# 1TB WD Green SATA hdd 259.00 @ Best Buy



## cr33p

Just thought Id let everyone know I saw the sales ad today for BB and they have the new WD Green 1TB hard drives for sale, 259.00 after 90 dollar instant savings. What a steal.


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## gamndbndr

And the Antec MX-1 enclosure is $49.99 after in-store savings at BB.

There are Seagate drives on sale, too, but none in the "recommended" list that I saw.

</plunk head>And I just installed the external 750G drive last week!


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## lessd

cr33p said:


> Just thought Id let everyone know I saw the sales ad today for BB and they have the new WD Green 1TB hard drives for sale, 259.00 after 90 dollar instant savings. What a steal.


I got the only three in CT so they may be hard to find; oh and this 1Tb Best Buy sale was posted 3 or four days ago on this form on a different thread that i am not going to look for.


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## lawilson2

Man, what a great deal. I just got a 750GB from Microcenter a week ago for $229 for my PC (I already have a 250GB in there as C drive). It's tempting to take it back and get this. Only thing is that I don't trust that I can wipe it good enough where my data couldn't be extracted. Or, I could just get this as an additional drive and have 2TB of space. I'd definitely have to make this a true media center PC if I did that!


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## cr33p

Yeah I just installed a 750 last week myself, went with a Seagate because it was a great deal but I can say that I wish I hadnt, its too loud Oh well.


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## lawilson2

I picked up this drive. Now I have to think about where I want to put it. I can't put it as an external on the Tivo; I already have a 750GB on it and if I removed it I'd lose all of my programs on there. So I may either build a NAS with it or add it to my current desktop. Great deal though!


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## tootal2

cr33p said:


> Just thought Id let everyone know I saw the sales ad today for BB and they have the new WD Green 1TB hard drives for sale, 259.00 after 90 dollar instant savings. What a steal.


How do these compare to the Seagate® DB35? Are they made for dvr use?


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## aaronwt

lawilson2 said:


> I picked up this drive. Now I have to think about where I want to put it. I can't put it as an external on the Tivo; I already have a 750GB on it and if I removed it I'd lose all of my programs on there. So I may either build a NAS with it or add it to my current desktop. Great deal though!


Just copy the 750GB drive to the 1000GB drive. It will work fine with WinMFS.


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## lawilson2

I thought about that, but I've decided to just use it for my desktop. I'm not even close to using all of the space in my Tivo currently with 1TB combined in there now. I'll use this drive as a video/movie drive in my PC. I want to use my PC as more of a media center, and I have my xbox 360 in the living room as my extender.

Thanks though!


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## cr33p

tootal2 said:


> How do these compare to the Seagate® DB35? Are they made for dvr use?


I do not have any specific information about the drives. Sorry


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## joneSi

I just got mine yesterday to replace my WD 750gb HDD in my Tivo HD. Yes...I wanted MORE! I can't ever have enough HD content stored on my setup. I have yet to use a DB35 Drive or anything qualified to go into a DVR and I have never had an issue with heat (including putting 2 drives inside of a series 2 that shipped with one). I have used mostly WD's but have also used the occasional Seagate. Not one has failed on me. I'm sure for noise concerns, if you have them, there are quieter drives, but I can't hear the HDD running from my couch with or without the tv running.

My .02
joneSi


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## cr33p

I have installed drives in all of my tivo units in the past and have had no issues, I would never deny the fact that a DB35 is designed for a DVR however I think a lot of it is marketing hype. I think the WD drives are the way to go.


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## jstrangfeld

How much $ do the Hitachi / Seagate 1 TB drives cost comparatively speaking?


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## tootal2

How do i install one of these into my tivo hd? Is it hard to to do?


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## lawilson2

That Dataguard software doesn't work under Vista which sucks. I wanted to use their tool vs Vista's tool to properly format the drive...

Edit: Scratch that, I forgot about using XP compatibility mode. Worked perfectly.


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## richsadams

tootal2 said:


> How do i install one of these into my tivo hd? Is it hard to to do?


TiVo HD internal HDD upgrade info.


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## rmassey

I just picked up this combo (WD 1TB + MX-1) at Bestbuy. Looks like I found the only (or last) one available in my town. total cost was ~ $333 w/ tax.

I just hooked it up to the S3 and now have 165 HRs of HD recording capacity. - Cool 

Seems to be dead quiet to me, but I have my S3 on a rack outside of my HT room, so it's not really a big concern to me.

I was looking at getting a SG 750 from TheNerds and that was gonna be about $320 shipped with the MX-1, so for +$13, I got an extra 250 GB of recording space. Seems like a no brainer to me.

Let's hope it holds up with the fall TV season starting tonight.


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## 1283

rmassey said:


> Tivo S3 - Stock 160GB
> Tivo HD - 250GB + 1TB eSata


Something is wrong with your signature.


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## Televisionary

tootal2 said:


> How do these compare to the Seagate® DB35? Are they made for dvr use?


Considering that their "Green" selling point is that they save energy by sleeping and/or using lower-power modes when not needed, I would say the designers' first thought wasn't 24/7 instantaneous availability. A TiVo would never use these green features.

I tend to be cautious, and go for the DVR-specific Seagate DB35s and their 5-year warrantee. Still, folks here have reported good luck with pretty every drive on the market. And it seems every drive has at least a few people who have had problems, too. In the end, it's probably more luck of the draw than how a drive is marketed.

Beyond that, it's probably hard to go wrong with a drive with a 3 or 5 year warrantee, and has good acoustic specs, if you're sensitive to noise.

My free advice, and worth every cent! 

-T

PS> One caveat I should add: get a name brand drive from a well-known vendor. I tried to save some money, and ordered two Maxtor 80G drives from a small California outfit. While they superficially looked like Maxtor drives I'd seen, one had a label with a different font than usual and a serial number of 00000000, and the other had a blank label with no printing. Both drives failed within a year, and of course there was no warrantee at all.


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## rmassey

c3 said:


> Something is wrong with your signature.


Doh! - thanks


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## rmassey

> Considering that their "Green" selling point is that they save energy by sleeping and/or using lower-power modes when not needed,


reading the manual, I see that it mentions a jumper will allow it to boot in sleep mode for servers only. And that it can run from 5400 to 7200 as needed. Perhaps this is the only 'green' aspect. if the jumper is not set it will not assume sleep mode. Not sure if the variable rpm is good or bad.

i recorded all the HD shows last night with no problems. long term use is still under review.


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## 1283

Televisionary said:


> Considering that their "Green" selling point is that they save energy by sleeping and/or using lower-power modes when not needed, I would say the designers' first thought wasn't 24/7 instantaneous availability. A TiVo would never use these green features.


The *operating power* is much lower than other drives, so it's "green" in that sense. The terms "DVR drives" and "24x7 drives" are mostly marketing.


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## rmassey

BTW, I listened to it closely today for noise and the S3 HD was making more noise than the WD+Antec.


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## remichel

I was waiting for e-sata support on a TIVO HD, but just couldn't wait any longer. I upgraded my internal dive today with the WD green 1TB drive from Best Buy and the upgrade was extremely smooth (used MFSlive 1.3b)! I bought the drive yesterday and used the 10% BBY coupon that discussed on this forum. Final cost for the drive was $233. During the upgrade the drive was much cooler than the stock WD 160 GB drive and was very quiet. My TIVO is back up and running with 131 hours of HD capacity!!!


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## rmassey

with 165 HRs HD or 1561 SD capacity, the fun part is to leave suggestions on and see how many programs get added to the folder  I'm shooting for it to hit hundreds in a day or so


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## remichel

I upgraded to the 1tb WD this morning and I just noticed that I'm getting pixilation and stuttering on HD channels occasionally. Not sure if this is a coincidence, but I haven't seen any pixilation since I installed the system about 3 weeks ago. I have a Motorola M card and all has been well until today.


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## 1283

remichel said:


> I upgraded to the 1tb WD this morning and I just noticed that I'm getting pixilation and stuttering on HD channels occasionally.


I would highly recommend running *complete* (full surface) read and write tests on hard drives before putting them in service. I do that for all of my drives, PC and TiVo.


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## remichel

I will report back to the group if this issue continues and will also run a surface scan if I experience this again


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## jlib

c3 said:


> The *operating power* is much lower than other drives, so it's "green" in that sense...


C3, do you know how they are able to consume less energy (not counting any averaging due to suspend mode, just full on) since it has four platters like other similar drives (Hitachi has 5, though). Is it just better designed and more efficient motors? It would make sense if it had 3 platters and then would need less power to spin the mass.


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## jlib

rmassey said:


> ...if the jumper is not set it will not assume sleep mode...


Note that when used with the TiVo, it and any drive with a sleep or suspend mode will never go to sleep regardless of how that feature is jumpered. Nor will it ever throttle down to 5400 either. Good thing, too, because it takes a full 16 seconds to wake up. The S3/HD will be constantly recording even when put in TiVo standby mode so the drive will never ever be given the opportunity to start the suspend timer. It is a feature one need not be concerned with at all.


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## old64mb

The two that I have in my S3s are working nicely for now after doing about 5 hours straight of HD recording on 2 channels during premiere night #1 - no pixellation, and a couple degrees cooler than before even though it was a hot night. Not quite as quiet as I originally thought (can hear occasional seeks) and may yet run AAM software but so far very good.


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## jlib

That's a good reminder that manually setting the AAM should be part of the initial setup either via Linux hdparm or Hitachi Feature Tool. It can also be done at any time later without affecting contents.


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## 1283

jlib said:


> C3, do you know how they are able to consume less energy (not counting any averaging due to suspend mode, just full on) since it has four platters like other similar drives (Hitachi has 5, though). Is it just better designed and more efficient motors? It would make sense if it had 3 platters and then would need less power to spin the mass.


No, I don't have any inside info. I wish I do. After many hours of continuous read/write tests with the drive sitting on a table without fan, the drive was just warm, not hot like the WD5000YS.


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## 1283

You have to change the AAM setting to "quiet" to really appreciate its quietness. Otherwise, it's just "nothing special".


