drive now. Had some pauses with pixelation yesterday but none today.

It is still clicking though. Is my drive faulty? Should I get it replaced or is this normal? the clicking is really annoying. 

Any help is greatly appreciated....


----------



## spike2k5

Flappjakk said:


> If so, what did Windows do?


It depends on your windows version and service pack level.

With XP sp2 or Vista, it won't do anything unless you mount the drive using disk manager. It will write it's own version of MBR and erase Tivo Bootpage.

If you want to work with Tivo drive in Windows, check out WinMFS.


----------



## spike2k5

TMontana said:


> It is still clicking though. Is my drive faulty? Should I get it replaced or is this normal? the clicking is really annoying.


If DB35 drive clicks too loud then it might be defective.


----------



## dougdingle

On August 4th, I installed an MX-1 with a 500 gig Samsung drive in it on my Series 3. Everything seemed to be fine. 

On august 7th, I turned on the set and found the TiVo paused (I thought). In fact, what it was doing was responding verrrrrrryyyyyyy slowly. The guide would take a long time to come up, the images would advance/skip once every few seconds, etc. A couple of minutes later, it spontaneously rebooted, then came back with the green screen. I had to leave for the evening, so I don't know how long it took to right itself.

This morning when I turned on the set, all seemed fine, except that the response to the remote was quite sluggish, and about half the time, the led on the front panel signaling receipt of IR commands didn't blink. I decided to reboot, and went off to work. This evening, after rebooting this morning and running all day, everything seemed back to normal, with snappy remote response, and nothing obvious wrong. The external drive continues to be recognized.

I am highly experienced with electronics and computers, and am very sure my installation is a clean as it can possibly be. Based on my experience and those of others here, I have to conclude that some TiVos have a (serious) problem with having an external drive hooked up. Too many people are seeing essentially what I am. Some units seem to be fine, but some definitely don't perform well with the eSATA port in use.

I wish I'd followed my first instinct and just upgraded the internal drive. If anyone has a DB35 750 gig drive they'd like to get rid of because it didn't work for them in an external box, drop me a private message here on the forum.


----------



## richsadams

TMontana said:


> Hello Newbie here,
> 
> I just installed an MX-1 with Seagate DB35 750 Gb to my Series 3 a few days ago. Installation went without a hitch.
> 
> The next day it restarted by itself - hmmm, no big deal....
> 
> The 2nd day however, my drive is making a clicking sound with the light on the enclosure flickering at the same rate as the sound. I guess the TiVo is recording to the eSATA drive now. Had some pauses with pixelation yesterday but none today.
> 
> It is still clicking though. Is my drive faulty? Should I get it replaced or is this normal? the clicking is really annoying.
> 
> Any help is greatly appreciated....


Agree with Spike. The Seagate DB35 7200.3 series is a dedicated DVR drive that has a number of "silencing features". You should not be hearing much of anything. Ours runs almost completely silent even when it's recording.

If everything is connected properly you shouldnt be seeing any reboots either. That indicates there may be some data corruption or a bad connection.

I'd unplug TiVo, unplug your external drive from TiVo and then plug the drive in and listen to it. If it continues to click it sounds like a candidate for a replacement.

If you reconnect your external drive, power it on and then power up TiVo again all of your recordings should be fine. If you power up TiVo w/o the external drive it will ask to divorce it. If you dont intend to reconnect it be sure to divorce it so you can connect a new one later.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> I am highly experienced with electronics and computers, and am very sure my installation is a clean as it can possibly be. Based on my experience and those of others here, I have to conclude that some TiVos have a (serious) problem with having an external drive hooked up. Too many people are seeing essentially what I am. Some units seem to be fine, but some definitely don't perform well with the eSATA port in use.


I tend to agree with you about there being issues with the back door hack we're using to connect an eSATA drive to the TiVo S3. However I'm not convinced that it's actually a TiVo problem.

Everyone that owns a TiVo S3 owns essentially the same box running the same software, using the same firmware, etc. The real variables here are the untold different combinations of cablecos, cable cards and the peripherals connected to TiVo itself. In addition everyone uses their TiVo differently; different ways of watching live/recorded shows, wish lists, season passes, HD Vs SD and on and on.

There are a dozen plus eSATA drives "experiments" being used that are connected with all sorts of cables and placed in all kinds of situations...HT's, unventilated cabinets, on the top of fish tanks and who knows what. Then there are the other components including televisions, receivers, surge protectors, UPS, broadband networks, wi-fi, phone lines, etc. not to mention the methods of connecting TiVo to those components. There are plenty of posts on other threads about TiVo not playing nice or having problems which have nothing to do with the eSATA port.

My gut feeling is that the combination of various drives being employed and the different variations of end-user situations are the key to external drives working flawlessly for months (as in our case) or causing problems either immediately or at a future date when some other unknown brings on a glitch or failure. In the end TiVo is a computer and we all have the same one. Who hasnt added something new to their computer and not run into problems at some point? (Apple folks need not chime in!  )

TiVo is beta testing eSATA now and is slated to deliver a software upgrade and their own external drive to support the feature. I suspect a lot of these problems will either be rectified at that time or perhaps it will render all of what we've done to date useless.  Let's hope it's the former.


----------



## moxie1617

TMontana said:


> Hello Newbie here,
> 
> I just installed an MX-1 with Seagate DB35 750 Gb to my Series 3 a few days ago. Installation went without a hitch.
> 
> The next day it restarted by itself - hmmm, no big deal....
> 
> The 2nd day however, my drive is making a clicking sound with the light on the enclosure flickering at the same rate as the sound. I guess the TiVo is recording to the eSATA drive now. Had some pauses with pixelation yesterday but none today.
> 
> It is still clicking though. Is my drive faulty? Should I get it replaced or is this normal? the clicking is really annoying.
> 
> Any help is greatly appreciated....


Maybe others with the MX-1 enclosure will chime in also, but I have never seen the MX-1 light flicker when the drive is working. I have two MX-1 enclosures, one I use with my Tivo and the other I use for offsite images and backups of PC's.

I've never noticed them flicker when working. I think you have a problem, either with the MX-1 enclosures or the drive.


----------



## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> There are a dozen plus eSATA drives "experiments" being used that are connected with all sorts of cables and placed in all kinds of situations...HT's, unventilated cabinets, on the top of fish tanks and who knows what. Then there are the other components including televisions, receivers, surge protectors, UPS, broadband networks, wi-fi, phone lines, etc. not to mention the methods of connecting TiVo to those components. There are plenty of posts on other threads about TiVo not playing nice or having problems which have nothing to do with the eSATA port.


Well, I've got two S3's, and both had been working flawlessly (and I mean flawlessly) since new for about 8 weeks. I have been using TiVo in one form or another for about seven years (three DirecTivos plus some analog units), so I know what to expect.

To have a unit which was functioning perfectly begin to experience failures a few days after installing an external drive with great care sure seems like the the setup is far too fragile. Perhaps things will improve when the eSATA port "officially" turns on. They sure had better, or TiVo is going to have a huge mess on their hands.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> To have a unit which was functioning perfectly begin to experience failures a few days after installing an external drive with great care sure seems like the the setup is far too fragile. Perhaps things will improve when the eSATA port "officially" turns on. They sure had better, or TiVo is going to have a huge mess on their hands.


 Agreed...it's too fragile as is. As the hack does work physically it would seem to be a software issue causing instability for some and not (TiVo) hardware. I certainly don't envy TiVo's R&D dept. workload at the moment!


----------



## richsadams

moxie1617 said:


> Maybe others with the MX-1 enclosure will chime in also, but I have never seen the MX-1 light flicker when the drive is working. I have two MX-1 enclosures, one I use with my Tivo and the other I use for offsite images and backups of PC's.
> 
> I've never noticed them flicker when working. I think you have a problem, either with the MX-1 enclosures or the drive.


Good point. Our MX-1 light doesn't flicker like most external drives that are designed to let you know when there is recording activity. So indeed there may be a problem with the enclosure. Again, about the only way to find out would be to disconnect it from TiVo and give it a dry run.


----------



## TMontana

richsadams said:


> Good point. Our MX-1 light doesn't flicker like most external drives that are designed to let you know when there is recording activity. So indeed there may be a problem with the enclosure. Again, about the only way to find out would be to disconnect it from TiVo and give it a dry run.


thanx for the advice everybody! I guess I have a project tonite. Gonna be a bummer to have to send it back; but, better now then after having it for a while and a lot of programs on the drive.....


----------



## BruceShultes

I have never seen the light on my MX-1 come on either, but since my S3 seems to work fine with it, I see no need to investigate the light.


----------



## slimm

moxie1617 said:


> Maybe others with the MX-1 enclosure will chime in also, but I have never seen the MX-1 light flicker when the drive is working. I have two MX-1 enclosures, one I use with my Tivo and the other I use for offsite images and backups of PC's.
> 
> I've never noticed them flicker when working. I think you have a problem, either with the MX-1 enclosures or the drive.


I've seen my MX-1 light flicker, though it's strange that it doesn't happen regularly when recording or watching a recording. I've seen it flicker like mad when watching live tv. There doesn't seem to be any rhyme or reason as to when it happens.


----------



## crowfan

Hi folks,

I have the Seagate ST3500601XS-RK eSata drive + enclosure hooked up to my S3 and it's working fine. But this drive does not boot up when I lose power and it gets restored. So I'd like to pull the drive out of here and put it into another external enclosure, like this one. I also like that this enclosure has a fan.

Has anyone tried to take apart the Seagate ST3500601XS-RK and take out the drive? How did it work? Any things I should watch out for, tips, etc.?

Thanks!


----------



## donaudio

I just hooked up my third Seagate FAP without any trouble. Now using a Siig cable. Will let you know how long it lasts. It's a good thing that it has a five year warranty. Don


----------



## Flappjakk

My 120GB drive didn't work either. I guess this enclosure attempting to convert IDE HDDs to eSATA just doesn't agree with Tivo.

Thanks again to all who helped. I'm done.


----------



## richsadams

crowfan said:


> Hi folks,
> 
> I have the Seagate ST3500601XS-RK eSata drive + enclosure hooked up to my S3 and it's working fine. But this drive does not boot up when I lose power and it gets restored. So I'd like to pull the drive out of here and put it into another external enclosure, like this one. I also like that this enclosure has a fan.


 You shouldn't have any trouble removing your drive from its current enclosure although it will likely void the warranty. But unless you already have the drive enclosure you referenced, I'm curious why you would go with an unknown quantity instead of a proven enclosure like Antec's MX-1? Price? It's only a few dollars more, is dead silent, has a fan and comes with the proper cable.


----------



## richsadams

Flappjakk said:


> My 120GB drive didn't work either. I guess this enclosure attempting to convert IDE HDDs to eSATA just doesn't agree with Tivo.
> 
> Thanks again to all who helped. I'm done.


    Sorry to hear that. Are you going to try upgrading the internal drive?

Thanks for keeping us posted all along...you're another trooper that deserves a new battle ribbon! :up:


----------



## JRJr

New to this forum, and I've had my S3 since late last Fall, 2006. Moved to TIVO from ReplayTV (which I still like, despite it's lack of HD), but I do surely love this TIVO.

I have not tried adding any additional storage to my S3, but I am considering it. In answer to the question about light activity, I have an MX-1 connected via eSATA to my PC, and the blue light on mine does flicker when I'm writing data to it. I would suppose the same should happen with the S3 setup.

I've bought a 2nd MX-1, arrived yesterday, but may hold off until TIVO officially supports the eSATA port before expanding. Hardware issues invariably seem to be my greatest weakness in the PC arena.

A question: I know how to find out how many total hours I can store, either as the S3 came or after expanding its capacity. But is there a way to find out how many hours I have LEFT available? It's not an issue with me thus far, but am curious about it. My ReplayTV shows me this info on my main guide screen all of the time, and I find it useful.

Thanks.


----------



## snathanb

JRJr said:


> I've bought a 2nd MX-1, arrived yesterday, but may hold off until TIVO officially supports the eSATA port before expanding. Hardware issues invariably seem to be my greatest weakness in the PC arena.


I think (and I am too lazy to go back and look again) that I read somewhere (howz that for a source  ) that when TIVO does official support the eSATA port, they will only official support its use with an official TIVO eSATA drive. Much like they only officially support their own branded wireless adapter now.

If that is the case, then there really is no reason to wait, as your MX-1 wouldn't ever be _officially _sanctioned.


----------



## snathanb

JRJr said:


> A question: I know how to find out how many total hours I can store, either as the S3 came or after expanding its capacity. But is there a way to find out how many hours I have LEFT available? It's not an issue with me thus far, but am curious about it. My ReplayTV shows me this info on my main guide screen all of the time, and I find it useful.
> 
> Thanks.


About the closest thing you can do is count up the items in your recently deleted folder to determine how much space is left. It doesn't remove the items from the recently deleted folder until the space needs to be reclaimed for new recordings.


----------



## fred2

JRJr said:


> New to this forum, and I've had my S3 since late last Fall, 2006. Moved to TIVO from ReplayTV (which I still like, despite it's lack of HD), but I do surely love this TIVO.
> 
> A question: I know how to find out how many total hours I can store, either as the S3 came or after expanding its capacity. But is there a way to find out how many hours I have LEFT available? It's not an issue with me thus far, but am curious about it. My ReplayTV shows me this info on my main guide screen all of the time, and I find it useful.
> 
> Thanks.


(slowly I turn, well, not really)

First, I can see your reluctance on upgrading since there are still some very IFFY stories.

I can tell you are new to the forum..... The whole issue of Tivo showing how much space is used or left is one I've seen regularly debated. I favor your approach - more info. But there are diehards here who see no reason for it and see no reason to even ask for it. The issue it is merely an estimate since things can be automatically deleted and in the next two seconds, Tivo might start recording a Wishlist item, a season pass item, etc. I still see no problem providing that info but since it has been requested since the dinosaurs and tivo has not provided it - it probably will not happen.

Welcome to the forum. My esata upgrade has been working fine since I shook down the cable issue - I've got the Seagate FAP and a trimmed (don't look at it wrong) cable.


----------



## crowfan

richsadams said:


> You shouldn't have any trouble removing your drive from its current enclosure although it will likely void the warranty. But unless you already have the drive enclosure you referenced, I'm curious why you would go with an unknown quantity instead of a proven enclosure like Antec's MX-1? Price? It's only a few dollars more, is dead silent, has a fan and comes with the proper cable.


Well, the MX-1 is almost twice the price. The one I linked to has a fan, and a hard power switch. I already have the cable, and the one I linked to is listed in the first post of this thread as being tested and working properly. I don't care all that much about the noise (or looks, frankly) since it will be in a cabinet. I didn't think about the warranty, so that's something to consider.


----------



## JRJr

Thanks to all for your prompt replies. Yes I think you are right, if TIVO will only support their drive, then waiting is pointless. I haven't actually run into a shortage of time yet as I don't seem to record/watch all that much. I must be the last person in America who doesn't (& won't) have cable... another story though. But having the option of adding more recording space is nice to know. On ReplayTV I had about 65 hours, and that was nearly full all the time.

As for the time remaining issue, my apologies for not researching this beforehand. I KNOW better! I guess just being aware of how much is left let's me know if I should speed up my watching, or maybe manually deleting some things myself. But I'll refrain from continuing this subject on this thread, and do some searching.

Again, Thanks for your comments.

BTW, I bought my first MX-1 for $55 including shipping, and the second for $45 (also incl. shipping) from the same place, after a $10 "reward" for posting a site-review.


----------



## hunts

I just picked up the Antec MX-1 from staples.com using the jellyfish.com engine. The price after "cash back" should be around $55. Now I don't rememeber where there was a low cost place to buy the DB35s? I searched around the previous pages, but do not see where most people bought them from. I am looking for the 750 GB version of the DB35 and I did notice that there are 2 models to choose from. Which one am I looking to get?

Seagate DB35 750Gb ST3750640SCE Yes Yes
Seagate DB35 750Gb ST3750840SCE Yes Yes

Edit: Is referral linking against posting guidelines? I currently do not have the referral link there, but if it is allowed, I would like to attach it.


----------



## jrpeterson5

hunts said:


> I just picked up the Antec MX-1 from staples.com using the jellyfish.com engine. The price after "cash back" should be around $55. Now I don't rememeber where there was a low cost place to buy the DB35s? I searched around the previous pages, but do not see where most people bought them from. I am looking for the 750 GB version of the DB35 and I did notice that there are 2 models to choose from. Which one am I looking to get?
> 
> Seagate DB35 750Gb ST3750640SCE Yes Yes
> Seagate DB35 750Gb ST3750840SCE Yes Yes
> 
> Edit: Is referral linking against posting guidelines? I currently do not have the referral link there, but if it is allowed, I would like to attach it.


The ST3750640SCE has a 16MB cache buffer and the ST3750840SCE has an 8MB cache buffer. To my knowledge, at this time, you can only purchase the 8MB cache and I beileve the 16MB cache drive has been discontinued. So that's an easy decision for you!


----------



## richsadams

crowfan said:


> Well, the MX-1 is almost twice the price. The one I linked to has a fan, and a hard power switch. I already have the cable, and the one I linked to is listed in the first post of this thread as being tested and working properly. I don't care all that much about the noise (or looks, frankly) since it will be in a cabinet. I didn't think about the warranty, so that's something to consider.


Okay...money's always an issue with me too.  But since I spent a boat load of money on my TiVo S3 (compared to the TiVo HD  ), I guess in my mind twenty bucks or so isn't that much.

Excaliberpc.com has it here for only $16 more ($49.99). That's where we bought ours...brilliant service and it arrived in less than 48 hours with regular shipping. :up:

Okay, 'nuff said about that!  Keep us posted!


----------



## richsadams

hunts said:


> I just picked up the Antec MX-1 from staples.com using the jellyfish.com engine. The price after "cash back" should be around $55. Now I don't rememeber where there was a low cost place to buy the DB35s? I searched around the previous pages, but do not see where most people bought them from. I am looking for the 750 GB version of the DB35 and I did notice that there are 2 models to choose from. Which one am I looking to get?
> 
> Seagate DB35 750Gb ST3750640SCE Yes Yes
> Seagate DB35 750Gb ST3750840SCE Yes Yes
> 
> Edit: Is referral linking against posting guidelines? I currently do not have the referral link there, but if it is allowed, I would like to attach it.


We bought both our MX-1 and Seagate DB35 drive from excaliberpc.com. The recommended 750GB DB35 (ST3750840SCE) is listed here  for what appears to be a competitive price. As mentioned previously their service was excellent.


----------



## ctcraig

Well I"m back
my Series 3 with Apricorn DVR Xpander started to continuously reboot a couple of days ago. It worked fine for alomost 2 months! I've divorced it, married it, divorced it again and remarried and still the same problem.

The TiVo works perfect now in single drive mode. 

ANy thoughts would be appreciated!

cheers

Chuck


----------



## jrpeterson5

ctcraig said:


> Well I"m back
> my Series 3 with Apricorn DVR Xpander started to continuously reboot a couple of days ago. It worked fine for alomost 2 months! I've divorced it, married it, divorced it again and remarried and still the same problem.
> 
> The TiVo works perfect now in single drive mode.
> 
> ANy thoughts would be appreciated!
> 
> cheers
> 
> Chuck


Hi Chuck. Here's my post from a week or so ago. The restarts were what plagued me as well. My S3 ran fine for about 4 weeks with the upgrade and then started to act up.



jrpeterson5 said:


> Ever since upgrading externally with the Antec MX1 (eSata cable from MX1) and a Seagate 500GB DB35 drive two months ago I've been plagued with sporadic restarts, partial recordings (interestingly always on the same program), and even a few green screens.  I've done everything the FAQ says to do for restarts, and it's hard to say if it's made any difference.
> 
> My question is this: If I totally remove the external upgrade and do an internal upgrade only (to a 750GB or 1TB drive), do you all think this will this fix these problems I've described?


Well, I'm happy to say I divorced the drive, imaged the 500GB drive, installed it in the S3 and now it works PERFECTLY as a single drive S3. Not a restart, stutter, or strange act to be found.  So I'm not offering much help except the fact that I had the same scenario and reverting to a single drive seemed to fix all the problems.

Good luck!


----------



## ctcraig

Thanks for the reply

I may in the future grab a new internal drive and see what's what, or wait until TiVo brands their own external ESATA drive

Cheers!

Chuck


----------



## JohnBrowning

My MX-1/DB35 combo worked perfect for a couple months, now I get fairly regular freeze-ups and require reboots. I'm wondering if the TiVo firmware is getting confused over free space management. I went in and manually deleted everything in the "Recently Deleted" folder. That seems to have helped some, but, doesn't appear to be the total answer. I wonder if the TiVo splits recordings across drives and that could be contributing to the problem.


----------



## ctcraig

I was hoping the "divorce" would do the same thing as your deleting. However the reboots continued. I'm not sure what to try next

Cheers

Chuck


----------



## moxie1617

FYI. Newegg has the MX-1 enclosure up at their web site with a $10 instant savings and $20 mail-in rebate.


----------



## hunts

moxie1617 said:


> FYI. Newegg has the MX-1 enclosure up at their web site with a $10 instant savings and $20 mail-in rebate.


I saw this also AFTER I bought my MX-1 2 days ago.  Oh well, such is life.


----------



## moxie1617

Yeah, I paid full price for mine too. Hopefully someone else can benefit from this.


----------



## SMB-IL

My Seagate 750gb FAP worked fine for two months or so also and then the TiVo started rebooting constantly. I think it also has to do with space management -- everything seemed fine until there was a huge amount of shows/movies both stored and recently deleted. I divorced them, but they want NO part of getting back together. I finally gave up and have the 750gb on my Mac as a backup/video storage drive.

Any news on when TiVo might "officially" get the eSATA feature going?


----------



## richsadams

SMB-IL said:


> My Seagate 750gb FAP worked fine for two months or so also and then the TiVo started rebooting constantly. I think it also has to do with space management -- everything seemed fine until there was a huge amount of shows/movies both stored and recently deleted. I divorced them, but they want NO part of getting back together. I finally gave up and have the 750gb on my Mac as a backup/video storage drive.
> 
> Any news on when TiVo might "officially" get the eSATA feature going?


  Sorry to hear about the "break up". Well, now you have more real estate for your computer files!  No news (AFAIK) about eSATA support other than "soon" according to TiVo.

IMO the more I read "Everything was fine but weeks (or months) later I'm having problems" the more it seems likely that we are indeed seeing a storage issue. If TiVo has increased the size of the "temp file" for the software running TiVo HD it seems plausible that it's part of the eventual eSATA support and hopefully we'll see an improvement once the next S3 upgrade is pushed out.

I wonder if they purposefully ensured that the TiVo HD would _not _ be able to handle an eSATA drive to avoid these very issues until they were ready to support it?

It seems like I can tell when TiVo is getting sluggish but when I clean out the Recently Deleted files and tidy up the SP's and WL's it seems to come right again. So far no reboots or GSOD's, etc. I suspect I'm seeing fewer issues with a 500GB eSATA HDD than others with larger drives as well.

Com'on update!! :up:


----------



## ctcraig

After I "remarried" my ESATA and TiVO the relationship lasted less than a day. Then I was back to continuous reboot. I wish I could try the manual space management!

Cheers

Chuck


----------



## nuttzy06

So is our new hypothesis to do some simple cleanup while you can - deleted items/suggestions down to a certain level where TiVo doesn't start to act sluggish?

Thanks,
-Nuttzy


----------



## richsadams

nuttzy06 said:


> So is our new hypothesis to do some simple cleanup while you can - deleted items/suggestions down to a certain level where TiVo doesn't start to act sluggish? Thanks, -Nuttzy


Keeping things cleaned up, a good eSATA II cable, the right drive in the right enclosure, holding your tongue just so and a local witch doctor's blessing...all sounds about right.  Well, about as good as anything else it would seem. I'm all ears otherwise.


----------



## richsadams

ctcraig said:


> After I "remarried" my ESATA and TiVO the relationship lasted less than a day. Then I was back to continuous reboot. I wish I could try the manual space management! Cheers. Chuck


 Sounds like some data corruption in your case. Perhaps Kickstart 57 would help clear things up if you can get the drive remarried and TiVo running long enough to try it. Just a thought.

Keep us posted! :up:


----------



## maynerd

Just a quick follow up and a question.

Some of may remember that my MX-1 enclosure started making noise and in my investigation of the noise I accidentally unplugged it while it was on and while the Tivo was recording. Upon hooking it back up I couldn't get the Tivo to find my drive. I got my replacement drive from Seagate. Plugged it all back in and everything is A-OK again! Whee!

I have a question.

I will be needing to unhook my tivo and external drive this weekend (unplug and move everything around). What is the best/proper way to power down everything so I can feel comfortable that my hard drive won't blow up again?

Thanks!


----------



## jrpeterson5

maynerd said:


> I will be needing to unhook my tivo and external drive this weekend (unplug and move everything around). What is the best/proper way to power down everything so I can feel comfortable that my hard drive won't blow up again?
> 
> Thanks!


I found the best way to do this is the following:

1. In the setting menu, select restart TiVo (and follow directions - three thumbs down and enter).
2. When you see the startup screen, pull the plug on the TIVO.
3. Once, and only once, the power to the TIVO is gone...then shut off your external drive. And then the eSATA cable can be disconnected.
4. Move and setup everything in the new location. Of course being conscience of interference that can effect the eSATA cables (subwoofers, power supplies, power cords, etc)
5. Plug in the eSATA cable and then turn on the external and allow it to spin up (I give it 15-30 seconds).
6. Plug in the TiVo.
7. Off you go!!

Your TiVo will never know it was moved and should boot up normally with the eSATA drive connected. Good luck!


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> Just a quick follow up and a question.
> 
> Some of may remember that my MX-1 enclosure started making noise and in my investigation of the noise I accidentally unplugged it while it was on and while the Tivo was recording. Upon hooking it back up I couldn't get the Tivo to find my drive. I got my replacement drive from Seagate. Plugged it all back in and everything is A-OK again! Whee!
> 
> I have a question.
> 
> I will be needing to unhook my tivo and external drive this weekend (unplug and move everything around). What is the best/proper way to power down everything so I can feel comfortable that my hard drive won't blow up again?
> 
> Thanks!


Glad to hear everything is back to normal again! :up:

When the eSATA drive needs to be disconnected and I want to save everything I've done about the same as *jrpeterson5*, however I just unplug TiVo. As long as TiVo is unplugged before you disconnect the eSATA drive you can do whatever you want with it. Just make sure the eSATA drive is powered up and connected to TiVo prior to powering TiVo back up and you should be fine.


----------



## maynerd

richsadams said:


> Glad to hear everything is back to normal again! :up:
> 
> When the eSATA drive needs to be disconnected and I want to save everything I've done about the same as *jrpeterson5*, however I just unplug TiVo. As long as TiVo is unplugged before you disconnect the eSATA drive you can do whatever you want with it. Just make sure the eSATA drive is powered up and connected to TiVo prior to powering TiVo back up and you should be fine.


Thanks jrpeterson5 & richsadams!

So just to be clear richsadams...you don't bother with the whole resetting and startup stuff that jrpeterson5 does you just unplug the tivo?

As always whenever I need help someone is here to help!


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> Thanks jrpeterson5 & richsadams!
> 
> So just to be clear richsadams...you don't bother with the whole resetting and startup stuff that jrpeterson5 does you just unplug the tivo?
> 
> As always whenever I need help someone is here to help!


Although I'm sure it couldn't hurt I never go through the screens...as long as they're not in the middle of recording anything I've always just pulled the plug on S1's, S2's and S3's and they haven't given me any grief yet.  Being that they're Linux based I don't think TiVo needs to go through any "shutdown" procedure...but I could be wrong...ask my wife!


----------



## jtrain

Installed this last night without a hiccup...I'm very excited for the extra space considering football season and various television series starting up soon. I've got a Series 3 that I received for Father's Day along with a Sony SXRD KDS-50A2020...very excited to be sure...just wanted to share my success story...and give a thank you to all of those in this thread who supply such useful information day in and day out.


----------



## richsadams

jtrain said:


> Installed this last night without a hiccup...I'm very excited for the extra space considering football season and various television series starting up soon. I've got a Series 3 that I received for Father's Day along with a Sony SXRD KDS-50A2020...very excited to be sure...just wanted to share my success story...and give a thank you to all of those in this thread who supply such useful information day in and day out.


Congrats! :up: Keep everything neat and tidy and it should serve you well. BTW, we're in West Linn...looks like we're just across the freeway from you.


----------



## donaudio

Follow-Up on my FAP experience. Installed my third FAP with a Siig cable and put a muffin fan behind it as the unit is in a closed cabinet. So far it has been working for over one week and the FAP is not hot. The fan seems to keep it cool and since it is in a cabinet there is no noise. Don


----------



## platbr

Does there seem to be any kind of a trend with eSATA drives developing problems in the longer term? Full drives & too many programs causing issues?

I've just ordered an S3, MX-1, and 750GB DB35... I guess I can try it out for myself. I'm just wondering if it would make more sense to just stick the 750GB inside the S3, rather than on the eSATA port.


----------



## jfh3

platbr said:


> Does there seem to be any kind of a trend with eSATA drives developing problems in the longer term? Full drives & too many programs causing issues?
> 
> I've just ordered an S3, MX-1, and 750GB DB35... I guess I can try it out for myself. I'm just wondering if it would make more sense to just stick the 750GB inside the S3, rather than on the eSATA port.


Well, a one drive system is always better than a two drive one. If you are comfortable opening the S3, I'd put it inside. You can always add an external drive later.


----------



## richsadams

platbr said:


> Does there seem to be any kind of a trend with eSATA drives developing problems in the longer term? Full drives & too many programs causing issues?
> 
> I've just ordered an S3, MX-1, and 750GB DB35... I guess I can try it out for myself. I'm just wondering if it would make more sense to just stick the 750GB inside the S3, rather than on the eSATA port.


Yes, there appears to be an issue with TiVo when the eSATA drive (and presumably the "A" drive) fill up. Although ours has been working just fine for over three months weve begun clearing the Recently Deleted folder and keeping the SPs and WLs down to ensure things dont go south. I cant be positive that this is why we havent run into difficulty, but it seems to be working. If I were to do it over again I'd probably opt for an internal drive or wait until TiVo upgrades the software to support the eSATA drive function.


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> ...Yes, there appears to be an issue with TiVo when the eSATA drive (and presumably the "A" drive) fill up...


I'm not convinced that those eSATA issues can be extended to the internal "A" drive. I have had a full internal 1TB drive (so much so I regularly get the little notice that says if you record such and such then this other show will have to be deleted early to make space) including 100+ Season Passes for the last 9 months and have never experienced any noticeable performance problems that I could tie to lack of free space. In fact, I can't think of any performance issues since the slow reordering of SPs was fixed a while back.


----------



## platbr

richsadams said:


> Yes, there appears to be an issue with TiVo when the eSATA drive (and presumably the "A" drive) fill up. Although ours has been working just fine for over three months weve begun clearing the Recently Deleted folder and keeping the SPs and WLs down to ensure things dont go south. I cant be positive that this is why we havent run into difficulty, but it seems to be working. If I were to do it over again I'd probably opt for an internal drive or wait until TiVo upgrades the software to support the eSATA drive function.


Other than losing programs, I presume there is no harm in giving the eSATA drive a shot, and if it has problems in a few months just divorcing, imaging, and swapping the 750 GB drive to be a single internal drive?

I'll confess I was drawn to the eSATA solution by the ease of kickstart 62. I'm not too intimidated by pulling the Tivo open to upgrade the drive, but after having issues years ago with a Series 1 DirecTivo (powersurge = nostart), I'd hate to void my warranty before its time. god help me if my actions again infringe on the 3 yr. old's morning Bob the Builder routine ;-).


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> I'm not convinced that those eSATA issues can be extended to the internal "A" drive. I have had a full internal 1TB drive (so much so I regularly get the little notice that says if you record such and such then this other show will have to be deleted early to make space) including 100+ Season Passes for the last 9 months and have never experienced any noticeable performance problems that I could tie to lack of free space. In fact, I can't think of any performance issues since the slow reordering of SPs was fixed a while back.


That's good news. We'll keep our fingers crossed!


----------



## richsadams

platbr said:


> Other than losing programs, I presume there is no harm in giving the eSATA drive a shot, and if it has problems in a few months just divorcing, imaging, and swapping the 750 GB drive to be a single internal drive?
> 
> I'll confess I was drawn to the eSATA solution by the ease of kickstart 62. I'm not too intimidated by pulling the Tivo open to upgrade the drive, but after having issues years ago with a Series 1 DirecTivo (powersurge = nostart), I'd hate to void my warranty before its time. god help me if my actions again infringe on the 3 yr. old's morning Bob the Builder routine ;-).


Yes, there's no indication that anything is compromised if an eSATA drive is connected and then properly divorced later.

FYI a post on another thread said that TiVo will be releasing an S3 software upgrade near month's end. The OP was told that it will address the macroblocking issue some are seeing so there's nothing to say that it will have any affect on the eSATA problems, but one can only hope.


----------



## HTH

Sorry if this was asked before, but there are 41 pages to this thread now, and this wasn't in the FAQ first-post of the thread.

If I upgrade with a 1 TB eSATA drive now and want to upgrade the internal SATA drive to 1 TB as well later, will I have to divorce first and lose shows, or can the internal be upgraded in place? Can the new MFS Tools move shows from a pair of drives to a new pair with a larger internal drive, increasing the number of shows retainable in a divorce, or is the painless TiVo-performed divorce (how about "annulment"?) not possible with a larger internal drive?


----------



## robus

Came back from vacation to find Tivo locked up because the DVR Xpander was not responding  - after multiple attempts to get it to reconnect I had to switch back to single drive mode. Meaning we lost a bunch of recent recordings.

Really unhappy - and unsure whether to gamble on eSATA again.

Robert.


----------



## richsadams

robus said:


> Came back from vacation to find Tivo locked up because the DVR Xpander was not responding  - after multiple attempts to get it to reconnect I had to switch back to single drive mode. Meaning we lost a bunch of recent recordings.
> 
> Really unhappy - and unsure whether to gamble on eSATA again.
> 
> Robert.


That sucks.  Did your Apricorn drive actually die?


----------



## jtrain

Beginning last night, while on FOX 12 HD (OTA), the S3 locked up and rebooted. This morning as I came downstairs, I noticed that the rebooting process was once again running, and then this afternoon, my wife lets me know that it has done it again. I never had an issue prior to the connection of the eSATA drive (ANTEC MX-1 w/ DB 35 500GB). Could the reboots be connected to the eSATA installation? Any help or suggestions are appreciated. Thank you.


----------



## GT1Boy

jtrain said:


> Beginning last night, while on FOX 12 HD (OTA), the S3 locked up and rebooted. This morning as I came downstairs, I noticed that the rebooting process was once again running, and then this afternoon, my wife lets me know that it has done it again. I never had an issue prior to the connection of the eSATA drive (ANTEC MX-1 w/ DB 35 500GB). Could the reboots be connected to the eSATA installation? Any help or suggestions are appreciated. Thank you.


What time did this occur and do you have closed captions on? Was your other tuner was on KATU-DT? A couple of us Series3 owners in the AVS Forums have noticed that our TiVos have rebooted when watching KATU-DT newscasts or newbreaks with the digital closed captions turned on. It typically happens during the weather segments where the captions become garbled. I emailed the engineering dept at KATU back in March but never received a response. TiVo Support has info on it though.


----------



## richsadams

GT1Boy said:


> What time did this occur and do you have closed captions on? Was your other tuner was on KATU-DT? A couple of us Series3 owners in the AVS Forums have noticed that our TiVos have rebooted when watching KATU-DT newscasts or newbreaks with the digital closed captions turned on. It typically happens during the weather segments where the captions become garbled. I emailed the engineering dept at KATU back in March but never received a response. TiVo Support has info on it though.


Wow, that's interesting. I was going to suggest checking the eSATA cable to ensure it's properly seated on both ends. I had never heard about the closed caption issue until now. Wonder if it's a problem elsewhere as well? Thanks and any links would be appreciated. :up:


----------



## jboy

Frys has a sale on them, $179. The drive gets good reviews on NewEgg.

BTW, my Seagate ST3500630NS died after 2 months in an Apricorn enclosure!!!

jerry


----------



## robus

richsadams said:


> That sucks.  Did your Apricorn drive actually die?


Yep - it was making a very unhappy rev up/down noise - like it couldn't get going.

