# Samsung Hard drives



## rondun (Jan 24, 2006)

Hi - Looking to do my first hard drive upgrade. 

The Samsung HA250JC seems to be a popular choice on these forums, but they're pretty thin on the ground, and the one place I did find them wants a kings ransom for postage where I live. 

So, I was wondering how the 7200rpm Samsung drives (eg. SP2514N, D300LD etc) compare in people's view (they seem a fair bit cheaper) - or is it better to try and source a 5400rpm drive from another manufacturer? 
If I end up going the seagate route, and get a 7200.9 model, am I right in thinking I can't add a second one due to the power supply constraints of the Tivo? 

Also, I'd probably add a cachecard at some point - is it ok to install the drivers & tivoweb etc when I'm doing the hard drive upgrade, or should I wait until I actually install the cachecard? 

Thanks!


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## davidg (Aug 24, 2002)

I upgraded my Tivo to HA250JC when my Samsung 160GB died (after 14 months - still, I got a replacement under warranty) from a firm called ultratec - do a google (in case we can't post links to external web-shops).

£79 for a 250GB drive including next day postage seemed very good.

Regards,
David Goodman


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## groovyclam (Feb 18, 2002)

I just put a HA250JC in my TiVo after a four year old Maxtor failed.

The Maxtor was in a SilentDrive enclosure - I left the Samsung HA250JC out of the SilentDrive enclosure.

The Samsung is quieter now than the Maxtor was in the SilentDrive enclosure!

Pay the extra postage - it is a great drive for lack of noise.

I am now thinking of getting a second HA250JC for my HTPC.

I got mine from Ultratec too, very fast delivery.


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## rondun (Jan 24, 2006)

Thanks guys.


davidg said:


> £79 for a 250GB drive including next day postage seemed very good.


That does seem very good, alas Ultratec want £37 to put it to my door. 
Now even if they are planning to have Heidi the Swedish massage therapist deliver it personally its still too much to pay for postage on a hard drive.

I have a mate whos away on a trip, so I might get him to pop in somewhere like PC World for me. They don't seem to stock the HA250JC's anymore, but have a fair price on 7200rpm samsungs - not sure how good these are for Tivo use though


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## GeoffT (Dec 21, 2001)

Samsung. Hmmmm. I guess everyone has good and bad experiences.

I replaced a failed Maxtor with a Samsung 160Gb (can't remember model No.) about two years ago, based on comments hereabouts about the brand being quiet and reliable. As soon as I powered it up the first time I was less than impressed. It made a constant droning/humming noise that resonated wonderfully through the Tivo case, and has done so ever since. It's loud enough to be a nuisance in an otherwise quiet room.

Now it's started periodically making a circular saw type noise and I'm seeing the occasional drop out and reboot so I reckon it's about ready for replacement. That will be the fourth new drive since getting my Tivo (I can't remember when but I was an early adopter).

It's a two drive Tivo and the funny thing is the smaller of the two (a 60Gb Maxtor) has been in and working reliably and silently since the very first upgrade.

GeoffT.


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## ndunlavey (Jun 4, 2002)

rondun said:


> 7200rpm samsungs - not sure how good these are for Tivo use though


I've had an SP1213N in my TiVo for 18 months, and it's been fine (and nearly silent).


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## timjon (Dec 23, 2001)

I have a load of Samsung drives (probably 7 or 8 now), including a 120GB in TiVo. I have a mix of 5400 and 7200 RPM drives. The 7200 drives are generally being used in computers, but they're still very quiet - the only caveat with TiVo use might be operating temperature, which would probably be slightly higher than the 5400 drives. I'd still imagine it would be fine, though. 

Incidentally, every Samsung drive I've used has been near silent, especially after changing the AAM settings. I'd assume a noisy one was faulty and RMA it, personally.

Cheers,

Tim.


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## rondun (Jan 24, 2006)

GeoffT said:


> It made a constant droning/humming noise that resonated wonderfully through the Tivo case....Now it's started periodically making a circular saw type noise


Hmm - not exactly what I was aiming for! but guess it could've have been faulty from the off.



> especially after changing the AAM settings


Cheers Tim.
AAM=Some kind of disk utility? But how would you run it on a Tivo drive? - I thought you weren't meant to connect them to a Windows partition?


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

The Samsung utility HUTIL can be used to change the AMM on Samsung drives. It's DOS based and runs from a bootable floppy.

Given the choice I would go for an HA250JC as they are as quiet (seek noise) as the other Samsung drives but are a lot cooler and tend not to suffer from hum-inducing vibration in the same way that the 7200rpm drives can. Typically they have so little vibration in fact that I often have to double-check they're plugged in when configuring them as I can't tell just by touching the side or top of the drive as I can with 7200rpm drives

I've only had 1 HA250JC that hummed, so I RMA'd it as faulty via www.rexo.co.uk with no problem - received the replacement within a week


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## rondun (Jan 24, 2006)

Thanks -

I've ended up going for a SP2514N purely for convenience / price. 
I'll just have to live with any hum I guess - has anybody experimented with installing some kind of rubber damper when installing a new drive to prevent this?


blindlemon said:


> The Samsung utility HUTIL can be used to change the AMM on Samsung drives. It's DOS based and runs from a bootable floppy.


Does it matter if you do this before or after you mount the drive?

Also back to one of my first questions - will it cause any problems if I install the cachecard drivers, tivoweb etc and don't actually have the cachecard installed?

Cheers,
ron

PS... if anybodys feeling brave and wants a bargain there's a new? HA250JC currently on ebay in the USA which works out at about £55 delivered to the UK...


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## groovyclam (Feb 18, 2002)

> Also back to one of my first questions - will it cause any problems if I install the cachecard drivers, tivoweb etc and don't actually have the cachecard installed?


Your dialup will not work - installing the drivers, reconfigs the listings to go via IP routing via the cachecard/turbonet ethernet port rather than the modem.

You may be able to install the drivers then do an extra step to reconfig the listings grab to go via the modem - but I don't know how to do that.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

It's one of the options in nic_install - so no extra step 

You can change the AMM settings at any time.


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## rondun (Jan 24, 2006)

Thanks guys.

I guess I'll have to set it back to dial up anyway as it won't be fully networked until I get a wireless bridge ( or is it access point or router?) - what is the best (cheapest) for that?


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

You need a wireless bridge to connect to an existing wireless network. 

I would strongly recommend getting one from the same manufacturer as your wireless router/access point too as compatibility between manufacturers is utter pants!


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## rondun (Jan 24, 2006)

cheers.

I've got US Robotics kit, and they do a 5450 access point, but it also does Point to point wireless bridging and acts as a Wireless Ethernet client, so i guess it'll do the job?
But i think thats probably going to end up being another thread, fist things first - got my hd home today, so now i must get the right sized torx driver and have some fun...


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## healeydave (Jun 4, 2003)

Actually, you should find installing the cachecard drivers will cause no problems even though the default setting is to use "Network" instead of "Dialup".

As long as the cachecard is physically not in the machine, the Modem will continue to work.

As soon as you put the cachecard in, it will expect to use the Network which will be fine as long as everythings ready to go. 

If you have the cachecard installed and need to continue to use the Modem for some reason, then you will need to go into "/sbin/nic_config_tivo" to change the conection type.


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