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## sfhub

Which tool are you using to change the AAM setting? Is it Hitachi feature tool or something else? It's been a while since I used the Hitachi feature tool. I thought they had a number based sliding scale interface. Maybe they had some "quiet" moniker next to some of the numbers.


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## 1283

I used the Hitachi Feature Tool. Yes, there is a sliding scale from 128 to xxx. Whether the number means anything is up to the drive's firmware. It could be just on/off or very few steps. I use the default 128.


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## jfh3

c3 said:


> I would highly recommend running *complete* (full surface) read and write tests on hard drives before putting them in service. I do that for all of my drives, PC and TiVo.


What tool do you use to do this with WD drives?


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## Canoehead

Sort of on topic (well not really) - does anyone know if it is possible to run the Tivo server/ttg/ttcb software on a NAS? I am looking at Thecus N4100+ to serve the various machines in the house, and would really love to use it to offload stuff from the Tivo without having the PC on. Can this be done?


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## 1283

jfh3 said:


> What tool do you use to do this with WD drives?


WD Lifeguard Diagnostic (read and write) or Hitachi Feature Tool (read only).


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## old64mb

I couldn't get the Hitachi tool to recognize the drive via USB, so went back to MFSLive Linux boot CD and did the hdparm -M (capital M!) 128 /dev/sda command. Worked like a charm, noticeable difference, slightly quieter than the native drive.

PS: Spike2K5, if you're reading this, would be a great feature to add to the next release of WinMFS 

PPS: Oh, how does one get the Tivo to recognize the name on tivo.com so that I don't get the stupid "Name this Tivo" reminder?


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## spike2k5

old64mb said:


> PS: Spike2K5, if you're reading this, would be a great feature to add to the next release of WinMFS


Setting AAM is easy in Windows but can't do it without mounting the drive. If I mount it, it overwrites bootpage.


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## old64mb

Ah, yeah, mounting would be bad. Oh well, thanks for thinking about it


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## GuysInCT

lessd said:


> I got the only three in CT .


Really? In the other thread you mentioned, I already posted that I snapped up two. Glad you were successful as well.


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## jlib

old64mb said:


> I couldn't get the Hitachi tool to recognize the drive via USB, so went back to MFSLive Linux boot CD and did the hdparm -M (capital M!) 128 /dev/sda command. Worked like a charm, noticeable difference, slightly quieter than the native drive.


Thanks for verifying that hdparm is the correct silencing method for users of USB-to-SATA adapters.


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## cheerdude

I assume using this drive as-is in a MX-1 is still ok... right?

With the MX-1, are you using the stand that comes with it... or just laying the enclosure horizantally?


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## sfhub

In case anyone was deciding between Hitachi 1TB and WD 1TB...

Hitachi may sell stake in hard drive unit -sources
http://www.reuters.com/article/marketsNews/idUKT9980620070926?rpc=44

The drive business I'm sure will survive, be merged with someone else, etc. so it isn't something I'd be terribly worried about from warranty standpoint, but sometimes with heavy losses, there could be some short-term turmoil during transition periods.


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## AbMagFab

old64mb said:


> I couldn't get the Hitachi tool to recognize the drive via USB, so went back to MFSLive Linux boot CD and did the hdparm -M (capital M!) 128 /dev/sda command. Worked like a charm, noticeable difference, slightly quieter than the native drive.
> 
> PS: Spike2K5, if you're reading this, would be a great feature to add to the next release of WinMFS
> 
> PPS: Oh, how does one get the Tivo to recognize the name on tivo.com so that I don't get the stupid "Name this Tivo" reminder?


Does the new WD 1TB require this, or just the Hitachi? I'm having a hard time telling which drive people are talking about with AAM.


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## 1283

AbMagFab said:


> Does the new WD 1TB require this, or just the Hitachi?


both


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## AbMagFab

c3 said:


> both


Can someone point me to where I go to download and run the tool for the WD? It doesn't seem to be on the WD disk. Do I have to boot into Linux and run the hdparm command on the /dev?

Edit: As an aside, for disks that are in Windows, is there a place to go to do this for them, if I want to quiet them down?


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## JKay

remichel said:


> I upgraded to the 1tb WD this morning and I just noticed that I'm getting pixilation and stuttering on HD channels occasionally. Not sure if this is a coincidence, but I haven't seen any pixilation since I installed the system about 3 weeks ago. I have a Motorola M card and all has been well until today.


I installed the BestBuy Western Digital Green 1TB drive on Sunday the 23rd as an internal unit in a S3 and I'm getting pixilation and stuttering on HD channels as well. Ive noticed it on both recorded and live (of course live is recorded) play back. It is not very frequent, but it is something Ive not seen with the WD 500 & 750 drives I had it the S3 before.

I set the acoustic management to 128 using the Hitachi hard drive utility and left the drive un-Jumpered.


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## old64mb

Try Spike's site at www.mfslive.org. Burn the CD from the ISO there, it's a simple boot up afterwards, and run the hdparm command from the prompt.



jlib said:


> Thanks for verifying that hdparm is the correct silencing method for users of USB-to-SATA adapters.


Which also reminds me, somewhere Spike had posted an updated set of parameters for hdparm and USB-SATA; I got errors when using them instead of the original version that is in his AAM section that I quoted earlier. YMMV.

20 hours of HD and no problems so far. Would have never recorded the Today show to see what Damian Lewis actually sounds like in his native accent without this, so then again all this space may not be a good thing! Disturbing a couple of people are getting stuttering and pixellation. I'll keep my eyes out for it.

Oh, anyone have a solution for the name this Tivo thing? I renamed both DVRs on tivo.com thinking it was maybe a matter of flushing their queue, but no dice so far.


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## aaronwt

AbMagFab said:


> Can someone point me to where I go to download and run the tool for the WD? It doesn't seem to be on the WD disk. Do I have to boot into Linux and run the hdparm command on the /dev?
> 
> Edit: As an aside, for disks that are in Windows, is there a place to go to do this for them, if I want to quiet them down?


It's available on the Hitachi website. that is where I downloaded it from.


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## aaronwt

old64mb said:


> Try Spike's site at www.mfslive.org. Burn the CD from the ISO there, it's a simple boot up afterwards, and run the hdparm command from the prompt.
> 
> Which also reminds me, somewhere Spike had posted an updated set of parameters for hdparm and USB-SATA; I got errors when using them instead of the original version that is in his AAM section that I quoted earlier. YMMV.
> 
> 20 hours of HD and no problems so far. Would have never recorded the Today show to see what Damian Lewis actually sounds like in his native accent without this, so then again all this space may not be a good thing! Disturbing a couple of people are getting stuttering and pixellation. I'll keep my eyes out for it.
> 
> Oh, anyone have a solution for the name this Tivo thing? I renamed both DVRs on tivo.com thinking it was maybe a matter of flushing their queue, but no dice so far.


I haven't noticed any pixelation or stuttering yet from my 1Tb WD drive. But it's only been 3 days since I installed it.
The naming problem with the TiVos is a problem on the TiVo end. They are suppsoed to fix it sometime this fall. I think there was some problem with the server if i remember correctly. But they are supposed to fix it. It doesn't affect any Unbox downloads. At Unbox it will still show the name of each box and will still download to the proper box. Maybe the fix will be in place when they activate MRV since you will need the naming function to figure out which TiVo you want to transfer shows from.


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## richsadams

AbMagFab said:


> Can someone point me to where I go to download and run the tool for the WD? It doesn't seem to be on the WD disk. Do I have to boot into Linux and run the hdparm command on the /dev?
> 
> Edit: As an aside, for disks that are in Windows, is there a place to go to do this for them, if I want to quiet them down?


 Here's the link for the Hitachi Feature Tool:

http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm#FeatureTool

Hitachi's is a DOS program.


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## richsadams

JKay said:


> I installed the BestBuy Western Digital Green 1TB drive on Sunday the 23rd as an internal unit in a S3 and I'm getting pixilation and stuttering on HD channels as well. Ive noticed it on both recorded and live (of course live is recorded) play back. It is not very frequent, but it is something Ive not seen with the WD 500 & 750 drives I had it the S3 before.
> 
> I set the acoustic management to 128 using the Hitachi hard drive utility and left the drive un-Jumpered.


That's worrisome. I have the same drive (WD100000CSRTL 1TB) sitting on my desk, ready to install (internally) in our S3 (in lieu of the eSATA we have now). I think I'll wait a bit and see if others are experiencing these problems.

Anyone else seeing issues with the new WD 1TB Green drive?


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## rainwater

richsadams said:


> That's worrisome. I have the same drive (WD100000CSRTL 1TB) sitting on my desk, ready to install (internally) in our S3 (in lieu of the eSATA we have now). I think I'll wait a bit and see if others are experiencing these problems.
> 
> Anyone else seeing issues with the new WD 1TB Green drive?


Pixelation and macroblocking is almost caused by signal and/or software issues. I doubt a hard drive is going to cause that. Now, if the persons TiVo was rebooting and frequently locking up, then the drive might be the culprit.


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## richsadams

rainwater said:


> Pixelation and macroblocking is almost caused by signal and/or software issues. I doubt a hard drive is going to cause that. Now, if the persons TiVo was rebooting and frequently locking up, then the drive might be the culprit.


Yes, I'd have to agree there. Hopefully this new drive and TiVo can play nice.


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## SAH2

Just thought I would share that I was able to use the $40 of $199 CC coupon at Best Buy and ended up with a WD 1TB for $219. I had gotten 2 earlier for myself using the BB 10% coupon but my Dad wanted one also and gave me the CC coupon.

By the way the local stores just got their shipments in today, so you may want to check back if they did not have them earlier in the week.


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## old64mb

SAH2 said:


> Just thought I would share that I was able to use the $40 of $199 CC coupon at Best Buy and ended up with a WD 1TB for $219. I had gotten 2 earlier for myself using the BB 10% coupon but my Dad wanted one also and gave me the CC coupon


Where did you a. find the $40 off coupon and b. how did you got them to match?

And thanks for the headsup on the Tivo naming issue.