Robert


----------



## ctcraig

richsadams said:


> Sounds like some data corruption in your case. Perhaps Kickstart 57 would help clear things up if you can get the drive remarried and TiVo running long enough to try it. Just a thought.
> 
> Keep us posted! :up:


 I did the kickstart 57, got the GSOD with message. It didn't seem to take very long to complete the disk repair. Well it did another reboot about 2 hours after the kickstart 57. Not a good sign. The little bugger ran great for days in single drive mode, and 3 hrs after multi-drive boom.

Sigh. I'm hopeful that that was a restart for some other reason. I'll keep ya'll posted

Cheers!
Chuck


----------



## richsadams

robus said:


> Yep - it was making a very unhappy rev up/down noise - like it couldn't get going.
> 
> Robert


How unfortunate. Drives go bad; a fact of life I guess. Apricorn was using WD drives the last I checked. At least it's under warranty, but that doesn't save your programs.


----------



## richsadams

ctcraig said:


> I did the kickstart 57, got the GSOD with message. It didn't seem to take very long to complete the disk repair. Well it did another reboot about 2 hours after the kickstart 57. Not a good sign. The little bugger ran great for days in single drive mode, and 3 hrs after multi-drive boom.
> 
> Sigh. I'm hopeful that that was a restart for some other reason. I'll keep ya'll posted
> 
> Cheers!
> Chuck


I can't recall if you had replaced your eSATA cable at some point. If not, that might be an option. They seem to be delicate at best. The first post on this thread has a list of quality replacements.


----------



## Kenji

robus said:


> Yep - it was making a very unhappy rev up/down noise - like it couldn't get going.


This just happened with my Apricorn DVR Xpander too. I cycled its power a couple times, and now it seems to be working fine, but this incident doesn't give me a warm fuzzy feeling...


----------



## robus

Kenji said:


> This just happened with my Apricorn DVR Xpander too. I cycled its power a couple times, and now it seems to be working fine, but this incident doesn't give me a warm fuzzy feeling...


Hey Kenji,

Glad that worked for you - I was desperately trying to get it to sync with the TiVo again (in order to avoid losing a bunch of shows) - tried that and power-cycling the TiVo box too - but it didn't work for me.

I'd recommend not putting off the shows you really want to watch!

Robert.


----------



## dqdude

I am going to be adding a 750gb DB35 eSata drive to an already upgraded 750GB DB35 internal drive. I have read and reread the directions for adding an external drive to an already upgraded and the instructions do not seem very clear.

Am I missing something or are there better instructions out there?


----------



## richsadams

dqdude said:


> I am going to be adding a 750gb DB35 eSata drive to an already upgraded 750GB DB35 internal drive. I have read and reread the directions for adding an external drive to an already upgraded and the instructions do not seem very clear.
> 
> Am I missing something or are there better instructions out there?


It's probably best to PM *Spike2K5*. He's the expert.


----------



## jtrain

After looking once more at the setup to verify everything, the S3 rebooted again and this time I received the 2nd Drive Error Message on the screen. I shut down the TiVo once more, powered down the eSATA drive and disconnected it to return to the single-drive mode (and no reboots since that time). 

I'm using the eSATA cable that came with the Antec MX-1 enclosure. Should I be using a different one? That's the only thing I can think of, the fan and ventilation was proper and working. 

And thank you for the suggestion on KATU-DT with closed caption, but no, I don't use closed captioning at all and the other tuner was not on KATU-DT, but on an analog station. 

Any thoughts or ideas would be appreciated. Thank you!


----------



## fandango jango

richsadams said:


> How unfortunate. Drives go bad; a fact of life I guess. Apricorn was using WD drives the last I checked. At least it's under warranty, but that doesn't save your programs.


My Apricorn DVR Xpander went bad as well, causing my TIVO to restart repeatedly. The drive worked perfectly for about a month. Just as previously stated, it sounded like the disk kept trying to spin. I divorced it and kickstarted the drive again. It worked for a short period of time before causing my TIVO to restart again. I called Apricorn tech support. They wanted me to hook the drive to my computer via USB, but the computer would not recognize the drive. At that point, they offerred me a replacement. I hooked up the replacement for a couple of days before deciding to divorce it. I will wait until this is supported before connecting again.


----------



## maynerd

richsadams said:


> Although I'm sure it couldn't hurt I never go through the screens...as long as they're not in the middle of recording anything I've always just pulled the plug on S1's, S2's and S3's and they haven't given me any grief yet.  Being that they're Linux based I don't think TiVo needs to go through any "shutdown" procedure...but I could be wrong...ask my wife!


Unplugged and moved my tivo replugged things back in and everything went perfect. Thanks again for the advice folks!


----------



## richsadams

jtrain said:


> After looking once more at the setup to verify everything, the S3 rebooted again and this time I received the 2nd Drive Error Message on the screen. I shut down the TiVo once more, powered down the eSATA drive and disconnected it to return to the single-drive mode (and no reboots since that time).
> 
> I'm using the eSATA cable that came with the Antec MX-1 enclosure. Should I be using a different one? That's the only thing I can think of, the fan and ventilation was proper and working.
> 
> And thank you for the suggestion on KATU-DT with closed caption, but no, I don't use closed captioning at all and the other tuner was not on KATU-DT, but on an analog station.
> 
> Any thoughts or ideas would be appreciated. Thank you!


I think most people with MX-1's are using the eSATA cable that came with them. (Ours is functioning fine) But there's at least one other post where the OP said that their MX-1 eSATA cable had gone bad...and it sounds like that's what may have happened to you as long as the drive and enclosure appear to be in good working order.

A new cable isn't very expensive. Proper eSATA II cables seem to be hit-and-miss in the retail stores so most are buying them on line. There are some good options under #31 on the Series3 eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion post.

Id do a quick test on the drive before ordering a cable however. Id pull the enclosure cover, turn it on and listen to it to ensure that it sounds like its spinning up properly. You might also want to plug into your P.C. via USB (or SATA if you have it) and test it to make sure its reading/writing okay. (TiVo reformats the drive each time it's married so whatever you put on it will be deleted.) You could also try running the manufacturer's diagnostic program like Segates SeaTools.

Good luck and keep us posted! :up:


----------



## richsadams

maynerd said:


> Unplugged and moved my tivo replugged things back in and everything went perfect. Thanks again for the advice folks!


 :up: :up:


----------



## bsather

I have two S3's upgraded internally and with esata drives in Antec MX-1's. I had multiple GSOD's on the first one, and after replacing the stock cable with the Siig CB-SA0111-S1 esata cable, I have had zero problems. So it can happen.


----------



## richsadams

bsather said:


> I have two S3's upgraded internally and with esata drives in Antec MX-1's. I had multiple GSOD's on the first one, and after replacing the stock cable with the Siig CB-SA0111-S1 esata cable, I have had zero problems. So it can happen.


I think I'll order a back-up cable just in case.


----------



## Kenji

fandango jango said:


> My Apricorn DVR Xpander went bad as well, causing my TIVO to restart repeatedly. The drive worked perfectly for about a month. Just as previously stated, it sounded like the disk kept trying to spin.


Wow, that's 2.5 failed Apricorn DVR Xpanders in this thread (mine came back to life after cycling its power a few times). That doesn't speak well for Apricorn's reliability.


----------



## drew00001

Given my requirements below, which drive would you buy? I'd also appreciate any reason to stay away from one of these drives. Please ignore total price. Also, price per GB is important to me, but a few $.01 per GB will not kill me. 

I am only considering drives 500GB and above. I suppose this means I am considering overall quality/satisfaction, including noise, heat, longevity, etc. I am considering three drives:

1. WD WD5000AVJS
2. Seagate DB35 (500 or 750GB), 
3. Hitachi Deskstar (either 500GB, 750GB, or 1TB) 

These seem to be the standard choices, so typing them out was probably more information than you needed.


----------



## richsadams

drew00001 said:


> Given my requirements below, which drive would you buy? I'd also appreciate any reason to stay away from one of these drives. Please ignore total price. Also, price per GB is important to me, but a few $.01 per GB will not kill me.
> 
> I am only considering drives 500GB and above. I suppose this means I am considering overall quality/satisfaction, including noise, heat, longevity, etc. I am considering three drives:
> 
> 1. WD WD5000AVJS
> 2. Seagate DB35 (500 or 750GB),
> 3. Hitachi Deskstar (either 500GB, 750GB, or 1TB)
> 
> These seem to be the standard choices, so typing them out was probably more information than you needed.


WD's run hot and should probably be avoided. Apricorn's are using WD and there are two reports of failures recently as well  .

The Seagate DB35 7200.3's seem to be the most reliable and are in wide use by forum members. Be sure to get model numbers that end in SCE (not ACE).

A few folks are using the Hitachi's with success as well.


----------



## lrhorer

richsadams said:


> WD's run hot and should probably be avoided. Apricorn's are using WD and there are two reports of failures recently as well  .
> 
> The Seagate DB35 7200.3's seem to be the most reliable and are in wide use by forum members. Be sure to get model numbers that end in SCE (not ACE).
> 
> A few folks are using the Hitachi's with success as well.


I'm using a Seagate Barracuda 750G in an Antec MX-1 housing on one TiVo and a Hitachi Deskstar 1TB on the other. The 750G is paired with a stock 250G Series III TiVo, and the 1Tb is paired with a Weaknees 1TB Hitachi Deskstar Series III. I am pleased with both, although both are experiencing occasional GSODs since upgrading the external drives. They are annoying but not frequent, and I've only lost 2 programs out of many hundreds recorded. Both of them aired at a later date and were captured at that time. Neither unit suffered a single GSOD before upgrade, but both suffered a GSOD within 4 days of upgrading. They were upgrades several months apart, and I had one for 5 months before upgrading, the other 2 months before upgrading.


----------



## Laserfan

Can someone here tell me if this 2TB Cavalry eSATA drive selling at Buy.com for $600 will just plug & play with the S3 Tivo?


----------



## moxie1617

It shouldn't. There is a 1TB limit per drive and that unit is 1.5TB.


----------



## richsadams

Laserfan said:


> Can someone here tell me if this 2TB Cavalry eSATA drive selling at Buy.com for $600 will just plug & play with the S3 Tivo?


*moxie1617 * is correct, TiVo currently has a 1TB limit per drive although there are one or two people here running a RAID setup.

FYI it's noted on the first post in this thread that Cavalry drives have had significant problems when being used as eSATA drives on TiVo.


----------



## platbr

Success!

Just thought I'd chime in that my Tivo S3 refurb arrived this week, and after a quick setup and cablecard swap (from the returned Tivo HD), I was able to get Kickstart 62 to work first try. I'm using an Antec MX-1 with a Seagate DB35 7200.3 750 GB drive, exactly as recommended in this thread. I'm using the eSATA cable that came in the Antec MX-1 box, with all the parts purchased from ExCaliberPC.

On the whole, this is a great setup that I'm very pleased with. I guess time will tell if the "two-month" itch shows up, and problems develop, but I'm optomistic.


----------



## richsadams

platbr said:


> Success!
> 
> Just thought I'd chime in that my Tivo S3 refurb arrived this week, and after a quick setup and cablecard swap (from the returned Tivo HD), I was able to get Kickstart 62 to work first try. I'm using an Antec MX-1 with a Seagate DB35 7200.3 750 GB drive, exactly as recommended in this thread. I'm using the eSATA cable that came in the Antec MX-1 box, with all the parts purchased from ExCaliberPC.
> 
> On the whole, this is a great setup that I'm very pleased with. I guess time will tell if the "two-month" itch shows up, and problems develop, but I'm optimistic.


 :up: Great news and thanks for keeping us up to date! Just curious if you're planning on letting your drives fill up or if you're going to keep the Recently Deleted folder, SP's and WL's down below their max. It would be good to know either way should something happen.

Not that it will mind you! I'm sure everything will be fine.


----------



## richsadams

platbr said:


> Success!
> 
> Just thought I'd chime in that my Tivo S3 refurb arrived this week, and after a quick setup and cablecard swap (from the returned Tivo HD), I was able to get Kickstart 62 to work first try. I'm using an Antec MX-1 with a Seagate DB35 7200.3 750 GB drive, exactly as recommended in this thread. I'm using the eSATA cable that came in the Antec MX-1 box, with all the parts purchased from ExCaliberPC.
> 
> On the whole, this is a great setup that I'm very pleased with. I guess time will tell if the "two-month" itch shows up, and problems develop, but I'm optimistic.


 :up: Great news and thanks for keeping us up to date! Just curious if you're planning on letting your drives fill up or if you're going to keep the Recently Deleted folder, SP's and WL's down below their max. It would be good to know either way should something happen.

Not that it will mind you! I'm sure everything will be fine.


----------



## moxie1617

platbr said:


> Success!
> 
> Just thought I'd chime in that my Tivo S3 refurb arrived this week, and after a quick setup and cablecard swap (from the returned Tivo HD), I was able to get Kickstart 62 to work first try. I'm using an Antec MX-1 with a Seagate DB35 7200.3 750 GB drive, exactly as recommended in this thread. I'm using the eSATA cable that came in the Antec MX-1 box, with all the parts purchased from ExCaliberPC.
> 
> On the whole, this is a great setup that I'm very pleased with. I guess time will tell if the "two-month" itch shows up, and problems develop, but I'm optomistic.


The 25th will be 3 months for me with the MX-1 and the 500GB DB35. I had one reboot but that was due to a toxic program-an episode of DL.TV. It was reproducible. Currently I'm recoding everything available in order to fill up the HD to see if that introduces any instability, and not doing any housekeeping on the S3. I want to see what happens before the fall season starts up.

I still think this thread needs a fingers-crossed emoticon, at least I do.


----------



## jtrain

I checked the drive to make sure it was spinning up properly with no noticeable sounds of failure in startup. 

Thought I'd try and re-install the drive last night and went off without a hitch with no reboots or anything at least in the three hours subsequent to the installation of the drive. 

Well, after turning the TV on this morning, I once again got the 2nd Drive Error Message. I went ahead and powered down the drive and switched over to single drive mode. 

I think now, I may either try to get a replacement drive as it is a brand new Seagate drive and/or replace the eSata cable with an eSATA II cable and see if that works.

I'm certainly not disheartened as this setup was a gift (Antec enclosure with DB 35 drive), but am anxious to get it working properly before the fall season of television/football begins.


----------



## msrolla

Today is two months on the 750G FreeAgent Pro and the Siig cable. Drive has been full enough to erase old suggestions for at least 3 weeks. No problems.


----------



## Laserfan

richsadams said:


> *moxie1617 * is correct, TiVo currently has a 1TB limit per drive although there are one or two people here running a RAID setup.
> 
> FYI it's noted on the first post in this thread that Cavalry drives have had significant problems when being used as eSATA drives on TiVo.


I thought I'd done a Search but I guess I jumped the gun. Thanks guys for the feedback.


----------



## jlib

Laserfan said:


> Can someone here tell me if this 2TB Cavalry eSATA drive selling at Buy.com for $600 will just plug & play with the S3 Tivo?


The problem is not the size of the unit in this case (since it can be configured as RAID 0+1 or Raid 5 with hot spare, both of which would be 1TB) but the fact that it uses a RAID controller card and software drivers. You can only use true hardware RAID which can connect to any eSATA port (not just their proprietary eSATA RAID controller) and appear to the host as a single drive without any drivers required. Rule of thumb: If it includes a proprietary controller card or a disk with drivers it is incompatible.

In an era of quiet and affordable 1TB drives there is little purpose for a RAID unit on the TiVo unless you have some perceived need for data redundancy and don't mind the noise and heat. A year ago there were no 1TB drives and no quiet 750GB ones so a RAID of smaller drives was the only solution.


----------



## Dr_Diablo

I wonder as the drives continue to grow in size, upwards of 5 to 30 Terra Bytes, will they be compatiable to the Tivos out there.

In 1992 I paid $1,200.00 for a 860 Meg drive for my PC. At that time that was the largest drive available, an was told I'd never fill that sucker up...LOL


----------



## dqdude

Added an esata (Antec enclosure with Seagate DB35 750mb HD) to an already upgraded internal drive (DB35 750mb).

Total time on upgrade 

Disassemble tivo and remove internal drive 2 minutes
Connect both drives to laptop using usb cables and esata enclosures 2 minutes
Load linus spftware 5 minutes including boot time.
Assemble everything back tpo original state and hookup to tv 5 minutes
Tive Boot time with aknowledgemnent of new drive 5 minutes

Time spent OCD'ing leading up to the above...48 hours!

This was so damn easy I could saved myself a lot of worry time.

198 hours of HD awaits....SWEET!!!


----------



## lrhorer

Dr_Diablo said:


> I wonder as the drives continue to grow in size, upwards of 5 to 30 Terra Bytes, will they be compatiable to the Tivos out there.


'Not at this time. The current limit is 2 TB. I expect there will be various work-arounds before long.


----------



## Dr_Diablo

As I have mentioned, I'd be happy with the SATA port enabled for the Tivo HD


Can't imagine how long it would take to fill a 30 Terra Byte drive...


----------



## RandyMeinke

UPS just delivered a CinemaStar 1TB drive. Plugged it into an Antec MX-1 and followed the directions on the FAQ. Nice and quiet and kickstarted the first time. 165HD/1561 SD with a drive designed for a DVR. Paid 416 at aztekcomputers. Filled up the ToDoList with HD movies. Will update if any problems. Thanks to those who pioneered the process and tweaked the directions.


----------



## mazman

Dr_Diablo said:


> As I have mentioned, I'd be happy with the SATA port enabled for the Tivo HD


Any speculation on why SATA was enabled for the S3 and not Tivo HD?


----------



## Dr_Diablo

Copyright enfringements, just as DVD copying has been such a taboo in the resent past


----------



## richsadams

mazman said:


> Any speculation on why SATA was enabled for the S3 and not Tivo HD?


TiVo never really "enabled" the eSATA port on the S3. The method for doing this is a backdoor hack; not a supported feature. When it is there will be a software update that will allow for a user-friendly experience by giving TiVo the ability to automatically recognize when an external drive has been installed. Based on the trials and tribulations posted here over the past few months it's become obvious that the current software was not meant to handle it.

The software running TiVo HD is reported to have additional space in the partition that handles temporary files. It would seem logical that this would be one of the requisites to address some of the problems current eSATA users are seeing so support may already be somewhat present.

My speculation would be that TiVo is keenly aware of what we TiVo enthusiasts" are up to and realized that they needed to ensure that new TiVo HD owners couldn't do the same thing. (A good call IMO based on the TiVo HD fires theyre currently putting out.) That will give them a clean slate to introduce their own branded eSATA drive along with downconverted HD data, etc. when the time is right. Hopefully it wont wipe out everything weve done here when the time comes!


----------



## linetest

Add me to the "no-workie" list. I purchased the MX-1 and a Seagate drive listed from the FAQ. Freezes and reboots are the order of the day. So now I've ordered a SIIG eSata cable. Not sure what else to do since I followed the "recommended" equipment list as shown on the FAQ. Let's hope it's just a bum cable.


----------



## richsadams

linetest said:


> Add me to the "no-workie" list. I purchased the MX-1 and a Seagate drive listed from the FAQ. Freezes and reboots are the order of the day. So now I've ordered a SIIG eSata cable. Not sure what else to do since I followed the "recommended" equipment list as shown on the FAQ. Let's hope it's just a bum cable.


Sorry to hear about the problems. We'll be _very _ interested to hear if the new eSATA cable cures it.

Out of curiosity, do you remember which Seagate drive you're using, size, model number, etc.?


----------



## jon96cobra

After taking the time to clean out the deleted files and the Suggestions Mine has seemed more stable.


----------



## richsadams

jon96cobra said:


> After taking the time to clean out the deleted files and the Suggestions Mine has seemed more stable.


Hmmmm...interesting. We've had the same experience. That leads me back to the evolving theory about TiVo's space allocation for "temp files" (which is apparently where these files are kept) on the current software release and eventual problems due to there being more "temp" data than TiVo can handle. Wish there was a "delete all" option in the Recently Deleted folder!


----------



## linetest

Sorry, this drive...Seagate Barracuda ES 250Gb ST3250620NS. Front the front page, good for 24/7 use.


----------



## richsadams

linetest said:


> Sorry, this drive...Seagate Barracuda ES 250Gb ST3250620NS. Front the front page, good for 24/7 use.


Thanks for that. :up: Comparing the Barracuda which is primarily suited for enterprise use and the Seagate DB35 7200.3 DVR drive specs, they look very similar. The Barracuda has a 16MB cache Vs the DB35's 8MB's. I dont recall that being an issue. The DB35's have a slightly lower failure rate and higher temp toleration specs but with the fan-cooled MX-1 enclosure that shouldn't be an issue.

At least if it's not the cable you still have a 5 year warranty on your drive.

Thanks again and keep us posted.


----------



## Kenji

richsadams said:


> That leads me back to the evolving theory about TiVo's space allocation for "temp files" (which is apparently where these files are kept) on the current software release and eventual problems due to there being more "temp" data than TiVo can handle.


Perhaps, but it would be unbelievably lame of TiVo's software if this were true. S3s run Linux, right? Linux (like all variants of Unix) has a very reliable filesystem, and no concept of "temp" for files that have been closed (like any recorded program). In other words, once a program has been recorded, that file exists on the filesystem, period; it's up to the TiVo software to keep track of which files have been "deleted", which just amounts to placing them into the Recently Deleted directory on the filesystem. So, while it may be possible for the TiVo software to have some issue when the filesystem is almost full, I have a hard time believing that this could be true, since requirement #2 for the code should be "doesn't screw up when the filesystem is full".

Just my two cents from 27 years of professional software development experience.


----------



## moxie1617

I'm in the process of filling up my Tivo now, Antec MX-1 and 500GB DB35. When it gets full I'll report back and let you know if stability is an issue. I don't record suggestions but I'll let the list of suggestions build and see what happens. I want to do this before the fall season begins.


----------



## richsadams

Kenji said:


> Perhaps, but it would be unbelievably lame of TiVo's software if this were true. S3s run Linux, right? Linux (like all variants of Unix) has a very reliable filesystem, and no concept of "temp" for files that have been closed (like any recorded program). In other words, once a program has been recorded, that file exists on the filesystem, period; it's up to the TiVo software to keep track of which files have been "deleted", which just amounts to placing them into the Recently Deleted directory on the filesystem. So, while it may be possible for the TiVo software to have some issue when the filesystem is almost full, I have a hard time believing that this could be true, since requirement #2 for the code should be "doesn't screw up when the filesystem is full".
> 
> Just my two cents from 27 years of professional software development experience.


Cool. :up: We run a web server using Linux and I tend to agree with your all of your logic and assumptions.

Im certainly not stuck on any one notion about any of this. However with all of the things that many of us have tried to do to eliminate problems, the one of too much data and not enough space is about the only one that seems to fit. Taking action by reducing the files actually seems to make a difference.

We should also keep in mind that this issue isn't limited to TiVo's with eSATA drives. There have been numerous posts in the past (long before eSATA expansion) that reported sluggish behavior, freezing and reboots resulting from SP's and WL's (particularly HD programming) going over a certain threshold. It seems logical that this issue could/would be amplified when adding even more capacity.

That being said, care to pose any theories as to why problems arise when the system fills up (while an eSATA drive is connected) as opposed to running (fairly) normally when "temporary files" such as the Recently Deleted folder, SP's, WL's, etc. are kept to a minimum? We're all ears!


----------



## richsadams

moxie1617 said:


> I'm in the process of filling up my Tivo now, Antec MX-1 and 500GB DB35. When it gets full I'll report back and let you know if stability is an issue. I don't record suggestions but I'll let the list of suggestions build and see what happens. I want to do this before the fall season begins.


What a trooper! :up:


----------



## BruceShultes

Just a thought, but any directory in a Linux file system either has to be on the primary partition or mounted from a different partition.

All partitions are created with a maximum size, even though it can be different for each partition.

If the S3 is using a directory on the internal drive to keep track of deleted shows and/or suggestions, the directory becoming full could easily result in the GSOD.

The next time you get one, check what is left in your Suggestions folder and Deleted Shows folder after it comes back up.


----------



## richsadams

BruceShultes said:


> Just a thought, but any directory in a Linux file system either has to be on the primary partition or mounted from a different partition.
> 
> All partitions are created with a maximum size, even though it can be different for each partition.
> 
> If the S3 is using a directory on the internal drive to keep track of deleted shows and/or suggestions, the directory becoming full could easily result in the GSOD.
> 
> The next time you get one, check what is left in your Suggestions folder and Deleted Shows folder after it comes back up.


Good info...thanks...and that makes perfect sense too! :up:

I'm a bit conflicted because our TiVo has never had a problem since we installed our eSATA drive (Seagate 500GB DB35 7200.3 series) back on May 12th. When it got sluggish and appeared to be on the verge of having problems I decided to try cutting down on whatever files I could think of. That had a measurable, positive impact in that our TiVo is as perky as ever and that it's never rebooted or had a GSOD which some others are experiencing. I kind of feel badly for others, but good for us. 

I should add that we have all sorts of recordings saved up...all of the Planet Earth's in HD and many, many others (mostly in HD) so I can be certain that the eSATA drive is carrying its weight. The biggest impact seemed to be permanently deleting the Recently Deleted recordings as well as keeping our SP's under about 70 or so programs.


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## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> The biggest impact seemed to be permanently deleting the Recently Deleted recordings as well as keeping our SP's under about 70 or so programs.


Running a 500 gig Samsung in the MX-1.

The one time my previously flawless system stuttered, froze, then went GSOD (3 days after the eSATA installation), I had about 10 items in the deleted folder, a total of maybe 15 hours of HD recorded, no WL items, and about a dozen SP's.

It seems unlikely in my case the quantity of any of those things had any effect at all.

That was almost 3 weeks ago, and no issues since.


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## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> Running a 500 gig Samsung in the MX-1.
> 
> The one time my previously flawless system stuttered, froze, then went GSOD (3 days after the eSATA installation), I had about 10 items in the deleted folder, a total of maybe 15 hours of HD recorded, no WL items, and about a dozen SP's.
> 
> It seems unlikely in my case the quantity of any of those things had any effect at all.
> 
> That was almost 3 weeks ago, and no issues since.


That sounds right...not a "too full" issue there. Wonder if the eSATA cable hiccupped or something?


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## jlib

The MFS is more like a database masquerading as a file system so some of the classic file system notions don't apply.



BruceShultes said:


> Just a thought, but any directory in a Linux file system either has to be on the primary partition or mounted from a different partition.
> 
> All partitions are created with a maximum size, even though it can be different for each partition.
> 
> If the S3 is using a directory on the internal drive to keep track of deleted shows and/or suggestions, the directory becoming full could easily result in the GSOD.
> 
> The next time you get one, check what is left in your Suggestions folder and Deleted Shows folder after it comes back up.


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> The MFS is more like a database masquerading as a file system so some of the classic file system notions don't apply.


Sounds good, but isn't the bottom line that it is in fact indexing content and like any database structure, there is finite space in that particular partition?


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## dnorth12

> Wow, that's 2.5 failed Apricorn DVR Xpanders in this thread (mine came back to life after cycling its power a few times). That doesn't speak well for Apricorn's reliability.


+1 more maybe.

I started having a similar problem a couple days ago. Anything I recorded would freeze and then force a restart after hitting play. I was concerned that it was the S3 HD failing.
Anything recorded prior to the start day of the problem was unaffected.

I divorced the Apricorn 750 and the problem went away. I have not tried to bring it back in to the mix as of yet. Don't know whether it is a drive failure or some kind of maxing out the drive and file handling problem. Not that techie, will have to keep on eye on this post for what others may discover.


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## inaka

richsadams said:


> TiVo never really "enabled" the eSATA port on the S3. The method for doing this is a backdoor hack; not a supported feature. When it is there will be a software update that will allow for a user-friendly experience by giving TiVo the ability to automatically recognize when an external drive has been installed. Based on the trials and tribulations posted here over the past few months *it's become obvious that the current software was not meant to handle it.*


I have to call complete shenanigans to this statement.

I have the apricon sata enclosure that came with the esata cable, and I popped in a maxtor 500 GB hd. It worked from the very first boot up and I've never looked back. No issues whatsoever.

I have a feeling a lot of the people that don't have problems are rarely going to post a their success stories more than once. But people with issues will post a bunch of questions until they narrow things down a bit. Thus, it'll look like the problems far outweigh the success stories.


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## richsadams

inaka said:


> I have to call complete shenanigans to this statement.
> 
> I have the apricon sata enclosure that came with the esata cable, and I popped in a maxtor 500 GB hd. It worked from the very first boot up and I've never looked back. No issues whatsoever.
> 
> I have a feeling a lot of the people that don't have problems are rarely going to post a their success stories more than once. But people with issues will post a bunch of questions until they narrow things down a bit. Thus, it'll look like the problems far outweigh the success stories.


 I'd agree that if people aren't having problems, they most likely won't post here...although quite a few do. We're in the "no problems" category ourselves and could easily ignore this thread. But I'm really interested in finding out what the issue(s) are should something happen to our setup and otherwise just curious about the inner workings of the newer TiVo's.

There is an eSATA poll here  where people can let others know how things are going.

I suppose we may never know, but if and when we do narrow things down, some troopers here will be due a medal or two! :up:


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## HD_Dude

My Apricorn 750 DVR Xpander died too....after working 2 1/2 months flawlessly. The company replaced it, saying they had had a bad batch of power supplies.

The replacement is doing fine. However, I lost all the shows I recorded...including all the HD 'Planet Earth" episodes....


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## richsadams

HD_Dude said:


> My Apricorn 750 DVR Xpander died too....after working 2 1/2 months flawlessly. The company replaced it, saying they had had a bad batch of power supplies.
> 
> The replacement is doing fine. However, I lost all the shows I recorded...including all the HD 'Planet Earth" episodes....


Well that's frustrating.  Although it's good to know that my experiences with Apricorn being a quality retailer and standing behind their products still holds. We have the Antec MX-1/Seagate DB35 combo, but I have a couple of Apricorn external drives on my PC's. I had to replace one once and there was no problem. The other one is still humming along.

PBS' Planet Earth in HD s the "Wow!" factor videos we play for our friends and family that haven't a clue what TiVo...and sometimes HD are and I'd hate to lose them; they're a great "selling tool". I know PBS is trying to sell the DVD's now, but I'm sure they'll re-air them in the future.


----------



## dnorth12

> My Apricorn DVR Xpander went bad as well, causing my TIVO to restart repeatedly. The drive worked perfectly for about a month. Just as previously stated, it sounded like the disk kept trying to spin. I divorced it and kickstarted the drive again. It worked for a short period of time before causing my TIVO to restart again. I called Apricorn tech support. They wanted me to hook the drive to my computer via USB, but the computer would not recognize the drive. At that point, they offerred me a replacement. I hooked up the replacement for a couple of days before deciding to divorce it. I will wait until this is supported before connecting again.


I just called Apricorn and described my problem and the first thing they mentioned was the power supply. I asked if that was a known/common issue and was told that it was. (DVR Expander)

The power supply might be failing and not have enough juice to run the play function which is where my issue is happening. (Play/Freeze/Reboot - rinse and repeat)

I just need to send them my current power supply and they will return me a new one. Should take all of a week back and forth and I will post the results after I have tested it for a few days.

I don't know for sure if this is the issue for me or not. My drive was pretty full at the time this started happening for me. But dumping most of the deleted programs did not resolve the problem.


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## bareyb

dnorth12 said:


> I just called Apricorn and described my problem and the first thing they mentioned was the power supply. I asked if that was a known/common issue and was told that it was. (DVR Expander)
> 
> The power supply might be failing and not have enough juice to run the play function which is where my issue is happening. (Play/Freeze/Reboot - rinse and repeat)
> 
> I just need to send them my current power supply and they will return me a new one. Should take all of a week back and forth and I will post the results after I have tested it for a few days.
> 
> I don't know for sure if this is the issue for me or not. My drive was pretty full at the time this started happening for me. But dumping most of the deleted programs did not resolve the problem.


Sounds like the most sensible plan. I've had numerous problems with power supplies in external enclosures. Hopefully the new power supply will fix the drive and you can get all your shows back. :up:


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## Kenji

dnorth12 said:


> I just called Apricorn and described my problem and the first thing they mentioned was the power supply. I asked if that was a known/common issue and was told that it was. (DVR Expander). ... I just need to send them my current power supply and they will return me a new one. Should take all of a week back and forth and I will post the results after I have tested it for a few days.


The person at Apricorn told me the same thing and offered to send me a new power supply. However, I've already divorced my S3 and DVR Xpander, so the S3 has reconstructed its Now Playing list based solely on the contents of its hard drive. Since I'm not sure what the S3 will do if I re-marry it to the DVR Xpander (which still has many recorded programs on it) in a week or so after the contents of the S3's hard drive has changed, I opted to have Apricorn send me a replacement unit.


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## Joe-user21

Well, here's my experience. I expanded with the Antec MX-1 and a Seagate DB35 750GB about a month ago. Worked flawlessly from the get-go, until yesterday.
I suspect both drives were "full"; I had many (50+) recordings and 115 items in "Recently Deleted", majority HD.
What happened - it went into a reboot loop. But not quite..
It reboots. Comes up to Tivo menu. First couple key presses are responsive, then it starts slowing down. By the 5th or 6th key press (anything, left, right, play, pause, whatever), it locks up and stops accepting input.
Interestingly, if I have it playing either live or recorded video, that plays fine. We played an SD program to the end. At the end it went to a gray screen.
After many minutes of "non-responsiveness", it will reboot.
So, catch it at the right moment, and plan one's keystrokes, and one can actually start and watch a program.

So, in one of these cycles, I started deleting "Recently Deleted" recordings. Took a few cycles, but deleted most of them, and it got a little better after that. In fact, if I stick with Live I can switch tuners and channels. But, go into the recordings, and after 4, 5 or 6 key presses it will freeze (strictly, stop processing input, but playing whatever was going).

I will try divorcing and see if that works. I do suspect there's some temp or swap or whatever partition not sized correctly for the expansion. But who knows?

Any ideas are welcome. Thanks!


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## dnorth12

> The person at Apricorn told me the same thing and offered to send me a new power supply. However, I've already divorced my S3 and DVR Xpander, so the S3 has reconstructed its Now Playing list based solely on the contents of its hard drive. Since I'm not sure what the S3 will do if I re-marry it to the DVR Xpander (which still has many recorded programs on it) in a week or so after the contents of the S3's hard drive has changed, I opted to have Apricorn send me a replacement unit.


From everything I have heard you will lose your recordings as soon as you divorce. I did the divorce to verify that it wasn't my S3 with the problem. I did not remarry after that point, but would have been a good test to see if the statement is true.

I already resigned myself to the loss. Kind of like paying alimony, but it doesn't drag on forever. 1 payment and it's done.


----------



## HD_Dude

Yes, the power supply appears to be the culprit with the Apricorn drives. When they sent me a new unit, it had a power supply from a different manufacturer. Works fine.

But this raises a bigger issue. Can't we somehow back up these drives? 

Like, if I had 80 hours of HD programming on an external SATA drive, isn't there some way to copy that data to a second hard drive and keep it in a drawer? Just in case, in another 2 1/2 months, another 'fatal' problem pops up?

Frustrating! Just imagine all the data we keep on our PC's...and never, ever being able to back it up. So that any time a drive crashed you'd have to start from scratch. Impossible! Yet, we seem to accept it with the external SATAs.

I'm sure the inability to do that is in part due to digital content management restrictions...but we sure are skating on thin ice here.


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## richsadams

HD_Dude said:


> Yes, the power supply appears to be the culprit with the Apricorn drives. When they sent me a new unit, it had a power supply from a different manufacturer. Works fine.
> 
> But this raises a bigger issue. Can't we somehow back up these drives?
> 
> Like, if I had 80 hours of HD programming on an external SATA drive, isn't there some way to copy that data to a second hard drive and keep it in a drawer? Just in case, in another 2 1/2 months, another 'fatal' problem pops up?
> 
> Frustrating! Just imagine all the data we keep on our PC's...and never, ever being able to back it up. So that any time a drive crashed you'd have to start from scratch. Impossible! Yet, we seem to accept it with the external SATAs.
> 
> I'm sure the inability to do that is in part due to digital content management restrictions...but we sure are skating on thin ice here.


The problem isn't so much backing up a drive...the instructions for backing up a drive and the software required can be found on this post. (These are instructions for people wanting to upgrade their current "A" HDD.)

The issue lies with how TiVo marries and "divorces" an eSATA drive. Each time a new eSATA drive is connected TiVo reformats the drive. AFAIK no one has a work-around for that.

