# Can Ser. 2 models still take a B drive?



## cab1024 (Aug 3, 2005)

I am slowly moving towards upgrading my Series 2 40-hr Tivo DVR (service number starts 540-0001). I bought a 120GB HD a few months ago and that is as far as I've gotten.

But, I was just looking at the Hinsdale site. It now says that due to the Software vers 7.2 upgrade, the Tivo units are now not upgradeable with a B drive, that only the A drive can be upgraded/replaced. Is this really true?

And now for the most ridiculous question, what is the easiest most sure-fire way of formatting the drive and adding/installing it into the TiVo? Can I get by with duck tape instead of the $16 mounting bracket? What other hardware would I "need"? Can I use an 2-port IDE cable from any old computer?

Thanks!


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## maharg18 (Dec 4, 2002)

Yes it can take a B drive. What you cannot do is get a preformatted B drive from somebody like Weaknees and just drop it in, as 7.2 has broken blesstivo, which is what was previously used to preformat drives. That is what they are saying.

You will need to use MFSTools, and yes you definately need a bracket. Any 'ol IDE cable will work fine too, if it's long enough.


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## mr.unnatural (Feb 2, 2006)

I believe the 2-drive limitation only applies to the DVD combo models. There should be no problem adding a 2nd drive to your Tivo.

You don't format a drive before installing it in a Tivo. Since you are already familar with Hinsdale's (or at least you know where the website is) you should be able to read the instructions to see how to restore an image to a drive and add a 2nd drive.

I personally wouldn't use duck tape (chewing gum works much better - just kidding). You can get a hard drive bracket at a reasonable cost from 9th Tee. Weaknees overcharges for everything they sell (their profit margin must be totally outrageous) so I'd avoid their brackets and anything else they offer, but that's just my opinion. Many others are perfectly content to get ripped off.

You will need a power splitter and a 2-drive ultra ATA IDE cable (the kind with 80 conductors and not the older 40-wire version). Other than the drive bracket and a drive, that's all you will need. You will need a Torx T-15 and possibly a Torx T-10 driver to remove the chassis cover and hard drive bracket screws.


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## 2njl (Jan 23, 2006)

mr.unnatural said:


> You will need a power splitter and a 2-drive ultra ATA IDE cable (the kind with 80 conductors and not the older 40-wire version). Other than the drive bracket and a drive, that's all you will need. You will need a Torx T-15 and possibly a Torx T-10 driver to remove the chassis cover and hard drive bracket screws.


Do you really need an ultra-ATA (80 conductor) cable? IIRC, when I swapped out the drive in my TCD5400XX, the original cable was 40 conductor. Perhaps Tivo is content with operating the drives at udma33?


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## Robdalec (Feb 3, 2006)

cab1024 said:


> I am slowly moving towards upgrading my Series 2 40-hr Tivo DVR (service number starts 540-0001). I bought a 120GB HD a few months ago and that is as far as I've gotten.
> 
> But, I was just looking at the Hinsdale site. It now says that due to the Software vers 7.2 upgrade, the Tivo units are now not upgradeable with a B drive, that only the A drive can be upgraded/replaced. Is this really true?
> 
> ...


I replaced the 40GB drive in my TCD540040 with two 500GB drives and it works fine. Took 9 hours to copy but was able to save everything. I am saving the original drive so that down the road if there's problems I can reinstall it. This is the best way to go in my opinion.


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## mr.unnatural (Feb 2, 2006)

> Do you really need an ultra-ATA (80 conductor) cable? IIRC, when I swapped out the drive in my TCD5400XX, the original cable was 40 conductor. Perhaps Tivo is content with operating the drives at udma33?


If your original cable was a 40-conductor cable then you can use the same type cable for your upgrade. I don't have a series 2 standalone model so I have no idea what comes with it. The series 2 DTivos all use 80-conductor ultra ATA cables.


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## classicsat (Feb 18, 2004)

mr.unnatural said:


> I believe the 2-drive limitation only applies to the DVD combo models. There should be no problem adding a 2nd drive to your Tivo.


DVD Comobs limitation is purely mechanical, and that can be overcome by someone inventive enough.
All TiVos can, at a software level, accept a second drive with mfsadd or mfsrestore.


> You don't format a drive before installing it in a Tivo. Since you are already familar with Hinsdale's (or at least you know where the website is) you should be able to read the instructions to see how to restore an image to a drive and add a 2nd drive.


You don't even need to restore an image to add a drive, just use mfsadd.


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## cab1024 (Aug 3, 2005)

classicsat said:


> DVD Comobs limitation is purely mechanical, and that can be overcome by someone inventive enough.
> All TiVos can, at a software level, accept a second drive with mfsadd or mfsrestore.
> 
> You don't even need to restore an image to add a drive, just use mfsadd.


Quickly reviewing the mfsadd procedures, it would seem that I must take the A drive from my Tivo, plug it *and* the new blank B drive into a PC and boot from the mfsTools CD. Is that correct?

If so, this old PC I got from work, since I have only Macs at home, to perform this operation is actually useless. It is a circa-2000 Dell Optiplex GX110 that appears to only handle one HD. At least the IDE cable does not have a second slot.

Which means I am even further away from finishing the upgrade than I thought.

Is there any way to setup the new B drive without touching the A drive or the Tivo until I'm ready to duck tape it into place? Kidding on the duck tape. Or am I?

Thanks!


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## classicsat (Feb 18, 2004)

You need to install both drives into the PC. You will need a dual IDE cable, maybe a power Y splitter. 

The only way to add a B drive without removing the A drive is Blesstivo, 
which of course doesn't work on 7.2


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## jshorr (Mar 29, 2005)

Was BlessTiVo recently fixed on 7.2? I am seeing on weaknees website add-on kits available....


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## weaknees (May 11, 2001)

See our post here:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=3837649&&#post3837649


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