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## SAH2

The coupon was online. here

My dad printed it on glossy, heavy paper so it looked like an original. I just asked nicely if they would honor it as a price match and they did. They needed the manager to approve it. This particular BB is usually very helpful, quite different from the one closer to my house


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## AbMagFab

Hey spike2k5- 

I just did a copy using winmfs from a 500GB THD drive to the 1TB WD green drive. It took ~6 hours, and when it asked about extra space, I said "yes", and it said there were no partitions to use (or something like that). I tried mfsadd (which just crashed winmfs), and just about every other option, but it never worked.

Finally I gave up, did a truncated backup and restore, and it worked fine.

Any idea why this would fail for a copy, but succeed on a truncated backup/restore?


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## AbMagFab

Correction - the backup/restore didn't actually work. I got the Green Screen reboot cycle every 5 minutes or so.

Can someone who has successfully put the 1TB WD into a THD with winmfs post what they did? E.g., does "supersize" need to be on or off? Do I need to do anything special with the bootpage? I've tried fixswap, and both fixbootpage options, and nothing is working.


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## lessd

AbMagFab said:


> Correction - the backup/restore didn't actually work.  I got the Green Screen reboot cycle every 5 minutes or so.
> 
> Can someone who has successfully put the 1TB WD into a THD with winmfs post what they did? E.g., does "supersize" need to be on or off? Do I need to do anything special with the bootpage? I've tried fixswap, and both fixbootpage options, and nothing is working.


I put the 1TB WD in in a TiVo HD (652) using WinMFT without problems and i used supersize, but my image is an automatic clear and delete image (I use the same image for a lot of TiVos (652) so i set it up that way. After the new HD install the TiVo does a C&D then I do a guided setup and get 144 HD time and 1338 Basic record time, I have done over 10 units and non of my friends have had any problems. (Only did three with the 1TB WD drive)


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## old64mb

AbMagFab said:


> Correction - the backup/restore didn't actually work. I got the Green Screen reboot cycle every 5 minutes or so.
> 
> Can someone who has successfully put the 1TB WD into a THD with winmfs post what they did? E.g., does "supersize" need to be on or off? Do I need to do anything special with the bootpage? I've tried fixswap, and both fixbootpage options, and nothing is working.


This sounds like my first attempt on the S3, including the 6 hour timeframe and reboot cycling (cept I didn't get the GSOD, just constant rebooting once I switched bootpages on WinMFS).

I deleted the formatting on the 1TB, lowered my swap size to 127MB (very likely unnecessary, and now I'd probably prefer to have that option back) did WinMFSCopy over again for 6 hours, and voila, it worked perfectly. On the second S3, worked perfectly the first time as well without any swap size twiddling.

Supersize was on with the first success and off with the second, turned it on after the yes box that does MFSAdd and worked perfect. The first one was off of a 750 GB drive, the second off the original Tivo drive.

I'd say just delete the 1TB format and try MFSCopy again (preferably while you're asleep) before freaking out too much. 

And thanks for the coupon headsup, I may try a buy and return swap.


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## remichel

rainwater said:


> Pixelation and macroblocking is almost caused by signal and/or software issues. I doubt a hard drive is going to cause that. Now, if the persons TiVo was rebooting and frequently locking up, then the drive might be the culprit.


I'm on my second wd 1tb drive. I experienced pixelation and menu stuttering with the first drive that I installed so I ran the WD diagnositc software included with the drive and sure enough it had several bad sectors. I returned the drive to BB for another one and the new drive. This time I did a full surface scan of the dive prior to using MFSlive. The drive had 0 errors and all is working fine now (24 hours of use so far...)


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## AbMagFab

old64mb said:


> This sounds like my first attempt on the S3, including the 6 hour timeframe and reboot cycling (cept I didn't get the GSOD, just constant rebooting once I switched bootpages on WinMFS).
> 
> I deleted the formatting on the 1TB, lowered my swap size to 127MB (very likely unnecessary, and now I'd probably prefer to have that option back) did WinMFSCopy over again for 6 hours, and voila, it worked perfectly. On the second S3, worked perfectly the first time as well without any swap size twiddling.
> 
> Supersize was on with the first success and off with the second, turned it on after the yes box that does MFSAdd and worked perfect. The first one was off of a 750 GB drive, the second off the original Tivo drive.
> 
> I'd say just delete the 1TB format and try MFSCopy again (preferably while you're asleep) before freaking out too much.
> 
> And thanks for the coupon headsup, I may try a buy and return swap.


What do you use to delete the format/partition?


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## cheerdude

So far... so good on mine.

Installed it last night with the Antec MX-1 and hooked it up with the recommended cable that is mentioned in the S3 eSATA thread.

Watched one show that was recorded solely on the S3 and then watched a show that was in the process of being recorded using the eSATA. No problems.


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## old64mb

AbMagFab said:


> What do you use to delete the format/partition?


There's an option after you select the drive under the File menu (I think) to delete the formatting.


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## richsadams

remichel said:


> I'm on my second wd 1tb drive. I experienced pixelation and menu stuttering with the first drive that I installed so I ran the WD diagnositc software included with the drive and sure enough it had several bad sectors. I returned the drive to BB for another one and the new drive. This time I did a full surface scan of the dive prior to using MFSlive. The drive had 0 errors and all is working fine now (24 hours of use so far...)


Thanks for that...good to know, well sort of. At least it didn't have anything to do with TiVo.

As others have recommended, a full surface scan before installing is probably a good idea.

Enjoy the new real estate!


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## joneSi

AbMagFab said:


> Hey spike2k5-
> 
> I just did a copy using winmfs from a 500GB THD drive to the 1TB WD green drive. It took ~6 hours, and when it asked about extra space, I said "yes", and it said there were no partitions to use (or something like that). I tried mfsadd (which just crashed winmfs), and just about every other option, but it never worked.
> 
> Finally I gave up, did a truncated backup and restore, and it worked fine.
> 
> Any idea why this would fail for a copy, but succeed on a truncated backup/restore?


Well you and I have had the same issue then. I started out with a 160-->750gb upgrade before I even got the cable cards. Worked like a charm and I used MFSlive to do the install as the computer I was on at the time did -not- have enough Sata ports for the windows drive and two others (2 sata ports). Then when a new juicy 1,000gb(!) drive was on sale at BB over the weekend, I couldn't resist.

So I went to WinMFS and spent 3 hours to copy everything over. WinMFS asks if I would like to expand tells me that I can't add space to my drive for the reason that I wouldn't have enough partitions. I then try MFSadd from the tools menu and it crashes WinMFS. So I went back to MFSlive and was told there I couldn't expand again. So I did a truncated backup and then restored it to the 1tb drive. It booted and was starting to have a green flickering screen <eek!> I hit the TiVo button and got my favorite TiVo menus! Then I even played a recordning that I had before. All was looking good.

Then things started to go bad. I started to manually delete everything but that finally froze up the GUI, so I ended up restarting, and doing a C&DE. Had to call the cable company and get reset up there. Finally it all worked, but now I have to reset season pass info, thumbs, and redownload stuff from Unbox. I know it is famous last words to say I'll never do it again, but a 2tb drive -would- be nice 

Also, I guess I could go and do a save of my original tivo drive next, the 160, and that way I have the unexpanded goodness of the virgin drive. Would that be better to use that image with the new TB drive so that it has the unexpanded portions on there? Damn. I didn't even think about that. Maybe back to taking the TiVo apart.

Anyway, let me know if you figure out how to get it back on track. That was my experience. Good luck!

BTW, if Spike2k5 hasn't gotten back to you on it, he will. He's busy with a lot of things not the least of which is hearing about things like this with the software.

joneSi


----------



## AbMagFab

old64mb said:


> There's an option after you select the drive under the File menu (I think) to delete the formatting.


Well, I did this, and did a restore of a truncated backup, and I've got the cycling green-screens again.

What's going on? Does this simply not work for a 1TB internal in a THD? I think I have the "Supersize" option on still.

I've done tons of upgrades before, and never had a problem, so this is either:
a) A problem with the THD, 1TB drive, and some other factor
b) A problem win WinMFS (I've usually used mfstools, until the last couple of upgrades)

Anyone have thoughts?

Edit: I might have received the fall update on this box, so perhaps the backup/restore doesn't work with the new update? I suppose I could use the original 160GB backup, but I'd really like to avoid setting up the SP's again...


----------



## AbMagFab

Okay update: It wasn't cycling this time, it just happened once, then came back. But it said 20HD hours. So I went back to my PC, and realized I popped out the drive when WinMFS was asking about "You have extra space, do you want to expand"?

Spike - If I disconnect the drive at this point, does WinMFS leave the drive in a slightly unfinished state?

I went back, did an mfsadd to the drive, and am waiting to see if it works fully now.


----------



## AbMagFab

Okay, very weird - it seems to be working now, with 132HD and 1500SD (or something like that).

What's weird is that I did a truncated backup/restore, but there are 5 shows that are playable on it, completely. I FF/RW through them, and it worked.

Perhaps the full copy I did is still lingering on there, and the green screen was able to recover a few programs? I bet if I had done the mfsadd before the green screen, it might have recovered all the programs?

Perhaps this green screen was because the NPL from the truncated backup (from a 500GB) couldn't be reconciled with the restore without the mfsadd (creating a 160GB Tivo), so it just tried to clean it all up best it could? And perhaps my original green screen was from not deleting the partition first (does the WD come pre-formatted or something?).

Anyway, it seems to be working, and I'll just keep an eye over the next few days to make sure I don't see stuttering or anything else.

Spike - Would be interested in your feedback as to what these problems are.


----------



## Falkinator

I had the exact same issues. Had a 750 Seagate that was too loud, bought the WD 1TB green drive and mfscopy couldn't expand because of "too many partitions". Wrote to spike about it on another forum and he worked with me. I ended up doing a truncated backup / restore. Upon bootup i got the GSOD, played some Halo 3 (gamertag: Falkinator), came back and booted it up and all was good, I got scared when it said "Number of cablecards had changed", but it worked anyways.

In addition, all my programs still worked, the full copy must have still been referenceable. Cool.. 144Hrs HD = SWEET! Set the AAM to 128 and it's pretty quiet.