If you disconnect an eSATA drive while TiVo is active or plug TiVo back in after disconnecting the drive you will be required to divorce the eSATA drive. (Be SURE to divorce the drive or you're in for some trouble using an eSATA drive ever again!) Once divorced all of the programming/recordings since the drive was connected are lost. Any eSATA drive you connect to TiVo will have to be married again using Kickstart 62. In doing so TiVo automatically reformats the eSATA drive.

In the case of the Apricorn power supply issue the ideal would be to have Apricorn send you a new power supply. You can then:

1. Unplug TiVo
2. Disconnect the eSATA drive
3. R&R the eSATA power supply
4. Reconnect the eSATA drive, plug it in and turn it on
5. Plug TiVo back in

TiVo will never know the drive was disconnected.

Who knows how things will go when TiVo finally supports eSATA? I have to believe the new software wont require anything like a Kickstart for installationlikely a plug and pray solution will be employed. It would also seem logical that the new software would allow for removing and replacing the drive without losing all of the programming. We can only wait and see.


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## 1283

HD_Dude said:


> Can't we somehow back up these drives?


Yes, but you have to backup both internal and external drives at the same time. If you really want to do that, the best solution to prevent single drive failures is to have a hardware RAID 1/5 system replacing the internal drive. A RAID 0/1 enclosure is around $150, and at least several people in this forum have done that.


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## HD_Dude

Thanks very much...I appreciate the help!


----------



## zob

zob said:


> I have had 1 reboot since I installed the ESATA drive, this was during a thunder storm/power outage, but have the S3 & ESATA drive on an UPS unit. It split the scheduled recording into 2 recorded segments & lost about 5 minute of the show durning the reboot. I will keep an eye on it for futher reboots & post if there is any more problems.


 It has been a little over a month now & have had no futher problems since. I replaced the original MX1 cable with the 1.5' recommended cable that is supplied in this forum. I hope this info helps.


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## richsadams

zob said:


> It has been a little over a month now & have had no futher problems since. I replaced the original MX1 cable with the 1.5' recommended cable that is supplied in this forum. I hope this info helps.


Cheers for that. :up: I have an extra eSATA cable standing by in case our MX-1 goes south.


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## JKay

I read through this entire 57 page thread over the last three days. On day two I ordered an Antec MX-1 enclosure and a selection of eSATA cables for a total expenditure of 125 dollars all this for a recently purchased Western Digital 750 Gig drive.

On day three of my reading adventure on this thread I became convinced I had made a grave error buying the enclosure and that my original intent of replacing my S3s current internal 500 Gig drive with the new 750 Gig drive was indeed the safest and most practical course of action.

Like many of you, I am trying to increase storage capacity while maintaining total reliability so my wife and I dont miss a minute to these damn night time soaps, like Lost, Jericho and 24. 

Hopefully, after the dust settles on this eSATA implementation by TiVo, that Antec MX-1 will still have some value.


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## drew00001

JKay said:


> I read through this entire 57 page thread over the last three days. On day two I ordered an Antec MX-1 enclosure and a selection of eSATA cables for a total expenditure of 125 dollars all this for a recently purchased Western Digital 750 Gig drive.
> 
> On day three of my reading adventure on this thread I became convinced I had made a grave error buying the enclosure and that my original intent of replacing my S3s current internal 500 Gig drive with the new 750 Gig drive was indeed the safest and most practical course of action.
> 
> Like many of you, I am trying to increase storage capacity while maintaining total reliability so my wife and I dont miss a minute to these damn night time soaps, like Lost, Jericho and 24.
> 
> Hopefully, after the dust settles on this eSATA implementation by TiVo, that Antec MX-1 will still have some value.


I'm in a similar position with a 750GB db35 going in this weekend. I plan on using the MX-1 for business backup until I need the space. I realize the eSATA drives have some quirks (e.g., slowing down if you let recently deleted recordings accumulate), which will not prevent me from upgrading if I need the space. Overall, it seems most people have had good experiences with such.


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## 1283

JKay said:


> I ordered an Antec MX-1 enclosure and a selection of eSATA cables for a total expenditure of 125 dollars


125 dollars???  I would think bad cables are rare. I don't think it's necessary to buy a bunch of cables just in case something doesn't work.


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## richsadams

JKay said:


> I read through this entire 57 page thread over the last three days. On day two I ordered an Antec MX-1 enclosure and a selection of eSATA cables for a total expenditure of 125 dollars all this for a recently purchased Western Digital 750 Gig drive.
> 
> On day three of my reading adventure on this thread I became convinced I had made a grave error buying the enclosure and that my original intent of replacing my S3s current internal 500 Gig drive with the new 750 Gig drive was indeed the safest and most practical course of action.
> 
> Like many of you, I am trying to increase storage capacity while maintaining total reliability so my wife and I dont miss a minute to these damn night time soaps, like Lost, Jericho and 24.
> 
> Hopefully, after the dust settles on this eSATA implementation by TiVo, that Antec MX-1 will still have some value.


I'm with ya. Were I to do it all over again I think I'd pop the box and add a larger HDD at this point and wait for TiVo to support the eSATA feature. But now that my eSATA is attached and has been working just fine (knock on wood) I'm happy with it.


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## JKay

c3 said:


> 125 dollars??? I would think bad cables are rare. I don't think it's necessary to buy a bunch of cables just in case something doesn't work.


I know some of the folks here are not convinced that keeping a hard drive real cool is all that important. I on the other hand believe it is of paramount importance, and to that end I was also planning on building my own eSATA enclosure. The extra eSATA cables were purchased to facilitate that endeavor.

I was planning on mounting the hard drive in the center of a 5 inch retangular tube with a low rpm 120 mm fan in one end. The size and looks of this contraption are not an issue as I have a very large built-in video center with out-of-sight storage. I had the necessary power supply and fans to accomplish this task and just needed the right eSATA cable.


----------



## 1283

JKay said:


> I know some of the folks here are not convinced that keeping a hard drive real cool is all that important. I on the other hand believe it is of paramount importance, and to that end I was also planning on building my own eSATA enclosure. The extra eSATA cables were purchased to facilitate that endeavor.


I think the cooling provided by Antec is sufficient (based on what I have read, not personal experience). However, if you want to build your own, having a direct SATA connection to the drive (no USB bridge) would be the best for signal integrity. I would also recommend keeping the cable length to 1 meter max.


----------



## dnorth12

Apricorn sent me the replacement power supply already. I was expecting to have to wait until they received mine prior to them shipping to me. Anyway, I will be resetting up the esata tonight and we'll see probably pretty quick whether it truly is the power supply or a hard drive issue with the Apricorn. It certainly is not the S3 as it has been working fine since I did the divorce.

On the other hand if it is too many deleted files building up, I won't see a problem for several more months. When the problem started for me I had about 230 deleted programs some HD mostly SD


----------



## JKay

c3 said:


> 125 dollars??? I would think bad cables are rare. I don't think it's necessary to buy a bunch of cables just in case something doesn't work.


I had another reason for buying the extra SATA cables:

The design and implementation of the SATA cable connectors is an engineering nightmare. The interior connectors are fragile and any mis-adventure can result in a damaged hard drive or motherboard. The external or eSATA connectors come in several flavors and are not identified in a reasonable or competent manner. These are items you normally can not purchase at the local brick & mortar, so having one of each type on hand is convenient.


----------



## JKay

c3 said:


> I think the cooling provided by Antec is sufficient (based on what I have read, not personal experience). However, if you want to build your own, having a direct SATA connection to the drive (no USB bridge) would be the best for signal integrity. I would also recommend keeping the cable length to 1 meter max.


I agree, I also believe the Antec does an adequate job of cooling. But, your point about eliminating the USB circuitry (bridge) might prove to be the biggest benefit.


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## dougdingle

JKay said:


> I know some of the folks here are not convinced that keeping a hard drive real cool is all that important. I on the other hand believe it is of paramount importance


There was a white paper making the rounds recently by the engineers at Google (who use an ENORMOUS amount of drives) regarding their experiences with drive failures over the last few years.

Much to my surprise, heat is one of the LEAST contributing factors to drive failure. Their experience was that unless the drive was being run under ridiculously hot circumstances (the drive is running too hot to touch at all), drive heat had virtually nothing at all to do with drive failure.


----------



## 1283

dougdingle said:


> Their experience was that unless the drive was being run under ridiculously hot circumstances (the drive is running too hot to touch at all), drive heat had virtually nothing at all to do with drive failure.


With most (if not all) 7200rpm drives, "too hot to touch" is what you would get without forced air circulation.


----------



## dougdingle

c3 said:


> With most (if not all) 7200rpm drives, "too hot to touch" is what you would get without forced air circulation.


That hasn't been my experience, especially with the newer technology drives. They run warm to the touch, but not hot, even just sitting and running on a bench.


----------



## linetest

**Update

I had purchased the MX-1 enclosure and a Seagate Barracuda ES 250Gb ST3250620NS as listed on the main post in this thread. I had nothing but freezes and reboots. I finally ordered the SIIG eSata cable, also mention on the first page. Problem solved. 5 days of solid performance. So, if you have an MX-1 with these type of problems, seek a new cable.


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## dnorth12

Got the new power supply from Apricorn and so far no problems. Had 2 SP's record last night and no hickups when playing. Crossing my fingers that the power supply replacement is the end of the problem.

Just sad that I lost all of the recordings I had.


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## JKay

dougdingle said:


> That hasn't been my experience, especially with the newer technology drives. They run warm to the touch, but not hot, even just sitting and running on a bench.


Your experience is a lot different than mine. I was blessing my new WD 750 Gig drive with the S3s original WD 250 Gig a week ago and during the 85 minute process I reached over and touched both drives as they were leaning against the PC case and they were hot as in uncomfortable to hold onto. I would say they were in the 120F to 130F range. After the conversion process was complete I check the temp again and didnt notice any drop in the heat factor.

Years ago I killed a couple of young health 60 Gig drives by placing then in a pair of those neat, small, compact Gucci looking aluminum external cases. I still have a couple of USB external drive case and they are those big honking ugly ones with a fan.


----------



## BillL

I purchased the Antec MX-1 and the Seagate 750GB DB35. Hooked them up to my series 3 and did Kickstart 62. Tivo rebooted but never got to the second drive is activated screen. So I hooked the Antec up to my XP machine and it recognized it in "device manager" as a hard drive but when I go to windows explorer there is no drive letter associated with it. Any suggestions? What am I missing?

**Looks like I need to format the drive in computer management. Drive appears to work, must be a case of the bad esata cable.


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## drew00001

BillL said:


> I purchased the Antec MX-1 and the Seagate 750GB DB35. Hooked them up to my series 3 and did Kickstart 62. Tivo rebooted but never got to the second drive is activated screen. So I hooked the Antec up to my XP machine and it recognized it in "device manager" as a hard drive but when I go to windows explorer there is no drive letter associated with it. Any suggestions? What am I missing?
> 
> **Looks like I need to format the drive in computer management. Drive appears to work, must be a case of the bad esata cable.


I have been having problems with my MX-1 too. I planned on "testing" the unit for work before plugging it into my TiVO in a few months (or buying a 2nd Mx-1 if I liked it).

I tried hooking the MX-1 to my "work" computer, using the included SATA to eSATA bracket, and I only got the computer to recognize the drive after fiddling with the power and eSATA cables for a long while.

The next time I rebooted, the computer froze and would not go into the bios screen after several attempts. The computer worked fine once I turned the MX-1 off and rebooted.

Oddly, I plugged the MX-1 into my home computer, with onboard eSATA, and everything is working great.


----------



## richsadams

BillL said:


> I purchased the Antec MX-1 and the Seagate 750GB DB35. Hooked them up to my series 3 and did Kickstart 62. Tivo rebooted but never got to the second drive is activated screen. So I hooked the Antec up to my XP machine and it recognized it in "device manager" as a hard drive but when I go to windows explorer there is no drive letter associated with it. Any suggestions? What am I missing?
> 
> **Looks like I need to format the drive in computer management. Drive appears to work, must be a case of the bad esata cable.


Interesting. It appears that the MX-1's supplied eSATA cable seems to be a hit and miss.


----------



## drew00001

richsadams said:


> Interesting. It appears that the MX-1's supplied eSATA cable seems to be a hit and miss.


Similarly, I think my problem is with the supplied eSATA to SATAII bracket. Any suggestions where to get a good one? I was at Fry's this morning, and this is beyond anything they have.


----------



## richsadams

drew00001 said:


> Similarly, I think my problem is with the supplied eSATA to SATAII bracket. Any suggestions where to get a good one? I was at Fry's this morning, and this is beyond anything they have.


I think I'd go with a USB 2.0 to SATA Adapter instead.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16812186020

http://www.pcmicrostore.com/PartDetail.aspx?q=p:10504271


----------



## drew00001

richsadams said:


> I think I'd go with a USB 2.0 to SATA Adapter instead.
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16812186020
> 
> http://www.pcmicrostore.com/PartDetail.aspx?q=p:10504271


If I am going to use USB, isn't it best just to use a regular USB cable with USB port on the back of the MX-1?


----------



## richsadams

drew00001 said:


> If I am going to use USB, isn't it best just to use a regular USB cable with USB port on the back of the MX-1?


Yes...sorry, I thought you just wanted to hook up the bare drive to your PC. Duh!


----------



## Joe-user21

Update: I have the Antec MX-1 and the Seagate 750GB DB35, which worked fine for about a month, then the Series3 got into a state where it would only freeze and reboot.

I was going to try a new eSata cable, but just went ahead and divorced the drive. That process seemed to go cleanly, but then same problem - Tivo boots and soon freezes.
Managed to get to the "Clear and delete everything" - that also seemed to run ok, but re-did setup, and back to the same problems.
Not sure how thorough a drive format (if at all) C&DE does - but it is possible that my Tivo just died - maybe the internal HD died - independently of the external..

Looks like I'll have to replace it..


----------



## richsadams

Joe-user21 said:


> Update: I have the Antec MX-1 and the Seagate 750GB DB35, which worked fine for about a month, then the Series3 got into a state where it would only freeze and reboot.
> 
> I was going to try a new eSata cable, but just went ahead and divorced the drive. That process seemed to go cleanly, but then same problem - Tivo boots and soon freezes.
> Managed to get to the "Clear and delete everything" - that also seemed to run ok, but re-did setup, and back to the same problems.
> Not sure how thorough a drive format (if at all) C&DE does - but it is possible that my Tivo just died - maybe the internal HD died - independently of the external..
> 
> Looks like I'll have to replace it..


Bummer! I suspect that various problems with TiVo are coincidental to the eSATA expansion...but it's always good to eliminate the obvious first.

You might want to give TiVo one last chance to clean things up using its built-in diagnostics which can be activated via "Kickstart 57".

*Kickstart 57:*

1. Unplug TiVo and wait 15 seconds.
2. Plug TiVo in, get the TiVo remote and aim it at TiVo.
3. Press and hold the pause button until the orange light comes back on by itself.
4. Release the pause button and immediately type in the numbers 5 and 7 on the remote (you have about 10 seconds to do this step).
5. TiVo will reboot and the GSOD screen will come on saying TiVo has encountered a serious error. It will then run the disk management tool which can take from 10 minutes to 3 hours to complete. During this time it will look for and correct configuration problems as well as isolating any bad sectors on the hard drive so they can no longer be used.
6. TiVo will automatically reboot again and hopefully things will return to normal. (Programs that used any bad sectors may be lost.)

If that doesnt work you may want to contact TiVo and see what they suggest. You might want to get an exchange unit or look into replacing your hard drive (very easy to do).


----------



## Joe-user21

Thanks Rich - I didn't know about KS 57 and will try it.

You mentioned replacing the hard drive - this might be a stupid question, but is there a way to do that without having a clean drive to clone? In other words - say my internal HD is dead. I have the 750 GB waiting in the wings. Is there a way to get a "tivo image" (ghost or whatever) and slam it down onto the 750? Any pointers or links would be appreciated. Thanks..

I know I could buy one from Weaknees, but that's a little pricey and I already have a 750GB just sitting idle (I'm pretty sure IT is good - that I can check with diagnostics).

Thanks again..


----------



## Joe-user21

Random P.S. - I have a Series 1 Sony unit, bought the week they rolled into stores, upgraded with a Weaknees drive, that has been running without flaw since day 1. That thing is a tank. I wish the Series3 was as robust..


----------



## drew00001

drew00001 said:


> I have been having problems with my MX-1 too. I planned on "testing" the unit for work before plugging it into my TiVO in a few months (or buying a 2nd Mx-1 if I liked it).
> 
> I tried hooking the MX-1 to my "work" computer, using the included SATA to eSATA bracket, and I only got the computer to recognize the drive after fiddling with the power and eSATA cables for a long while.
> 
> The next time I rebooted, the computer froze and would not go into the bios screen after several attempts. The computer worked fine once I turned the MX-1 off and rebooted.
> 
> Oddly, I plugged the MX-1 into my home computer, with onboard eSATA, and everything is working great.


I was able to fix the problem by adding a eSATA PCIE adapter. This was an expensive part . . . . I would have prefered not to add it, but the eSATA bracket that came with the MX-1 was useless. It didn't seem like I was getting any signal at all.


----------



## richsadams

Joe-user21 said:


> Thanks Rich - I didn't know about KS 57 and will try it.
> 
> You mentioned replacing the hard drive - this might be a stupid question, but is there a way to do that without having a clean drive to clone? In other words - say my internal HD is dead. I have the 750 GB waiting in the wings. Is there a way to get a "tivo image" (ghost or whatever) and slam it down onto the 750? Any pointers or links would be appreciated. Thanks..
> 
> I know I could buy one from Weaknees, but that's a little pricey and I already have a 750GB just sitting idle (I'm pretty sure IT is good - that I can check with diagnostics).
> 
> Thanks again..


If you can remove your current drive and get it to spin up while connected to a P.C. you can indeed copy the proper files over (you don't need to pre-format your drive).

This link is a good place to start.


----------



## cab2

my external drive died??? Anyone else having a problem? I got the screen of death this am when I looked at the unit. I noticed even the clock was not showing. Turned things on to find the message about the external hard drive has stopped working. I'm guessing it's just me, but want to make sure it's not some global thing like Tivo flipping some sort of switch?

I have a Seagate Free Agent Pro 500 gig drive, with all the proper connections and cables, etc. As far as I can tell, the drive is fine, but I don't have an esata port on my pc to test it with. All attempts to unplug, replug, reboot, etc on the tivo were for not. I finally had to do the divorce and see if that will fix it. Crossing my fingers. This will be the 4th or 5th time since hooking up the external drive that the tivo has said there is a problem with the external drive. It's always come back after doing it's maintenance thing, but this time, I couldn't get there from here. Harumph. I know it's not a supported feature yet, but it sure was nice to have that extra space. I just hope the divorce works cleanly. I've had the external drive since about a month after the hack was announced. Except for the few 'problems' screens, it's worked like a champ. I guess maybe I'll wait until they announce at this point. Any suggestions?


----------



## greg_burns

cab2 said:


> I guess maybe I'll wait until they announce at this point. Any suggestions?


Can you put a different drive in that Free Agent Pro? Can you take the current drive out and test it in a PC using Seagates diagnostic software?

I've had zero problems with my Antec MX-1 w/ a 500GB WD drive.


----------



## cab2

greg_burns said:


> Can you put a different drive in that Free Agent Pro? Can you take the current drive out and test it in a PC using Seagates diagnostic software?
> 
> I've had zero problems with my Antec MX-1 w/ a 500GB WD drive.


I suppose, I could put another drive in the seagate inclosure, but what I remember of the shell, it wouldn't be an easy thing without breaking the case? I'd have to look at the case in good light, and thats not where it sits now in the HT setup.

Yea, the antec thing is starting to look good, just hate the idea of spending more money all over again.

I can't run the seagate diagnostics since I don't have a esata card in my pc. Opening my old pc and adding something new is an uncomfortable adventure in itself.  I really need to build myself a new pc, but then moving all that software and what not, ugh! I run xp on the main pc and have all the stuff needed to go to vista (inclucing the os), and just don't for that very reason. Building / setup of the pc itself is only a few hours, re-doing all the software and making things work like they do now, is days. Just not up for that effort.


----------



## greg_burns

cab2 said:


> I can't run the seagate diagnostics since I don't have a esata card in my pc.


I was thinking if you had removed the drive you could connect it via a sata port (not eSata) in your PC. If it is too old, it probably wont have one though.


----------



## dougdingle

cab2 said:


> Yea, the antec thing is starting to look good, just hate the idea of spending more money all over again.


People with Antec cases are also having problems (like me, for instance). I installed my external drive on August 4th, and since then the system has frozen and rebooted three times (last night being the latest).

A lot of people who post here have found the external drive setup to be unstable, while some have had no problems at all.

I just ordered the SIIG eSATA cable to see if that improves things. If it does not, I'm brooming the external drive and buying the 1TB Hitachi to put inside the S3 box.

So don't think of the Antec case as a cure-all, because it's not.


----------



## richsadams

It's true that the S3 can become unstable when an eSATA drive is connected. As mentioned, adding an eSATA drive is unsupported by TiVo and IMHO for good reason. The current setup (be it software, hardware or a combination of both) is not designed to support it at this time. However as pointed out, many people have been using them without a problem. Ours (MX-1 w/500GB DB35) has been connected since May 12th and we've never experienced a reboot, GSOD, etc.

There's about five months of historical data concerning the use of the Antec MX-1 enclosure and Seagate DB35 7200.3 series HDD combination for TiVo eSATA drive expansion on this thread now. This setup seems to receive the least amount of "complaints". There have been a few issues and almost all have been isolated to a bad eSATA cable and I believe one bad drive and one bad enclosure if my running count is correct. 

Other drive and enclosure combinations have not fared as well however and some of the Free Agent Pros have had their share of problems (again, eSATA cables often curing some issues). Unfortunately the FAP cases are sealed and opening them voids the warranty.

Other issues appear to point to the fact that the current S3 software becomes unstable when the system fills up with "temporary files". Some have found additional stability by keeping their Recently Deleted folder low or empty and their SP's and WL's reduced as well.

Were I to do it again Id probably pop the case and upgrade the internal driveand/or wait for the TiVo software upgrade and branded eSATA drive to hit the market for even more real estate. But were happy with the additional space we have now, even though it means keeping an eye on things a little more than Id like sometimes.


----------



## A J Ricaud

richsadams said:


> Ours (MX-1 w/500GB DB35) has been connected since May 12th and we've never experienced a reboot, GSOD, etc.


My 2 Kingwin Jet enclosures/500GB Seagates (non-DB35) have been working fine since May 7. So far, so good.


----------



## richsadams

A J Ricaud said:


> My 2 Kingwin Jet enclosures/500GB Seagates (non-DB35) have been working fine since May 7. So far, so good.


Excellent!! :up:


----------



## fred2

My FAP drive has a usb connection as well as the esata. Do you have usb on your and your computer?

(edit): I might as well add that on Sat I moved my Tivo, and FAP into an armoire without any hitches so far. I powered down the Tivo (it seems so ungraceful to yank its plug but that's how I did it) and then unplugged the FAP's esata cable. Moved those items as well as the dvd player and the Monoprice hdmi switchbox. Stuff seems to be working two days later. So far I've left the doors open since I don't have any IR (or rf) extenders and to avoid heat build up. I figure I will test another day or two and then while home close the doors with stuff running and see what happens with the temperature.


----------



## John Songer

My two cents:

My Western Digital DVD Expander arrived tonight (WDG1S5000), and now I have 98 hours of HD.

For those interested, the WD DVD Expander is marketed as being designed for the Scientific Atlanta box and is thus 24/7 capable, and is a real easy 500GB upgrade for the S3. $200.

My only complaint is that I had to settle for 500GB... I would have preferred 1TB.


----------



## cab2

Well, in my case, the divorce I guess worked. I lost all but 2 programs I had saved on the 2 drives. Those 2 programs were from early april i think. sigh! Since everything was gone, i thought I would try to hook up the FAP again and see if tivo still complained. Hooked everything up again, and no complaints from the tivo box, but of course all the files that were on the FAP were gone. Will see how things go. If it craps out again, I'll disconnect the FAP and wait for the external drive to be fully supported.

And no, my FAP does not have a usb port on it. At least I don't think it does. I'll look sometime this week. I do have the proper esata cable. I had to go to a local vendor and get the right cable.


----------



## zob

richsadams said:


> I tend to agree with you about there being issues with the back door hack we're using to connect an eSATA drive to the TiVo S3. However I'm not convinced that it's actually a TiVo problem.
> 
> Everyone that owns a TiVo S3 owns essentially the same box running the same software, using the same firmware, etc. The real variables here are the untold different combinations of cablecos, cable cards and the peripherals connected to TiVo itself. In addition everyone uses their TiVo differently; different ways of watching live/recorded shows, wish lists, season passes, HD Vs SD and on and on.
> 
> There are a dozen plus eSATA drives "experiments" being used that are connected with all sorts of cables and placed in all kinds of situations...HT's, unventilated cabinets, on the top of fish tanks and who knows what. Then there are the other components including televisions, receivers, surge protectors, UPS, broadband networks, wi-fi, phone lines, etc. not to mention the methods of connecting TiVo to those components. There are plenty of posts on other threads about TiVo not playing nice or having problems which have nothing to do with the eSATA port.
> 
> My gut feeling is that the combination of various drives being employed and the different variations of end-user situations are the key to external drives working flawlessly for months (as in our case) or causing problems either immediately or at a future date when some other unknown brings on a glitch or failure. In the end TiVo is a computer and we all have the same one. Who hasnt added something new to their computer and not run into problems at some point? (Apple folks need not chime in!  )
> 
> TiVo is beta testing eSATA now and is slated to deliver a software upgrade and their own external drive to support the feature. I suspect a lot of these problems will either be rectified at that time or perhaps it will render all of what we've done to date useless.  Let's hope it's the former.


We are enterting the new season premiers very soon, it would be nice to know if we are going loose all of our upcoming recordings on the next upgrade. I personally have not experienced any real problems as of today.


----------



## fred2

Re: Season premiers

The only way to almost guarantee no loss would be to disable the esata drive with a divorce and hope you can fit all the premiers on your current single drive??? 

Hopefully, Tivo will not create a lot of angry folks who will have plenty of time to vent if they lose their premier shows.


----------



## richsadams

Anyone have a spare crystal ball?!


----------



## larrs

cab2 said:


> Well, in my case, the divorce I guess worked. I lost all but 2 programs I had saved on the 2 drives. Those 2 programs were from early april i think. sigh! Since everything was gone, i thought I would try to hook up the FAP again and see if tivo still complained. Hooked everything up again, and no complaints from the tivo box, but of course all the files that were on the FAP were gone. Will see how things go. If it craps out again, I'll disconnect the FAP and wait for the external drive to be fully supported.
> 
> And no, my FAP does not have a usb port on it. At least I don't think it does. I'll look sometime this week. I do have the proper esata cable. I had to go to a local vendor and get the right cable.


All FAP's have USB and eSata on them.


----------



## Televisionary

dougdingle said:


> People with Antec cases are also having problems (like me, for instance). I installed my external drive on August 4th, and since then the system has frozen and rebooted three times (last night being the latest).
> 
> A lot of people who post here have found the external drive setup to be unstable, while some have had no problems at all.
> 
> I just ordered the SIIG eSATA cable to see if that improves things. If it does not, I'm brooming the external drive and buying the 1TB Hitachi to put inside the S3 box.
> 
> So don't think of the Antec case as a cure-all, because it's not.


My experience is similar to yours. I put a 750G Seagate DB35 into an Antec-MX1, and got my first GSOD the next day. That was three weeks ago, and I've had two more GSODs. They typically take only 10 minutes, rather than three hours, to fix whatever serious problem has been detected.

Like you, I suspect the Antec cable. It seems a little, uh, "cost-reduced." Please post your experience with the SIIG eSATA cable!

-T


----------



## dougdingle

Televisionary said:


> My experience is similar to yours. I put a 750G Seagate DB35 into an Antec-MX1, and got my first GSOD the next day. That was three weeks ago, and I've had two more GSODs. They typically take only 10 minutes, rather than three hours, to fix whatever serious problem has been detected.
> 
> Like you, I suspect the Antec cable. It seems a little, uh, "cost-reduced." Please post your experience with the SIIG eSATA cable!
> 
> -T


The cable should be here tomorrow. The longest I've gone between reboots (had another one last night) was 17 days, so results will definitely not be immediate.

Since the original installation on August 4th, I have had 4 reboots, and 2 have resulted in the GSOD (about 10-15 minutes to repair), while the other two just rebooted.

I have fewer than 20 season's passes, a wishlist with 2 items, an empty deleted folder, and about 30 hours total recordings, so I don't think it has anything to do with any of that.


----------



## Nethead28

FYI...

Back about June 19, I hooked up my Seagate 750 db35 + MX-1 with MX-1 supplied cable and in 3 days I got my first and only GSOD. After that I hooked up a 3' SIIG cable instead of the one supplied with the MX-1 and all has been great since. (knock on wood).

So it has been going strong for almost 3 month's. The MX-1 is sitting on top of my S3 and next to my Monoprice HDMI switch. So as stated here before, a good quality cable can make all the difference.


----------



## akessel56

Has anyone used the Seagate 300 GB External eSata 3.0 Drive (ST3300601XS-RK) This drive comes with cable and a pci card to use with a pc if desired.

I've been using it with only one problem, I occassionally, get these pauses while watching tivo, and occassionally in playback.

No reboots or other errrors, just these temporary freezes, which clear up if you hit the forward or back buttons.

Otherwise flawlessly set up with the engadget boot trick.


----------



## shaown

Just picked up the Seagate Free Agent Pro 500gb on sale at BB for 139.99 (had 75 in GCs) ... Ordered the SIGG eSata cable.
-Shaown


----------



## SeattleFred

At the risk of jinxing my good fortune, I thought I ought to report that my Seagate FAP 750 has been running flawlessly since I installed it (with a Tripplite cable) nearly 2 months ago. Having read about the many bad experiences folks have had with this drive, I bought it against my better judgement when it jumped off the shelf at Costco and landed in my cart. (It was just too convenient to pass up.)

My FAP sits on top of my TV stand, hidden behind a 42" Aquos; I decided against keeping it inside the TV stand cabinet to reduce the likelihood of any heat-induced problems.


----------



## sbessel

I see Best Buy just put the external Hitachi 1 TB units back on sale, not for that once great price, but for $299.99 - still better than I have seen online for just the bare drive.

I plan on picking one up today.


----------



## drew00001

sbessel said:


> I see Best Buy just put the external Hitachi 1 TB units back on sale, not for that once great price, but for $299.99 - still better than I have seen online for just the bare drive.
> 
> I plan on picking one up today.


It looks like BB also reduced the Regular Price by $50, to $349. I missted the last sale. When I finally went to BB the drive was being sold for $399.


----------



## Kenji

My replacement Apricorn DVR Xpander arrived today and it and my S3 are on their proverbial honeymoon. Hopefully this marriage will last longer than my S3's first one (grin).


----------



## sbessel

drew00001 said:


> It looks like BB also reduced the Regular Price by $50, to $349. I missted the last sale. When I finally went to BB the drive was being sold for $399.


I just found a Best Buy 10% discount coupon located here: http://www.mommysavesbig.com/printable-coupons/best-buy.pdf

$269 - not a bad deal!


----------



## richsadams

sbessel said:


> I just found a Best Buy 10% discount coupon located here: http://www.mommysavesbig.com/printable-coupons/best-buy.pdf
> 
> $269 - not a bad deal!


Nice :up: Thanks!


----------



## JKay

sbessel said:


> I see Best Buy just put the external Hitachi 1 TB units back on sale, not for that once great price, but for $299.99 - still better than I have seen online for just the bare drive.
> 
> I plan on picking one up today.


That enclosure just has USB so I take it you plan to pop the case and use the drive to replace the S3 drive. I would sure like to hear (or read) how opening the case works out.


----------



## sbessel

JKay said:


> That enclosure just has USB so I take it you plan to pop the case and use the drive to replace the S3 drive. I would sure like to hear (or read) how opening the case works out.


There is a boat load of info posted here about people that have pulled the drive out and put it either inside the S3 or in an external case. I chose an external Antec MX1 case. Took ~15 minutes total time, both cases were *very* simple. This method was actually cheaper than buying the drive by itself online. I now also have an extra USB case, of course I have no idea what I would do with it... of course I could put a brick in it and return it to Best Buy <evil grin>


----------



## richsadams

sbessel said:


> I now also have an extra USB case, of course I have no idea what I would do with it... of course I could put a brick in it and return it to Best Buy <evil grin>


 ROFLMAO   :up:


----------



## bkdtv

John Songer said:


> My two cents:
> 
> My Western Digital DVD Expander arrived tonight (WDG1S5000), and now I have 98 hours of HD.
> 
> For those interested, the WD DVD Expander is marketed as being designed for the Scientific Atlanta box and is thus 24/7 capable, and is a real easy 500GB upgrade for the S3. $200.
> 
> My only complaint is that I had to settle for 500GB... I would have preferred 1TB.


I have also received a fair share of recommendations for this drive.

I have added it the FAQ.


----------



## sirius

The enclosure that I want says ( Support eSATA (external SATA) for transfer speeds up to 1500Mbps) is that the same as 1.5 Gb? Do I want an enclosure that supports 3.0 GB?

Thanks you in advance for everyone's help


----------



## bkdtv

sirius said:


> The enclosure that I want says ( Support eSATA (external SATA) for transfer speeds up to 1500Mbps) is that the same as 1.5 Gb? Do I want an enclosure that supports 3.0 GB?
> 
> Thanks you in advance for everyone's help


It wouldn't matter. The eSATA controller in the Series3 supports a maximum of 1.5Gbps (same as 1500Mbps).


----------



## sirius

Thank you very much for your help


----------



## 1283

sbessel said:


> There is a boat load of info posted here about people that have pulled the drive out and put it either inside the S3 or in an external case.


The warranty is 1 year for the external drive versus 3 years for the bare drive. Once you take the external drive apart, you may have voided the warranty.


----------



## s44

Has anyone tried using the Rosewill RX-358 case? It looks promising, but I haven't found any actual objective reviews (cooling, etc.).


----------



## davidmin

I popped open the Hitachi today, you have to take off the warranty stickers to get to the screws and press down inside on some tabs to open it. I decided to do an internal upgrade since the drive is so huge, and winmfs made it a snap. I just hooked up the old drive and the USB drive and it took about 6 hours to copy.


----------



## immagikman

The set up:
Seagate (DB35) 750GB drive (SATA/300) 
New eSATA cable with longer connector
Antec MX-1
Series 3 Tivo with 8.3.1 software (with the original 250gb drive in it)

The problem. The tivo does not see the drive. The power is on, the MX-1's blue LED is lit but numerous kickstart 62's have not been successful in getting the Series 3 to see the drive.

Any suggestions?


----------



## George Cifranci

immagikman said:


> The set up:
> Seagate (DB35) 750GB drive (SATA/300)
> New eSATA cable with longer connector
> Antec MX-1
> Series 3 Tivo with 8.3.1 software
> 
> The problem. The tivo does not see the drive. The power is on, the MX-1's blue LED is lit but numerous kickstart 62's have not been successful in getting the Series 3 to see the drive.
> 
> Any suggestions?


And you are still using the original 250GB internal drive correct?


----------



## immagikman

Yeah still using the original drive
if this eSATA thing isn't stable I'll probably just swap the 750 for the 250 but thats a last resort.


----------



## richsadams

immagikman said:


> The set up:
> Seagate (DB35) 750GB drive (SATA/300)
> New eSATA cable with longer connector
> Antec MX-1
> Series 3 Tivo with 8.3.1 software (with the original 250gb drive in it)
> 
> The problem. The tivo does not see the drive. The power is on, the MX-1's blue LED is lit but numerous kickstart 62's have not been successful in getting the Series 3 to see the drive.
> 
> Any suggestions?


We have the same setup and all went well the very first time. I'm sure you've followed the directions carefully...but just in case.

1. Order of connections (important): go to TiVo Central > Messages & Settings > Reset/Restart > Restart > press thumbs down 3x > Enter > at "Powering up screen" unplug TiVo > plug the eSATA cable into the new drive and into TiVo (firm connection both ends) > plug the eSATA drive into electrical > plug TiVo in

2. Perform Kickstart 62 per instructions  (carefully and exactly).

3. Try the eSATA cable supplied with the MX-1?

Let us know if it's doing anything other than powering up normally.


----------



## greg_burns

richsadams said:


> 3. Try the eSATA cable supplied with the MX-1?