----------



## AbMagFab

Falkinator said:


> I had the exact same issues. Had a 750 Seagate that was too loud, bought the WD 1TB green drive and mfscopy couldn't expand because of "too many partitions". Wrote to spike about it on another forum and he worked with me. I ended up doing a truncated backup / restore. Upon bootup i got the GSOD, played some Halo 3 (gamertag: Falkinator), came back and booted it up and all was good, I got scared when it said "Number of cablecards had changed", but it worked anyways.
> 
> In addition, all my programs still worked, the full copy must have still been referenceable. Cool.. 144Hrs HD = SWEET! Set the AAM to 128 and it's pretty quiet.


So what exactly did you do to set the acoustic management? I haven't done anything, and it seems silent to me, but I'd love to make it even quieter/cooler.


----------



## joneSi

AbMagFab said:


> So what exactly did you do to set the acoustic management? I haven't done anything, and it seems silent to me, but I'd love to make it even quieter/cooler.


Boot the mfslive cd

'hdparm -M 128 /dev/sdx'

Where 'x' in 'sdx' is the letter of your tivo drive.

HTH,
joneSi


----------



## AbMagFab

Okay, I'm seeing some stuttering, but it apears on only a few channels (and in fairness, these were channels I rarely/never watched before). This is the same stuttering problem I was getting before, but I thought I had resolved. Since it's on only one CC, it's probably not a drive problem?

Some quick Q's:

1) What do people use to do non-destructive and destructive surface scans of the WD drive?

2) For the non-destructive one, does it add a windows partition or anything that will screw up putting it back in the Tivo?

3) If I happen to mount the drive in Windows, does the WinMFS "Delete Partitions" get rid of the Windows stuff? This was always a problem in the past, so I'm super paranoid about mounting the disk in Disk Manager for fear of not being able to put it back in the Tivo.

Thanks!


----------



## paslax

I'm looking to do this upgrade in the next couple of days. I am planning to follow the instructions specified here, but I'd also like to do a drive scan for bad sectors and change the acoustic management settings. I'm not exactly sure where in the process these steps should occur. Someone want to take a crack at updating these instructions to include those steps as well? This is for the WD 1TB Green drive.

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5478694&&#post5478694


----------



## uforia

paslax said:


> I'm looking to do this upgrade in the next couple of days. I am planning to follow the instructions specified here, but I'd also like to do a drive scan for bad sectors and change the acoustic management settings. I'm not exactly sure where in the process these steps should occur. Someone want to take a crack at updating these instructions to include those steps as well? This is for the WD 1TB Green drive.


I did the extended diagnostics (surface scan) first with WD diagnostics from WD website, and then set the acoustics with the Hitachi Feature tool. I'd do these before taking your Tivo down for the upgrade because the extended disk test took 3 hours each for the two 1TB WD GP drives I just bought.

If you copy all the shows from a stock drive, it could take 1-2 hours. If you add the 3 hours for testing the drive, that's a lot of downtime for you Tivo. No reason to waste that time and maybe miss a recording if you have a bad drive.


----------



## 1283

AbMagFab said:


> 1) What do people use to do non-destructive and destructive surface scans of the WD drive?


WD Lifeguard Diagnostic. One pass extended read, one pass extended write, and another pass extended read. About 12 hours.


----------



## JKay

richsadams said:


> That's worrisome. I have the same drive (WD100000CSRTL 1TB) sitting on my desk, ready to install (internally) in our S3 (in lieu of the eSATA we have now). I think I'll wait a bit and see if others are experiencing these problems.
> 
> Anyone else seeing issues with the new WD 1TB Green drive?


Update on WD 1TB Green Drive:
I installed this as an internal drive in a S3 on Sept 23rd and experienced some pixilation and shuddering issues the first day I used it. Now 4 days later and after watching 9 or 10 recording Ive not experienced any repeat of these issues even while recoding two shows and watching a recording.

In the future I would run the diagnostic on a new hard drive, before using it in a TiVo, but for now I am happy to blame the pixilation and stuttering I observed on Time Warner and not on the WD 1TB drive.


----------



## AbMagFab

c3 said:


> WD Lifeguard Diagnostic. One pass extended read, one pass extended write, and another pass extended read. About 12 hours.


Is that on the CD that came with the drive? I'm at the office right now, so can't check.


----------



## 1283

AbMagFab said:


> Is that on the CD that came with the drive? I'm at the office right now, so can't check.


It should be, but I never used that CD. You can also download it from WD.


----------



## richsadams

JKay said:


> Update on WD 1TB Green Drive:
> I installed this as an internal drive in a S3 on Sept 23rd and experienced some pixilation and shuddering issues the first day I used it. Now 4 days later and after watching 9 or 10 recording Ive not experienced any repeat of these issues even while recoding two shows and watching a recording.
> 
> In the future I would run the diagnostic on a new hard drive, before using it in a TiVo, but for now I am happy to blame the pixilation and stuttering I observed on Time Warner and not on the WD 1TB drive.


Excellent, good advice...and thanks for the update. I'm still staring at the drive on my desk. We have to catch up on about six season premiers so we'll probably do that this weekend...and then I'll dive in. 

A big thanks also to everyone else for their feedback and advice. I used to tear into our old S1 on a regular basis to upgrade and add drives, hacks and whatever via the Linux boot disk. But now I'm a little more hesitant with our S3 and never having used winMFS, etc. It all sounds easy enough but I'm a little more nervous about the new 1TB drives for some reason. Success stories, mishaps and any other feedback are truly appreciated...keep 'em coming and I'll post my results as well. :up:


----------



## AbMagFab

c3 said:


> WD Lifeguard Diagnostic. One pass extended read, one pass extended write, and another pass extended read. About 12 hours.


The Extended Write is just the All-Zero write?

I'm running it now, and bored... I assume it will report some sort of error if it finds it?

Also strange - I'm connecting it via an Antec MX-1, eSATA, and it doesn't want to load any of the SMART info. Any ideas why?


----------



## AbMagFab

joneSi said:


> Boot the mfslive cd
> 
> 'hdparm -M 128 /dev/sdx'
> 
> Where 'x' in 'sdx' is the letter of your tivo drive.
> 
> HTH,
> joneSi


You sure this works with the WD drive? I just tried this (connected via Antex MX-1 and USB) and got the following error:

HDIO_DRIVE_CMD:ACOUSTIC failed: Invalid argument
HDIO_DRIVE_CMD(identity) failed: Invalid argument

Doesn't seem like the WD 1TB supports acoustic management. Can anyone actually confirm they've set this on the new WD 1TB, and if so, what you exactly did?

Edit: This only worked for me by connecting the WD drive directly via SATA. Perhaps the Antec MX-1 is blocking things like this? I would have thought eSATA would have been the same as a direct connection?

For what it's worth, the SMART info wouldn't come up in the WS tool via the Antec, either as USB or eSATA, either. Only when I connected directly via SATA would this work.


----------



## AbMagFab

Okay, given my earlier semi-failures with the mfscopy, I'm trying again. This time:

1) I've connected both drives direcly via SATA (instead of via Antec MX-1 enclosures)
2) I've pre-set AAM on the 1TB to 128 (for no particular reason have I done this first, just noting that it worked and might slow things down)
3) I'm using WinMFS
4) I did the full diagnostics using the WD tool first (W then R)
5) I did the "Delete Partitions" using WinMFS first
6) It's copying now, 500GB to 1TB, should be done in <3 hours

Will respond back when I've tested. Hopefully the "mfsadd" will just work, and I won't have to go through the weird issues from last time, and no GSOD.


----------



## AbMagFab

AbMagFab said:


> Okay, given my earlier semi-failures with the mfscopy, I'm trying again. This time:
> 
> 1) I've connected both drives direcly via SATA (instead of via Antec MX-1 enclosures)
> 2) I've pre-set AAM on the 1TB to 128 (for no particular reason have I done this first, just noting that it worked and might slow things down)
> 3) I'm using WinMFS
> 4) I did the full diagnostics using the WD tool first (W then R)
> 5) I did the "Delete Partitions" using WinMFS first
> 6) It's copying now, 500GB to 1TB, should be done in <3 hours
> 
> Will respond back when I've tested. Hopefully the "mfsadd" will just work, and I won't have to go through the weird issues from last time, and no GSOD.


Well, same drive expansion error. I did the copy from the 500GB to the 1TB.

I'm now going to:
1) Delete partitions on the 1TB
2) Truncated backup of the 500GB
3) Truncated restore to the 1TB, and mfsadd
4) Pop into the TivoHD

Hopefully I'll get a GSOD, then it will come back with most/all the recordings from the NPL.

*Spike2K5 - Definitely looks like you have a problem with WinMFS and doing an mfsadd after an mfscopy.*


----------



## AbMagFab

Okay, here are instructions that work with the current WinMFSbeta5:

If you are doing a clean install, and don't care about keeping recordings:
1) Do a trucated backup of the stock drive
2) "Delete Format" on the destination drive (and it doesn't hurt to do this anyway)
3) Do a trucated restore on the destination drive
4) When it asks you to expand, say yes, you won't get any errors
5) Install in the Tivo
6) If you need to (e.g. get Error #51 when going to the NPL), do a C&DE

If you want to maintain recordings, especially if you have an already upgraded internal drive:
1) "Delete Format" of the destination drive
1) Do an MFSCopy, selecting the source and destination, using the defaults
2) When it asks you to expand, say yes, and it will likely fail
3) If it succeeds, pop it in the TivoHD and you're likely done (stop here)
4) If it fails, do a "Delete Format" on the destination drive
5) Do a truncated backup of the source drive
6) Do a truncated restore to the destination drive
7) When it asks you to expand, say "yes", it should succeed
8) Pop it in the Tivo
9) When you boot up, it will either go to the GSOD, or it might boot up successfully
10) Try to play a show, better to try the oldest thing on the NPL
11) FF/skip to tick, watch the Tivo reboot
12) GSOD
13) When it comes back, you should have all your recordings - do some testing

The end.

This all seems to be caused by a bug in WinMFS doing the expansion after the MFSCopy, but it's recoverable for now. The mfsadd might only fail when going from an already upgraded drive, or perhaps only an already upgraded drive using an older version of WinMFS, or it might be TivoHD specific. In any case, the key factor is the failed mfsadd after the mfscopy.

Hope this helps others out there!


----------



## snathanb

I just completed this upgrade from the stock S3 drive to the 1 TB WD green drive.

Worked like a champ, first shot, no problems.

Used winmfs, set supersize on, started the drive copy, mowed the lawn, selected expand, popped the new drive in, powered up and all was good. All my previous recordings are there and play just fine.

I set the AAM to 128 and it is whisper quiet.

I did notice during the disk copy that the new drive runs considerably cooler than the old one.


----------



## richsadams

Thanks to *AbMagFab * , *snathanb*, *Spike * and everyone else pioneering the WD 1TB Green drive upgrade! :up: :up: I'm still apprehensive, but see that it can be done.

AbMagFab I think you're right about there being an issue when you're upgrading from an already upgraded drive. It appears that upgrading from the stock drive using WinMFS works without any modifications, but thanks for the detailed list of "what to do's" in the case of an already upgraded drive...that took some patience! I'm planning on keeping my original drive intact and on the shelf JIC.


----------



## aaronwt

I've never deleted the format on the destination drive and haven't had any problems copying to the Terabyte drives with WinMFS beta5.


----------



## AbMagFab

aaronwt said:


> I've never deleted the format on the destination drive and haven't had any problems copying to the Terabyte drives with WinMFS beta5.


Did you start with the stock drive, or an already upgraded drive, when moving to the 1TB WD? And did you do this on the THD or S3?


----------



## cherry ghost

I put one in an MX-1 on Wednesday and have gotten a few reboots since. New cable should be here Monday.


----------



## lessd

AbMagFab said:


> Okay, here are instructions that work with the current WinMFSbeta5:
> 
> If you are doing a clean install, and don't care about keeping recordings:
> 1) Do a trucated backup of the stock drive
> 2) "Delete Format" on the destination drive (and it doesn't hurt to do this anyway)
> 3) Do a trucated restore on the destination drive
> 4) When it asks you to expand, say yes, you won't get any errors
> 5) Install in the Tivo
> 6) If you need to (e.g. get Error #51 when going to the NPL), do a C&DE
> 
> If you want to maintain recordings, especially if you have an already upgraded internal drive:
> 1) "Delete Format" of the destination drive
> 1) Do an MFSCopy, selecting the source and destination, using the defaults
> 2) When it asks you to expand, say yes, and it will likely fail
> 3) If it succeeds, pop it in the TivoHD and you're likely done (stop here)
> 4) If it fails, do a "Delete Format" on the destination drive
> 5) Do a truncated backup of the source drive
> 6) Do a truncated restore to the destination drive
> 7) When it asks you to expand, say "yes", it should succeed
> 8) Pop it in the Tivo
> 9) When you boot up, it will either go to the GSOD, or it might boot up successfully
> 10) Try to play a show, better to try the oldest thing on the NPL
> 11) FF/skip to tick, watch the Tivo reboot
> 12) GSOD
> 13) When it comes back, you should have all your recordings - do some testing
> 
> The end.
> 
> This all seems to be caused by a bug in WinMFS doing the expansion after the MFSCopy, but it's recoverable for now. The mfsadd might only fail when going from an already upgraded drive, or perhaps only an already upgraded drive using an older version of WinMFS, or it might be TivoHD specific. In any case, the key factor is the failed mfsadd after the mfscopy.
> 
> Hope this helps others out there!


I reported this to Spike2K5 when build 5 of the software first came out and was told I had a problem, I have a workaround that i have been using but i glad that someone also has seen this GSOD problem. Spike2K5 done such a good job i hate to complain.


----------



## joneSi

AbMagFab said:


> You sure this works with the WD drive? I just tried this (connected via Antex MX-1 and USB) and got the following error:
> 
> HDIO_DRIVE_CMD:ACOUSTIC failed: Invalid argument
> HDIO_DRIVE_CMD(identity) failed: Invalid argument
> 
> Doesn't seem like the WD 1TB supports acoustic management. Can anyone actually confirm they've set this on the new WD 1TB, and if so, what you exactly did?
> 
> Edit: This only worked for me by connecting the WD drive directly via SATA. Perhaps the Antec MX-1 is blocking things like this? I would have thought eSATA would have been the same as a direct connection?
> 
> For what it's worth, the SMART info wouldn't come up in the WS tool via the Antec, either as USB or eSATA, either. Only when I connected directly via SATA would this work.


Sorry I didn't read this earlier. This worked for me and I connected only directly via the SATA port. And that is -exactly- what I did. I have also noted your edit and I also think that the culprit is the enclosure.

joneSi


----------



## cmonroe

Hey AbMagFab,

I'm in the process of going form a 750GB -> 1TB WD right now and hit all of the issues you mention in your post above so I followed your instructions. How long did your TiVo sit at GSOD? I've got the screen up telling me that it's detected a serious problem and is trying to fix it but could take up to 3hrs.


----------



## cmonroe

Well, no luck. After the GSOD finished my TiVo booted but my SPs were gone, and only about an 1/8th of my shows were in the NP list.


----------



## jlib

AbMagFab, help me understand the "maintain recordings" method when the initial expansion attempt fails (steps 4 onward). I had thought that doing a truncated backup eliminated the recordings. Are you saying that the recordings remain on the destination drive from the failed expansion step and that doing the subsequent truncated backup|restore just fixes the expand problem and leaves the recordings that had previously been copied?


----------



## Arcady

Why can't people just wait a couple months until they turn on official eSATA support?

I bought the 1tb drive. I'm putting it in my Mac. Thanks for letting people know about the deal.


----------



## AbMagFab

jlib said:


> AbMagFab, help me understand the "maintain recordings" method when the initial expansion attempt fails (steps 4 onward). I had thought that doing a truncated backup eliminated the recordings. Are you saying that the recordings remain on the destination drive from the failed expansion step and that doing the subsequent truncated backup|restore just fixes the expand problem and leaves the recordings that had previously been copied?


It wasn't long, like about an hour.


----------



## AbMagFab

Arcady said:


> Why can't people just wait a couple months until they turn on official eSATA support?
> 
> I bought the 1tb drive. I'm putting it in my Mac. Thanks for letting people know about the deal.


Some are followers, some are leaders, some are pioneers.


----------



## joneSi

Arcady said:


> Why can't people just wait a couple months until they turn on official eSATA support?
> 
> I bought the 1tb drive. I'm putting it in my Mac. Thanks for letting people know about the deal.


Because then I can have an internal 1TB drive and then whatever I may want on e-sata. A 1TB drive is a GREAT starting point.

joneSi


----------



## pinballfan

Best Buy is backordered and has raised the price on the WD, but they now have the Hitachi Deskstar for $249.99. 

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8295588&st=1tb&lp=6&type=product&cp=1&id=1172880158065


----------



## jlib

AbMagFab said:


> It wasn't long, like about an hour.


I think you were thinking of cmonroe's post. I was wondering how your recordings survived a truncated backup and restore. I'm still not clear on how your second method works.


----------



## jlib

Arcady said:


> Why can't people just wait a couple months until they turn on official eSATA support?


Mainly because the internal upgrade method is better from a statistical reliability standpoint than the external method (with its two possible failure points), whether official or not, so is the method of choice for initial upgrade. Besides, we are cursed with the _can't leave well enough alone_ disease so we would rather do it now than wait till next year.


----------



## d_anders

AbMagFab said:


> Some are followers, some are leaders, some are pioneers.


Yep, and it will be interesting to see what's actually supported when eSata support is finally official on the TiVo HD.

They're may be a lot of dead pioneers. Just like dem folks on the Oregon Trail.


----------



## aaronwt

pinballfan said:


> Best Buy is backordered and has raised the price on the WD, but they now have the Hitachi Deskstar for $249.99.
> 
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8295588&st=1tb&lp=6&type=product&cp=1&id=1172880158065


That's a better deal! I think I might pick up another Hitachi. At least this one will be under warranty since I won't have to pull it out of an enclosure..


----------



## wierdo

aaronwt said:


> That's a better deal! I think I might pick up another Hitachi. At least this one will be under warranty since I won't have to pull it out of an enclosure..


The WD is 10dB quieter, according to StorageReview, just FWIW.

It's too bad, but not surprising, that Best Buy didn't keep the WD on sale for longer than a week. They were selling it for almost a hundred bucks less than anybody else.


----------



## Calvin098

I just upgraded my S3 from it's stock 250 GB drive to the WD 1 TB Green drive. Used WinMFS and worked the first time. The only problem I had was WinMFS not recognizing any of my hard drives, I fixed that issue by turning off the User Access Control.


----------



## aaronwt

The first thing I did when I installed Vista was turn off the UAC. It's a PITA.


----------



## richsadams

pinballfan said:


> Best Buy is backordered and has raised the price on the WD, but they now have the Hitachi Deskstar for $249.99.
> 
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage.jsp?skuId=8295588&st=1tb&lp=6&type=product&cp=1&id=1172880158065


BB shows "Sold Out" on the Hitachi now...no store pickups or orders.


----------



## joneSi

d_anders said:


> Yep, and it will be interesting to see what's actually supported when eSata support is finally official on the TiVo HD.
> 
> They're may be a lot of dead pioneers. Just like dem folks on the Oregon Trail.


Well, if that is the case then I'll a dead pioneer. I don't know that I 'need' more than 144 hours of HD recording...not to mention 1300 hours of SD. If I do, then I'll gladly do another internal update...maybe when 1.5tb drives hit $250? Well, assuming there will be 1.5tb drives.

I do understand wanting to wait for a supported solution. I just didn't (and don't) want to wait. Though I can now more easily await what TiVo plans to offer to the masses, and won't necessarily care if I can't make use of it.

Two schools of thought on this one, I guess.

joneSi


----------



## aaronwt

richsadams said:


> BB shows "Sold Out" on the Hitachi now...no store pickups or orders.


Crap! I knew I should have ordered it earlier this evening.