I was going to give the same advice. At least as a test.


----------



## richsadams

greg_burns said:


> I was going to give the same advice. At least as a test.


Great minds think alike.  We're actually using the eSATA cable that came with the MX-1 and everything has been flawless since May 12th. However I've read several posts about the supplied cable being questionable. I have a "backup" sitting here just in case.

P.S. Cool avatar! Makes my eyes red just looking at it.


----------



## larrs

my local BB has the MX-1 on sale for $58.99. With all of the show premiers starting soon (first up: Prison Break on Monday), I think I need more space. Since I kept my original drive, I am thinking about changing out the current upgrade for the original and putting the current 500GB DB35 in the external case. Is it worth the trouble for another 30 hours (I ONLY watch HD on the S3)?

Opinions?


----------



## stmckin

FAP (Free Agent Pro) 500 works fine for me.... ($139.99 at Besy Buy)

- plugged in the drive, turned it on, and connected with 6ft eSata2 ($12 curiously NOT available at Best Buy) cable while the S3 was still running
- did a restart with the 3 thumbs down using the remote
- imemdiately held down the pause button until only an orange light was showing
- immediately pressed "6" waited one second then pressed "2"
- made sandwich and ate a couple of chips until I heard the THX sound
- looked at system information: 98 hours HD almost 1000 SD

cool, thanks to all for the instructions


----------



## larrs

Well- I put my old drive back in and bought the MX-1 from BB. We'll see how it works out tomorrow (downloading service update right now).


----------



## sirius

I received my external case and HD yesterday and my Esata cable arrives on Monday.

One of the things I have read is to make sure the Esata cable is not twisted. My external drive will be sitting on top of my TicoHD series 3, but the Esata cable will be 1 meter in length. Is it ok to leave the excess cable folded the way it is shipped, or is it better to let the cable hang loose.

Thank you for all of you help.


----------



## jlib

Compliant  eSATA cables are all coaxially well shielded so there would be no auto-interference from a coiled cable. Better that than having the cable dangle in parallel with AC power cables.


----------



## philwojo

Well I too took the plunge and went with a FAP 750, gonna see what happens. Install was no problem, worked on the first try.

I did try and disable the settings on the drive as stated in the 1st post for "Spin down", and I also turned off the lights. Had to hook it up to my PC first to do that, but after I powered it down and moved it from the PC to the TV, the light is now back on. So, not sure if the changes I made were saved or not.

I have left it out of my enclosed cabinet, and put in on the stand behind my TV.

Phil


----------



## ckelly33

I disconnected my FAP 750 today. I've decided to go single-drive. Although I've enjoyed it since the first week it was enabled, it became unstable - leading to TiVo restarts and crashes. TiVo replaced one unit thinking it was the TiVo itself but the new unit started in with the same problems after 1 week. 

I tried to turn on the Titans-Colts game today and the TiVo was on the "Powering Up" screen and then went black, then I got the GSOD and then the process repeated 4 times in a row before I just decided to pull the plug on the FAP. After that, the TiVo started up right away...it's only been an hour so we'll see if problems continue at all but I have a strong feeling I have just said goodbye to these inconsistencies since I never had them before.

I had to get this settled before the fall season begins or my wife will kill me.


----------



## bkdtv

philwojo said:


> Well I too took the plunge and went with a FAP 750, gonna see what happens. Install was no problem, worked on the first try.
> 
> I did try and disable the settings on the drive as stated in the 1st post for "Spin down", and I also turned off the lights. Had to hook it up to my PC first to do that, but after I powered it down and moved it from the PC to the TV, the light is now back on. So, not sure if the changes I made were saved or not.
> 
> I have left it out of my enclosed cabinet, and put in on the stand behind my TV.


Anyone else think I should put a stronger warning in the FAQ for the FAP750? I know many members are using that successfully, but it's also caused problems for _many_.

As per the FAQ, the Western Digital My DVR Expander is the only recommended pre-packaged solution right now. It is the only external solution I would buy if you don't build your own.


----------



## larrs

bkdtv said:


> Anyone else think I should put a stronger warning in the FAQ for the FAP750? I know many members are using that successfully, but it's also caused problems for _many_.
> 
> As per the FAQ, the Western Digital My DVR Expander is the only recommended pre-packaged solution right now. It is the only external solution I would buy if you don't build your own.


The FAP just wasn't designed for this. IMHO it has to do with heat problems. I'll bet a drive removed from an FAP and put in a MX1 or Apricorn case would work. But I am sure that would void your warranty.


----------



## jfh3

bkdtv said:


> Anyone else think I should put a stronger warning in the FAQ for the FAP750? I know many members are using that successfully, but it's also caused problems for _many_.
> 
> As per the FAQ, the Western Digital My DVR Expander is the only recommended pre-packaged solution right now. It is the only external solution I would buy if you don't build your own.


I think there should be a stronger warning, based on my own experience and those that I've read.


----------



## richsadams

jfh3 said:


> I think there should be a stronger warning, based on my own experience and those that I've read.


+1 :up:


----------



## ckelly33

larrs said:


> The FAP just wasn't designed for this. IMHO it has to do with heat problems. I'll bet a drive removed from an FAP and put in a MX1 or Apricorn case would work. But I am sure that would void your warranty.


At least in my case, I don't think that heat was an issue. My components are all in a closet which is cooled by a fan. The FAP was the closest component to the fan (it sat directly under it) and was never even warm to touch but was usually cool.

For what it's worth, I chose the FAP because it was 1) relatively cheap and 2) given only a mild warning on this site, thus I took a "probably won't happen to me stance". Nothing is worse than having the TiVo real estate filled with movies just to have to remove it. Out of probably 30-40 HD movies, I was left with 1 after I remove the HDD....I was hoping for more 

I vote for a stonger warning.


----------



## philwojo

As Ckelly just said I bought it based on only mild warnings, and posts that said how well it is working for them.

Maybe I will take it back and go the build it yourself route before the new season really kicks in to gear.

Phil


----------



## philwojo

OK so I just put in an order for a Seagate DB35 750GB drive and an Antec MX-1 enclosure from thenerds.net With shipping for both it is $313.

I will disconnect my FAP tonight and return it to Fry's.

Phil


----------



## immagikman

richsadams said:


> We have the same setup and all went well the very first time. I'm sure you've followed the directions carefully...but just in case.
> 
> 1. Order of connections (important): go to TiVo Central > Messages & Settings > Reset/Restart > Restart > press thumbs down 3x > Enter > at "Powering up screen" unplug TiVo > plug the eSATA cable into the new drive and into TiVo (firm connection both ends) > plug the eSATA drive into electrical > plug TiVo in
> Done
> 
> 2. Perform Kickstart 62 (carefully and exactly).
> Done
> 
> 3. Try the eSATA cable supplied with the MX-1?
> Done
> 
> Let us know if it's doing anything other than powering up normally.


*
The Tivo acts as if it has never had the eSATA drive attached. I have ordered the SIIG cable online so will have to wait to update everyone.*


----------



## richsadams

immagikman said:


> *
> The Tivo acts as if it has never had the eSATA drive attached. I have ordered the SIIG cable online so will have to wait to update everyone.*


Hmmmm... 

I can't remember...losing track here sometimes...but did you ever have an eSATA drive connected or is this the first one? I ask because at least one person disconnected their eSATA drive but didn't go through the proper divorce procedure and they couldn't get a new setup connected (same symptoms as you have) w/o divorcing the old one.


----------



## ev007

It'd be nice if there was an external eSATA raid that would work. Anyone know of one that will use 4 drives and run raid 5 or so? Oh, and not be noisy... that's important too.

Thanks!


----------



## philwojo

I saw a link for a Buffalo one at thenerds.net and it has 4 250GB HDs in it. It was like $450 shipped, not sure what if any raid type it was running. It had esata and usb connections and used sata drives if I remember right, but I just glanced.

Phil


----------



## eDbolson

bkdtv said:


> Anyone else think I should put a stronger warning in the FAQ for the FAP750? I know many members are using that successfully, but it's also caused problems for _many_.


I have not had a problem in the many months (middle of June) that my FAP750 has been running. It is really hot to the touch and has been the entire time.

When I first installed it, I had the usual cable problem. I stripped back the short cable end(s) and the cable fits very securely into the Series 3 and the Seagate drive. I have had no reboots that I've witnessed, although there must have been at least one since I lost my 30 sec skip awhile ago.

As far as I can tell, I have never had a missed recording or problem that I can attribute to this drive. I feel lucky, especially since I would lose 100's of hours of saved recordings. Boy I wish there was a way to archive them!


----------



## jlib

philwojo said:


> I saw a link for a Buffalo one at thenerds.net and it has 4 250GB HDs in it. It was like $450 shipped, not sure what if any raid type it was running. It had esata and usb connections and used sata drives if I remember right, but I just glanced.


The Buffalo DriveStation Quattro has the requisite hardware based RAID (no operating system drivers needed) and they even boast of a quiet fan (normally not an important spec for most clueless manufacturers). It does RAID 0/1/5/JBOD. RAID 5 would give you 750GB redundant capacity. There is also a 4 x 500GB version (1.5TB RAID 5). It is unfortunate it does not come bare. You have to use the drives they install which means you would have to tediously disassemble the unit to remove the drives, attach them individually to a PC to reset the acoustic setting (assuming they are not Seagate drives), and then reinstall them. This kind of device is only of value for someone who perceives a need for data redundancy or who wants more than 1TB in one unit. It should work in either the internal TiVo SATA port or the external one.


----------



## ev007

jlib said:


> It is unfortunate it does not come bare. You have to use the drives they install which means you would have to tediously disassemble the unit to remove the drives, attach them individually to a PC to reset the acoustic setting (assuming they are not Seagate drives), and then reinstall them. This kind of device is only of value for someone who perceives a need for data redundancy or who wants more than 1TB in one unit. It should work in either the internal TiVo SATA port or the external one.


That's less than ideal. I am assuming that, even if so inclined, you could not replace the internal drives with larger ones. I would guess thier software does not support that.

Thank you all for the suggestions tho...


----------



## sirius

I just set up my external esata drive. Here is the set up I am trying.

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16822136144

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16817256025

http://www.newegg.com/product/product.asp?item=N82E16812191016

I don't think this set up has been tried yet. So far everything is stable and the case is cool to the touch. wish me luck


----------



## jlib

sirius said:


> ...I don't think this set up has been tried yet. So far everything is stable and the case is cool to the touch. wish me luck


 The Western Digital Caviar RE2 is a superb drive for DVR use once acoustically detuned. It also has by default a desirable lazy error correction algorithm since it is intended for RAID use (where you don't want the individual drives fighting the RAID chip over error correction) so in standalone use with a TiVo it will never hang up trying to continually re-read an error like a normal drive might. Since it is not calculating your income tax refund you don't really care if it drops a frame from the Dukes of Hazzard.


----------



## naclone

What is the latest, if anything, on a TiVo eSATA product offering? I'm getting itchy to try one of the unsanctioned options but if TiVo is making any noise at all about releasing an official device that is "guaranteed" to be stable and not nuke 750GBs of programming after a few months, than I'd prefer to wait it out. After spending $800 on an S3 I can't justify another $300-$400 expanding and having it not be near 100% reliable. Especially if TiVo were to disable the unsanctioned options once they release their own (which I wouldn't expect they would do, but you never know).


----------



## jlib

ev007 said:


> That's less than ideal. I am assuming that, even if so inclined, you could not replace the internal drives with larger ones. I would guess their software does not support that.


If you were inclined you could probably change the drives but you are already paying for the drives they provide. By software you probably mean firmware (since there are no software drivers involved). It is possible but not likely there would be any drive limitations in their firmware. But really, with affordable 1GB drives arriving from all the manufacturers there is not much need for such a multi-drive solution.


----------



## dkahs23

Are the new HD-Tivo's supporting this now?


----------



## drew00001

dkahs23 said:


> Are the new HD-Tivo's supporting this now?


Nope. Tivo never supported this for the S3 either, but people in this community figured out the activation procedure for eSata, which is not available for THD.

Spike25 has a workaround in his thread, but I would recomend upgrading the internal drive first via his method - over any eSATA alternative.


----------



## immagikman

To Recap:

_The set up:
Seagate (DB35) 750GB drive (SATA/300) 
New eSATA cable with longer connector
Antec MX-1
Series 3 Tivo with 8.3.1 software (with the original 250gb drive in it)_

* Ordered the 1meter SIIG cable that someone here reccomended and all is well.
I now see 130 hours of HD programming or 1600 low def. So now I have a total of 1TB attached to the Series 3.

My problem was apparently the cable supplied with the MX-1 enclosure.
Thanks guys for the encouragement and helping me keep at it till I got it right.*


----------



## richsadams

immagikman said:


> To Recap:
> 
> _The set up:
> Seagate (DB35) 750GB drive (SATA/300)
> New eSATA cable with longer connector
> Antec MX-1
> Series 3 Tivo with 8.3.1 software (with the original 250gb drive in it)_
> 
> * Ordered the 1meter SIIG cable that someone here reccomended and all is well.
> I now see 130 hours of HD programming or 1600 low def. So now I have a total of 1TB attached to the Series 3.
> 
> My problem was apparently the cable supplied with the MX-1 enclosure.
> Thanks guys for the encouragement and helping me keep at it till I got it right.*


Excellent! :up:


----------



## dscoob

I want to increase the hard drive on my stock S3 and I've read through the posts here. Seems like the WD My DVR Expander is a good solution, but I searched the archives and didn't find any info, other than in the FAQ. Has anyone successfully used this with the S3? Is it plug and play, no software install needed? Seems like WD is the only place to get it online. Is it sold by any reputable online dealers for less than $199? I'm leaning to some of the posters who say external drives aren't stable yet until officially supported, and to wait until they are. Is the WD My DVR any more stable than the do-it-yourself solutions?

I'd like to wait to get the official Tivo external hard drive, but who knows when that is coming out. Anyone have any guesses?

Or I could upgrade the internal drive... I was thinking of going with a Weakness replacement to just skip all the hassles. But $400 or $600 for a 750/1TB drive is a lot. I'd pay $100-200 extra for the confidence factor and having everything internal.

I'm confused....


----------



## richsadams

dscoob said:


> I want to increase the hard drive on my stock S3 and I've read through the posts here. Seems like the WD My DVR Expander is a good solution, but I searched the archives and didn't find any info, other than in the FAQ. Has anyone successfully used this with the S3? Is it plug and play, no software install needed? Seems like WD is the only place to get it online. Is it sold by any reputable online dealers for less than $199? I'm leaning to some of the posters who say external drives aren't stable yet until officially supported, and to wait until they are. Is the WD My DVR any more stable than the do-it-yourself solutions?
> 
> I'd like to wait to get the official Tivo external hard drive, but who knows when that is coming out. Anyone have any guesses?
> 
> Or I could upgrade the internal drive... I was thinking of going with a Weakness replacement to just skip all the hassles. But $400 or $600 for a 750/1TB drive is a lot. I'd pay $100-200 extra for the confidence factor and having everything internal.
> 
> I'm confused....


The WD DVR drive is quite new but I do believe at least one person here is using it. AFAIK there's no reason that it would be any more or less stable than any other drive however it does not have a fan so it would need a fully ventilated location to prevent overheating. Plug and play? No. But it's fairly easy to activate on an S3...read the first post on this thread. Not sure where to buy them.

No one knows when TiVo will officially support the eSATA feature although someone let it slip that they were beta testing it a few months ago. Some have guessed that it might be ready by year end...perhaps a new TiVo branded eSATA drive will be this year's stocking stuffer.

If you decided to go with a larger internal HDD you could buy a pre-formatted drive from Weaknees, the TiVo Store (or other vendors) or you could buy a bare drive and do it yourself (easy if you don't mind opening your TiVo and a PC).

Bottom line? If youre the nervous type and dont want to risk losing any of the new seasons showseither do an internal upgrade and/or wait until TiVo supports the eSATA feature.


----------



## fred2

One would have thought that the new Fall Season would have been a great time to introduce an official Tivo Esata solution as folks stock up on the new offerings. A missed opportunity. Stocking stuffer would seem to be the next good timing.


----------



## Bighouse

My hunch is that they will enable it officially when they do the roll-out of TTG and MRV in November.


----------



## ev007

jlib said:


> If you were inclined you could probably change the drives but you are already paying for the drives they provide. By software you probably mean firmware (since there are no software drivers involved). It is possible but not likely there would be any drive limitations in their firmware. But really, with affordable 1GB drives arriving from all the manufacturers there is not much need for such a multi-drive solution.


Actually I do mean software. There's a host setup application for the Buffalo that seems to establish the raid levels, etc. It seems to scan the drives and do some validation on them. I'm sure it writes that information to the firmware of the device after the initial setup.

Buying additional drives does seem like a huge waste... I wish more manufacturers offered "0TB" options. I know it bumps their profit margins to integrate drives, and may offer an advantage to less technically inclined customers, but to me the value is limited at best.

I'll be glad when the 1TB drives become more standard across the industry. I have a Hitachi in my Tivo now and it works great. My main concerns are drive failure and HD recording size. Call it overkill and over-engineering, but I will almost always prefer a solution that increases reliability and predictability.


----------



## jlib

ev007 said:


> Actually I do mean software. There's a host setup application for the Buffalo that seems to establish the raid levels, etc. It seems to scan the drives and do some validation on them. I'm sure it writes that information to the firmware of the device after the initial setup.


Ah, I see. So, you would need to configure the RAID on your PC rather than sliding a switch on the back of the box. Then indeed they _could_ be evil and limit drives to the ones they provide.


----------



## Joe-user21

Hi - UPDATE to my saga - 
RECAP: Awhile ago I put a 750GB DB35 into an MX-1, and did kickstart 62 on a stock Series3. Worked fine - not one freeze or GSOD - for about a month, then Tivo went into a mode where it would reboot and then freeze. Divorced the drive cleanly, but Tivo would still boot and freeze. Could have been a coincidence that Tivo #1 died, could've been the eSata, who knows?
Tivo ended up doing the $49 replacement for me. 
I ran Tivo #2 a little while to burn it in, then just today upgraded the internal. Sorry, the eSata hack is just a little too hinky..
I'd run it enough to gather some programs, so I figured I'd try the WinMFS full drive copy. Worked like a charm!
I ran the 750 in the MX-1 via USB 2.0, and the Tivo 250 GB via an internal Sata off the motherboard. My box boots with a 250 GB Maxtor Sata, and I left it on (hey, I wanted to try the Windows version!)
WinMFS works well - indeed, it ignores Windows-mounted drives by default, so there was no confusion which 250 it was seeing. Saw the 250 and the 750 (it doesn't care if they are Sata or USB) - I picked the 250 as the source, then MfsCopy, then picked the 750, then go.. Took a little over 3 hours on a 3gHz dual-core.
Note to users: WinMFS will "blank out its window" if you move it or a screen saver kicks in. So just watch the drive light or Task Manager to ensure it's still going and not hung. It will tell you when it's done, and ask if you want to expand (of course you do!) (memo to WinMFS author: can we see a new rev handling PAINT msg in a separate thread or using a delegate or whatever? Thanks!)

Bottom line: WinMFS works great doing a full disk copy to retain all programs. Going from the stock 250 to a 750 took 3 h 10 mins on a 3 gHz box.

Cheers -


----------



## jfh3

Anyone have any experience with the new Western Digital 1TB Eco Friendly Caviar GP Hard Drive or understand the specs enough to know whether it would be a reasonable drive for Tivo use (either internal or external) or more accurately, know of any reason it WOULDN'T be a good choice?


----------



## 1283

jfh3 said:


> Anyone have any experience with the new Western Digital 1TB Eco Friendly Caviar GP Hard Drive


Just finished upgrading one of my S3s with that drive (internal, from WD5000YS). Low temperature and extremely quiet.


----------



## richsadams

Joe-user21 said:


> Hi - UPDATE to my saga -
> RECAP: Awhile ago I put a 750GB DB35 into an MX-1, and did kickstart 62 on a stock Series3. Worked fine - not one freeze or GSOD - for about a month, then Tivo went into a mode where it would reboot and then freeze. Divorced the drive cleanly, but Tivo would still boot and freeze. Could have been a coincidence that Tivo #1 died, could've been the eSata, who knows?
> Tivo ended up doing the $49 replacement for me.
> I ran Tivo #2 a little while to burn it in, then just today upgraded the internal. Sorry, the eSata hack is just a little too hinky..
> I'd run it enough to gather some programs, so I figured I'd try the WinMFS full drive copy. Worked like a charm!
> I ran the 750 in the MX-1 via USB 2.0, and the Tivo 250 GB via an internal Sata off the motherboard. My box boots with a 250 GB Maxtor Sata, and I left it on (hey, I wanted to try the Windows version!)
> WinMFS works well - indeed, it ignores Windows-mounted drives by default, so there was no confusion which 250 it was seeing. Saw the 250 and the 750 (it doesn't care if they are Sata or USB) - I picked the 250 as the source, then MfsCopy, then picked the 750, then go.. Took a little over 3 hours on a 3gHz dual-core.
> Note to users: WinMFS will "blank out its window" if you move it or a screen saver kicks in. So just watch the drive light or Task Manager to ensure it's still going and not hung. It will tell you when it's done, and ask if you want to expand (of course you do!) (memo to WinMFS author: can we see a new rev handling PAINT msg in a separate thread or using a delegate or whatever? Thanks!)
> 
> Bottom line: WinMFS works great doing a full disk copy to retain all programs. Going from the stock 250 to a 750 took 3 h 10 mins on a 3 gHz box.
> 
> Cheers -


Awesome and well done! :up: Our eSATA is still plugging along just fine with no issues what-so-ever...but I'll be a little more comfortable once TiVo starts supporting it. Thanks for the update!


----------



## jfh3

c3 said:


> Just finished upgrading one of my S3s with that drive (internal, from WD5000YS). Low temperature and extremely quiet.


Any thoughts on performance? You see anything that says this drive wouldn't be a good choice for a Tivo drive?


----------



## 1283

jfh3 said:


> Any thoughts on performance? You see anything that says this drive wouldn't be a good choice for a Tivo drive?


I don't know how to judge "performance". Any of today's drives should be able to handle 3 HD streams with room to spare. With its temperature and acoustic characteristics, I would say the WD GP line is absolutely the best drive available now, and probably for the near future as well.

I know this is an external drive thread, but I would highly recommend a one-drive system for higher reliability.


----------



## SAH2

c3 said:


> Just finished upgrading one of my S3s with that drive (internal, from WD5000YS). Low temperature and extremely quiet.


Did you use the same model that is on sale at BB? Did you have to run accoustical management? I am looking for a 1TB that I can use for an internal upgrade that doesn't require AM, as I will be using the USB to eSata cables, and have no native Sata connection on my laptop to be able to run AM

Thanks.


----------



## 1283

SAH2 said:


> Did you use the same model that is on sale at BB? Did you have to run accoustical management? I am looking for a 1TB that I can use for an internal upgrade that doesn't require AM, as I will be using the USB to eSata cables, and have no native Sata connection on my laptop to be able to run AM


Yes, the one from BB, and I had to change the AAM setting. Don't know if AAM can be changed through the USB interface.


----------



## JKay

Today I went over to BestBuy and got one of those WD I TB Green drives they have on sale. I just stuck a WD 750 in my S3, but I could not pass up this 1 TB drive. I am in the process of blessing it with my original WD 250 drive as I type this.

I used the Hitachi hard drive utility to activate AAM on the 1 TB WD and started up the Linux conversion routine. When I ran this Bumwine routine on the 250 to the 750 conversion a few weeks ago I noticed that both drives got so hot they were uncomfortable to hold. 

I am about 40 minutes into this conversion and the new 1 TB Western Digital drive is noticeably cooler than the original WD 250 drive. Western Digitals claim that this new drive runs cooler seems to hold up. Now I am just hoping it is quiet and has some endurance.


----------



## jlib

Users using USB-to-SATA convertors who might have difficulty successfully running the pre-USB DOS-based Hitach Feature Tool might try the hdparm command from any Linux boot disk instead (such as the MFSLive Boot CD).


----------



## larrs

larrs said:


> Well- I put my old drive back in and bought the MX-1 from BB. We'll see how it works out tomorrow (downloading service update right now).


FYI- my setup with the MX-1, DB35 and MX-1 orignial cable has worked flawlessly for almost two weeks now. As the multitude of new season passes starts to fill up the drives, I'll pay close attention to the performance. Just in case, I turned off the Tivo suggestions.

BTW, Best Buy has the MX-1 for $49.99 this week (I went in yesterday and got the difference back between that and the $58 I paid).


----------



## jsnow789

I just successfully installed the Apricorn 1TB DVR Xpander... now what should I expect. I saw something about the power supplies going bad?


----------



## richsadams

jsnow789 said:


> I just successfully installed the Apricorn 1TB DVR Xpander... now what should I expect. I saw something about the power supplies going bad?


The Apricorn power supply issue seems to have been cleared up a while back so you should only expect to...watch even more TV!


----------



## jsnow789

richsadams said:


> The Apricorn power supply issue seems to have been cleared up a while back so you should only expect to...watch even more TV!


That's good news!


----------



## GmanTiVo

I am thinking of getting a 750Gb drive, eSATA case and cable.

What is the difference between the Seagate ST3750*84*0SCE and ST3750*64*0SCE ?

When doing an etailer price comparison for the ST3750*84*0SCE i keep getting prices for the ST3750*64*0SCE instead (almost like a switch and bait).

Thanks in advance


----------



## richsadams

GmanTiVo said:


> I am thinking of getting a 750Gb drive, eSATA case and cable.
> 
> What is the difference between the Seagate ST3750*84*0SCE and ST3750*64*0SCE ?
> 
> When doing an etailer price comparison for the ST3750*84*0SCE i keep getting prices for the ST3750*64*0SCE instead (almost like a switch and bait).
> 
> Thanks in advance


Specs for the ST3750640SCE 
Specs for the ST3750840SCE

The ST3750840SCE has an 8-MB cache buffer and the ST3750640SCE has a 16-MB cache buffer.

If I'm not mistaken one (ST3750640SCE?) has been discontinued. Either will work just fine.


----------



## fandango jango

richsadams said:


> The Apricorn power supply issue seems to have been cleared up a while back so you should only expect to...watch even more TV!


My Apricorn DVR Xpander received in mid June had the power supply problem. My replacement drive has worked since Aug 22. Fingers are crossed heading into the fall season.


----------



## XBR

Has anyone noticed any change in responsiveness (SP reordering, etc.) after adding a bunch of SP's and significantly filling up your expanded space? Just curious...my upgraded Series 1 DirecTiVos (SD & HD) became absolute dogs but my Series 2's became decent after the last software update before the S3's became available. Just wondering how the expanded Series 3's have been scaling...


----------



## richsadams

XBR said:


> Has anyone noticed any change in responsiveness (SP reordering, etc.) after adding a bunch of SP's and significantly filling up your expanded space? Just curious...my upgraded Series 1 DirecTiVos (SD & HD) became absolute dogs but my Series 2's became decent after the last software update before the S3's became available. Just wondering how the expanded Series 3's have been scaling...


There were a number of earlier back-and-forth posts about S3's responsiveness slowing appreciably once an eSATA drive was installed and the Recently Deleted folder filled up. Possibly something to do with the /var "temp file" being over indexed (?) w/v8.3x software. Seems like when we and some others reduced our SP's, WL's and particularly permanently deleted the RD folder contents things went back to normal. We try to keep our RD folder empty most of the time...it's a pain, but seems to keep things speedy.

It'll be interesting to see if one, the eSATA drives are affected in any way with v9.1x upgrade, and two if letting the RD folder fill up continues to slow things down.

Personally I can't wait for all of this to be resolved because losing programs is always in the back of my mind. I like the eSATA concept and am glad a lot of us were early adopters, but now I'm really leaning toward removing it and popping in an internal 1TB drive now that they're under $250 or so and be done with it.


----------



## alyssa

On that note;
my eSATA drive seems to be dieing, Pixlating, hanging etc. I permanently deleted all my suggestions & turned suggestions off.

I've got a bunch of shows stacked on the unit. Is there anyway to dump the shows off of he unit, or prolong the life of the drive?

Antec enclosure & Seagate ST (not DVR rated) 750 HD


----------



## richsadams

alyssa said:


> On that note;
> my eSATA drive seems to be dieing, Pixlating, hanging etc. I permanently deleted all my suggestions & turned suggestions off.
> 
> I've got a bunch of shows stacked on the unit. Is there anyway to dump the shows off of he unit, or prolong the life of the drive?
> 
> Antec enclosure & Seagate ST (not DVR rated) 750 HD


Unfortunately TiVo uses a striping system to record programs w/eSATA drives...that is the recordings could be on one or even spread across both drives. So there's no real way to recover anything that's been recorded since the eSATA drive was installed if it's divorced.

How have you determined that it's the eSATA drive that's dieing? The symptoms you've described can be attributed to an internal drive as well.

Another cause could be a bad eSATA cable. Several posts have indicated that the cable that came with the MX-1 drive was faulty. Once replaced the problems went away. If you check on the very first post on this thread there is a list of "approved" eSATA cables which are fairly inexpensive.

It's not a cure-all, but you might also try running TiVo's diagnostic program, Kickstart 57 to see if that helps.

If replacing the cable and the diagnostics aren't helpful I would divorce the eSATA drive - unplug TiVo, unplug the eSATA drive from TiVo, plug TiVo back in and let it reboot then follow the divorce screen instructions. If the problem goes away you can be pretty sure that there's trouble with the external drive. Most Seagate bare drives have a five-year warranty so you should be able to get a replacement. If theres still a problem it could be the internal drive or something else all together.

Good luck and let us know how it goes!


----------



## alyssa

richsadams said:


> How have you determined that it's the eSATA drive that's dieing? The symptoms you've described can be attributed to an internal drive as well.
> 
> Another cause could be a bad eSATA cable. Several posts have indicated that the cable that came with the MX-1 drive was faulty. Once replaced the problems went away. If you check on the very first post on this thread there is a list of "approved" eSATA cables which are fairly inexpensive.
> 
> It's not a cure-all, but you might also try running TiVo's diagnostic program, Kickstart 57 to see if that helps.
> 
> Good luck and let us know how it goes!


I think it's the external drive because I no longer am hearing any clicking sounds coming from the drive. Of course it could be the cable etc as you've suggested. I did not realize there was a problem with some of the MX-1 cables. 
I'm gonna try the kickstart 57.
much to do but I'll report back when I"ve got something to write. 
*Thank you* for responding!!


----------



## Mandlf

Buy.com has a special on a 500GB WD CAIS00500 for $109.99 with free shipping. I know it's 7200RPM with a 16MB buffer, but does anyone have any opinion on whether this will work well as an upgrade for the TiVo HD?


----------



## naclone

So I picked up a FAP from Best Buy last weekend for $180. Too good a price not to give it a shot. 

My SIIG SATA cable arrives today.

My question is this: Any particular reason not to kickstart this evening (potentially jeopardizing the recordings of series/season premieres tonight)? or should I wait until this weekend when there is nothing in the to do list and I have the opportunity to monitor the stability? I know the latter is probably the safer option but I'm antsy.


----------



## richsadams

naclone said:


> So I picked up a FAP from Best Buy last weekend for $180. Too good a price not to give it a shot.
> 
> My SIIG SATA cable arrives today.
> 
> My question is this: Any particular reason not to kickstart this evening (potentially jeopardizing the recordings of series/season premieres tonight)? or should I wait until this weekend when there is nothing in the to do list and I have the opportunity to monitor the stability? I know the latter is probably the safer option but I'm antsy.


I always wait until the planets are aligned for these sorts of decisions. 

Our eSATA setup (DB35/Antec MX-1) has been working flawlessly since May 12th so IMHO you shouldn't have too many worries. And good move getting a proper cable. Just make sure the drive has plenty of ventilation space around it as it has no cooling fan and most folks say the FAP's get hot. (Overheating can cause serious problems of course.)

Worst case is that you will lose everything that's been recorded from the point you marry the eSATA drive to TiVo to the point that you divorce it (if it comes to that.) Not much different than getting married in real life.


----------



## naclone

richsadams said:


> I always wait until the planets are aligned for these sorts of decisions.
> 
> Our eSATA setup (DB35/Antec MX-1) has been working flawlessly since May 12th so IMHO you shouldn't have too many worries. And good move getting a proper cable. Just make sure the drive has plenty of ventilation space around it as it has no cooling fan and most folks say the FAP's get hot. (Overheating can cause serious problems of course.)
> 
> Worst case is that you will lose everything that's been recorded from the point you marry the eSATA drive to TiVo to the point that you divorce it (if it comes to that.) Not much different than getting married in real life.


Thanks for the encouragement.

I intend to keep it on an open-air shelf. unfortunately our apartment faces west and we are on the Hudson river so there is nothing between our very large window and the afternoon sun so it does get quite warm in our apartment but we also have an english bulldog who is probably more sensitive to heat than the FAP, so we have the AC running pretty much constantly.

I had originally planned to put the FAP next to my xbox360 (again on an open air shelf) but that space is right in front of the sub and i saw a post about staying clear of the magnet. i'll find a spot, but it might be awkward. I'm hesitant to put it behind the LCD as a thermometer shows it's about 7-9 degrees warmer back there.


----------



## T-Shee

richsadams said:


> It'll be interesting to see if one, the eSATA drives are affected in any way with v9.1x upgrade...


Sorry, but I can't seem to find any info about how the Fall Update (v9.1x) affects ESATA kick-started drives, ie, non-Tivo-sanctioned ESATA expansion drives.

Has anyone reported that the 9.1 disables kickstarted drives???

Thanks!

ps my MX-1 with Samsung 500g has been flawless since installation (may 2007), using the Antec supplied ESATA cable.


----------



## richsadams

Mandlf said:


> Buy.com has a special on a 500GB WD CAIS00500 for $109.99 with free shipping. I know it's 7200RPM with a 16MB buffer, but does anyone have any opinion on whether this will work well as an upgrade for the TiVo HD?


Guessing you're looking at this offer which is actually for a WD5000AAKS 500GB SATA drive? Here's the specs.

The only thing that stands out are the acoustic specs, as high as 33 dBA during seek periods. That's acceptable for a PC and if your TiVo is in a cabinet you might not notice it, but if it's within earshot in a quiet room it may make its presence known. You may be able to adjust it with the automatic acoustic management settings in Hitachi's Feature Tool however.

Otherwise IMO I don't see any reason it wouldn't work...and you're right, that's a pretty decent price.


----------



## richsadams

T-Shee said:


> Sorry, but I can't seem to find any info about how the Fall Update (v9.1x) affects ESATA kick-started drives, ie, non-Tivo-sanctioned ESATA expansion drives.
> 
> Has anyone reported that the 9.1 disables kickstarted drives???
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> ps my MX-1 with Samsung 500g has been flawless since installation (may 2007), using the Antec supplied ESATA cable.


I've read at least two posts now (here and here) that said that the Fall Upgrade, v9.1x, did NOT affect existing eSATA drive installations.

Phew! :up:


----------



## richsadams

naclone said:


> Thanks for the encouragement.
> 
> I intend to keep it on an open-air shelf. unfortunately our apartment faces west and we are on the Hudson river so there is nothing between our very large window and the afternoon sun so it does get quite warm in our apartment but we also have an english bulldog who is probably more sensitive to heat than the FAP, so we have the AC running pretty much constantly.
> 
> I had originally planned to put the FAP next to my xbox360 (again on an open air shelf) but that space is right in front of the sub and i saw a post about staying clear of the magnet. i'll find a spot, but it might be awkward. I'm hesitant to put it behind the LCD as a thermometer shows it's about 7-9 degrees warmer back there.


Yep, when it comes to external hard drive placement...speaker magnets baaaad...power supplies baaaad...LCD TV's baaaad. Fresh, cool air...goooood. :up:

Oh, and dog slobber? Probably baaad.


----------



## Mandlf

> Originally posted by *richsadams*
> 
> Guessing you're looking at this offer which is actually for a WD5000AAKS 500GB SATA drive? Here's the specs.
> 
> The only thing that stands out are the acoustic specs, as high as 33 dBA during seek periods. That's acceptable for a PC and if your TiVo is in a cabinet you might not notice it, but if it's within earshot in a quiet room it may make its presence known. You may be able to adjust it with the automatic acoustic management settings in Hitachi's Feature Tool however.
> 
> Otherwise IMO I don't see any reason it wouldn't work...and you're right, that's a pretty decent price.


Yep, that's the one. My TiVo is in a closed cabinet, so I think I'll give it a shot. Thanks.


----------



## naclone

richsadams said:


> Oh, and dog slobber? Probably baaad.


i was counting on that keeping it cool.


----------



## T-Shee

richsadams said:


> I've read at least two posts now (here and here) that said that the Fall Upgrade, v9.1x, did NOT affect existing eSATA drive installations.
> 
> Phew! :up:


Thanks, Rich!!

"Phew!" is right. My drive has been such a bulletproof and transparent experience that it would've bummed me out to have the mothership kill it off, inadvertantly or otherwise.

Thanks again.


----------



## jtrain

Finally replaced the "supplied" Antec cable with the Siig eSATA II cable last night and voila...back up to 98 hours of HD. I'm using the Antec MX-1 and a Seagate DB35 (500GB) drive. Very excited as the new television season gets going in earnest this week. 

I haven't received the new software update yet, so I can't comment on whether that has any effect on the eSATA drive working properly.

Thanks to everyone who reports back and gives timely response to questions and provide helpful information!


----------



## richsadams

jtrain said:


> Finally replaced the "supplied" Antec cable with the Siig eSATA II cable last night and voila...back up to 98 hours of HD. I'm using the Antec MX-1 and a Seagate DB35 (500GB) drive. Very excited as the new television season gets going in earnest this week.
> 
> I haven't received the new software update yet, so I can't comment on whether that has any effect on the eSATA drive working properly.
> 
> Thanks to everyone who reports back and gives timely response to questions and provide helpful information!


Glad to hear it was only the cable giving you fits. You can sit back and relax now...maybe watch some good TV.


----------



## dscoob

I upgraded the hard drive on my S3 with a 1TB Hitachi. The seek noises are pretty loud. I'll try changing the drive's acoustic management settings. If that doesn't work, I was thinking of installing acoustic foam inside the case. Has anyone done this in an S3 or other TiVo? The foam would be the kind that is used to line the inside of PC cases, like Dynamat or Acoustipack. I have Acoustipack in my PC and am very happy with it, so I was going to try that. They're basically thin sheets of foam that you adhere to the insides of the case.

I'm wondering if (a) it will help, and (b) if it will cause a problem with cooling inside the TiVo.

Any other ideas on how to deaden the sound? Will putting the S3 on a foam mat help?


----------



## jlib

Changing the acoustic default setting is all you will need to do.


----------



## dr_mal

Just one more data point to support using a SIIG eSATA cable in place of the one supplied by Antec...

I'm using an external DB35 750GB drive with the Antec MX1 enclosure - worked fine for a while, but then the TiVo started locking up/rebooting. I replaced the cable with the SIIG cable last week, and so far, haven't seen any lockups or rebooting.

Time will tell, but so far so good.


----------



## JKay

Mandlf said:


> Buy.com has a special on a 500GB WD CAIS00500 for $109.99 with free shipping. I know it's 7200RPM with a 16MB buffer, but does anyone have any opinion on whether this will work well as an upgrade for the TiVo HD?


I put that model WD 500 in my S3 back in Nov 06 and removed it in Aug 07 just to upgrade to a 750 Gig drive. I didnt tweak the acoustic setting on the 500 and found the drive to be quiet. However, the original WD 250 has the acoustic (AAM) setting tweaked from the factory, so I would use the Hitachi utility to tweak the WD 500 if you get it. The drive worked flawlessly for the eight months I used it in the S3.


----------



## alyssa

the kick start 57 seemed to help
I also deleted more shows

A new SIIG cable is due to be delivered on Friday-

Thankfully I've got 2 S2's up & running so they're catching the new shows, not in HD but...better then watching live tv<grin>


----------



## richsadams

alyssa said:


> the kick start 57 seemed to help
> I also deleted more shows
> 
> A new SIIG cable is due to be delivered on Friday-
> 
> Thankfully I've got 2 S2's up & running so they're catching the new shows, not in HD but...better then watching live tv<grin>


That's good news! :up:

Make sure you power TiVo down (unplug it) before replacing the eSATA cable and that the connections are snug on both ends. Power it back up and you should be good to go.


----------



## cheerdude

Thanks all who posted about this... and to those that mentioned the BB deal.

After installing the drive in the MX-1 on Tuesday (thanks to some tweezer help with getting the mounting screws back on), I hooked everything up last night.

The only thing that I saw that was "weird" was that when the "Your second Hard Drive..." message came up the first and last letter in the message was cut off by the ends of the picture. I also noticed that, while watching a recording from ABC HD, the D on the Channel logo looked to be cut off.

Not a big deal, as the picture itself was fine. So far...


----------



## naclone

just an update: installed a 750g FAP with SIIG cable last evening. drive was recognized on the first try and all seems well.


----------



## bdlucas

cheerdude said:


> After installing the drive in the MX-1 on Tuesday (thanks to some tweezer help with getting the mounting screws back on)


A magnetized screwdriver did the trick for me. You can get magnetized extension holders for the hex shank screwdriver bits.


----------



## cheerdude

Bruce - Yeah... had to buy screwdrivers for this... and didn't think about getting the magnetic type until just that moment.


----------



## jlib

Or just get any magnet (like the kind for notes on refrigerators) and swipe driver in one direction a half dozen times or so.


----------



## donaudio

naclone said:


> just an update: installed a 750g FAP with SIIG cable last evening. drive was recognized on the first try and all seems well.


Just want to let everyone know my experiences with the FAP 750. The first two failed and I got a third (lucky it has a five year warranty). It is in an enclosed cabinet so this time I changed cables and got a Siig and put a muffin fan behind the FAP and so far it has been working for about two months and the drive doesn't seem hot to the touch. Keeping fingers crossed. Don


----------



## alyssa

jlib said:


> Or just get any magnet (like the kind for notes on refrigerators) and swipe driver in one direction a half dozen times or so.


silly me, 
I just held the unit above my head with the screw balanced on the screwdriver. Of course my headlamp was a critical piece of equipment.


----------



## ManWithAPlan

Just hooked up my new Western Digital DVR Expander thingy - went the super easy route. Although it's only 500GB, it recognized it right away and is working like a champ! Signed up for about 8 new season passes, yeeeeehaaaaaaaa!!!!!

Loving the eSATA thing, drive is quiet as a church mouse.


----------



## jtrain

Received the Update yesterday afternoon/evening and no problems to speak of so far, no slowing in the menus, or problems with the eSATA drive up to this point...double-checked again this morning and everything seems fine so far.


----------



## richsadams

jtrain said:


> Received the Update yesterday afternoon/evening and no problems to speak of so far, no slowing in the menus, or problems with the eSATA drive up to this point...double-checked again this morning and everything seems fine so far.


Excellent! :up: Must be taking a little longer to get to us over here in West Linn.


----------



## dr.greghouse

alyssa said:


> silly me,
> I just held the unit above my head with the screw balanced on the screwdriver. Of course my headlamp was a critical piece of equipment.


Yeah, I was about to say the same thing. Hold the drive/enclosure upside down, balance the screw on the screwdriver and into the hole she goes...


----------



## dr.greghouse

Bought western digital 500GB SATA + Antec MX-1. Everything looks good so far. Used to have an eSATA Seagate 300GB, but was scared of power going off and since the power button is "soft", tivo would hang and not record if a power glitch occurred.


----------



## alyssa

Bagh
300gb = not enough room

I want *big* room <evil grin> just to confound my husband <he he>

BTW, Huge cutos to Rick for following this tread & helping people out!! He saved me a bunch of cash & heartache. It seems as tho the new SIIG cable has fixed my hang/restart problem. I'm not saying it's fixed but after a couple of hours it's looking like the problem is solved!
Thank You Rick!!


----------



## richsadams

alyssa said:


> Bagh
> 300gb = not enough room
> 
> I want *big* room <evil grin> just to confound my husband <he he>
> 
> BTW, Huge kudos to Rick for following this tread & helping people out!! He saved me a bunch of cash & heartache. It seems as tho the new SIIG cable has fixed my hang/restart problem. I'm not saying it's fixed but after a couple of hours it's looking like the problem is solved!
> Thank You Rick!!


  Saaaayyyy...don't go blaming _me_ for any absurd advice that you've decided to follow. There are a lot of people here responsible for dubious counsel. Let's spread the blame, er, love around a bit! 

P.S. Glad things appear to be resolved.


----------



## Oldandslow

After operating successfully for several months, my eSATA expansion drive started acting "flaky" and the Tivo Series 3 rebooted several times within a one day period. Checking the cables, I found that moving the power cable to the Antec MX1 enclosure caused the drive inside to stop and the blue light on the front of the enclosure to go off and on. When I say "moving" I mean the slightest movement would cause this to happen (walking on the floor near the unit, even!)

I removed the enclosure and found the socket on the back of the enclosure to be defective (loose pin connections). After checking the website where I purchased the enclosure and seeing there is a $25.00 fee to return items for replacement (I only paid $49.95 for the enclosure), I decided to repair the enclosure . I took the enclosure apart, unsoldered the power input socket off the circuit board, cut the plug off the power supply "brick", and soldered the power supply wires directly to the enclosure circuit board.

The expansion drive now works correctly with no reboots. I thought I would share my experience in case some of you have a multiple reboot problem and wonder what else to check. Wiggle the cables!


----------



## sdcajack

Does anyone know if there is a significant difference between the Western Digital My DVR Expander 500G and the My Book Premium ES 500G?

They appear to be almost identical as far as performance, dimensions, heat dissipation, etc. The DVR Expander comes with an esata cable but the My Book only comes with USB. Of course, the DVR expander only has an esata port and the My Book has both USB and esata.

I'm looking for a self-contained esata drive for my Tivo and the My Book is the better deal... and has the USB option if I decide down the road to use it with my computers.

Does anyone know if the drives inside these two enclosures are different?


----------



## richsadams

Oldandslow said:


> After operating successfully for several months, my eSATA expansion drive started acting "flaky" and the Tivo Series 3 rebooted several times within a one day period. Checking the cables, I found that moving the power cable to the Antec MX1 enclosure caused the drive inside to stop and the blue light on the front of the enclosure to go off and on. When I say "moving" I mean the slightest movement would cause this to happen (walking on the floor near the unit, even!)
> 
> I removed the enclosure and found the socket on the back of the enclosure to be defective (loose pin connections). After checking the website where I purchased the enclosure and seeing there is a $25.00 fee to return items for replacement (I only paid $49.95 for the enclosure), I decided to repair the enclosure . I took the enclosure apart, unsoldered the power input socket off the circuit board, cut the plug off the power supply "brick", and soldered the power supply wires directly to the enclosure circuit board.
> 
> The expansion drive now works correctly with no reboots. I thought I would share my experience in case some of you have a multiple reboot problem and wonder what else to check. Wiggle the cables!


Wow! That's excellent feedback...and unexpected.

I did a quick "wiggle" test on our MX-1's power cord and it seems to be fine. But for those experiencing problems, perhaps that's one other thing to check.

I think the MX-1s are warranted by Antec for 1 year. Of course shipping it back to them would cost something as well, so its good youre a DIY type. 

*bkdtv*, do you think that's worth adding to your terrific eSATA FAQ/Troubleshooting post?


----------



## alyssa

richsadams said:


> P.S. Glad things appear to be resolved.


Well it appears I wrote too soon. 
After about 24 hours of normal Tivo operation the hang/reboot started again.

I'm thinking the next thing to do is divorce the eSATA <sigh> I keep coming back to the thought that the external drive is not making the clicking sound like it normally does, plus it's a ST.

I've tried kickstart 57 & a new SIIG cable.

eta:I divorced the drive, & got the same problem. 

I spoke with a Tivo cs. After doing a cable card test, restarting the tivo with the cards semi-ejected, the CSR offered to swap out my unit with another S3. It should arrive on Tuesday.


----------



## dr.greghouse

I've noticed that a 1hr 1080i recording uses 6GB of space while SD Best Quality 1hr uses 3GB. I would think that the SD would use way less than half of HD. Good thing series 3 supports expansion drives. 500GB(drive) / 6GB = 83 hrs of HD.

By the way, do yall think the Fall update will officially support eSATA?


----------



## jlib

You're comparing digital to analog initial signals. Digital SD _is_ much smaller as you would expect.


----------



## jlib

sdcajack said:


> Does anyone know if there is a significant difference between the Western Digital My DVR Expander 500G and the My Book Premium ES 500G?


 If there is any difference it would probably be that the DVR Expander is already set for quiet head seeks. You can easily do that manually yourself.


----------



## akessel56

I've noticed that if I reboot the tivo, the problems seem to clear up for a while.


----------



## richsadams

dr.greghouse said:


> By the way, do yall think the Fall update will officially support eSATA?


TiVo S3's with v9.1x continue to support back door eSATA expansion. Based on previous posts on this and other threads TiVo HD's w/v9.1x do not (without removing the HDD and performing several P.C. based upgrade steps as before).


----------



## richsadams

alyssa said:


> Well it appears I wrote too soon.
> After about 24 hours of normal Tivo operation the hang/reboot started again.
> 
> I'm thinking the next thing to do is divorce the eSATA <sigh> I keep coming back to the thought that the external drive is not making the clicking sound like it normally does, plus it's a ST.
> 
> I've tried kickstart 57 & a new SIIG cable.
> 
> eta:I divorced the drive, & got the same problem.
> 
> I spoke with a Tivo cs. After doing a cable card test, restarting the tivo with the cards semi-ejected, the CSR offered to swap out my unit with another S3. It should arrive on Tuesday.


Bummer.  The symptoms were in line with a failing HDD. Sorry you had to go through all of the hassles though. At least you'll have a shiny new TiVo to start with...again.


----------



## lrhorer

alyssa said:


> silly me,
> I just held the unit above my head with the screw balanced on the screwdriver. Of course my headlamp was a critical piece of equipment.


I must say the worst thing about the Antec MX-1 is trying to install a hard drive in it. One can of course magnetize a screwdriver for the purposes, but even though the odds of causing harm to a hard drive (especially an empty one) with a magnetized screwdriver are extremely low, I try to avoid placing any magnetic sources near any hard drive, no matter how small or how briefly. Perhaps I should be ashamed to admit it, but I just took a tiny piece of the bubble-gum I was chewing and used it to stick the screws to the screwdriver.

Honest, I swear. Chewing gum. It really worked!


----------



## alyssa

richsadams said:


> Bummer.  The symptoms were in line with a failing HDD. Sorry you had to go through all of the hassles though. At least you'll have a shiny new TiVo to start with...again.


No worries- I've been wanting a longer eSATA cable it'll make my setup a lot more elegant. Plus I had to rule out the external drive prior to calling CS.

The two sucky things are not having a S3tivo until it arrives & the cable guy comes Plus losing all my shows & SP's. But those would have eventually happened regardless of my troubleshooting for a bad eSATA external. Still big kudo's for all your help!

The Tivo CSR said they'd next day air my new tivo & I'll have it on Tuesday-I'm skeptical but want to believe she spoke the truth. They certainly have charged my CC.


----------



## alyssa

lrhorer said:


> .... Perhaps I should be ashamed to admit it, but I just took a tiny piece of the bubble-gum I was chewing and used it to stick the screws to the screwdriver.
> 
> Honest, I swear. Chewing gum. It really worked!


And your drive is minty fresh?


----------



## lrhorer

alyssa said:


> And your drive is minty fresh?


Nah. It was regular bubble gum. I do occasionally hear a very tiny "whoosh - pop!" from the drive, though. Maybe the gum will keep the gremlins happy and the drive will last forever?


----------



## dr.greghouse

jlib said:


> If there is any difference it would probably be that the DVR Expander is already set for quiet head seeks. You can easily do that manually yourself.


How do you set quiet head seek manually on a Western Digital Internal 500GB?

Thanks.


----------



## greg_burns

dr.greghouse said:


> How do you set quiet head seek manually on a Western Digital Internal 500GB?
> 
> Thanks.


Have to pull the drive and connect it to your PC (via sata connection of course). Then download and create a bootable CD or floppy of Hitachi Feature Tool.

http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm


----------



## richsadams

Received v9.1 upgrade this a.m. It appears to have had no affect on the eSATA drive connected to our S3. :up:


----------



## bareyb

richsadams said:


> Received v9.1 upgrade this a.m. It appears to have had no affect on the eSATA drive connected to our S3. :up:


Have you noticed any difference in the way that 30 second skip and Instant Replay work? There have been some reports of a "lag" or "delay". Please tell me they work the same for you?!?


----------



## richsadams

bareyb said:


> Have you noticed any difference in the way that 30 second skip and Instant Replay work? There have been some reports of a "lag" or "delay". Please tell me they work the same for you?!?


Hey Barey.

The 30 second skip works normally. :up:

I noticed some others commenting about the FF or RW to Play being different (momentary freeze frame-like issue). I just tried it on a program that was recorded before the update and it seems like it's there, however brief. However I tried it on a program that was just recorded and don't see it at all...instantaneous playback coming from either "direction" at any speed. Checked it on the live buffers and no problems either. :up:

So all looks well in TiVo Upgrade Land.


----------



## bareyb

richsadams said:


> Hey Barey.
> 
> The 30 second skip works normally. :up:
> 
> I noticed some others commenting about the FF or RW to Play being different (momentary freeze frame-like issue). I just tried it on a program that was recorded before the update and it seems like it's there, however brief. However I tried it on a program that was just recorded and don't see it at all...instantaneous playback coming from either "direction" at any speed. Checked it on the live buffers and no problems either. :up:
> 
> So all looks well in TiVo Upgrade Land.


Very relieved to hear that. Thanks Rich. :up:


----------



## ginolee

I just added a seagate freeagent pro 500 MB hard drive to my Tivo Series 3. By the way, I picked it up for < $150 at Best Buy. Better deal than Amazon..

One thing I notice is that the base of the drive gets pretty hot when in a vertical position. Because of this, instead of placing it in the normal upright vertical position, I've got it laying horizontally so the base can dissipate the heat.

If you get one of these Seagate FreeAgent pro units, I would strongly recommend that you lay it in a horizontal position for 24x7 operation, e.g. Tivo 2nd disk drive.

My hunch is that there are probably two issues that affect these freeagent pro units: 
1) using the right cable ( eSata cable version 2, such as the Trip-Lite P950 -- $10 from Amazon).
2) overheating due to the default vertical position.

If you have it in a vertical position, that's your prerogative. But just think of the heat at the base of the unit and the effect it must inevitably have on the electronics in the rest of the unit over time. Even if it works fine for a while, my guess is that the electronics itself will age at a much faster rate due to the heat dissipation issue.

Anyways, I'll try to report back after 6-12 months on this configuration and how well it worked for me. Or sooner, if I run into issues...

Anyways, it's a relief to have this extra space. Yesterday, I was trying to "race" my Tivo -- to see if I could watch some of the shows before they got deleted due to lack of space.. .

Cheers .

Gino.


----------



## jt72

I too had the 9.1 upgrade waiting for me when I got home today. 

I have not noticed any issues with either the ESATA drive, FF, or RW. I don't use the 30 second skip so I cannot comment on that. 

Everything seems to be working at least as good as it was before the upgrade. I haven't noticed any problems yet, but I have only had a few hours to play since the upgrade.


----------



## ctcraig

T-Shee said:


> Sorry, but I can't seem to find any info about how the Fall Update (v9.1x) affects ESATA kick-started drives, ie, non-Tivo-sanctioned ESATA expansion drives.
> 
> Has anyone reported that the 9.1 disables kickstarted drives???
> 
> Thanks!
> 
> ps my MX-1 with Samsung 500g has been flawless since installation (may 2007), using the Antec supplied ESATA cable.


I got the new 9.1 last night and I got the "Your second drive is not responding" error screen. I had to divorce. I'll try to re-add it in a while and see if that works...

Sheesh


----------



## dougdingle

9.1 had no effect on my external drive.

As an aside, I changed cables from the MX-1 cable to the SIIG cable on 9/10, and haven't had any problems since. Prior to that, I had reboots about once a week.


----------



## dougdingle

bareyb said:


> Have you noticed any difference in the way that 30 second skip and Instant Replay work? There have been some reports of a "lag" or "delay". Please tell me they work the same for you?!?


There is a definite difference in some of the machine's "ballistics" with the 9.1 upgrade.

When Instant Replay is pressed, or the machine changes from shuttle mode to play, the current frame freezes for several frames (around 5-10 frames, I think) before the machine does the requested function. This is a definite change from the previous behavior, when that momentary freezing of the image did not occur.

If it had always been that way, I would not have given it a second thought, so it's not awful or anything, but it IS different.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> There is a definite difference in some of the machine's "ballistics" with the 9.1 upgrade.
> 
> When Instant Replay is pressed, or the machine changes from shuttle mode to play, the current frame freezes for several frames (around 5-10 frames, I think) before the machine does the requested function. This is a definite change from the previous behavior, when that momentary freezing of the image did not occur.
> 
> If it had always been that way, I would not have given it a second thought, so it's not awful or anything, but it IS different.


Were you watching a program recorded prior to or after the upgrade? I'm seeing a little of what you've described on shows recorded prior to the upgrade, but nothing like that on shows recorded afterwards. Everything looks normal on our TiVo's.


----------



## naclone

ginolee said:


> If you get one of these Seagate FreeAgent pro units, I would strongly recommend that you lay it in a horizontal position for 24x7 operation, e.g. Tivo 2nd disk drive.


I would do this, but i'd be terrified of the eSATA cable getting jarred or accidentally hitting the soft power switch while tipping it over. I won't even go *near* my FAP for fear of throwing something out of whack.


----------



## richsadams

naclone said:


> I would do this, but i'd be terrified of the eSATA cable getting jarred or accidentally hitting the soft power switch while tipping it over. I won't even go *near* my FAP for fear of throwing something out of whack.


If you want to ensure nothing bad happens, simply unplug TiVo, move your eSATA drive (or change cables, etc.), make sure the power cord and eSATA cable are snug (both ends) and then plug TiVo back in. It will never know you were playing around.


----------



## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> Were you watching a program recorded prior to or after the upgrade? I'm seeing a little of what you've described on shows recorded prior to the upgrade, but nothing like that on shows recorded afterwards. Everything looks normal on our TiVo's.


I was looking at live video and moving around the timeline in the buffer.

I haven't looked at recorded shows yet, but I can't imagine it would be any different. It's the "deck control" that has subtly changed, and it would be highly unusual for that to be dependent on content.


----------



## T-Shee

ctcraig said:


> I got the new 9.1 last night and I got the "Your second drive is not responding" error screen. I had to divorce. I'll try to re-add it in a while and see if that works...
> 
> Sheesh


Sorry to hear that.

I got the 9.1 update yesterday. No issues whatsoever.

The menus and overall system behavior was a mere 2% more sluggish during the first ten minutes after the system came up fully. After that, the Tivo has exhibited no noticable changes in menu speed, button presses, etc.

Working at home today, the Tivo has been running flawlessly all day.

re: v9.1xx I like the placement of the "diagnostics" screen in multiple menus - helps for those "bad cable card" days when you have to troubleshoot. Nice improvement in the diagnostics reporting screen as well.


----------



## cab2

is there a link here somewhere as to what's in the 9.1 update?


----------



## bareyb

cab2 said:


> is there a link here somewhere as to what's in the 9.1 update?


Yes. Check the thread listings on the front page of this forum. :up:

I just got my 9.1 update and the external drives are working the same as ever. No change there. HOWEVER.... The 30 second skip and "instant replay" are fudged up. The picture of the screen lags behind the timeline so you can't see where you are going or where you have been. Makes it pretty tough to know when you have gone "far enough". The fix (if you can call it that) is to press the buttons slower and wait for the picture to "catch up". Pretty lame. I can't imagine TiVo will leave this broken for very long. They will probably slip in a fix in the next few days hopefully.


----------



## A J Ricaud

cab2 said:


> is there a link here somewhere as to what's in the 9.1 update?


http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=368411


----------



## immagikman

immagikman said:


> To Recap:
> 
> _The set up:
> Seagate (DB35) 750GB drive (SATA/300)
> New eSATA cable with longer connector
> Antec MX-1
> Series 3 Tivo with 8.3.1 software (with the original 250gb drive in it)_
> 
> * Ordered the 1meter SIIG cable that someone here reccomended and all is well.
> I now see 130 hours of HD programming or 1600 low def. So now I have a total of 1TB attached to the Series 3.
> 
> My problem was apparently the cable supplied with the MX-1 enclosure.
> Thanks guys for the encouragement and helping me keep at it till I got it right.*


Update, eSATA is still working weell after about a month with no glitches.

The only problem I have now is that both my Series 3 Tivo's have been acting squirrely losing sound that requiers me to reboot the system. Doesnt affect the eSATA but it is annoying. I think it is something to do with the Tivo software/updates and is not related to the eSATA expansion.


----------



## naclone

looks like the 9.1 update screwed me up to. got the GSOD on the S3 and an S03 error on my S2.

not a happy camper right now.

edit:

okay, so I tried to restart the S3 three different times. the first yielded a GSOD. the next two both yielded an ORANGE screen of death. I haven't heard about the OSOD yet. Should I panic?

I'm guessing my next course of action should be to divorce the eSATA drive (which makes me sad seeing as how my first wedding anniversary is this weekend), get the 9.1 update installed and working properly and then attempt to remarry the eSATA?

Does that sound right?


----------



## donaudio

Just got my 9.1 update last night and so far my FAP750 seems to be working OK. Don


----------



## GBL

After about 2 months, the MX-1 enclosure is getting noisy, sounds like a bad fan bearing (noise stops when I stop fan). Does anyone else have a noisy MX-1? If, so how would you rate Antec's warranty?


----------



## dtsob75

I just got my TiVo HD (20 hr) and it is working fine. Got the 9.1 upgrade last night. I received an eSata drive and tried to install it, using the instructions from Endgadget article. It did not work. I found an update info on 8.3 upgrade and it says to hold the pause until the lights all went out, except the orange. Well, the Orange and Red went out. leaving the green. Does anyone know if the instructions for the activation of esata external drive is different for 9.1?

I have a Lacie 500 gB drive with an esata II cable.

Help!!!

Joel WZ


----------



## dougdingle

I wasn't aware the eSATA port was enabled on the THD. AFAIK, only the Series 3 allows an external drive at the moment, but I could be behind the times...


----------



## 1283

dtsob75 said:


> I just got my TiVo HD (20 hr)


no kickstart with that model


----------



## naclone

so in a major upset, both units are now working normally (i think).

was just about to divorce the FAP but decided one last restart when I got home from work, it booted normally and then started the 9.1 service update.

the S2 is working fine too after showing an S02 error which I was under the impression was rather catastrophic. 

what the hell is up with 9.1?


----------



## jlib

dougdingle said:


> I wasn't aware the eSATA port was enabled on the THD. AFAIK, only the Series 3 allows an external drive at the moment, but I could be behind the times...


Yes, behind the times


----------



## jlib

dtsob75 said:


> ...I received an eSata drive and tried to install it, using the instructions from Endgadget article. It did not work.


Spike2k5 at MFS*LiVe* is the canonical source for upgrade methods on the HD. See the first post in this thread.


----------



## MadTxn

Greetings. I recently picked up the 1TB WD drive, and wanted to change the acoustic settings and run a drive test. I have an OLD (and I do mean old) desktop running Win2K, so I bought a PCI SATA controller (Promise TX2plus something). When I run the Hitachi tool, it doesn't see the drive. When I run the WD Diagnostics, first, SMART is disabled, and at some point during the extended scan (ran it overnight), I got the "You have ejected a device without unplugging it" message, making the scan fail with "too many bad sectors". Now, is the problem that the scan doesn't work on a PCI card, or do I need to change jumper settings (to 1.5GB/s) or is my drive DOA? Thanks in advance.


----------



## jlib

MadTxn said:


> Greetings. I recently picked up the 1TB WD drive, and wanted to change the acoustic settings and run a drive test. I have an OLD (and I do mean old) desktop running Win2K, so I bought a PCI SATA controller (Promise TX2plus something). When I run the Hitachi tool, it doesn't see the drive...


Are they using FreeDOS as the operating system? I remember something about it not supporting Promise SATA but that was some time ago. You could either try a different boot disk to get the system up and then put the disk with the Hiachi Feature Tool on it back in or just use the Linux hdparm command. Also, the early Promise SATA controllers were 150MB/s (1.5G_bit_/s) only. If the model number says 150 in it try setting the drive to 150MB/s if it already isn't.


----------



## XBR

MadTxn said:


> Greetings. I recently picked up the 1TB WD drive, and wanted to change the acoustic settings and run a drive test. I have an OLD (and I do mean old) desktop running Win2K, so I bought a PCI SATA controller (Promise TX2plus something). When I run the Hitachi tool, it doesn't see the drive. When I run the WD Diagnostics, first, SMART is disabled, and at some point during the extended scan (ran it overnight), I got the "You have ejected a device without unplugging it" message, making the scan fail with "too many bad sectors". Now, is the problem that the scan doesn't work on a PCI card, or do I need to change jumper settings (to 1.5GB/s) or is my drive DOA? Thanks in advance.


The PC's BIOS, the adapter's BIOS and the OS all have to be able to support the drive's geometry as one hands off to the next during the boot process...I had a 250GB drive with a newer controller in a circa '95 PC that would install and boot XP, but not Linux--go figure.

If you go into the PC's and/or adapter card's BIOS setup screen, does it correctly report the capacity of the drive?


----------



## dafish721

Does anyone know of anyone who is building eSATA drive with enclosures and selling them aftermarket. I know I can buy the Western Digital WDG1S5000N 500Gb but if I want a 1 Tb or 750 Gb and don't want to build my own what other options do I have. I know this might have already been mentioned in this thread but 64 pages is daunting to go through. TIA


----------



## Kenji

dafish721 said:


> Does anyone know of anyone who is building eSATA drive with enclosures and selling them aftermarket. I know I can buy the Western Digital WDG1S5000N 500Gb but if I want a 1 Tb or 750 Gb and don't want to build my own what other options do I have.


Apricorn does.


----------



## jlib

dafish721 said:


> ...if I want a 1 Tb or 750 Gb and don't want to build my own...


Or look at it this way: Spend a half hour putting it together yourself and save $200. Sounding better?


----------



## dafish721

Is it easy to put together? Can you direct me to a link with directions?


----------



## Kenji

dafish721 said:


> Can you direct me to a link with directions?


Click on the word "Apricorn" in my previous post...


----------



## dafish721

Thanks, I saw the Apricorn site but they seem pretty pricey. If I can save $200 and it only takes 30 mintutes I thought maybe I could check into doing it myself. Is there a link that describes the process?


----------



## moxie1617

Here is link to the Antec site for the MX-1 enclosure. Click on the video and it will show you how to install the drive into the case. You have to wait until the guy finishes talking about the case and features before he shows you how to install the drive so be patient.

http://www.antec.com/ec/productDetails.php?ProdID=00700


----------



## dafish721

Thanks, that seem very easy to do. The only question I have left is the video says that the MX-1 can accomidate up to 750Gb. Does it not support a 1 Tb drive?


----------



## cherry ghost

dafish721 said:


> Thanks, that seem very easy to do. The only question I have left is the video says that the MX-1 can accomidate up to 750Gb. Does it not support a 1 Tb drive?


It's very easy and it does support a 1Tb drive


----------



## moolman

dafish721 said:


> Thanks, that seem very easy to do. The only question I have left is the video says that the MX-1 can accomidate up to 750Gb. Does it not support a 1 Tb drive?


Just buy a preassembled one, if you think you can't make it. There's plenty of reasons why the Antec MX-1 is difficult to assemble. ie. if you have only one arm because getting the 2 inner screws in are difficult especially with one arm missing.


----------



## bareyb

After all the posts here I was fully expecting the MX-1 enclosure to be "difficult". Nothing could be farther from the truth. In fact, it was so darn easy I thought I must have done something wrong. About the only unusual tool you might want to have is a screwdriver with magnetic tip. It's a piece of cake. Seriously. Easiest thing ever. If you guys think this is hard, you should have seen what it took to install a drive in an enclosure 15 years ago. There were Jumpers to configure, you needed the right wire harness, and in some cases you even had to solder. All sorts of happy crappy that really did make it (somewhat) hard. These drive enclosures today are all but foolproof. 

Take a chance and go for it! The MX-1 is an excellent enclosure with great cooling and very low noise. :up:


----------



## MadTxn

jlib said:


> Are they using FreeDOS as the operating system? I remember something about it not supporting Promise SATA but that was some time ago. You could either try a different boot disk to get the system up and then put the disk with the Hiachi Feature Tool on it back in or just use the Linux hdparm command. Also, the early Promise SATA controllers were 150MB/s (1.5G_bit_/s) only. If the model number says 150 in it try setting the drive to 150MB/s if it already isn't.


It *was* freedos. I booted with Ubuntu and tried to set the parameter, and I got 


Code:


 HDIO_DRIVE_CMD:ACOUSTIC failed: Invalid argument
 HDIO_GET_ACOUSTIC failed: Invalid argument




XBR said:


> The PC's BIOS, the adapter's BIOS and the OS all have to be able to support the drive's geometry as one hands off to the next during the boot process...I had a 250GB drive with a newer controller in a circa '95 PC that would install and boot XP, but not Linux--go figure.
> 
> If you go into the PC's and/or adapter card's BIOS setup screen, does it correctly report the capacity of the drive?


Well, the Promise utility reports everything correctly, but the WD doesn't show the proper SMART status. The drive capacity is correct everywhere. I'm just going to "plug & pray".


----------



## moxie1617

dafish721 said:


> Thanks, that seem very easy to do. The only question I have left is the video says that the MX-1 can accomidate up to 750Gb. Does it not support a 1 Tb drive?


Yes it does. Right above the window with the video was a note from Antec re: the 1 TB drives and that they do work. People here have already installed the 1 TB drive successfully in the Antec MX-1.


----------



## T-Shee

bareyb said:


> After all the posts here I was fully expecting the MX-1 enclosure to be "difficult". Nothing could be farther from the truth. In fact, it was so darn easy I thought I must have done something wrong. About the only unusual tool you might want to have is a screwdriver with magnetic tip. It's a piece of cake. Seriously. Easiest thing ever. If you guys think this is hard, you should have seen what it took to install a drive in an enclosure 15 years ago. There were Jumpers to configure, you needed the right wire harness, and in some cases you even had to solder. All sorts of happy crappy that really did make it (somewhat) hard. These drive enclosures today are all but foolproof.
> 
> Take a chance and go for it! The MX-1 is an excellent enclosure with great cooling and very low noise. :up:


100% agreement here.
If you can use a screwdriver and follow a few easy directions, you can easily (very easily) build your own drive, save some money and get the satisfaction of having done it yourself.

My MX-1 has been 100% problem free since installation about 6 months ago.


----------



## Joybob

Do the yellow 'about to delete' icons on the now playing list go away with a bigger hard-drive?


----------



## NCC2893

Joybob said:


> Do the yellow 'about to delete' icons on the now playing list go away with a bigger hard-drive?


Nope. It just takes longer to get there. I believe those are triggered when your available space drops under 50%.


----------



## jlib

Joybob said:


> Do the yellow 'about to delete' icons on the now playing list go away with a bigger hard-drive?


 No but they stay there for a longer time (especially if you do not auto record suggestions). They are eligible for deletion only if space is needed. The TiVo will auto delete the oldest first unless you change the keep until date. You can also set up your season passes to keep until you delete if it is something you know you want to archive or absolutely do not want to miss if you do not watch it immediately.


----------



## lrhorer

NCC2893 said:


> Nope. It just takes longer to get there. I believe those are triggered when your available space drops under 50%.


No, they are triggered whenever the Save Until date is exceeded.


----------



## lrhorer

bareyb said:


> After all the posts here I was fully expecting the MX-1 enclosure to be "difficult".


I don't know why you came away with that impression. If you have a stock 250G drive, it's extremely easy. Even if you have an expanded primary drive it's not really difficult, although in that case one must remove the primary drive and boot Linux in a desktop PC to marry the drives.



bareyb said:


> About the only unusual tool you might want to have is a screwdriver with magnetic tip.


Well, that's hardly an unusual tool. If one uses one's screwdrivers very much it can actually be rather difficult not to wind up with magnetized tips. On the other hand, while using a magnetic screwdriver is quite unlikely to damage a hard drive, it's still a very remote possibility, and therefore I would not personally suggest you recommend this to other individuals. If someone winds up with a paperweight, they may well accuse you of giving them bad advice even if the magnetic screwdriver had nothing to do with it.



bareyb said:


> Take a chance and go for it! The MX-1 is an excellent enclosure with great cooling and very low noise. :up:


I agree. I have two of them. I suggest the user consider getting a better e-SATA cable than comes with the enclosure. Some users have reported problems with them, and indeed it looks like this may be the case with mine. More testing is required to make certain, but some intermittent lockups and GSODs appear to have been caused by using the stock cable with my TiVos.