----------



## Parkmad

Picked up my WD 1TB yesterday and the Antec MX-1 today. Setup went fine until I determined that the Antec has a loose power connector the same as an earlier post. It's Ok unless I touch it then the WD turns off and the Tivo reboots. I will try a new one tomorrow.


----------



## lrhorer

Arcady said:


> Why can't people just wait a couple months until they turn on official eSATA support?
> 
> I bought the 1tb drive. I'm putting it in my Mac. Thanks for letting people know about the deal.


Well, first of all, it wasn't a couple of months. It is closer to 5 and counting. Secondly, AFAIK, it has not yet been officially announced e-SATA support will be in the upcoming release. It may or may not. Even when it finally is official, it may not support the upgrade from 1 TB to 2TB, so those of us with more than 1TB would have to use the hack, anyway. We will have waited for nothing. Finally, those of us who had full 1TB drives and did not want many of our recordings to be erased needed the upgrade option much sooner rather than later.


----------



## old64mb

After about 60-70ish hours of HD recorded (my deleted files folder is larger than the base S3 drive!), did notice an involuntary reboot on one of the WDs - got back and discovered a football game I was taping had two segments, and while it's possible the power went out unlikely as its on a UPS and the delay between segments wasn't long.

Other than that, no problems so far.


----------



## moolman

So storagereview.com is saying that the WD drive is basically a 5400rpm drive, or estimated to be about 6000rpm. They say that it is much quieter than the Hitachi and Seagate but lags slightly in performance. 

The Tivo doesn't need the speed right, hence the quieter drive and using less electricity would be an advantage.


----------



## wierdo

moolman said:


> So storagereview.com is saying that the WD drive is basically a 5400rpm drive, or estimated to be about 6000rpm. They say that it is much quieter than the Hitachi and Seagate but lags slightly in performance.
> 
> The Tivo doesn't need the speed right, hence the quieter drive and using less electricity would be an advantage.


If you look at the whole review, it doesn't really lag in performance compared to the Seagate, only compared to the Hitachi.

It won't make a lick of difference in the TiVo, performance wise.


----------



## richsadams

moolman said:


> So storagereview.com is saying that the WD drive is basically a 5400rpm drive, or estimated to be about 6000rpm. They say that it is much quieter than the Hitachi and Seagate but lags slightly in performance.
> 
> The Tivo doesn't need the speed right, hence the quieter drive and using less electricity would be an advantage.


Hmmm. I saw this article as well...same one? What I got out of that was that the drive employs some proprietary technology that allows it save energy as noted:



> The GP family of hard drives employs technologies and features that are designed to deliver power savings as the primary attribute. GP drives deliver average power savings of 4-5 watts compared with conventional drives. In addition, these solid performing drives are the coolest and quietest in their class. The following technologies enable WDs GP platform.
> 
>  IntelliPower: A fine-tuned balance of spin speed, transfer rate and cache size designed to deliver both significant power savings and solid performance.
> 
>  IntelliPark: Delivers lower power consumption by automatically unloading the heads during idle to reduce aerodynamic drag.
> 
>  IntelliSeek: Calculates optimum seek speeds to lower power consumption, noise and vibration.


 The drive I have on my desk, a WD100000CSRTL 1TB says that it's a 7200 RPM SATA HDD. The actual specs for the drive claim that their technology allows it to run between 5400 and 7200 RPM depending on the requirements. AFAIK stock TiVo drives are still 5400 RPM (although I haven't opened my S3 yet) so I'd agree with the supposition that a drive running at something between 7200 RPM's and at least 5400 RPM's would make little or no difference with TiVo.

Does anyone else see an issue with this drive's technology affecting TiVo's performance one way or another...before I open the box and pop this little bugger in?


----------



## wierdo

lessd said:


> I reported this to Spike2K5 when build 5 of the software first came out and was told I had a problem, I have a workaround that i have been using but i glad that someone also has seen this GSOD problem. Spike2K5 done such a good job i hate to complain.


I was all ready to do this, but I can't get it to GSOD. I guess I'm going to have to spend another 5 hours copying and do it the hard way, if I can find a hex editor, anyway.

I was an idiot and told mfsrestore to optimize the partition layout, hence the need for a new copy.


----------



## Arcady

I wasn't questioning the use of larger internal drives, just the unofficial eSATA use. I'd be afraid that a future update would break it.

I've already put a Maxtor QuickView 500gb in my Series3, and I'll be putting another in my TiVoHD as soon as my CableCard install is complete. I don't need more than 500gb in each TiVo, especially with MRV and TTG support coming next month. I have no plans to ever use eSATA due to clutter/noise/space issues.


----------



## moolman

richsadams said:


> Hmmm. I saw this article as well...same one? What I got out of that was that the drive employs some proprietary technology that allows it save energy as noted:
> 
> The drive I have on my desk, a WD100000CSRTL 1TB says that it's a 7200 RPM SATA HDD. The actual specs for the drive claim that their technology allows it to run between 5400 and 7200 RPM depending on the requirements. AFAIK stock TiVo drives are still 5400 RPM (although I haven't opened my S3 yet) so I'd agree with the supposition that a drive running at something between 7200 RPM's and at least 5400 RPM's would make little or no difference with TiVo.
> 
> Does anyone else see an issue with this drive's technology affecting TiVo's performance one way or another...before I open the box and pop this little bugger in?


I think the article concluded that the drive doesn't spin at the full 7200rpm because one of the benchmarks suggests the speed is similar to a 5400rpm drive. 
The article infers that the intellipower is code for the drive could spin at a slower rate than 7200rpm depending on the model. The drive doesn't adjust for speed, meaning it doesn't ramp up to 7200rpm when needed because that would take more energy than having a constant speed. So if that is true and Tivo doesn't require a 7200rpm drive, then is the ideal hard drive, minus the dedicated DVR drives made by Seagate and Hitachi.


----------



## aaronwt

moolman said:


> So storagereview.com is saying that the WD drive is basically a 5400rpm drive, or estimated to be about 6000rpm. They say that it is much quieter than the Hitachi and Seagate but lags slightly in performance.
> 
> The Tivo doesn't need the speed right, hence the quieter drive and using less electricity would be an advantage.


When I was using the DirecTV HD TiVo boxes I had one box that had two 5400 rpm drives while my other two boxes each had two 7200 rpm drives. The performance was identical between the boxes. You could not tell that one box had 5400rpm drives without opening it up.


----------



## rmassey

aaronwt said:


> You could not tell that one box had 5400rpm drives without opening it up.


sure you could, check the internal temp, the 7200 rpm would be higher.


----------



## rmassey

> I just picked up this combo (WD 1TB + MX-1) at Bestbuy. Looks like I found the only (or last) one available in my town.


status report:

Well one week after the install and no ill effects so far. No reboots, no GSOD, Nadda. Of course, I only added the WD 1TB via eSata to a stock S3, using an MX-1 and stock eSata cable. I've been recording all the new season shows, HD & SD, and suggestions (up to 162 now) with zero problems.


----------



## jlib

Some points to remember about the WD 1TB. The low 3.8W power consumption at idle will never be achieved in the TiVo because that figure relies on parking and unloading the heads which it will automatically do when idle. It will never unload the heads in the TiVo. So, actual power consumption will be more like the 7.6W of active seek from the SR chart. That is still significantly lower than the typical seek power consumption of a 7200RPM drive by the very nature of it it not being a true 7200RPM drive, so thats still good. Also note that it actually being closer to a 5400RPM drive as SR determined is not a bad thing. Long ago TiVos used to come with 5400RPM drives until they pretty much vanished from the marketplace. Its performance is fully capable of handling the S3/HD demands. Less heat and less noise follow from the lowered speed and are bonuses of significant importance. I had been wondering how on earth they got the noise and power levels so low when I had thought it was a 4-platter 7200RPM drive. Now it all makes sense. I don't particularly like the obfuscation from WD, though. This seems more and more to be the ideal TiVo upgrade drive especially if it stays the price leader. Too bad Samsung appears to still be missing in action (I noticed their specs also point out in the fine print that their speed may actually be less that 7200RPM) .


----------



## joneSi

Arcady said:


> I wasn't questioning the use of larger internal drives, just the unofficial eSATA use. I'd be afraid that a future update would break it.
> 
> I've already put a Maxtor QuickView 500gb in my Series3, and I'll be putting another in my TiVoHD as soon as my CableCard install is complete. I don't need more than 500gb in each TiVo, especially with MRV and TTG support coming next month. I have no plans to ever use eSATA due to clutter/noise/space issues.


Ahhh...that clears it up for me. I would hope that TiVo wouldn't break all those with eSATA drives. But time will tell on that. Somehow I think some enterprising programmer will find a workaround, even if TiVo tries to shut it off. But in the meantime, I've got my 1tb internal upgrade done and working like a charm.

joneSi


----------



## richsadams

I had one of those brain-dead moments...but figured out the problem so I thought I'd pass it along JIC (although most everyone here is in the genius category, so maybe it's just me  )

If you decide to use the Hitachi Feature Tool  for AAM (advanced acoustical managment) on your new 1TB HD (works for WD as well as Hitachi), be sure you connect a wired keyboard and mouse _before _ you create the boot disk.

It took me three tries to eventually figure out that using my wireless keyboard and mouse wouldn't allow the Hitachi disk to work because when it creates the boot disk it saves your P.C.'s configuration...including the attached mouse and keyboard. Of course when you boot from a DOS disk, wireless peripherals are not recognized and the drivers are not loaded. Du'oh!

I know...Computer 101. Hope that saves someone time...someone as slow on the uptake as I am. 

BTW, I activated the AAM on my new WD 1TB "Green" HDD; set it to 128 (lowest/quietist) and it helped reduce the seek noise a bit. However as others have noted, the drive is pretty quiet to start with, so I'm not sure if it's going to make that much difference in our S3 which is already inside an HT cabinet. AAM did wonders for an older WD slave drive that used to cause all kinds of racket in my P.C. though! 

I'm running a deep scan/surface test using the WD Lifeguard Diagnostic  right now and the new drive is pretty cool to the touch, much cooler than a standard 7200 RPM drive. :up:


----------



## aaronwt

My bluetooth wireless keyboard worked fine with it.