----------



## lrhorer

jlib said:


> No but they stay there for a longer time


True.



jlib said:


> (especially if you do not auto record suggestions).


False. The TiVo will never automatically delete a scheduled recording to make room for a suggestion. If the TiVo is out of room, it will delete first it's recorded suggestions in chronological order of recording and then expired scheduled recordings in chronological order of expiration in order to record a new scheduled recording. It will delete only suggestions in chronological order of recording to make room for a new suggestion. If drive system is full of scheduled recordings, expired or not, then no new suggestions will be recorded. The TiVo will move up the expiration date on scheduled recordings if necessary to make room form new scheduled recordings unless all the recordings are marked "Keep until I delete."


----------



## jlib

Oh, OK. Since I have never turned suggestions on ever, I did not know that wrinkle. I had thought that expired programs would be over written by suggestions (one reason I never turned them on). Thanks for the clarification. :up: And I'm still not going to turn them on!


----------



## gcsheph

Much discussion here talks about the mX1 enclosure and one person suggested a 'better cable". 
1) What about the drive itself?- what is a high quality 1TB drive to use in the enclosure?
2) What about the 'better cable'? Specific recommendations?
3) When this jewel is built, do you just plug it in and the TIVO recognizes it and it works or is there a process to be followed.

Many thanks to all you experts out there. (All this refers to new S3HD unit)


----------



## greg_burns

gcsheph said:


> Much discussion here talks about the mX1 enclosure and one person suggested a 'better cable".
> 1) What about the drive itself?- what is a high quality 1TB drive to use in the enclosure?
> 2) What about the 'better cable'? Specific recommendations?
> 3) When this jewel is built, do you just plug it in and the TIVO recognizes it and it works or is there a process to be followed.
> 
> Many thanks to all you experts out there. (All this refers to new S3HD unit)


Not discounting those who have upgraded the cable, but I am using the original with no problems for months.

I am thinking about a 1TB, for myself I'm looking at the WD.
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=367225

If you have an S3, you have to do the "Kickstart 62" method. Not sure about TivoHD.


----------



## LHMPDX

I've had a MX-1 and DB35 500 for about 5 months. Only one GSOD and no other issues. A great solution. I again offer my thanks to all the pioneers. 

After some people reported problems as their external drive filled up, I turned off suggestions and began regularly deleting programs from the recently deleted folder. While only a very small bother, this type of vigilance is completely inconsistent with TiVo's general ease of use. 

Are people finding this necessary, or could it have been an overreaction to a few posts? 

lhm


----------



## generaltso

I have an MX-1 on one of my TiVos and an Apricorn on the other, both with 750GB DB35 drives. I've never had a single GSOD or any other issue. They've been working perfectly for months with no special care.


----------



## dr_mal

LHMPDX said:


> I've had a MX-1 and DB35 500 for about 5 months. Only one GSOD and no other issues. A great solution. I again offer my thanks to all the pioneers.
> 
> After some people reported problems as their external drive filled up, I turned off suggestions and began regularly deleting programs from the recently deleted folder. While only a very small bother, this type of vigilance is completely inconsistent with TiVo's general ease of use.
> 
> Are people finding this necessary, or could it have been an overreaction to a few posts?
> 
> lhm


I stopped having issues when I replaced the Antec bundled eSATA cable with a SIIG eSATA cable. Suggestions are on, and my drives are always full.


----------



## greg_burns

generaltso said:


> I have an MX-1 on one of my TiVos and an Apricorn on the other, both with 750GB DB35 drives. I've never had a single GSOD or any other issue. They've been working perfectly for months with no special care.


I am using the original cable, and my drives are always full as well. (250GB internal + 500GB external). No problems here.


----------



## moxie1617

LHMPDX said:


> I've had a MX-1 and DB35 500 for about 5 months. Only one GSOD and no other issues. A great solution. I again offer my thanks to all the pioneers.
> 
> After some people reported problems as their external drive filled up, I turned off suggestions and began regularly deleting programs from the recently deleted folder. While only a very small bother, this type of vigilance is completely inconsistent with TiVo's general ease of use.
> 
> Are people finding this necessary, or could it have been an overreaction to a few posts?
> 
> lhm


I think that those who reported having problems with the Tivo slowing down with the external drive had the 750GB. I have the 500GB DB35 and after running solid for 3 months I decided to let it fill up and even turned on suggestions. I let it run full for three weeks without any slowdowns or problems. After that I cleaned everything up, not for performance reason, just to be anal, and all was okay for a week. Then the rack where the Tivo and MX-1 was cleaned and after that I had two to three reboots a day until I could replace the stock MX-1 cable. Replaced the stock MX-1 cable with the SIIG and have been running six weeks and had three more cleaning crews messing with it and it has been rock solid.

I don't think housekeeping on the Tivo is necessary with the 500GB drive and if you do experience any problems, replace the stock MX-1 cable with the SIIG.

However, I would be cautions about housekeeping around the Tivo and MX-1 enclosure with the stock cable.


----------



## steves3

What! Last night ten minutes into the Packers/Bears game the video freezes and Tivo reboots saying it will take 3 hours to fix. My fix was to restart and unhook the drive so the divorce only cost me 10 minutes of game time (during much swearing).

Had worked fine for several weeks (using Seagate and MX-1). I'll never try again.


----------



## dr_mal

steves3 said:


> What! Last night ten minutes into the Packers/Bears game the video freezes and Tivo reboots saying it will take 3 hours to fix. My fix was to restart and unhook the drive so the divorce only cost me 10 minutes of game time (during much swearing).
> 
> Had worked fine for several weeks (using Seagate and MX-1). I'll never try again.


2 things:

1) It's a very bad idea to unplug the TiVo while it's got a GSOD (the "three hours to repair screen)
2) It's not uncommon for a SIIG eSATA cable (instead of the stock eSATA that comes with the Antec MX-1) to fix exactly that kind of problem.


----------



## lrhorer

jlib said:


> Oh, OK. Since I have never turned suggestions on ever, I did not know that wrinkle. I had thought that expired programs would be over written by suggestions (one reason I never turned them on). Thanks for the clarification. :up: And I'm still not going to turn them on!


The decision is of course completely up to you, but I for one love TiVo suggestions. It's actually rather amazing how well the TiVo can manage to figure out what it's users like and record things accordingly. It does require a small amount of dilligence on the user's part in hitting the thumbs up and thumbs down keys, but after only 3 or 4 weeks of hitting the thumbs up/down buttons, it can guess fairly well what I like. Of course, I'm sure with a significantly sized family wherein each person has different tastes may make it more difficult.

One other benefit: the TiVo suggestions list acts as a sort of free space indicator. If one enables suggestions and folders, a quick glance at the number of programs in the suggestions folders gives one a rough idea of how many scheduled programs can be recorded before losing one.

There is really no significant reason not to turn it on.


----------



## lrhorer

gcsheph said:


> Much discussion here talks about the mX1 enclosure and one person suggested a 'better cable".
> 1) What about the drive itself?- what is a high quality 1TB drive to use in the enclosure?


I could be mistaken, but I believe as of this time there are only two 1TB internal SATA drives avaiable. One is made by Hitachi and the other Seagate. There are a number of compatible e-SATA RAID arrays.



gcsheph said:


> 2) What about the 'better cable'? Specific recommendations?


I haven't replaced mine, yet. There are a number of suggestions in this thread. Try browsing through it.



gcsheph said:


> 3) When this jewel is built, do you just plug it in and the TIVO recognizes it and it works or is there a process to be followed.


See the first post of this thread.



gcsheph said:


> Many thanks to all you experts out there. (All this refers to new S3HD unit)


Is that an S3, or a TiVoHD? Is it stock or did you get an upgraded TiVo? If you have a stock Series III TiVo (250G drive), the kickstart method will work. If you have an upgraded Series III or a TiVoHD, then you'll need mfstools, and you'll need to open the TiVo, voiding the warranty.


----------



## lrhorer

moolman said:


> Just buy a preassembled one, if you think you can't make it. There's plenty of reasons why the Antec MX-1 is difficult to assemble. ie. if you have only one arm because getting the 2 inner screws in are difficult especially with one arm missing.


That's also the only reason of which I can think why it would take 30 minutes. The time spent doing both of mine together was only about 20 minutes, and I was being exceptionally careful with those large drives. Maybe the bubblegum made it all go faster?


----------



## lrhorer

steves3 said:


> What! Last night ten minutes into the Packers/Bears game the video freezes and Tivo reboots saying it will take 3 hours to fix. My fix was to restart and unhook the drive so the divorce only cost me 10 minutes of game time (during much swearing).
> 
> Had worked fine for several weeks (using Seagate and MX-1). I'll never try again.


The evidence is mounting this may be universally related to the stock cable supplied with the MX-1. I was skeptical myself, and still am to some extent, but one of my reboots was without question related directly to a loss of communication with the external drive. I still have some testing to do before I would be ready to declare the situation at my house to be directly related to the stock cable and nothing else, but it's looking more and more like it may be the case. None of the GSODs have been fatal, or for that matter have they even lasted very long, and they are not at all frequent, so I'm not overly concerned with the problem, either way.

Even with the occasional GSOD, my two Series III TiVos are both far more reliable than my Series I attached to the CATV set top box. The set top box has a habit of shutting itself down completely every so often, or whenver power flickers a bit. Once shut down it no longer responds ot the IR blaster, of course. I've lost days worth of programs with this setup. They are also more reliable than the piece of @#$! Scientific Atlanta 8300HD the CATV company charged me $30 a month to endure. It lost entire programs fairly regularly.


----------



## greg_burns

lrhorer said:


> I could be mistaken, but I believe as of this time there are only two 1TB internal SATA drives avaiable. One is made by Hitachi and the other Seagate. There are a number of compatible e-SATA RAID arrays.


There is also the WD...
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=367225&page=1&pp=30

Guess depends what you mean by available. As in hard to find?


----------



## Alcatraz

lrhorer said:


> I
> Is that an S3, or a TiVoHD? Is it stock or did you get an upgraded TiVo? If you have a stock Series III TiVo (250G drive), the kickstart method will work. If you have an upgraded Series III or a TiVoHD, then you'll need mfstools, and you'll need to open the TiVo, voiding the warranty.


If it's "upgraded", wouldn't the warranty already be void?


----------



## greg_burns

Alcatraz said:


> If it's "upgraded", wouldn't the warranty already be void?


A lot of the third party sellers (Weaknees, etc.) have their own warranties I believe.


----------



## jlib

lrhorer said:


> The decision is of course completely up to you, but I for one love TiVo suggestions...There is really no significant reason not to turn it on.


I guess now with folders in Now Playing you are right. I have always browsed the suggestions folder in the Find Programs area and do find an occasional gem but as you pointed out one must be diligent with the thumbs up/down for that to work effectively.

The problem of multiple viewers creating a composite user reminds me of a comment from someone here who said his TiVo was convinced he was a "Gay Nazi" because of his penchant for the Military and History channel and his wifes love of the Food Network and Travel channel.


----------



## Joybob

jlib said:


> I guess now with folders in Now Playing you are right. I have always browsed the suggestions folder in the Find Programs area and do find an occasional gem but as you pointed out one must be diligent with the thumbs up/down for that to work effectively.
> 
> The problem of multiple viewers creating a composite user reminds me of a comment from someone here who said his TiVo was convinced he was a "Gay Nazi" because of his penchant for the Military and History channel and his wifes love of the Food Network and Travel channel.


I too have had my Tivo recommend page after page of Gay pride programs. Apparently if you thumbs up Will & Grace it goes on to recommend homosexual programs instead of simply sitcoms?


----------



## dougdingle

Joybob said:


> I too have had my Tivo recommend page after page of Gay pride programs. Apparently if you thumbs up Will & Grace it goes on to recommend homosexual programs instead of simply sitcoms?


Between that and cooking shows, it's almost guaranteed.


----------



## Joybob

dougdingle said:


> Between that and cooking shows, it's almost guaranteed.


So if I happen to like both Emeril Live and Will&Grace I'm gay?

That explains the lack of girlfriend.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> So if I happen to like both Emeril Live and Will&Grace I'm gay?
> 
> That explains the lack of girlfriend.


Hmmmm...slightly off topic?


----------



## vstone

Joybob said:


> So if I happen to like both Emeril Live and Will&Grace I'm gay?
> 
> That explains the lack of girlfriend.


A name like JoyBob doesn't help much.


----------



## lrhorer

greg_burns said:


> A lot of the third party sellers (Weaknees, etc.) have their own warranties I believe.


Correct. Anyone who wants can sell you a modified device and agree to warranty it themselves, but the manufacturer will usually refuse to do so. Of course, as long as somebody does, and that somebody is good on their word and doesn't go bankrupt, who cares? I imagine Weaknees or PTVUpgrade will also void their third party warranties if you open the case.

I would never advise anyone to take action which would void a warranty on a device they own, but I have done so myself hundreds of times and I would always be happy to tell someone else how, provided they understand I am not recommending this course of action.


----------



## lrhorer

jlib said:


> The problem of multiple viewers creating a composite user reminds me of a comment from someone here who said his TiVo was convinced he was a "Gay Nazi" because of his penchant for the Military and History channel and his wifes love of the Food Network and Travel channel.


Yes, I can see how the poor thing got confused.


----------



## lrhorer

Joybob said:


> So if I happen to like both Emeril Live and Will&Grace I'm gay?


You said it, not me. 



Joybob said:


> That explains the lack of girlfriend.


But you still have your TiVo!!!


----------



## jsnow789

Kenji said:


> Apricorn does.


Just thought I'd report that my Apricorn 1TB DVR Extender has been running cool and quietly for several weeks. I did put a piece of grey duct tape over the red light on the front though. The tape matches the enclosure and now that annoying light is not shining across the living room.

eta: typo


----------



## richsadams

jsnow789 said:


> Just thought I'd report that my Apricorn 1TB DVR Extender has been running cool and quietly for several weeks. I did put a piece of grey duct tape over the red light on the front though. The tape matches the enclosure and now that annoying light is not shining across the living room.
> 
> eta: typo


Excellent! Thanks for the update. :up:


----------



## dougdingle

Just a quick update:

Installed 500 gig Samsung and MX-1 on Aug 4th

First reboot Aug 7
Second reboot Aug 14
Third reboot Sept 2
Fourth reboot Sept 8

Replaced MX-1 cable with SIIG cable Sept 10

No problems since.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> Just a quick update:
> 
> Installed 500 gig Samsung and MX-1 on Aug 4th
> 
> First reboot Aug 7
> Second reboot Aug 14
> Third reboot Sept 2
> Fourth reboot Sept 8
> 
> Replaced MX-1 cable with SIIG cable Sept 10
> 
> No problems since.


Good info, thanks. :up:

I wonder if Antec is aware of this? Their stock eSATA cables seem to be an ongoing problem. We're using our original MX-1 cable (since May 12th) and zero problems, but we have a SIIG cable for back-up JIC.

I know it's a bit of a pain, but if anyone that's had problems with their original Antec MX-1 eSATA cable could send a comment, it might push them to switch suppliers and save others some grief. Id think a simple Heres what happened to me comment would do it.

Here is a link to the Antec CS contact page:

*http://www.antec.com/NAnewticket.html*


----------



## mx77m

I need to move my Series 3 w/attached SATA drive that requires unplugging the Tivo and the SATA drive. Also, I don't want to risk erasing any of the saved programs on the drive. What's the best, safest method? Thanks,


----------



## richsadams

mx77m said:


> I need to move my Series 3 w/attached SATA drive that requires unplugging the Tivo and the SATA drive. Also, I don't want to risk erasing any of the saved programs on the drive. What's the best, safest method? Thanks,


*Moving TiVo w/eSATA Drive*

1. Unplug TiVo
2. Turn off and unplug the eSATA drive
3. Unplug the eSATA cable from TiVo and the eSATA drive (along with other cables, etc.)

*Setting TiVo Back Up w/eSATA Drive*

1. Plug in the eSATA cable to the drive and TiVo
2. Plug in and turn on the eSATA drive
3. Plug in TiVo

Basically you just don't want to unplug or turn off the eSATA drive while TiVo is plugged in as it will ask to divorce the drive. As long as TiVo is unplugged you can pretty much do whatever you need to do with the eSATA drive. Just make sure the drive is on and plugged into TiVo before plugging TiVo back in.


----------



## fred2

mx77m said:


> I need to move my Series 3 w/attached SATA drive that requires unplugging the Tivo and the SATA drive. Also, I don't want to risk erasing any of the saved programs on the drive. What's the best, safest method? Thanks,


I did it just the way Rich Adams suggested a few weeks ago when I moved all of my components into an armoire. No problems.


----------



## richsadams

fred2 said:


> I did it just the way Rich Adams suggested a few weeks ago when I moved all of my components into an armoire. No problems.


Great minds think alike!


----------



## fred2

richsadams said:


> Great minds think alike!


I might not go so far!  But we appear to both be believers in the pacific northWET - Seattle, here!

Back to our regularly scheduled topic - kind of....

I'm still using an esata cable I purchased from Frys with my FAP750 but I did trim the rubber/plastic to get a better fit.


----------



## Corran Horn

Big thanks to those that discovered this ability. I've got a 500GB drive in an Antec MX-1 and it worked first time, no problems. Extra space is a must, especially in a house with a 1-year-old.


----------



## Joybob

Anyone have any idea if drives with a large buffer (32 megs) will do anything for the tivo?


----------



## supie

I want to get a 1TB drive to install Externally and I am planning to get the Antec MX1 and the SIIG eSata II cable.

As far as I can tell there are currently only two 1TB drives which will work with the Series 3: 

Hitachi Cinemastar 1000Gb HCS721010KLA330
Western Digital 1000Gb WD10EACS
I search for a Seagate DB35 - 1TB but I do not think it has been released yet.

So my questions are:
1. Which of the two drives would you recommend?
2. Is there objectionable noise? (The WD is rated at 25-27db - Hitachi 29-30db)
3. Does either drive have adjustable acoustics?
4. Which runs cooler? (if it runs hot, how hot?)
5. Since the WD has not been around very long has anyone had problems?
6. If WD is running good, how long have you had it?
7. On both drives please tell us the Pros and Cons and anything else you can share?
8. Where is the best deal on either?

Thanks in advance.


----------



## 1283

definitely WD 1TB: cooler, quieter, and better RMA process


----------



## Joybob

Aren't those internal drives?


----------



## cheerdude

Joybob - They are internal drives... but with the Antec MX-1 enclosure, it makes it an external drive.

Supie - I've got a WD 1TB drive with the MX-1 (when the BestBuy deal was mentioned). So far, it has been going well for several weeks with no problems. Very quiet...


----------



## supie

Joybob Wrote:


> Aren't those internal drives?


Yes but placing them in an eSATA enclosure make them external, I am planning to get the Antec MX1 and the SIIG eSata


----------



## Joybob

cheerdude said:


> Joybob - They are internal drives... but with the Antec MX-1 enclosure, it makes it an external drive.
> 
> Supie - I've got a WD 1TB drive with the MX-1 (when the BestBuy deal was mentioned). So far, it has been going well for several weeks with no problems. Very quiet...


I'd go with Hitachi for the bigger Cache. Seems like it might help.


----------



## 1283

Joybob said:


> I'd go with Hitachi for the bigger Cache. Seems like it might help.


How would it help? Cache is not that useful when the data is not reused. The ones TiVo uses have 2MB cache.


----------



## RandyMeinke

c3 said:


> How would it help? Cache is not that useful when the data is not reused. The ones TiVo uses have 2MB cache.


 Cache will help with file operations. It will also help when watching 'live' TV, as TIVO first writes the data stream, and then it reads the stream to show it to you 'live'.


----------



## Joybob

RandyMeinke said:


> Cache will help with file operations. It will also help when watching 'live' TV, as TIVO first writes the data stream, and then it reads the stream to show it to you 'live'.


I dare say that it might make the UI faster too.


----------



## 1283

The cache issue has been discussed many times over the years. You should be able to find many threads here.


----------



## tomn

TiVo Series 3 eSATA drive expansion not working not working 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I have recently purchased a TiVo Model TCD652160 
Software Ver. 8.1.7c2-01-2-652 and I am attempting to add an additional drive through the eSATA port. The new drive is a Seagate DB35 7200.3 hard drive 750 GB Internal 3.5" with an Antec Veris Media enclosure with a supplied eSATA cable.

When I try to install the drive using the proceedure described (holding pause during reboot), I have no luck in getting the TiVo to recognize the pause command. It never stops but just keeps on booting up to the TiVO screen.

Has TiVo disabled this? 

I know the drive is working as I have hooked it to my computer and it gets recognized.

Any ideas on what I am doing wrong (if anything)?

Tom 
Report Post


----------



## richsadams

tomn said:


> TiVo Series 3 eSATA drive expansion not working not working
> 
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
> 
> I have recently purchased a TiVo Model TCD652160
> Software Ver. 8.1.7c2-01-2-652 and I am attempting to add an additional drive through the eSATA port. The new drive is a Seagate DB35 7200.3 hard drive 750 GB Internal 3.5" with an Antec Veris Media enclosure with a supplied eSATA cable.
> 
> When I try to install the drive using the proceedure described (holding pause during reboot), I have no luck in getting the TiVo to recognize the pause command. It never stops but just keeps on booting up to the TiVO screen.
> 
> Has TiVo disabled this?
> 
> I know the drive is working as I have hooked it to my computer and it gets recognized.
> 
> Any ideas on what I am doing wrong (if anything)?
> 
> Tom
> Report Post


Hi Tom and welcome. Unfortunately the KS procedure to add an eSATA drive does not work on the TiVo HD, only the original Series 3. You'll need to read this thread to learn more about adding the drive. It's more complicated but can be done.

*EDIT: * It looks as if v9.2 of the software may be rolling out now and it supposedly enables plug and play eSATA connections. I'd just wait a bit and see how that goes.

BTW, be careful about double posting (posting the same question on multiple threads)...the moderators can get fussy and it clogs things up a bit.


----------



## thxman

Hey, Hey . . . My first official post to this forum! Actually I have been following for a long time; just not a big poster normally.

Anyhow I decided to pose a question to the Seagate support team regarding the drives in their FreeAgent Pro line especially given their excellent warranty for an external model (I think it's about the best I've seen short of buying an internal drive and installing in an enclosure??), and was wondering based on what I've read so far here if this appears to be accurate:

My question to them:
"Can you tell me if these drives with 5 year warranty are certified for 24/7 A/V or DVR applications? Meaning are they certified to run 24/7 if needed?

Advanced Support reply:
"Thank you for your E-mail inquiry.

With regards to your query, I understand that you want to know whether FreeAgent Pro drives are certified for 24/7 A/V or DVR applications.

Yes, FreeAgent Pro can be used with these Applications and they are designed to run 24/7.

If you have any additional questions, please let me know."

Thanks and Regards,
Seagate Technical Support.
1-800-SEAGATE
=========================================

Any comments would be welcomed info! I just bought the recommended WD My DVR but the FAP500 is about $50 cheaper (less the cable I understand) and a MUCH better warranty which for DVR purposes should be of major consideration.

Thanks and good stuff on the posts!!
Kevin


----------



## richsadams

thxman said:


> Hey, Hey . . . My first official post to this forum! Actually I have been following for a long time; just not a big poster normally.
> 
> Anyhow I decided to pose a question to the Seagate support team regarding the drives in their FreeAgent Pro line especially given their excellent warranty for an external model (I think it's about the best I've seen short of buying an internal drive and installing in an enclosure??), and was wondering based on what I've read so far here if this appears to be accurate:
> 
> My question to them:
> "Can you tell me if these drives with 5 year warranty are certified for 24/7 A/V or DVR applications? Meaning are they certified to run 24/7 if needed?
> 
> Advanced Support reply:
> "Thank you for your E-mail inquiry.
> 
> With regards to your query, I understand that you want to know whether FreeAgent Pro drives are certified for 24/7 A/V or DVR applications.
> 
> Yes, FreeAgent Pro can be used with these Applications and they are designed to run 24/7.
> 
> If you have any additional questions, please let me know."
> 
> Thanks and Regards,
> Seagate Technical Support.
> 1-800-SEAGATE
> =========================================
> 
> Any comments would be welcomed info! I just bought the recommended WD My DVR but the FAP500 is about $50 cheaper (less the cable I understand) and a MUCH better warranty which for DVR purposes should be of major consideration.
> 
> Thanks and good stuff on the posts!!
> Kevin


Welcome!  Nice info.

Were it me I'd hold on for a short while. Apparently official eSATA support may be available very soon (more info)...and what will be supported is unknown at this time.

The only downside to FAP's has been their cables and the fact that they can overheat (no fan). If you use one of the recommended eSATA replacement cables and have good ventilation it should be fine.

We have had our Seagate DB 35 7200.3 and Antec MX-1 enclosure eSATA operating non-stop since May with no problems.


----------



## -happyshow-

I received the update enabling the esata port on the TiVo HD last night. I was surprized to get it so early. Anyway sorry if it's been posted already but esata expansion is now official.


----------



## greg_burns

-happyshow- said:


> I received the update enabling the esata port on the TiVo HD last night. I was surprized to get it so early. Anyway sorry if it's been posted already but esata expansion is now official.


9.2?


----------



## tivoPaul

I have been running the 1TB Deskstar in an MX1 enclosure with the 2M recommended SIIG cable (from Amazon) and am getting reboots at least daily (probably more, I'm not there to watch it all day). Anyone have any ideas? From all I have read, this combination should be good....about all I can think of is to try to the MX-1 stock cable.

My Series 3 is running 9.1.

Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks--

Paul


----------



## greg_burns

tivoPaul said:


> I have been running the 1TB Deskstar in an MX1 enclosure with the 2M recommended SIIG cable (from Amazon) and am getting reboots at least daily (probably more, I'm not there to watch it all day). Anyone have any ideas? From all I have read, this combination should be good....about all I can think of is to try to the MX-1 stock cable.
> 
> My Series 3 is running 9.1.
> 
> Any advice would be appreciated. Thanks--
> 
> Paul


I would connect it up to your PC and check it for problems

http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm

I believe "Drive Fitness Test" would be the appropriate software.


----------



## 1283

tivoPaul said:


> My Series 3 is running 9.1.


If you're using HDMI, 9.1 has a reboot problem, so it may not be related to the external drive. Other than that, I would recommend 1m instead of 2m cable for better signal integrity.


----------



## tivoPaul

I am using HDMI....I'll give it a try w/ component and see what happens. Thanks to you both for the input.


----------



## jlib

thxman said:


> My question to them:
> "Can you tell me if these drives with 5 year warranty are certified for 24/7 A/V or DVR applications? Meaning are they certified to run 24/7 if needed?


All their drives are capable of 24/7 use. So, no worry. It is much less stressful to leave a drive on constantly than to turn it on and off.


----------



## TerpBE

I've been having issues with my Cavalry enclosure, so I want to swap it with an Antec. Can I power down the Tivo, put the drive in a new enclosure, plug it back in, and power it back up without any problems? (same drive, different enclosure)

I want to make sure that there is no enclosure-specific identifying information that will prevent Tivo from recognizing that it is married to the drive.


----------



## thxman

richsadams said:


> Welcome!  Nice info.
> 
> Were it me I'd hold on for a short while. Apparently official eSATA support may be available very soon ...and what will be supported is unknown at this time.
> 
> The only downside to FAP's has been their cables and the fact that they can overheat (no fan). If you use one of the recommended eSATA replacement cables and have good ventilation it should be fine.
> 
> We have had our Seagate DB 35 7200.3 and Antec MX-1 enclosure eSATA operating non-stop since May with no problems.


Good call Rich, thanks! I think I'll just keep what I ordered until they actually announce their supported drive(s).

I just saw Engaget's "official" support announcement on their main site page:

homeentertainment.engadget(com of course)

Kevin


----------



## richsadams

TerpBE said:


> I've been having issues with my Cavalry enclosure, so I want to swap it with an Antec. Can I power down the Tivo, put the drive in a new enclosure, plug it back in, and power it back up without any problems? (same drive, different enclosure)
> 
> I want to make sure that there is no enclosure-specific identifying information that will prevent Tivo from recognizing that it is married to the drive.


That should do it. As long as the drive itself is not compromised the enclosure should be transparent.

Here's an earlier post regarding temporarily disconnecting an eSATA drive.


----------



## Joybob

TerpBE said:


> I've been having issues with my Cavalry enclosure, so I want to swap it with an Antec. Can I power down the Tivo, put the drive in a new enclosure, plug it back in, and power it back up without any problems? (same drive, different enclosure)
> 
> I want to make sure that there is no enclosure-specific identifying information that will prevent Tivo from recognizing that it is married to the drive.


Now that's just absurd. An enclosure is just a box with a fan dude. Why would it talk with the Tivo?


----------



## 1283

Joybob said:


> Now that's just absurd. An enclosure is just a box with a fan dude.


What's absurd is that your second sentence is not even a correct statement.


----------



## Joybob

c3 said:


> What's absurd is that your second sentence is not even a correct statement.


Well it's an over-simplification but you get the point.


----------



## tivoPaul

c3 said:


> If you're using HDMI, 9.1 has a reboot problem, so it may not be related to the external drive. Other than that, I would recommend 1m instead of 2m cable for better signal integrity.


After you told me this, I read about the HDMI reboot problem in the other thread, and was sure my problem was exactly the same one. Especially since it always seemed to happen right when I would turn the TV on. So I switched to component last night, tested it a couple times, and it seemed solid.

Now I get up this morning, turn on the TV (now hooked up to the S3 via component)...and get a reboot.

Still thinking, like you said, that it is unrelated to the additional drive. Am holding out my hoped that with 9.2 the problem goes away.


----------



## Joybob

Should I add an extra drive with the Kickstart method now or wait till 9.2?

Will it make any difference?


----------



## TerpBE

richsadams said:


> That should do it. As long as the drive itself is not compromised the enclosure should be transparent.
> 
> Here's an earlier post regarding temporarily disconnecting an eSATA drive.


Thanks!


----------



## Buran

Joybob said:


> Should I add an extra drive with the Kickstart method now or wait till 9.2? Will it make any difference?


I would hope that existing hookups will still work. I'm using a Lacie D2 Quadra 500GB scrounged from work (we were using it for something else, then we weren't, and it was just kicking around, so I put it to use) and I'm concerned that if I install 9.2 it will stop working. I don't know if anyone has 9.2 and an external drive already running, but I think we need to hear from someone in that situation to see if we need to worry or not ... I hope it will be okay; I've gone from never having room left for Suggestions and having shows vanish relatively quickly to not having to worry about that, and having 100 suggestions available.

Good thing, too, as History Channel just went HD in my area. I'll really be in trouble when Discovery HD hits ...  (Whenever that is, anyway).


----------



## talmania

Joybob said:


> Should I add an extra drive with the Kickstart method now or wait till 9.2?
> 
> Will it make any difference?


I just got the 9.2 upgrade last night and I'm wondering if I've originally upgraded the internal drive whether or not I need to do the kickstart method or I can just attach an external device?

Anyone?


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> Now that's just absurd. An enclosure is just a box with a fan dude. Why would it talk with the Tivo?


What's absurd is a reply like yours to an honest question; its not productive or helpful.



Joybob said:


> Should I add an extra drive with the Kickstart method now or wait till 9.2?
> 
> Will it make any difference?


Thats absurd. If you'd read the v9.2 threads you'd know that it wont make any differencedude.

Hows that?


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> What's absurd is a reply like yours to an honest question; its not productive or helpful.
> 
> Thats absurd. If you'd read the v9.2 threads you'd know that it wont make any differencedude.
> 
> Hows that?


Dude, I said the same thing richsadams wrote.

How is saying "the enclosure should be transparent." better than saying "an enclosure = box+fan"?


----------



## richsadams

Buran said:


> <snip>I don't know if anyone has 9.2 and an external drive already running, but I think we need to hear from someone in that situation to see if we need to worry or not ... <snip>


This post indicates that the OP has received v9.2.J. His eSATA drive has not been affected. IIRC, there are a couple of other posts saying the same thing. :up:


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> This post indicates that the OP has received v9.2.J. His eSATA drive has not been affected. IIRC, there are a couple of other posts saying the same thing. :up:


Yeah, but I'm wondering if kickstart and 9.2 methods of formatting and adding the drive are equivalent or if one would be better than the other.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> Dude, I said the same thing richsadams wrote.
> 
> How is saying "the enclosure should be transparent." better than saying "an enclosure = box+fan"?


It's possible that you didn't mean to be sarcastic but your response...



> Now that's just absurd. An enclosure is just a box with a fan dude. Why would it talk with the Tivo?


 certainly sounded that way. The question was already answered with reference to step-by-step instructions.

Your later response was not only inaccurate it appeared that you were trying to make the OP feel stupid for asking IMO.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> Yeah, but I'm wondering if kickstart and 9.2 methods of formatting and adding the drive are equivalent or if one would be better than the other.


If eSATA is fully supported, i.e. "plug and play", that would be better than using the six-month old hack we've been employing all along. No fuss, no muss...plug it in and you're golden. :up:

If anyone's wondering if they should do it now or wait a couple or three weeks until they get v9.2, my recommendation would be to wait.


----------



## Buran

richsadams said:


> This post indicates that the OP has received v9.2.J. His eSATA drive has not been affected. IIRC, there are a couple of other posts saying the same thing. :up:


Thanks. I found some of that a bit after posting, so I feel less worried. I know that it's theoretically possible to refuse to pair with certain types of drives - mfr/model info is available via IDE/ATA links, as PC diagnostic programs will show (my Powerbook knows the make and model of drive installed in it, for example) but I can't see why it would be to Tivo's advantage to kill pairings already made. Maybe, if they offer their own branded drive, if you don't already have a paired drive you might be told to buy theirs, but it would anger a lot of people if the "backdoor" were killed, losing data.


----------



## rictus

Has anyone discovered whether 9.2 will allow plug-and-play of a new eSATA drive if the original internal drive has been upgraded? I was hoping not to have to go through the trouble of breaking open the box again and doing the mfstools thing.


----------



## talmania

rictus said:


> Has anyone discovered whether 9.2 will allow plug-and-play of a new eSATA drive if the original internal drive has been upgraded? I was hoping not to have to go through the trouble of breaking open the box again and doing the mfstools thing.


Heh, I've asked the same question. Let me know if you find out!  I'll try it tonight but would rather hear from someone else first before trying.


----------



## richsadams

Buran said:


> Thanks. I found some of that a bit after posting, so I feel less worried. I know that it's theoretically possible to refuse to pair with certain types of drives - mfr/model info is available via IDE/ATA links, as PC diagnostic programs will show (my Powerbook knows the make and model of drive installed in it, for example) but I can't see why it would be to Tivo's advantage to kill pairings already made. Maybe, if they offer their own branded drive, if you don't already have a paired drive you might be told to buy theirs, but it would anger a lot of people if the "backdoor" were killed, losing data.


 Yep, if I were the betting type Id put my money on everything thats working continuing to work and an eventual introduction of a TiVo branded eSATA drive to be sold on line and/or at Best Buy. (Reference) That will be the most cost-effective way to manage eSATA support for TiVo.



rictus said:


> Has anyone discovered whether 9.2 will allow plug-and-play of a new eSATA drive if the original internal drive has been upgraded? I was hoping not to have to go through the trouble of breaking open the box again and doing the mfstools thing.


 GOOD question! Thats the only area where I see an existing eSATA setup possibly having trouble. Itll be good to get an answer to that one.

In the meantime I think Id hold of on doing any internal OR external upgrades for a few weeks.


----------



## GregComeLately

Maybe this has been posted already (if so, my apologies), but Circuit City has the MX-1 enclosure on sale now for $39.95 w/o any rebates.


----------



## richsadams

GregComeLately said:


> Maybe this has been posted already (if so, my apologies), but Circuit City has the MX-1 enclosure on sale now for $39.95 w/o any rebates.


I did notice that somewhere else, but thanks for the reminder...that's a good price. Ours has worked flawlessly for over six months now. I might pick up a couple more to replace the external drive cases on a couple of our P.C.'s that don't have any cooling...and are fairly noisy.

Thanks for the tip! :up:


----------



## aprest

Will this approach work with the $299 Tivo HD Recorder as well as the Tivo Series 3? 

I tried searching for this in this thread but the system appears to be too busy to respond.


----------



## richsadams

aprest said:


> Will this approach work with the $299 Tivo HD Recorder as well as the Tivo Series 3?
> 
> I tried searching for this in this thread but the system appears to be too busy to respond.


Not sure what you mean by "approach", but if you mean will the TiVo HD support an external SATA hard drive, the answer is yes with some modifications of the internal drive now (more here) and eventually yes as a plug and play device according to TiVo (more here).

Again, my advice would be to wait until the full software upgrade is rolled out to everyone in the next few weeks or so...keep an eye on the forum and see what is recommended at that time. Existing eSATA drives should continue to work...as they are with the trial version of the latest upgrade. But no one knows for sure what will happen so it's probably best to hold off for a bit.

The "Server Busy" message is very frustrating for us all. The "keepers" of the website have promised their own upgrade soon.


----------



## jonglee

GregComeLately said:


> Maybe this has been posted already (if so, my apologies), but Circuit City has the MX-1 enclosure on sale now for $39.95 w/o any rebates.


Thanks. I just ordered one at Circuit City after looking at your post. Saved $15 versus amazon!


----------



## nexus99

I have a Western Digital My Book Home 1TB eSATA device. I am attaching it to my S3 with a SIIG cable (the 1m version). My S3 continually reboots when the My Book is attached. I get the "Welcome! Powering Up..." screen and when you would usually have the single orange LED light up it reboots. When I dosconnect the My Book it powers up ok. Any ideas on this one? I know 9.2 is coming soon but I imagine I will have the same problem then.


----------



## Sevenpants

Bad news: Apparently not all is peachy when it comes to HD Tivo, 9.2, and eSATA. (Or, hopefully, I am just unlucky...)

My stock HD Tivo received the 9.2 update last night. I'm going out of town next week and could really use the extra storage, so I went and bought a 1 TB WD drive from Best Buy (the WD10000CSRTL/Green Power one) and an Antec MX-1. Installed drive in enclosure, power off tivo, plug in and power enclosure, and power on tivo. After everything is booted up, nothing is different until I hit the Tivo button. I get a message that an external drive is detected and do I want to enable it? I click yes, it takes me to the eSATA storage menu and gives me this message:

Unsupported Device

This Device may not be set up.

For more information on external storage solutions, visit the tivo expand website (it lists the url, but I don't have enough posts).

Since then, I've tried the following things, all to no avail:

- Go to eSATA menu manually and try to enable.
- Unplug and replug external drive and try to enable.
- Plug external drive into PC via USB, format, and then replug into tivo. The drive seems to work just fine in Windows (I haven't run any diagnostics on it, but copying a file worked...), but I still get the Unsupported Device message from Tivo.

Any ideas? Has anyone successfully added a new eSATA drive to a HD Tivo since the update?


----------



## richsadams

nexus99 said:


> I have a Western Digital My Book Home 1TB eSATA device. I am attaching it to my S3 with a SIIG cable (the 1m version). My S3 continually reboots when the My Book is attached. I get the "Welcome! Powering Up..." screen and when you would usually have the single orange LED light up it reboots. When I dosconnect the My Book it powers up ok. Any ideas on this one? I know 9.2 is coming soon but I imagine I will have the same problem then.


Unfortunately that sounds more like a hard drive problem...and if things return to normal when you divorce the eSATA drive, that's where I'd start.

TiVo may be unable to connect to the drive. The eSATA cable may still be the culprit. Make sure it's connected snugly at both ends with no power source or other interference nearby. Even though it's new, it still could be a bad cable.

Also check the power connection on the eSATA drive...snug connections w/o interruptions, good power switch, etc. A glitch there can cause problems as well.

There could be a problem with the enclosure...bad circuit board, bad connections, etc.

Finally it could be the SATA drive itself. Listen for proper spin up when you turn it on...any unusual noises. If it sounds good I'd connect it to a P.C. and run some diagnostics on it to check that the read/write heads are working properly and that there are no bad sectors. The WD Lifeguard Diagnostic tool is a good start. A quick test to start and if that passes, one pass extended read, one pass extended write, and another pass extended read. That will take up to 12 hours but at least you'll know if it's the drive or not.

If you don't want to go through all of that, you might want to just try and return everything and start new. OR (recommended) just wait for v9.2 to be rolled out and take advantage of the new eSATA plug and play support! Might be a few weeks, but who needs the headaches if you don't need the space right now?


----------



## richsadams

Sevenpants said:


> Bad news: Apparently not all is peachy when it comes to HD Tivo, 9.2, and eSATA. (Or, hopefully, I am just unlucky...)
> 
> My stock HD Tivo received the 9.2 update last night. I'm going out of town next week and could really use the extra storage, so I went and bought a 1 TB WD drive from Best Buy (the WD10000CSRTL/Green Power one) and an Antec MX-1. Installed drive in enclosure, power off tivo, plug in and power enclosure, and power on tivo. After everything is booted up, nothing is different until I hit the Tivo button. I get a message that an external drive is detected and do I want to enable it? I click yes, it takes me to the eSATA storage menu and gives me this message:
> 
> Unsupported Device
> 
> This Device may not be set up.
> 
> For more information on external storage solutions, visit the tivo expand website (it lists the url, but I don't have enough posts).
> 
> Since then, I've tried the following things, all to no avail:
> 
> - Go to eSATA menu manually and try to enable.
> - Unplug and replug external drive and try to enable.
> - Plug external drive into PC via USB, format, and then replug into tivo. The drive seems to work just fine in Windows (I haven't run any diagnostics on it, but copying a file worked...), but I still get the Unsupported Device message from Tivo.
> 
> Any ideas? Has anyone successfully added a new eSATA drive to a HD Tivo since the update?


Interesting...and valuable info. :up:

The TiVo HD's never supported the kickstart 62 eSATA expansion method like the S3's did. It looks like they have yet to support eSATA plug and play.

There are reports of existing S3s w/eSATA drives continuing to work with the latest upgrade...not sure about existing TiVo HD's w/eSATA drives working with the latest upgrade though. AFAIK no one has tried an eSATA plug and play on an S3 with the latest upgrade either.

The most recent process to add an eSATA drive to a TiVo HD involves removing the internal drive and doing some programming. (More here). So it still looks like eSATA drives are still not supported on the TiVo HD as plug and play devices with v9.2.j. Perhaps that will change with the rollout of v9.2?

Another good reason to hold out for a bit longer.


----------



## Joybob

nexus99 said:


> I have a Western Digital My Book Home 1TB eSATA device. I am attaching it to my S3 with a SIIG cable (the 1m version). My S3 continually reboots when the My Book is attached. I get the "Welcome! Powering Up..." screen and when you would usually have the single orange LED light up it reboots. When I dosconnect the My Book it powers up ok. Any ideas on this one? I know 9.2 is coming soon but I imagine I will have the same problem then.


I'm getting my My Book in the mail tomorrow, so I'll tell you if I have the same problem.


----------



## nexus99

Thanks JoyBob. I did validate that the My Book Home works fine when connected vis USB to a laptop. Also I can see that the TIVO talks to the drive too. It has a indicator on the front that shows activity.


----------



## Joybob

nexus99 said:


> Thanks JoyBob. I did validate that the My Book Home works fine when connected vis USB to a laptop. Also I can see that the TIVO talks to the drive too. It has a indicator on the front that shows activity.


Dude are you connecting the drive while the Tivo is still on?


----------



## jlib

Sevenpants said:


> Bad news: Apparently not all is peachy when it comes to HD Tivo, 9.2, and eSATA. (Or, hopefully, I am just unlucky...)
> 
> ...Any ideas? Has anyone successfully added a new eSATA drive to a HD Tivo since the update?


I don't see were there is any problem here. You are using an unsupported device so just use the unsupported but fully functional method richsadams linked to. The eSATA port is only going to work natively with TiVo branded or TiVo certified partner sweatheart implementations. There have been no reports of homemade setups such as yours failing with 9.2, you just have to manually install it. It is not a particularly difficult procedure. Since you already have that drive and enclosure there is no reason to wait, it will most likely never automatically work.


----------



## nexus99

Joybob said:


> Dude are you connecting the drive while the Tivo is still on?


No, the unit is completely powered down. The process is:

Power down Tivo
Power down My Book
Connect Cable to Tivo 
Connect to My Book
Power up My Book
Power up Tivo
Infinate Reboots

:-(


----------



## Joybob

nexus99 said:


> No, the unit is completely powered down. The process is:
> 
> Power down Tivo
> Power down My Book
> Connect Cable to Tivo
> Connect to My Book
> Power up My Book
> Power up Tivo
> Infinate Reboots
> 
> :-(


Does the orange light stay on when you hold the pause?


----------



## aprest

Thanks for your reply. I will wait and monitor this forum.



richsadams said:


> Not sure what you mean by "approach", but if you mean will the TiVo HD support an external SATA hard drive, the answer is yes with some modifications of the internal drive now (more here) and eventually yes as a plug and play device according to TiVo (more here).
> 
> Again, my advice would be to wait until the full software upgrade is rolled out to everyone in the next few weeks or so...keep an eye on the forum and see what is recommended at that time. Existing eSATA drives should continue to work...as they are with the trial version of the latest upgrade. But no one knows for sure what will happen so it's probably best to hold off for a bit.
> 
> The "Server Busy" message is very frustrating for us all. The "keepers" of the website have promised their own upgrade soon.


----------



## nexus99

Joybob said:


> Does the orange light stay on when you hold the pause?


No, the single orange light never comes on. All 4 lights and the Tivo symbol light up when the unit is turned on. It sits for a while. Talks to the My Book a couple of times. Then reboots.

This happens if I am holding pause or not. If I disconnect the My Book I can hold pause and the orange light will light up as it is supposed to.


----------



## richsadams

nexus99 said:


> No, the single orange light never comes on. All 4 lights and the Tivo symbol light up when the unit is turned on. It sits for a while. Talks to the My Book a couple of times. Then reboots.
> 
> This happens if I am holding pause or not. If I disconnect the My Book I can hold pause and the orange light will light up as it is supposed to.


The sequence you posted previously should work.

Did the drive come with an eSATA cable? If so, did you try using that one instead?

I'm outta here for now, but let us know how it goes. :up:


----------



## nexus99

richsadams said:


> The sequence you posted previously should work.
> 
> Did the drive come with an eSATA cable? If so, did you try using that one instead?
> 
> I'm outta here for now, but let us know how it goes. :up:


The drive itself didn't come with a cable. I did initially buy an eSATA cable but found out that it was one with the shorter ends and did not contact correctly. With that cable insered everything workd as if there was no drive attached. (Because there was no drive really attached  )

I looked around here and ordered the SIIG cable that has the longer ends which does look to correctly attach the drive.


----------



## richsadams

nexus99 said:


> The drive itself didn't come with a cable. I did initially buy an eSATA cable but found out that it was one with the shorter ends and did not contact correctly. With that cable insered everything workd as if there was no drive attached. (Because there was no drive really attached  )
> 
> I looked around here and ordered the SIIG cable that has the longer ends which does look to correctly attach the drive.


Okay. Let us know what you end up doing...diagnostics, replacement, etc. Thanks! :up:


----------



## rrman

Arghh! I had just assembled my Seagate 750MB DB35.3 drive and Antec MX-1 (I also got the SIIG eSata 1m cable)! I was planning on connecting it to my Tivo S3 tomorrow. Last I checked, I still had 9.1 (just signed up for 9.2 in TiVo's priority page). Now, I'm wondering - should I:

(1) just hook up the drive using the kickstart method (if I still have 9.1), or

(2) wait for 9.2 and attempt to use the "official" way of setting up my drive (preferred, if it will work and I can wait that long to get 9.2), or

(3) just return the drive (hard part is that I ordered it online, so I need to check the company's return policy).

Or, I can wait for (2), and if it doesn't work do (3). I read earlier that someone's eSata drive that was configured via the kickstart method still works after getting 9.2. However, I would prefer to add the drive the "official" Tivo way; otherwise, I'd be paranoid about my non-officially kickstarted drive potentially not working everytime we get a Tivo firmware upgarde in the future.

Hopefully, someone can confirm that they can add an eSata drive using the official procedure (with S3).


----------



## lmsyl

rrman said:


> Arghh! I had just assembled my Seagate 750MB DB35.3 drive and Antec MX-1 (I also got the SIIG eSata 1m cable)! I was planning on connecting it to my Tivo S3 tomorrow. Last I checked, I still had 9.1 (just signed up for 9.2 in TiVo's priority page). Now, I'm wondering - should I:
> 
> (1) just hook up the drive using the kickstart method (if I still have 9.1), or
> 
> (2) wait for 9.2 and attempt to use the "official" way of setting up my drive (preferred, if it will work and I can wait that long to get 9.2), or
> 
> (3) just return the drive (hard part is that I ordered it online, so I need to check the company's return policy).
> 
> Or, I can wait for (2), and if it doesn't work do (3). I read earlier that someone's eSata drive that was configured via the kickstart method still works after getting 9.2. However, I would prefer to add the drive the "official" Tivo way; otherwise, I'd be paranoid about my non-officially kickstarted drive potentially not working everytime we get a Tivo firmware upgarde in the future.
> 
> Hopefully, someone can confirm that they can add an eSata drive using the official procedure (with S3).


see this. Not good.
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5612569#post5612569


----------



## jeffster

richsadams said:


> The sequence you posted previously should work.
> 
> Did the drive come with an eSATA cable? If so, did you try using that one instead?
> 
> I'm outta here for now, but let us know how it goes. :up:


Similar issue with my TivoHD. Detects that a drive is connected, asks me if I want to set it up, then sayd "This device may not be set up."

It does also see the device in System Info.

Hope they just didn't configure it yet...


----------



## bkdtv

I updated the first post to reflect the 9.2 developments. More information coming soon.


----------



## richsadams

rrman said:


> Hopefully, someone can confirm that they can add an eSata drive using the official procedure (with S3).


Not just yet, but it's coming. We just received the latest trial upgrade (v9.2.j) and our eSATA drive is still doing fine. There is a reference to it now on the Account Information menu.










If I were you I'd sit tight for a bit...at least up to the day you can return what you bought.

I suspect TiVo will only support a few "blessed" or TiVo branded eSATA drives for P&P installation. They will need to keep their support for drives to a minimum.

However I also suspect that using a back-door/hack to install eSATA drives will continue to work as wellwhich would allow you to use what you have if you dont mind using the simple Kickstart method like we did.

So it's up to you...wait to see what happens or return what you have and buy a "verified device" once TiVo flips the switch.


----------



## richsadams

jeffster said:


> It does also see the device in System Info.
> 
> Hope they just didn't configure it yet...


That's my guess.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> That's my guess.


Dude all hard drives are created equal.


----------



## rrman

richsadams said:


> Not just yet, but it's coming. We just received the latest trial upgrade (v9.2.j) and our eSATA drive is still doing fine. There is a reference to it now on the Account Information menu.
> 
> If I were you I'd sit tight for a bit...at least up to the day you can return what you bought.
> 
> I suspect TiVo will only support a few "blessed" or TiVo branded eSATA drives for P&P installation. They will need to keep their support for drives to a minimum.
> 
> However I also suspect that using a back-door/hack to install eSATA drives will continue to work as wellwhich would allow you to use what you have if you dont mind using the simple Kickstart method like we did.
> 
> So it's up to you...wait to see what happens or return what you have and buy a "verified device" once TiVo flips the switch.


Well, I just checked the return policy of the online store where I purchased my Seagate DB35.3 750GB hard drive from. They don't accept returns on hard drives.

I wouldn't mind using the kickstart method on my S3 at all if I have to (in case the official method doesn't work, but that hasn't been proven or disproven). My primary concern is that if I do use the kickstart method, that I can rest assured that the eSata drive will continue to work in future upgrades. Based on past upgrades of other folks, it seems that this is a fairly safe assumption....

So now, the question is:

1. Do I do the kickstart method now while I am still on 9.1 (knowing that folks who had eSata prior to 9.2 had no problems upgrading to 9.2), OR

2. Wait for 9.2 and then try the official way of adding eSata, and if that doesn't work try the kickstart method (assuming the kickstart method still works in 9.2)?

Thanks.


----------



## rivilis

I just hooked up a Seagate Freeagent 500GB drive to my TIVO HD, and am now also getting endless reboots.

I tried this drive on both of my TIVO HDs, which are virgin out of the box unmodified tivos, with the 9.2 update, and the same things appends.

Anyone got ideas?


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> Dude all hard drives are created equal.


No, actually they are not.


----------



## shady

rrman said:


> So now, the question is:
> 
> 1. Do I do the kickstart method now while I am still on 9.1 (knowing that folks who had eSata prior to 9.2 had no problems upgrading to 9.2), OR
> 
> 2. Wait for 9.2 and then try the official way of adding eSata, and if that doesn't work try the kickstart method (assuming the kickstart method still works in 9.2)?
> 
> Thanks.


Yes, one of those. Flip a coin.

Personally, I'd wait!


----------



## richsadams

rrman said:


> Well, I just checked the return policy of the online store where I purchased my Seagate DB35.3 750GB hard drive from. They don't accept returns on hard drives.
> 
> I wouldn't mind using the kickstart method on my S3 at all if I have to (in case the official method doesn't work, but that hasn't been proven or disproven). My primary concern is that if I do use the kickstart method, that I can rest assured that the eSata drive will continue to work in future upgrades. Based on past upgrades of other folks, it seems that this is a fairly safe assumption....
> 
> So now, the question is:
> 
> 1. Do I do the kickstart method now while I am still on 9.1 (knowing that folks who had eSata prior to 9.2 had no problems upgrading to 9.2), OR
> 
> 2. Wait for 9.2 and then try the official way of adding eSata, and if that doesn't work try the kickstart method (assuming the kickstart method still works in 9.2)?
> 
> Thanks.


If you aren't able to return the drive (what company was it...I want to make sure I don't buy anything from them!) I'd say you're safe using KS62 to install the drive now. v9.2.j didn't have any impact and in fact recognizes existing expansion drives. So there's no reason to think that the final version won't either. Historically TiVo has been very good in this area and IMHO I don't think all that will change now.

If in fact P&P works with any drive (and I doubt that it will) after v9.2 is released, you can always divorce it and reinstall it that way.

Let us know how it goes! :up:


----------



## rrman

Thanks for the info. BTW - the company was PC Connection. They actually have a clause in their return policy that explicitly mentions that hard drives can't be returned.


----------



## richsadams

rivilis said:


> I just hooked up a Seagate Freeagent 500GB drive to my TIVO HD, and am now also getting endless reboots.
> 
> I tried this drive on both of my TIVO HDs, which are virgin out of the box unmodified tivos, with the 9.2 update, and the same things appends.
> 
> Anyone got ideas?


You could wait for the final upgrade and TiVo's announcement that eSATA is supported and try then.

Otherwise you'll need to follow the existing steps to add an eSATA drive to your TiVo HD.


----------



## richsadams

rrman said:


> Thanks for the info. BTW - the company was PC Connection. They actually have a clause in their return policy that explicitly mentions that hard drives can't be returned.


Ah, good to know. NewEgg.com, excaliberpc.com and a few others are much better about those sorts of things...although they do charge a "restocking fee". Their prices are quite good as well.

Note to self; PC Connection bad.

Thanks for the tip! :up:


----------



## Joybob

Sevenpants said:


> Bad news: Apparently not all is peachy when it comes to HD Tivo, 9.2, and eSATA. (Or, hopefully, I am just unlucky...)
> 
> My stock HD Tivo received the 9.2 update last night. I'm going out of town next week and could really use the extra storage, so I went and bought a 1 TB WD drive from Best Buy (the WD10000CSRTL/Green Power one) and an Antec MX-1. Installed drive in enclosure, power off tivo, plug in and power enclosure, and power on tivo. After everything is booted up, nothing is different until I hit the Tivo button. I get a message that an external drive is detected and do I want to enable it? I click yes, it takes me to the eSATA storage menu and gives me this message:
> 
> Unsupported Device
> 
> This Device may not be set up.
> 
> For more information on external storage solutions, visit the tivo expand website (it lists the url, but I don't have enough posts).
> 
> Since then, I've tried the following things, all to no avail:
> 
> - Go to eSATA menu manually and try to enable.
> - Unplug and replug external drive and try to enable.
> - Plug external drive into PC via USB, format, and then replug into tivo. The drive seems to work just fine in Windows (I haven't run any diagnostics on it, but copying a file worked...), but I still get the Unsupported Device message from Tivo.
> 
> Any ideas? Has anyone successfully added a new eSATA drive to a HD Tivo since the update?


Have you tried formatting the drive to NTFS? The drive comes with a bunch of programs on it, maybe that might help?


----------



## spike2k5

rrman said:


> 2. Wait for 9.2 and then try the official way of adding eSata, and if that doesn't work try the kickstart method (assuming the kickstart method still works in 9.2)?
> 
> Thanks.


Kickstart 62 does not work anymore on S3 w/ software 9.2j

TivoHD never had it.


----------



## keenanSR

spike2k5 said:


> Kickstart 62 does not work anymore on S3 w/ software 9.2j
> 
> TivoHD never had it.


That's a bit disconcerting. Would the fact that an existing ext drive is recognized by name and model in the sys-info screen be a good barometer that existing drives should have no issues going forward?

It works as good as it always has, but I'm a little concerned that disconnecting and then trying to reconnect may present a problem.


----------



## richsadams

FWIW, we currently have a Seagate DB35 7200.3 SATA drive in an Antec MX-1 enclosure and just received v9.2.j and it is still working fine.

I also have a WD 1TB "Green" drive sitting here in front of me, primed to replace the "A" drive in my S3 as soon as the final, v9.2, is released. I think that will give us enough storage w/o eSATA. If not I suppose I can always add the "approved" WD 500GB driveMy DVR Expander later.

I plan on taking the DB35 and installing it as the "A" drive in a THD that will soon replace one of our S2's. It doesn't need even that much storage, but what the heck  .

I'm glad I was able to (with Spike and everyone's help :up: ) pioneer the eSATA expansion back in April/May...but I think I'll stick to upgrading internal drives going forward.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> Have you tried formatting the drive to NTFS? The drive comes with a bunch of programs on it, maybe that might help?


Formatting makes no difference as the drive is reformatted automatically when it is married to TiVo.

P&P will apparently only work with one approved device, the WD My DVR Expander.


----------



## slimm

richsadams said:


> FWIW, we currently have a Seagate DB35 7200.3 SATA drive in an Antec MX-1 enclosure and just received v9.2.j and it is still working fine.
> 
> QUOTE] I have the same DB35 but it is a 750GB. I haven't received the 9.2 update yet. It will be interesting to see whether mine continues to work after the update.


----------



## richsadams

keenanSR said:


> It works as good as it always has, but I'm a little concerned that disconnecting and then trying to reconnect may present a problem.


If KS62 no longer works, I'd say that would be a safe bet.  At least until Spike or someone comes up with another method.


----------



## richsadams

slimm said:


> I have the same DB35 but it is a 750GB. I haven't received the 9.2 update yet. It will be interesting to see whether mine continues to work after the update.


No reason it shouldn't...but maybe you should sit down and watch every recording you have right now to be sure you don't miss anything.


----------



## richsadams

Based on Spike's most recent post  you can connect a "non-authorized" eSATA drive via P&P on an *S3 * now (not TiVo HD, yet).

However it still remains that if you divorce your existing drive, everything recorded since you installed it will be lost.


----------



## keenanSR

richsadams said:


> If KS62 no longer works, I'd say that would be a safe bet.  At least until Spike or someone comes up with another method.


I posted the below in another eSATA thread(too many of them methinks).

_Now that I think about it, just a few days ago I received a couple of the SIIG eSATA cables for future use but decided to swap out the stock cable I've been using on the MX-1 enclosure.

When I started the S3 back up I had forgotten to turn the MX-1 power back on so the S3 asked if I wanted to divorce the drive. I think at that point I pulled the plug on the S3, turned the power on to the MX-1 and then plugged the S3 back in. It booted up fine and recognized the external drive just fine.

I'm guessing if you go through the divorce procedure you may not get the drive married back, but just powering down, disconnecting and reconnecting seems to be okay, at least in my case it worked._

It didn't utilize KS62, but the drive was disconnected and then reconnected just fine.


----------



## richsadams

keenanSR said:


> I posted the below in another eSATA thread(too many of them methinks).
> 
> _Now that I think about it, just a few days ago I received a couple of the SIIG eSATA cables for future use but decided to swap out the stock cable I've been using on the MX-1 enclosure.
> 
> When I started the S3 back up I had forgotten to turn the MX-1 power back on so the S3 asked if I wanted to divorce the drive. I think at that point I pulled the plug on the S3, turned the power on to the MX-1 and then plugged the S3 back in. It booted up fine and recognized the external drive just fine.
> 
> I'm guessing if you go through the divorce procedure you may not get the drive married back, but just powering down, disconnecting and reconnecting seems to be okay, at least in my case it worked._
> 
> It didn't utilize KS62, but the drive was disconnected and then reconnected just fine.


Yep, that's always been the case. If the eSATA drive loses power or is disconnected while TiVo is on it will always default to the divorce screen...and stay there (no recording activity, etc.) until you tell it if you want to divorce the drive or not.

If you power down TiVo you can then disconnect the eSATA drive, do what you will with it and then reconnect it followed by powering up TiVo and everything will be fine...TiVo never knows it went missing.

You did exactly the right thing. :up:


----------



## rrman

richsadams said:


> Ah, good to know. NewEgg.com, excaliberpc.com and a few others are much better about those sorts of things...although they do charge a "restocking fee". Their prices are quite good as well.
> 
> Note to self; PC Connection bad.
> 
> Thanks for the tip! :up:


Moreover, PC Connection's web site said "Ships today", when in fact it took an extra two days to ship. I almost always use NewEgg, but they didn't have the Seagate drive that I wanted (the one specifically for DVRs).


----------



## nexus99

Are there any 1TB "certified" solutions? My WS My Book 1TB doesn't work with the S3.


----------



## Joybob

nexus99 said:


> Are there any 1TB "certified" solutions? My WS My Book 1TB doesn't work with the S3.


It shall allegedly start to work once you get 9.2


----------



## richsadams

nexus99 said:


> Are there any 1TB "certified" solutions? My WS My Book 1TB doesn't work with the S3.


You should be able to connect your drive to your S3 (as an "unauthorized device") via plug and play once you have v9.2.j.

Heres the online guide:

http://www.mfslive.org/tivos3_esata.htm

Follow the easy directions closely and let us know how it goes!


----------



## sirhab

jeffster said:


> Similar issue with my TivoHD. Detects that a drive is connected, asks me if I want to set it up, then sayd "This device may not be set up."
> 
> It does also see the device in System Info.
> 
> Hope they just didn't configure it yet...


Long time reader, first time poster. I am not sure if anyone posted this info yet, but:

The minute I found out about the 9.2 upgrade, I called Tivo and got connected to a CSR to find out which drives would be supported. He told me that they had a class on it and that only the Western Digital My DVR Expander would be supported by Tivo HD. He said that Series 3 would be able to use other drives but that it would not be wise to do so.


----------



## richsadams

sirhab said:


> Long time reader, first time poster. I am not sure if anyone posted this info yet, but:
> 
> The minute I found out about the 9.2 upgrade, I called Tivo and got connected to a CSR to find out which drives would be supported. He told me that they had a class on it and that only the Western Digital My DVR Expander would be supported by Tivo HD. He said that Series 3 would be able to use other drives but that it would not be wise to do so.


Welcome! And thanks for that. :up:

Yep, it's made the rounds already...nothing much slips by these guys. 

This is the "approved device"  WD 500GB drive My DVR Expander. AFAIK no one has actually connected this drive via plug-and-play to the TiVo HD yet.

It is interesting that they told you that that was the only drive that would work with TiVo HD's though.

Others have already installed "non-approved" eSATA drives in Series 3's (w/non-upgraded internal drives).


----------



## Islanti

Just wanted to report for those with cold feet on upgrading the Tivo HD. I picked up the WD 1TB drive on sale at Best Buy this week along with the MX-1 enclosure and 1M SIIG cable. I was able to marry the drive to my Tivo HD's drive using WinMFS. I got 9.2J today and all is well.


----------



## keenanSR

richsadams said:


> It is interesting that they told you that that was the only drive that would work with TiVo HD's though.


Actually, he was told it was the only drive that would be "supported", not that it was the only drive that would "work". I think that's an important distinction.


----------



## richsadams

keenanSR said:


> Actually, he was told it was the only drive that would be "supported", not that it was the only drive that would "work". I think that's an important distinction.


Well, yes, or no, or, maybe?  Here's what the OP posted:



> The minute I found out about the 9.2 upgrade, I called Tivo and got connected to a CSR to find out which drives would be supported. He told me that they had a class on it and that only the Western Digital My DVR Expander would be supported by Tivo HD. He said that Series 3 would be able to use other drives but that it would not be wise to do so.


 That last part, that the Series 3 would be able to use other drives has proven true. But anyone that's tried to expand their THD via P&P has failed. Although they're both running v9.2.j the S3 is obviously functioning differently from the THD, it could be, could be mind you, that they've decided to nip things in the bud and allow ONLY the  WD 500GB drive My DVR Expander to work.

AFAIK, no one has tried to install the "supported" drive w/P&P in the THD, so I'm not sure if the eSATA feature is not working at all, or will only work with that particular drive. Until that happens I think the jury is still out is all.


----------



## richsadams

Islanti said:


> Just wanted to report for those with cold feet on upgrading the Tivo HD. I picked up the WD 1TB drive on sale at Best Buy this week along with the MX-1 enclosure and 1M SIIG cable. I was able to marry the drive to my Tivo HD's drive using WinMFS. I got 9.2J today and all is well.


 :up: Enjoy the new real estate!


----------



## keenanSR

richsadams said:


> Well, yes, or no, or, maybe?  Here's what the OP posted:
> 
> That last part, that the Series 3 would be able to use other drives has proven true. But anyone that's tried to expand their THD via P&P has failed. Although they're both running v9.2.j the S3 is obviously functioning differently from the THD, it could be, could be mind you, that they've decided to nip things in the bud and allow ONLY the  WD 500GB drive My DVR Expander to work.
> 
> AFAIK, no one has tried to install the "supported" drive w/P&P in the THD, so I'm not sure if the eSATA feature is not working at all, or will only work with that particular drive. Until that happens I think the jury is still out is all.


Okay, I wasn't aware that others have already tried other drives and they failed. As I noted somewhere here, too many threads to keep track of.


----------



## CharlesH

richsadams said:


> That last part, that the Series 3 would be able to use other drives has proven true. But anyone that's tried to expand their THD via P&P has failed. Although they're both running v9.2.j the S3 is obviously functioning differently from the THD, it could be, could be mind you, that they've decided to nip things in the bud and allow ONLY the  WD 500GB drive My DVR Expander to work.


 This is reminiscent of the situation with WiFi adapters. The Series 3 supports all the wireless adapters that the Series2 supports, but the TiVoHD ONLY supports the TiVo branded wireless adapter.


----------



## dougdingle

CharlesH said:


> This is reminiscent of the situation with WiFi adapters. The Series 3 supports all the wireless adapters that the Series2 supports, but the TiVoHD ONLY supports the TiVo branded wireless adapter.


I don't see that as being all that unreasonable. The device which lists for $800 has several WiFi drivers built in, the one for $300 only has a driver for the one on which TiVo makes a little money.


----------



## Ripcord2

CharlesH said:


> This is reminiscent of the situation with WiFi adapters. The Series 3 supports all the wireless adapters that the Series2 supports, but the TiVoHD ONLY supports the TiVo branded wireless adapter.


The part where hardware restriction is the same, but the reasoning is very different.

With Wireless you may have to have a slew of different drivers to support Wireless. With SATA you have one driver that (nearly) everything is compatible with. So the hardware support headaches should be much, much less.


----------



## bkdtv

Ripcord2 said:


> The part where hardware restriction is the same, but the reasoning is very different.
> 
> With Wireless you may have to have a slew of different drivers to support Wireless. With SATA you have one driver that (nearly) everything is compatible with. So the hardware support headaches should be much, much less.


As we've seen in this thread, many drives simply will not work reliably with a DVR. In particular, many external drive enclosures are not designed to dissipate that heat from a drive that is writing 24/7.


----------



## lrhorer

dougdingle said:


> I don't see that as being all that unreasonable. The device which lists for $800 has several WiFi drivers built in, the one for $300 only has a driver for the one on which TiVo makes a little money.


Actually, one can get a Series III for $399 after rebate.


----------



## lrhorer

Ripcord2 said:


> With Wireless you may have to have a slew of different drivers to support Wireless. With SATA you have one driver that (nearly) everything is compatible with. So the hardware support headaches should be much, much less.


Yes, but the markup on a $350 external hard drive is much, much greater than the markup on a $70 USB adapter.

What's more, a wireless adapter will either work or not. If it doesn't work, it won't ever work. The chances of having problems post installation with the hard drive are much greater, and post installation tech support costs much, much more than installation support on a per case basis.


----------



## HDTiVo

bkdtv said:


> As we've seen in this thread, many drives simply will not work reliably with a DVR. In particular, many external drive enclosures are not designed to dissipate that heat from a drive that is writing 24/7.


Other than Spike's report http://www.mfslive.org/tivos3_esata.htm where he tests two drives, I don't see other reports of drives working with the S3, so statements like 'any drive will work with the S3' don't seem appropriate yet.

Maybe someone would accumulate reports of drives that the S3 will marry via 9.2 PnP for now instead.


----------



## HDTiVo

There is another form of eSata expansion with the TiVo HD that I don't see mentioned in the OP.

Using the eSata port for running the TiVo HD with only an eSATA drive.

I think it is a useful enough alternative to put up there.

I remember people cutting holes in their S3 chasis to connect RAID devices as the main drive. The TiVo HD offers an easier way to do that using the eSata connector.


----------



## Dr_Diablo

Gawd, cuttin a hole in the chassis seems rather extreme no?


----------



## slimm

Quote:
Originally Posted by slimm
I have the same DB35 but it is a 750GB. I haven't received the 9.2 update yet. It will be interesting to see whether mine continues to work after the update.



richsadams said:


> No reason it shouldn't...but maybe you should sit down and watch every recording you have right now to be sure you don't miss anything.


Received 9.2.J1 today and it's still working :up:


----------



## richsadams

slimm said:


> Quote:
> Originally Posted by slimm
> I have the same DB35 but it is a 750GB. I haven't received the 9.2 update yet. It will be interesting to see whether mine continues to work after the update.
> 
> Received 9.2.J1 today and it's still working :up:


Phew!


----------



## dougdingle

lrhorer said:


> Yes, but the markup on a $350 external hard drive is much, much greater than the markup on a $70 USB adapter.


I don't think there's that much difference in the markups. The drive is a low profit, high volume commodity device, while the TiVo adapter caters to a very select and small market with a much larger margin, percentage wise.

My guess is, if the drive is bought from a discount internet-orders-only parts place with no B&M presence, the "retail" markup is about $35-$45 on each of those.


----------



## Tiger87

Can I connect a 500GB Seagate FreeAgent to a Series 3 with a USB 2.0 to eSATA connector?


----------



## richsadams

Tiger87 said:


> Can I connect a 500GB Seagate FreeAgent to a Series 3 with a USB 2.0 to eSATA connector?


See answer here.


----------



## cab2

Any one else having problems with a FAP 500 external drive lately? Mine gave me the serious problem, 3 hours to fix thing at least 3 times yesterday. This am I woke up to find the tivo saying that the external storage could not be found and would not run without it. So, that means there was a problem again after I went to bed last night.

Just wondering if it's my drive, or something more global. It figures for me and is just my luck, I got my S3 last year at this time, so any war. that might have applied, is now prob. gone. Prior to yesterday, I think I saw the serious error screen maybe 2 or 3 times since hooking up the drive. I added my drive not long after the hack was made known. Ugh. Don't want to lose my tivo or the drive this time of year. Should I just break down and buy the approved drive?

thx


----------



## richsadams

cab2 said:


> Any one else having problems with a FAP 500 external drive lately? Mine gave me the serious problem, 3 hours to fix thing at least 3 times yesterday. This am I woke up to find the tivo saying that the external storage could not be found and would not run without it. So, that means there was a problem again after I went to bed last night.
> 
> Just wondering if it's my drive, or something more global. It figures for me and is just my luck, I got my S3 last year at this time, so any war. that might have applied, is now prob. gone. Prior to yesterday, I think I saw the serious error screen maybe 2 or 3 times since hooking up the drive. I added my drive not long after the hack was made known. Ugh. Don't want to lose my tivo or the drive this time of year. Should I just break down and buy the approved drive?
> 
> thx


The most common cause for what you're seeing is a bad eSATA cable/connection.