----------



## richsadams

aaronwt said:


> My bluetooth wireless keyboard worked fine with it.


Hmmm...is your mouse wireless as well?

Maybe it's just how I was holding my tongue.


----------



## aaronwt

richsadams said:


> Hmmm...is your mouse wireless as well?
> 
> Maybe it's just how I was holding my tongue.


Yes I have a Logitech bluetooth keyboard and bluetooth mouse.


----------



## richsadams

aaronwt said:


> Yes I have a Logitech bluetooth keyboard and bluetooth mouse.


Well...there goes my theory. Must be just me.


----------



## paslax

I'm stuck on step 1!

I'm trying to run the WD Lifeguard Diagnostic to scan the new hard drive. When I try to run from Windows, I get a BSOD, with BAD_POOL_HEADER error. When I try to run from the boot disc, the 1TB drive isn't recognized. I've tried uninstalling and reinstalling the Windows program - same BSOD each time. Any help is appreciated!

Details:
Win XP
USB2.0 to SATA Cable
WD 1TB Green Drive (931.51 GB Uninitialized drive according to Disk Management)


----------



## Arcady

Have you tried it on a real SATA connection?


----------



## paslax

Arcady said:


> Have you tried it on a real SATA connection?


I don't have one.


----------



## jtown

Did you try setting the drive to SATA/150 mode? That adapter might not work with the SATA/300 setting.


----------



## paslax

jtown said:


> Did you try setting the drive to SATA/150 mode? That adapter might not work with the SATA/300 setting.


I didn't try that, although it's a good idea. It looks like jumper pins 5+6 would do that on this drive.

I actually found a couple of SATA ports in my computer (wish I had checked before ordering the adapter). After finally figuring out that the SATA ports were disabled in the BIOS, I reenabled them and the drive is now scanning away.

EDIT: Yup - the 150 mode did it. I'm all upgraded! Although I wish that I had another SATA power adapter so that I could preserve the recordings.


----------



## old64mb

Oh, and as was covered in another thread the WD apparently didn't have anything to do with the reboot, so -1 issue for the drive.


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> Well...there goes my theory. Must be just me.


In the BIOS setup program of many computers there is a setting something like "BIOS support of legacy USB devices." If that setting is on then you should have USB keyboard support before the OS even boots up.


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> In the BIOS setup program of many computers there is a setting something like "BIOS support of legacy USB devices." If that setting is on then you should have USB keyboard support before the OS even boots up.


Thanks for that...I'll have a look as it might come in handy down the road. :up:


----------



## AbMagFab

Update - 3 days and running strong. My THD hasn't rebooted (as far as I can tell), and it's recording happily away. I am getting pixelation on some channels, but I was getting that before on the same set of channels, and this appears to be some lingering issue with the THD or something (it's been there since I purchased it).

Anyway, the 1TB WD seems great so far.


----------



## old64mb

Oh, the now-on-sale-Hitachi seems to periodically reappear on BB.com somewhere around midnight PDT until all the deal sites overwhelm their inventory for the day 5 minutes later.

Link here if you missed the other one. Good luck getting in the queue.


----------



## Rolow

old64mb said:


> Oh, the now-on-sale-Hitachi seems to periodically reappear on BB.com somewhere around midnight PDT until all the deal sites overwhelm their inventory for the day 5 minutes later.
> 
> Link here if you missed the other one. Good luck getting in the queue.


I just picked one up thanks for the link


----------



## AbMagFab

Anyone know if this WD is going on sale again this week?


----------



## Rolow

a scan of BB ad
http://www.flickr.com/photos/[email protected]/sets/72157602263397992/

http://www.sundaysaver.com/


----------



## fred2

AbMagFab said:


> Anyone know if this WD is going on sale again this week?


It is still BACKORDERED according to the site. My raincheck might be worthless!


----------



## Joybob

I splurged on this one since it's black and looks pretty.

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/West...93197/catOid/-12973/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

I shall post later to see if it works well.

p.s. Do those pesky yellow 'about to delete' Icons go away when you pop in an extra hard drive?


----------



## jlib

Joybob said:


> I splurged on [the Western Digital 1TB My Book] since it's black and looks pretty.


OK, but make sure you detune it acoustically.


----------



## Joybob

jlib said:


> OK, but make sure you detune it acoustically.


I have no idea what that means.


----------



## JKay

Joybob said:


> I have no idea what that means.


Acoustic management (AAM) can be set on the WD hard drive to reduce the noise a the drive makes. I used the Hitachi hard drive utility CD to set AAM from 256 down to 128. Not sure if this will work with 1TB drive in an enclosure.

Interestingly, WD does not provide a utility to change this setting and does not seem to support the idea of anyone doing that to their drives. But the setting can be changed and seems to makes sense when the drive is going to work with a TiVo.


----------



## Joybob

JKay said:


> Acoustic management (AAM) can be set on the WD hard drive to reduce the noise a the drive makes. I used the Hitachi hard drive utility CD to set AAM from 256 down to 128. Not sure if this will work with 1TB drive in an enclosure.
> 
> Interestingly, WD does not provide a utility to change this setting and does not seem to support the idea of anyone doing that to their drives. But the setting can be changed and seems to makes sense when the drive is going to work with a TiVo.


So I'd need third party software to change this on the drive? Is this a setting inside the firmware? Are you sure it will even function if it's connected to a Tivo?


----------



## JKay

Joybob said:


> So I'd need third party software to change this on the drive? Is this a setting inside the firmware? Are you sure it will even function if it's connected to a Tivo?


Yes, the Hitachi utility will change it when drive is on a PC sata port. And yes I believe it is a firmware setting.

I imagine you are going to leave your drive in the external enclosure and use the eSATA port, so I cant speak to what will work for you, but I would set the AAM to 128 *if possible*. You can always set it back to the default if it presents a problem,


----------



## Dr_Diablo

Good deal at Buy.com

http://www.buy.com/prod/cavalry-pre...-external-hard-drive/q/loc/101/205001869.html

Features Hard Drive 
Pre-formatted 1TB Hard Drive 
Supports 3.5" SATA I/II HDD 
USB 2.0 Interfacea 
Hot Swappable Plug and Play 
Power Supply: AC 100-240V 
DC 12V/5V Dual 
Weighs 5.1 pounds 
Dimensions: 5in x 3in x 7.75in


----------



## greg_burns

Dr_Diablo said:


> Good deal at Buy.com
> 
> http://www.buy.com/prod/cavalry-pre...-external-hard-drive/q/loc/101/205001869.html
> 
> Features Hard Drive
> Pre-formatted 1TB Hard Drive
> Supports 3.5" SATA I/II HDD
> USB 2.0 Interfacea
> Hot Swappable Plug and Play
> Power Supply: AC 100-240V
> DC 12V/5V Dual
> Weighs 5.1 pounds
> Dimensions: 5in x 3in x 7.75in


Doesn't that have 2 500GB drives? Since it is USB you can't use the enclosure for eSata...


----------



## jlib

Yeah, that's right. Good catch. And since it has two smaller drives it wouldn't even be worth salvaging them. Too bad...


----------



## larrs

jlib said:


> Yeah, that's right. Good catch. And since it has two smaller drives it wouldn't even be worth salvaging them. Too bad...


great price for desktop storage though.


----------



## aaronwt

larrs said:


> great price for desktop storage though.


Not really. Not when I can get 500 GB drives easily for under $100.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> I have no idea what that means.


You may be able to use Hitachi's Feature Tool to reduce the amount of noise the drive makes during the seek process. It involves connecting your new drive to your P.C. and booting from a floppy or CD you can create by downloading the program at this link and following the simple instructions in the users guide.



Joybob said:


> p.s. Do those pesky yellow 'about to delete' Icons go away when you pop in an extra hard drive?


No, they automatically appear based on the date recorded no matter how much disk space is available...unless you change the options to KUID.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> You may be able to use Hitachi's Feature Tool to reduce the amount of noise the drive makes during the seek process. It involves connecting your new drive to your P.C. and booting from a floppy or CD you can create by downloading the program at this link and following the simple instructions in the users guide.
> 
> No, they automatically appear based on the date recorded no matter how much disk space is available...unless you change the options to KUID.


The FAQ doesn't answer this, but do I have to pre-format the drive before adding it to the tivo?

p.s. The drive will be tucked sort of in the back so a little noise won't bother me.


----------



## AbMagFab

Joybob said:


> The FAQ doesn't answer this, but do I have to pre-format the drive before adding it to the tivo?
> 
> p.s. The drive will be tucked sort of in the back so a little noise won't bother me.


I'd suggest you remove formatting (using WinMFS) before you do the copy. Not sure it's needed, but it didn't work for me until I did that first.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> The FAQ doesn't answer this, but do I have to pre-format the drive before adding it to the tivo?
> 
> p.s. The drive will be tucked sort of in the back so a little noise won't bother me.


Since this is an external SATA HDD expansion theres no need to do anything else to your new drive. TiVo formats it when you use Kickstart 62 to marry it up. Keep in mind that the drive will be working 24/7 and will get warm to hot and should be placed in a position with plenty of ventilation to prevent any damage or data corruption.


----------



## richsadams

AbMagFab said:


> I'd suggest you remove formatting (using WinMFS) before you do the copy. Not sure it's needed, but it didn't work for me until I did that first.


Looks like the OP is adding an eSATA drive (this one) so should be good to go.

But for an internal upgrade it's a good idea. :up:


----------



## Rolow

Could some one tell me what settings and or values I should change when running Hitachi Feature Tool?
The drive is a new Hitachi deskstar that will be an internal Tivo HD drive hopfully soon. If my first time does not go very bad.


----------



## richsadams

Rolow said:


> Could some one tell me what settings and or values I should change when running Hitachi Feature Tool?
> The drive is a new Hitachi deskstar that will be an internal Tivo HD drive hopfully soon. If my first time does not go very bad.


AFAIK the only thing you'll need to do is set the AAM (Advanced Acoustic Management) to the lowest level, 128. That will quiet the read/write sequence during the seek periods. The program worked very well on our WD 1TB "Green" drive...although it was pretty quiet to begin with.