Before you relegate your FAP to the PC world, I'd recommend doing a couple of things. First, unplug TiVo then unplug or turn off your FAP. Make sure that the eSATA cable has a snug connection at both ends. Turn on your FAP then plug TiVo back in (in that order) and let it boot up. That may take care of it.

If that doesn't do it, I'd get one of the recommended replacement cables such as the SIIG Serial ATA. They're a bit hard to come by locally but you can check around.

Other eSATA cable recommendations (#25):

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5616160#post5616160

Good luck and let us know how it goes.


----------



## cab2

Thanks Rich;

I think my cable is fine, but what you say makes sense. I tuged on both ends of the cable and it all seemed secure. But buying a cable, is sure cheaper than replacing any of the other parts. I'll see about ordering the cable in the next day or two. You don't realize how much you use your tivo until it's out of commission. As of right now, the FAP seems to be working fine for the last day and a half anyway.


----------



## musictoo

I can vouch for the cable. I added a 750G DB35 and an MX1 and almost immediately stated having problems, from lock ups, to losing channels, requiring frequent reboots. I was using the Antec supplied cable. Thanks to this thread, I tried one the the recommended ESata cables and I would say my issues are 95&#37; solved. Hope it works for you as well.


----------



## richsadams

musictoo said:


> I can vouch for the cable. I added a 750G DB35 and an MX1 and almost immediately stated having problems, from lock ups, to losing channels, requiring frequent reboots. I was using the Antec supplied cable. Thanks to this thread, I tried one the the recommended ESata cables and I would say my issues are 95% solved. Hope it works for you as well.


We bought an Antec MX-1 enclosure and DB35 HDD in early May and we're still using the supplied cable with zero problems since day one. (We have a SIIG cable in a drawer JIC.)

However there were a burst of complaints about the MX-1's supplied eSATA cables...about a month later after everyone discovered the KS62 expansion hack and about when the MX-1's went on backorder for a while. I suspect they made a deal with the devil to get more on the street and regretted it later.

I haven't heard of any issues with the MX-1 supplied cables more recently so I'm guessing they went back to using a higher quality product after the demand was met.


----------



## MarkHolbrook

I'm pleased that my TiVo HD is very quiet... We have it in our bedroom and my wife would complain if there was fan noise.

If I wanted to go with one of the DVR expansion devices like My DVR Expander, are they noisy? Most of the drive enclosures I've purchased for PCs are noisy as heck and would not be good in a bedroom.


----------



## wilhouse

MarkHolbrook said:


> If I wanted to go with one of the DVR expansion devices like My DVR Expander, are they noisy?


Well, I have the Tivo My DVR Expander. I have it placed on the stand that holds my big Sony TV and the THD. I can't hear it at all. As a matter of fact, because it's black, my son didn't even know it was there.

How will it be in a quiet bedroom? I am not sure, but I bet it's quieter than the tivo!

good luck.
wilhouse


----------



## willettg

I've owned S3 for about a year and decided to purchase the "approved" WD 500GB expander. Ordered it from Tivo.

Got unit 2 days ago and could not get my S3 to recognize it (after several iterations of the power off / boot-up procedure). Called Tivo for an RMA and shipped it back today.

Picked up another expander from the local Best Buy this evening, and the same thing happens - Tivo does not "see" the external drive.

My S3 is at the 9.2a-01-2-648 software version.

I am desperate for a way to tell which item is bad (Tivo S3, eSATA cable, or WD external drive).

Is there any way to run a Tivo diagnostic to determine if the eSATA port is good/bad?

I don't have a computer with an external eSATA port. Any suggestions on how to test the WD drive? I could return the WD to Best Buy for a replacement, but two out-of-box failures have me wondering. Help!!!!


----------



## Joybob

willettg said:


> I've owned S3 for about a year and decided to purchase the "approved" WD 500GB expander. Ordered it from Tivo.
> 
> Got unit 2 days ago and could not get my S3 to recognize it (after several iterations of the power off / boot-up procedure). Called Tivo for an RMA and shipped it back today.
> 
> Picked up another expander from the local Best Buy this evening, and the same thing happens - Tivo does not "see" the external drive.
> 
> My S3 is at the 9.2a-01-2-648 software version.
> 
> I am desperate for a way to tell which item is bad (Tivo S3, eSATA cable, or WD external drive).
> 
> Is there any way to run a Tivo diagnostic to determine if the eSATA port is good/bad?
> 
> I don't have a computer with an external eSATA port. Any suggestions on how to test the WD drive? I could return the WD to Best Buy for a replacement, but two out-of-box failures have me wondering. Help!!!!


Trim some rubber off the end of the cable. Always works.


----------



## willettg

Joybob: Thanks for the prompt reply.

The eSATA cable came with the WD expander, seems to fit snugly. It is labeled "Total Technologies LTD", and the connector has "SATA II" on it.

The inserted portion is 0.4" long on both ends.

I'm hesitant to butcher the cable in case I return the drive. Is 0.4" not long enough, and if so, how much should be removed?


----------



## Joybob

willettg said:


> Joybob: Thanks for the prompt reply.
> 
> The eSATA cable came with the WD expander, seems to fit snugly. It is labeled "Total Technologies LTD", and the connector has "SATA II" on it.
> 
> The inserted portion is 0.4" long on both ends.
> 
> I'm hesitant to butcher the cable in case I return the drive. Is 0.4" not long enough, and if so, how much should be removed?


I butchered my cable pretty heavily for it to work. Just because it 'fits snuggly' doesn't mean it's making contact.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> I butchered my cable pretty heavily for it to work. Just because it 'fits snuggly' doesn't mean it's making contact.


If I recall correctly you don't have the WD My DVR Expander the OP is talking about and the cable youre using had to be cut because you bought one that wasnt recommended.


----------



## richsadams

willettg said:


> I've owned S3 for about a year and decided to purchase the "approved" WD 500GB expander. Ordered it from Tivo.
> 
> Got unit 2 days ago and could not get my S3 to recognize it (after several iterations of the power off / boot-up procedure). Called Tivo for an RMA and shipped it back today.
> 
> Picked up another expander from the local Best Buy this evening, and the same thing happens - Tivo does not "see" the external drive.
> 
> My S3 is at the 9.2a-01-2-648 software version.
> 
> I am desperate for a way to tell which item is bad (Tivo S3, eSATA cable, or WD external drive).
> 
> Is there any way to run a Tivo diagnostic to determine if the eSATA port is good/bad?
> 
> I don't have a computer with an external eSATA port. Any suggestions on how to test the WD drive? I could return the WD to Best Buy for a replacement, but two out-of-box failures have me wondering. Help!!!!


Sorry to hear that you're having trouble with your new expansion drive. I'm assuming you're connecting it per the instructions:

1. Unplug TiVo
2. Connect the eSATA cable to TiVo and to your expansion drive
3. Plug your expansion drive in, turn it on and give it a few seconds to spin up
4. Plug TiVo back in
5. Follow the on-screen instructions (do you get to the instruction screen at all?)

Others have had the same problem and the issue has been the eSATA cable. You can do one of two things; return the drive for another one (which you've already tried) or replace the eSATA cable yourself...which IMHO you shouldn't have to do, but it depends on your level of patience.

BTW, if the cable fits snugly on both ends do not damage it trying to get it to work as you are right, it could be a problem when you try to return it.

The odds of your getting two bad cables from what would be two different shipments are pretty slim. The odds of getting two bad drives are even slimmer. It's possible that you have a bad eSATA port. AFAIK there's no way of easily "testing" it.

You could try one of the recommended cables such as the SIIG Inc eSATA to eSATA Cable. Or you could get on the phone with TiVo and explain the situation and see what they suggest. If it turns out that your eSATA port is faulty you should be able to get a replacement unit.

Best of luck and keep us posted!


----------



## willettg

Richsadams: Thanks for your response.

"...Follow the on-screen instructions (do you get to the instruction screen at all?)...

No, I never have gotten the instruction screen.

I will order a cable to see if that helps. If not, I'll call TiVo support back.

Guess I need to find out what my S3 warranty coverage is (if any) since I did not buy it directly from Tivo.


----------



## richsadams

willettg said:


> Richsadams: Thanks for your response.
> 
> "...Follow the on-screen instructions (do you get to the instruction screen at all?)...
> 
> No, I never have gotten the instruction screen.
> 
> I will order a cable to see if that helps. If not, I'll call TiVo support back.
> 
> Guess I need to find out what my S3 warranty coverage is (if any) since I did not buy it directly from Tivo.


Thanks...good info.

Someone else posted the exact same problem on another thread yesterday as well and we suggested trying another eSATA cable. He did and everything worked fine...so it's yet another case of a faulty cable being included with the WD My DVR Expander. No idea why they are so flaky.

So there's a good chance that your TiVo is okay and that the cables WD is supplying are worthless.

Here's the other post/response.

Let us know how it goes. :up:

BTW, the warranty on TiVo is the same wherever you bought it...30 days full replacement (parts and labor) or 1 year parts. If it's less than a year old TiVo will exchange it for the labor cost which is $49. They've been known to do that for boxes over a year old as well. Otherwise I think they charge $150 when it's out of warranty. We buy ours from Costco because they will replace it for free for 24 months.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> If I recall correctly you don't have the WD My DVR Expander the OP is talking about and the cable youre using had to be cut because you bought one that wasnt recommended.


Just to be contrary.

eSata is an industry standard. A manufacturer cannot simply modify the specs on the cable or the plugs. It's not a huge leap of logic to assume that making better contact between the male and female ends of the plug will probably help things.


----------



## willettg

Richsadams:

I will try buying the new cable first. If that doesn't work, I'll see if I can get Tivo to consider a replacement (I bought it in Oct 2006) since it's likely the faulty eSATA port never worked.

I'll let y'all know how it goes. Thanks for all your help.



richsadams said:


> Thanks...good info.
> 
> Someone else posted the exact same problem on another thread yesterday as well and we suggested trying another eSATA cable. He did and everything worked fine...so it's yet another case of a faulty cable being included with the WD My DVR Expander. No idea why they are so flaky.
> 
> So there's a good chance that your TiVo is okay and that the cables WD is supplying are worthless.
> 
> Here's the other post/response.
> 
> Let us know how it goes. :up:
> 
> BTW, the warranty on TiVo is the same wherever you bought it...30 days full replacement (parts and labor) or 1 year parts. If it's less than a year old TiVo will exchange it for the labor cost which is $49. They've been known to do that for boxes over a year old as well. Otherwise I think they charge $150 when it's out of warranty. We buy ours from Costco because they will replace it for free for 24 months.


----------



## herculespilot

I added an Antec MX-1 with a WD 1TB WD10EACS OEM drive from Newegg to my Series3. The fan on the MX-1 is much louder than I think it should be...sounds like an old laptop I have that has a lot of fan noise. The WD drive also makes a lot of noise. My wife thinks it sounds like popcorn popping both when we are fast forwarding and when the TV is off and the TiVo is sitting at idle not recording anything. Does anyone else have similar experiences with this enclosure and drive? Other comments on this forum gave me the impression that both of these were relatively quiet.
Thanks


----------



## 1283

herculespilot said:


> The WD drive also makes a lot of noise. My wife thinks it sounds like popcorn popping


Use the Hitachi Feature Tool to adjust the acoustic setting to quiet.


----------



## 1283

Joybob said:


> eSata is an industry standard. A manufacturer cannot simply modify the specs on the cable or the plugs.


Having a standard does not mean everything is compliant to that standard.


----------



## richsadams

herculespilot said:


> I added an Antec MX-1 with a WD 1TB WD10EACS OEM drive from Newegg to my Series3. The fan on the MX-1 is much louder than I think it should be...sounds like an old laptop I have that has a lot of fan noise. The WD drive also makes a lot of noise. My wife thinks it sounds like popcorn popping both when we are fast forwarding and when the TV is off and the TiVo is sitting at idle not recording anything. Does anyone else have similar experiences with this enclosure and drive? Other comments on this forum gave me the impression that both of these were relatively quiet.
> Thanks


My Antec MX-1 fan was a bit noisy when I first plugged it in too...constant "whir". I pulled the drive back out and tapped on the center of the fan a bit here and there and it became very quiet...seemed to seat it or something. Ours is pretty much whisper quiet now. I'd say if it continues to make noise that you should return it to Antec...they're very good about backing up their products.

When I first connected the WD 1TB drive to my computer (bare drive, no case) it was pretty quiet IMO (compared to a regular HDD in any case). However as C3 suggests I ran the Hitachi Feature Tool and changed the AAM to 128 which made it a bit quieter.

Another thing that might help is to mitigate any "surface harmonics". Wood, glass, etc. can carry the sound from the drive. I put mine in its stand so it sits vertically. I pushed it down into the bottom of the stand and then pulled it back up just a bit so the only thing it's touching are the little rubber pads on the sides of the stand. If that doesn't do it you can also place something underneath to insulate it even more such as one of those spongy mouse pads.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> Just to be contrary.
> 
> eSata is an industry standard. A manufacturer cannot simply modify the specs on the cable or the plugs.


Perhaps you've missed the irony of your claim that eSATA is "standardized" when combined with your previous statement:



Joybob said:


> I butchered my cable pretty heavily for it to work.


It would appear that the only person you're being contrary with is yourself.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> Perhaps you've missed the irony of your claim that eSATA is standardized when combined with your previous statement:
> 
> It would appear that the only person youre being contrary with is yourself.


Let's split some hairs. I only said the metal end of the cable is standardized. The rubber shielding is not.


----------



## bizzy

Joybob said:


> Let's split some hairs. I only said the metal end of the cable is standardized. The rubber shielding is not.


But the length of the connector certainly is; which is what you needed to increase by removing some of the molded plastic.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> Let's split some hairs. I only said the metal end of the cable is standardized. The rubber shielding is not.


No, you said:



Joybob said:


> eSata is an industry standard. A manufacturer cannot simply modify the specs on the *cable or the plugs*.


(Bold added.)

Again, you're splitting hairs with yourself, not anyone else.

'Nuff said.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> No, you said:
> 
> (Bold added.)
> 
> Again, you're splitting hairs with yourself, not anyone else.
> 
> 'Nuff said.


Just because I wasn't clear doesn't mean I was contradictory. The metal plug itself is always the same length. I am not altering that by cutting rubber off.

I'm only changing the amount of the plug that is exposed and therefore how far it can be inserted into the port. That is not regulated and even the recommended cables have differing lengths of the plug exposed.


----------



## moxie1617

Joybob said:


> Just because I wasn't clear doesn't mean I was contradictory. The metal plug itself is always the same length. I am not altering that by cutting rubber off.
> 
> I'm only changing the amount of the plug that is exposed and therefore how far it can be inserted into the port. That is not regulated and even the recommended cables have differing lengths of the plug exposed.


You have a future in politics or the law.


----------



## herculespilot

Thanks c3 and Rich for the Hitachi Feature Tool suggestion. I downloaded the iso and burned it to cd. I can get it to run on my PC (Dell XPS 410 w/SATA drive) but it doesn't find either the PC's internal drive or the WD 1TB which I connected inside the PC. The Hitachi help files and the instructions with the HFT don't offer any solutions. Any trick to this? I'd appreciate some help.


----------



## greg_burns

herculespilot said:


> Thanks c3 and Rich for the Hitachi Feature Tool suggestion. I downloaded the iso and burned it to cd. I can get it to run on my PC (Dell XPS 410 w/SATA drive) but it doesn't find either the PC's internal drive or the WD 1TB which I connected inside the PC. The Hitachi help files and the instructions with the HFT don't offer any solutions. Any trick to this? I'd appreciate some help.


Sounds like you are going to have to try another PC w/ Sata.

Or maybe buy a cheapo Sata add-on PCI card with a supported chipset.


----------



## richsadams

herculespilot said:


> Thanks c3 and Rich for the Hitachi Feature Tool suggestion. I downloaded the iso and burned it to cd. I can get it to run on my PC (Dell XPS 410 w/SATA drive) but it doesn't find either the PC's internal drive or the WD 1TB which I connected inside the PC. The Hitachi help files and the instructions with the HFT don't offer any solutions. Any trick to this? I'd appreciate some help.


Hmmm...I copied the program to a floppy and used that to boot up my PC. Otherwise it sounds like you're doing everything right.

The program showed each of my two existing HDD's (as well as my DVD and CD ROM, etc.) plus the new drive that I connected to another eSATA port. The new drive hadn't been formatted for TiVo yet, but it doesn't seem like that should make any difference as it's basically booting to a DOS program anyway.

You might try the floppy method if you can I guess. Otherwise I'm not sure why it wouldn't work for you.


----------



## greg_burns

The DOS drivers with the Hitachi tools only supports certain SATA AHCI controller chips. You'll run into the same problem trying to install XP on certain machines. One of those cases where you have to press F6 on boot to supply the Sata driver. Unfortunately, not sure how you would do something similar with the Hitachi tool. 



> AHCI is fully supported out of the box for Microsoft Windows Vista and the Linux operating system from kernel 2.6.19. Older operating systems require drivers written by the host bus adapter vendor in order to support AHCI.


That may be the answer though. Use that one Linux command (hdparm)to change acoustics. Boot into Knoppix or something...


----------



## 1283

herculespilot said:


> I can get it to run on my PC (Dell XPS 410 w/SATA drive) but it doesn't find either the PC's internal drive or the WD 1TB which I connected inside the PC.


See if the BIOS has an ATA mode for the SATA. If so, make sure you change it back after you're done.


----------



## hummingbird_206

Any inside info, WAGs, or crystal ball predictions on when the officially sanctioned Western Digital My DVR Expander Hard Drive will be available in greater than the current 500GB size? I really want to add an external drive, but want to stick with a TiVo sanctioned one. However, I haven't been able to justify $200 for the 500GB. 

My timing is always off on electronics purchases as I seem to buy just before new releases or price drops. I was hoping that they were out of stock at the end of last year because the larger size was going to come out soon. But now the 500GB version is available again, so I'm wondering if I should just finally buy it?


----------



## herculespilot

c3 said:


> See if the BIOS has an ATA mode for the SATA. If so, make sure you change it back after you're done.


I changed the SATA operation in the BIOS from RAID ON to Autodetect/ATA, rebooted from my Hitachi Disk Tools CD, and HDT detected my hard drive. Even with the acoustic management on the lowest setting my WE10EACS inside the Antec MX-1 still makes a lot of vibration/noise. Are the Hitachi 1TB drives any quieter? Is the Cinemastar a Deskstar with the acoustic settings on the lowest level? Maybe I should just open the Series3 case and swap the 250GB drive for a 1TB drive.


----------



## MidrangeMan

Folks:

I'm trying to get an eSATA drive to work with my Tivo S3 HD.

It's running version 90.,2a-01-2-652 software. Service number starts with 652. The drive is a Seagate 320gb SATA drive in an Vantech Nextsar 3 case. 

The unit recognizes the drive, as it's showing the correct drive id on the system information panel, and I was offered the opportunity to setup the drive after restarting the system (a message popped up after the system had been running for a few minutes).

Unfortunately, when I try to setup the drive, I get a message "This device may not be set up".

Is this a known problem, or is something about the drive, cable, or case, not working?

Thanks!

david


----------



## 1283

652 is "HD", not "S3" (648). 652 does not work with eSATA other than Western Digital My DVR Expander, unless you open up the unit and run mfsadd.


----------



## MidrangeMan

c3 said:


> 652 is "HD", not "S3" (648). 652 does not work with eSATA other than Western Digital My DVR Expander, unless you open up the unit and run mfsadd.


I was afraid of that ... although the system information does say "Series 3".

Is there any expectation that Tivo is going to open up the esata connectivity to non-supported drives on the HD devices?

Thanks!

david


----------



## greg_burns

MidrangeMan said:


> Is there any expectation that Tivo is going to open up the esata connectivity to non-supported drives on the HD devices?


Absolutely not. The S3 is grandfathered to allow it...

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5624966&&#post5624966


----------



## 1283

MidrangeMan said:


> I was afraid of that ... although the system information does say "Series 3".


"Series 3" is the generation, and both are Series 3 units. The convention is to call the 648 as S3 and the 652 as TiVoHD or THD.


----------



## richsadams

MidrangeMan said:


> Folks:
> 
> I'm trying to get an eSATA drive to work with my Tivo S3 HD.


As C3 mentioned, if you're comfortable with removing the hard drive from your TiVo HD, connecting it to your PC and running a few commands, you can add an expansion drive to your TiVo HD.  More info here.

However I'd just buy a larger hard drive (up to 1TB) and install it internally rather than going to the trouble of adding something smaller than the approved expansion drive. It's an easy DIY project that can take less than a half-hour or so. More about upgrading hard drives can be found at MFSLive.org.


----------



## syd81

Can anyone tell me if WD has announce a 1TB TiVo Verified external drive yet? Rumors?


----------



## weaknees

It takes two to tango here - they'd have to release it, and TiVo would have to update the software on the TiVo HD and Series3 to include the new model as being verified.

We haven't heard of any rumors on this front.


----------



## richsadams

syd81 said:


> Can anyone tell me if WD has announce a 1TB TiVo Verified external drive yet? Rumors?


No and no.  IIRC both TiVo and WD reps said (late last year) they might have a 1TB option sometime late this year.


----------



## hidefhound

Office Depot has SimpleTech 1TB External USB/*eSATA* HD for $299.99(reg $399.99) this week. Worth considering?


----------



## richsadams

hidefhound said:


> Office Depot has SimpleTech 1TB External USB/*eSATA* HD for $299.99(reg $399.99) this week. Worth considering?


If this is the drive you're referring to it's almost certainly a dual 500GB package (which makes it a very poor buy to start with). IIRC there were problems with dual drive setups plus the internal drive models are unknown and AFAIK no one here has ever tried the brand.

There are a number of better alternatives IMHO including buying a bare 1TB drive (this WD 1TB drive for example) and an Antec MX-1 enclosure. Circuit City had the MX-1 on sale for $39.99 last week. If you have some patience you can find both the drive and the enclosure for a pretty good price. About the same price, tested and proven as a good expansion drive P&P option for the Series3. Hitachi and Samsung also make reliable and tested 1TB drives.


----------



## richsadams

For those wanting to follow along, this is a pretty old thread. The current "Official" eSATA drive thread can be found here:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5616160#post5616160


----------



## Fat Leo

I've done the reading (and this is a long thread), and I haven't seen anyone say yes for sure that the external Segate FreeAgent 1Tb works or doesn't. So here goes...

Doe the Segate external 1TB drive work? I know not officially, but does it work?

Here is the specific one I'm looking at-

Seagate FreeAgent Pro Data Mover 1TB 32MB Buffer eSATA, FIREWIRE 400 & USB 2.0 External Hard Drive - ST310005FPA1E3-RK. 

Seagate:
FRYS.com #: 5496159
Capacity: 1TB 
eSATA, Firewire 400 & USB 2.0 
32MB Buffer 
7200RPM 
5 Year Warranty 
Limit 1 per Household. 
(when purchased between 01/30/2008 and 01/31/2008) $269.99

I've tried 1 of the eSATA WD Books and it failed as indicated by others. Found this forum after I tried it. I'm just interested in knowing if the Seagate FreeAgents pass (un-officially). Couldn't tell for sure based on what I've read.

Thanks!


----------



## richsadams

Fat Leo said:


> I've done the reading (and this is a long thread), and I haven't seen anyone say yes for sure that the external Segate FreeAgent 1Tb works or doesn't. So here goes...
> 
> Doe the Segate external 1TB drive work? I know not officially, but does it work?
> 
> Here is the specific one I'm looking at-
> 
> Seagate FreeAgent Pro Data Mover 1TB 32MB Buffer eSATA, FIREWIRE 400 & USB 2.0 External Hard Drive - ST310005FPA1E3-RK.
> 
> Seagate:
> FRYS.com #: 5496159
> Capacity: 1TB
> eSATA, Firewire 400 & USB 2.0
> 32MB Buffer
> 7200RPM
> 5 Year Warranty
> Limit 1 per Household.
> (when purchased between 01/30/2008 and 01/31/2008) $269.99
> 
> I've tried 1 of the eSATA WD Books and it failed as indicated by others. Found this forum after I tried it. I'm just interested in knowing if the Seagate FreeAgents pass (un-officially). Couldn't tell for sure based on what I've read.
> 
> Thanks!


Welcome to the forum. AFAIK no one has tried that particular expansion drive with TiVo. You could be a pioneer!

As a caveat speculation has it that the WD "My Book" drives are not suitable due to the same triple bridge (USB/Firewire/eSATA) configuration. But that doesn't mean that the FAP's might not work.

The downside to the FAP's (and why they are not recommended on the current eSATA thread) is that they do not employ a cooling fan and some had eSATA cables and connectors that refused to work with TiVo without some modifications or at all. The 500GB and 750G FAP's displayed some heat issues (since they run 24/7 w/TiVo) and depending on the drive the 1TB models are using, that could be even more of a problem.

Some FAP's never worked while others worked for a while and then failed (reboots, etc.) however others are in the wild which are working fine so the new 1TB model may work (w/Series3's) as well.

So if you do go down that road, let us know how it goes. :up:


----------



## Fat Leo

Thanks,

Pioneer is one way of putting. 

~2 days or so, I should know and will post how well it is recieved by the S3. 


5496159 Seagate FreeAgent Pro Data Mover 1TB 32MB Buffer eSATA, FIREWIRE 400 & USB 2.0 External Hard Drive - ST310005FPA1E3-RK.
1 $269.99 $269.99 

5222647 eSATA TO eSATA HARD-DRIVE CABLE: 6-FEET, UV BLUE
1 $12.99 $12.99 

subtotal $282.98 

If it works with TiVo for ~300, it's a deal... If not it's an unexpected back-up drive for the home PC.


----------



## richsadams

Fat Leo said:


> Thanks,
> 
> Pioneer is one way of putting.
> 
> ~2 days or so, I should know and will post how well it is recieved by the S3.
> 
> 5496159 Seagate FreeAgent Pro Data Mover 1TB 32MB Buffer eSATA, FIREWIRE 400 & USB 2.0 External Hard Drive - ST310005FPA1E3-RK.
> 1 $269.99 $269.99
> 
> 5222647 eSATA TO eSATA HARD-DRIVE CABLE: 6-FEET, UV BLUE
> 1 $12.99 $12.99
> 
> subtotal $282.98
> 
> If it works with TiVo for ~300, it's a deal... If not it's an unexpected back-up drive for the home PC.


You'll be earning your Pioneer badge in no time! :up:

I'd still go with this combo:
Western Digital Caviar GP WD10EACS 1TB $254.99 and the Antec MX-1 Enclosure (incl. cable) $48.67. Although I'd wait for the MX-1 to go on sale somewhere...as low as $29.99 now and then. For about the same price you get two proven products.

It'll be good to hear how the FAP works out though. Also let us know about the eSATA cable listed. If it's this one the ends may need modification because the rubber shield extends too far down the connector. If so, you might want to get one of the recommended cables instead, such as the SIIG Serial ATA external cable or one of the other recommendations. (see #26)


----------



## toddc

Fat Leo said:


> Thanks,
> 
> Pioneer is one way of putting.
> 
> ~2 days or so, I should know and will post how well it is received by the S3.
> 
> 5496159 Seagate FreeAgent Pro Data Mover 1TB 32MB Buffer eSATA, FIREWIRE 400 & USB 2.0 External Hard Drive - ST310005FPA1E3-RK.
> 1 $269.99 $269.99
> 
> 5222647 eSATA TO eSATA HARD-DRIVE CABLE: 6-FEET, UV BLUE
> 1 $12.99 $12.99
> 
> subtotal $282.98
> 
> If it works with TiVo for ~300, it's a deal... If not it's an unexpected back-up drive for the home PC.


I am buying one.... if it does not work on the TiVo, it will work on my computer.
It should work on the TiVo as I already have a 750 GB FreeAgent Pro hooked up to one S3 and I have another S3. The old S3 had the FAP gradfathered since I put it on with the last version of the software with the jumpstart. You have to be careful with the cable, some do not work. The one I used is from startech.com purchased on Amazon, worked fine.


----------



## Fat Leo

It works.

165 HD hours -OR- 1,561 SD hours. Don't know when I'd need 65 nonstop days of recording, but the 165 hours of HD is more palatable.

Thanks for the suggestions on the cable. It required a little shave on the plastic to allow full connection into TiVo. No biggie not even an 18th of an inch shave. After that, S3 recognized the drive, did it's marriage thing and appears to have been recording a number of programs over the last 24 hours.

Works for me! :up:


----------



## richsadams

Fat Leo said:


> It works.
> 
> 165 HD hours -OR- 1,561 SD hours. Don't know when I'd need 65 nonstop days of recording, but the 165 hours of HD is more palatable.
> 
> Thanks for the suggestions on the cable. It required a little shave on the plastic to allow full connection into TiVo. No biggie not even an 18th of an inch shave. After that, S3 recognized the drive, did it's marriage thing and appears to have been recording a number of programs over the last 24 hours.
> 
> Works for me! :up:


Great news! Glad to hear things are working well. Curious about the heat emanating from the FAP. Do you have it in a cabinet or open air? Does it feel cool, warm or hot to the touch? How about the sound level? Can you hear it working and if so from how far away?

Thanks again for the feedback. :up:


----------



## Fat Leo

In an open cabinet, mildly warn to the touch (about the same temp as other electronics, not nearly as warm as my amp), quieter then TiVo. Hope it works out over time... which seems to be the real test for everyone.


----------



## richsadams

Fat Leo said:


> In an open cabinet, mildly warn to the touch (about the same temp as other electronics, not nearly as warm as my amp), quieter then TiVo. Hope it works out over time... which seems to be the real test for everyone.


Great! All good info for everyone. :up:


----------



## cab2

Just curious if others have seen this with their FAP's?

I have the 500 gig drive and it has worked fine (now that I got a GOOD cable) but last weekend on sunday am, i was sitting reading the paper without the tv on, and noticed the FAP started to get very loud. Sounded like spinning noise, but a little hard to tell. The drive was not any warmer than usual, and I turned on the HT and everything seemed to be working fine. Even had the S3 tivo record something on both channels with no issues. After about 1.5 hours, the drive quieted down again.

I guess, it's fine, but the thoughts that went through my mind was that my FAP was about to die. I connected my drive, not long after the kickstart method came out here on the board, so thats what, about a year now? not that old for a drive.

cab


----------



## TiivoDog

FYI, for those looking for a pretty good deal on a Seagate 750gb FreeAgent Pro, one can be had for $161. Also, I am NOT affiliated with this company, but just came across it and thought I would share on the forum:

SecureMart
http://www.securemart.com/cgi-bin/future/SMA0588590.html?pcode=1


----------



## norbus

All:

I've upgraded my TivoHD with the low end model (160GB Drive) using mfscopy via WinMFS with a 1TB WD10EACS.

Now, I've purchaed an additional WD10EACS to go into an eSata enclosure, using the Antec MX-1 case and SIIG cable.

There is some concern that the low end unit will not just "work" with the eSata extension.

Can I just add the eSata enclosure using normal Tivo means expansion menu, or do I need to pull my drive and use WinMFS/MFStools//Linux to marry the second drive?

Thanks,

Eric


----------



## 1283

You need to pull the drive.


----------



## norbus

Thanks! Sucks, but okay.

Eric


----------



## ciscokidinsf

Hey all, how can I tell if I have a BAD ESATA PORT in my HD Tivo, I said this because:

I've already tested on 2 different WD 'My DVR Expanders' drives
I've already tried the OEM cable and two different eSATA II cables
The S.M.A.R.T. test will NOT run at all if the external drive is connected, it runs fine when the external drive is NOT connected

I have a TivoHD, OEM (no hard drive changes) and the 9.3 software.

I always get the same, connect the DVR expander, I get the 'External Storage Detected' message and then when I said yes to add the external storage,I always get the screen that says the drive is not supported. After 3 different cables and two different expanders, my last logical choice is a bad Tivo eSATA Port. I tried already to dust it. Oddly, the drive DOES SHOW in the system screen. How can I check the port is bad? Can it be fixed? Do I need to open the Tivo and check if the card is in place? I've searched the thread but most problems seem to be cable related not Port related. Can someone give me a hand here? Thanks.


----------



## richsadams

ciscokidinsf said:


> Hey all, how can I tell if I have a BAD ESATA PORT in my HD Tivo


Sorry to hear that you're having problems trying to get a little more recording space on your TiVo HD. Since you've tried two of the "approved" drives as well as various cable combinations I would agree that there is probably an issue elsewhere as long as you're following the correct connection procedure:

1. Unplug Tivo
2. Connect the eSATA cable to TiVo and the eSATA drive
3. Plug the eSATA drive in, turn it on...wait 10 seconds for it to spin up
4. Plug TiVo in and follow the on-screen instructions.

You could certainly pull TiVo's cover and have a look at the connections but unless you see a loose wire it's difficult to know where the breakdown exists.

That said, the fact that TiVo is initially recognizing the drive plus it refuses to run the drive test leads me to believe that the eSATA port may be okay and that it could be a chip, motherboard or even a software issue.

It's a pretty unusual circumstance and it sounds like you've done just about everything possible. DVRUpgrade doesn't have an Instant Cake/TiVo HD image you could try quite yet (very soon they say) and even if the eSATA port is faulty I wouldn't try a DIY replacement. So it seems that your only recourse is to call TiVo, explain the problem and have them replace your TiVo HD under the one-year warranty ($49).


----------



## gatzke

I keep thinking Tivo will release an official 1 TB external drive, but I have not seen anything still. Have I missed it? With 1 TB drives so numerous, the 500 GB seems smallish now.

I know I could probably piece something together or buy an external ready to go, but for some reason I doubt it would be a smooth route. I know the official drive can be trouble too (for some) but I want to stick to blessed hardware.

I am not in a hurry, we are currently overseas for another 6 months. BTW, slingbox to Germany works pretty darn well! Grainy video and remote lag, but not too shabby! So Tivo HD is on SD right now until we get back. 

Plus the tuning dongle should be out in my area soon, so I am looking forward to my return...


----------



## richsadams

gatzke said:


> I keep thinking Tivo will release an official 1 TB external drive, but I have not seen anything still. Have I missed it? With 1 TB drives so numerous, the 500 GB seems smallish now.
> 
> I know I could probably piece something together or buy an external ready to go, but for some reason I doubt it would be a smooth route. I know the official drive can be trouble too (for some) but I want to stick to blessed hardware.
> 
> I am not in a hurry, we are currently overseas for another 6 months. BTW, slingbox to Germany works pretty darn well! Grainy video and remote lag, but not too shabby! So Tivo HD is on SD right now until we get back.
> 
> Plus the tuning dongle should be out in my area soon, so I am looking forward to my return...


FYI, this thread is very old and outdated. Check out the current Official eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion sticky thread for more up to date info.

No official TiVo blessed 1TB to date. And if there were going to be one this year it would be by this date IMHO.

A DIY or off the shelf 1TB eSATA drive can be found for less than $150 now. A couple of forum members are successfully using the Fantom Green 1TB drive which buy.com has for about $125 right now.

I'd wager by the time you get back there'll be one, but then I thought there would be one by now as well so....

Thanks for the feedback on Slingbox. I've been debating getting one. The downside is that most of the places where I stay have wireless broadband, some still haves 802.11b, so I'm not so sure it will work very well for me.

Travel safely!


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## gatzke

Our Tivo is on a wired network at home, but we are using wireless over in Germany and it seems to work fine. The player says something like 350 kbs all the tiime. I don't think we bought a N, just b I think. Right now it says 54 mbs. 

The biggest problem is the occasional hiccup across the atlantic, but you usually just lose tv for a few seconds if that and that is fairly rare (but comes in storms).

The lag is annoying, but bearable if you are patient.

Now my only problem is the closed captioning turned on and we aren't getting any volume and the tovo won't turn it off... very odd....


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## richsadams

gatzke said:


> Our Tivo is on a wired network at home, but we are using wireless over in Germany and it seems to work fine. Now my only problem is the closed captioning turned on and we aren't getting any volume and the tovo won't turn it off... very odd....


Can you have anyone at home reboot your TiVo (unplug it, wait 10 seconds or so and plug it back in)? That may cure the CC issue.

Thanks for the Slingbox recommendation. If it can make it across the Atlantic w/o too much trouble it should work across one or two states! Watching TV in hotels is utterly painful.

BTW, 54 mbps would be 802.11g. 802.11b would be 11 mbps. 

Thanks again! :up:


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