Best of luck! :up:


----------



## moolman

Setting the AAM to 128 is sort of a waste of time. Especially if you are using the Antec MX-1 external case, the fan on the Antec is louder than the hard drive. 

The WD is the quietest and coolest running HD I've seen so far. I have a 500 GB Seagate 7200.10 in my Series 2 and it is hot to the touch. The WD is cool, I'm sure the fan on the Antec is helping but you barely feel any heat.

I had to open up the case one last time to disconnect the LED, that blue LED is annoying because its always on. I would recommend that you disconnect it the first time you have the case open.

If you can hear the WD drive from farthar than 1-3 ft away, I suggest you take time to kill that cricket you can hear outside your bedroom and take up crime fighting since you can hear screams of help from miles away.


----------



## richsadams

moolman said:


> Setting the AAM to 128 is sort of a waste of time. Especially if you are using the Antec MX-1 external case, the fan on the Antec is louder than the hard drive.
> 
> The WD is the quietest and coolest running HD I've seen so far. I have a 500 GB Seagate 7200.10 in my Series 2 and it is hot to the touch. The WD is cool, I'm sure the fan on the Antec is helping but you barely feel any heat.
> 
> I had to open up the case one last time to disconnect the LED, that blue LED is annoying because its always on. I would recommend that you disconnect it the first time you have the case open.
> 
> If you can hear the WD drive from farthar than 1-3 ft away, I suggest you take time to kill that cricket you can hear outside your bedroom and take up crime fighting since you can hear screams of help from miles away.


The OP is installing a HDD drive _internally_, not as an eSATA, and it's a Hitachi, not a WD. Not sure how loud the Hitachi's are.


----------



## 1283

moolman said:


> If you can hear the WD drive from farthar than 1-3 ft away, I suggest you take time to kill that cricket you can hear outside your bedroom and take up crime fighting since you can hear screams of help from miles away.


Actually, I can still hear the WD drives from 3 feet away in a quiet room. As for the other two items, I cannot find any cricket to kill, and I'm not superman.


----------



## 1283

WD and Hitachi 1TB are both $279.99 this week at Best Buy. The choice is easy: WD.


----------



## sfhub

If you bought the MX-1 during the September sale for $49.99 you can get $11+tax bax on price match to today's Circuit City $39.99 sales price.

If you hurry up and buy the MX-1 from Best Buy today (or before Circuit City runs out or Best Buy adjusts their prices), you can get it for $36.59 after 110% price match.


----------



## MikeyB

Picked up my MX-1 for $17.99 @ CC yesterday. This was after the first store didn't have mine (at all) for in-store pickup. After using my $24 guarantee giftcard toward the purchase at a different location, the normally $70 MX-1, only cost me $18 including tax. Now if I can just get that good of a deal on the hard drive.


----------



## bifsiff94

has anyone tried the new western digital 1TB eSATA book hard drive?

WD Book Drive at Buy.com


----------



## aaronwt

WOn't that have the same 1TB WD drive in it that was $260 at BB?


----------



## supie

Went to BestBuy Web site to buy the 1000Gb Western Digital Hard Drive,but they have a Western Digital 1000Gb Drive with the Model Number WD10000CSRTL.

On the Western Digital site the only Green 1TB drive, that I can see is a model number WD10EACS.

And WD does not list the WD10000CSRTL and as far as I can tell there is only one 1TB Green Drive, the WD10EACS.

Called BB asked if this drive was really the WD10EACS and if they use a different number than the real number they assure me the WD10000CSRTL was the real number.

1. I was wondering if the WD10000CSRTL is last years model? 
2. If so is the one everyone is using? 
3. Is anyone using the WD10EACS?

Can anyone shed some light on the models?

Thanks


----------



## richsadams

supie said:


> Went to BestBuy Web site to buy the 1000Gb Western Digital Hard Drive,but they have a Western Digital 1000Gb Drive with the Model Number WD10000CSRTL.
> 
> On the Western Digital site the only Green 1TB drive, that I can see is a model number WD10EACS.
> 
> And WD does not list the WD10000CSRTL and as far as I can tell there is only one 1TB Green Drive, the WD10EACS.
> 
> Called BB asked if this drive was really the WD10EACS and if they use a different number than the real number they assure me the WD10000CSRTL was the real number.
> 
> 1. I was wondering if the WD10000CSRTL is last years model?
> 2. If so is the one everyone is using?
> 3. Is anyone using the WD10EACS?
> 
> Can anyone shed some light on the models?
> 
> Thanks


I have one sitting in front of me that I purchased from BB a few weeks ago.

The box lists it as a WD 1TB Caviar GP Eco-friendly storage device.

The model number on the sticker on the box is WD100000CSRTL.

The Model number on the actual drive is WD10EACS. At the bottom of the drive's label it has the leaf logo and the words "GreenPower Hard Drives By Western Digital".

So apparently they are one in the same.

AFAIK they did not have a 1TB drive last year and what BB is selling is the latest model.


----------



## greg_burns

http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/10/11/wd_caviar_gp/


----------



## 1283

WD10EACS + SATA cable/screws/etc. + retail box = WD10000CSRTL


----------



## Dr_Diablo

I'm holdin out for the WD 1 TB drive to drop below the $200.00 mark...

Filled up my 500 WD in ten days... geeze


----------



## jlib

Dr_Diablo said:


> I'm holdin out for the WD 1 TB drive to drop below the $200.00 mark...
> 
> Filled up my 500 WD in ten days... geeze


Hard drives are like freeways. The traffic just expands to match the capacity...


----------



## cheerdude

bifsiff94 said:


> has anyone tried the new western digital 1TB eSATA book hard drive?
> 
> WD Book Drive at Buy.com


If you care, zipzoomfly.com has the drive for about $20 cheaper - $ 330 w/ free shipping.


----------



## Joybob

cheerdude said:


> If you care, zipzoomfly.com has the drive for about $20 cheaper - $ 330 w/ free shipping.


I don't think anyone has been able to get the Mybook working with Tivo.

I'm getting mine in the mail today. I'll see if I can get it to work with my S3.


----------



## supie

Thanks to all that answered the Question the drives are the same.

WD10EACS + SATA cable/screws/etc. + retail box = WD10000CSRTL.

Since Tivo release the official eSATA 9.2 update I think I should wait a couple of days until Tivo announces which drives are officially supported.

If someone knows what the official support drives, could you post them here?

Thanks again.


----------



## Joybob

Joybob said:


> I don't think anyone has been able to get the Mybook working with Tivo.
> 
> I'm getting mine in the mail today. I'll see if I can get it to work with my S3.


Okay I just got boned in a major way. It seems the drive that Circuit City sells as a 'Home Edition drive' with eSATA is really an 'Essential Edition drive' that only has 1 USB port.

Here's the order summary:

"WDC WDH1U10000N Western Digital 1TB My Book Home Edition External Hard 
Drive (WDH1U10000N) "

And here's their new advertisement:

"Western Digital 1TB Essential Edition External Hard Drive

WDC WDH1U10000N"

http://www.circuitcity.com/ssm/West...93197/catOid/-12973/rpem/ccd/productDetail.do

Which they continue to claim has 'triple interface'.

So I just got nailed for $350 bucks plus shipping for the wrong drive.

Steer clear. That aside the drive, is very small and cute. If it had an eSATA port it would look really pretty over my S3.


----------



## aaronwt

I thought they had free shipping? It usually takes 1 to 2 days when I do free shipping from Circuit city.

ANd if you did pay for shipping you should be able to get a credit for it since their description was wrong.


----------



## Joybob

aaronwt said:


> I thought they had free shipping? It usually takes 1 to 2 days when I do free shipping from Circuit city.
> 
> ANd if you did pay for shipping you should be able to get a credit for it since their description was wrong.


Well I paid 11 bucks shipping; which isn't that much....

And do they give you store credit or a full refund? They don't sell the drive I want so there's no point to me getting a store credit.


----------



## aaronwt

I don't know. I usually just ask for store credit since there is less resistance to refunds that way.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> Well I paid 11 bucks shipping; which isn't that much....
> 
> And do they give you store credit or a full refund? They don't sell the drive I want so there's no point to me getting a store credit.


I've gotten full refunds from CC if they didn't have what I wanted. (Credit on the credit card I charged the item on that is.)


----------



## tivobw

I have upgraded my Tivo HD to 1TB. Thanks to Spike for WinMFS!!! It rocks. And thanks to all the folks for the tips and hints. Here's the story. Maybe it will help someone else. I know when I was reading through the forums that the little stories helped give me the confidence to try the upgrade.

I saw that the Western Digital "Green" 1TB HD was on sale at bestbuy for $279.99. Not the lowest price ever, but pretty good. Model #: WD10000CSRTL. Folks here were mentioning this drive looked pretty good so I decided to give it a go, and bestbuy showed that the HD was in stock at my local store. I also saw that Circuit City had a good price on the Antec MX-1 (~$40), so decided despite the rainy weather it was worth a trip!

Went to BB, picked up the WD Green 1TB for $279.99 + tax. Went to CC and picked up the Antec MX-1. Got home and thought about a few things.. I could either add the 1TB as an eSATA (in the enclosure) and still use the stock 160GB internal drive, *or* I could just replace the internal HD with the WD 1TB, keep the 160GB stock Tivo drive as a spare, and potentially add more capacity later via eSATA. 

It seems there is some confusion now with respect to eSATA on the Tivo HD, as Tivo is releasing a new update that enables the port, but it seems to only work with specific drives. I want to see how this all shakes out before I try adding a drive via eSATA. Plus, now, after replacing the internal HD with a 1TB, I can add even more storage later via eSATA as needed. It could be 1TB internal + 750GB eSATA, for example, instead of just 160GB internal + 1TB eSATA.

So, got home, and saw my PC only had two SATA ports inside. I thought about hooking the Tivo HD up to a free SATA port on the PC and putting the new WD 1TB in the Antec enclosure and then connecting that via USB, but thought it might take too long with USB, so decided to do things serially. This post is getting a little long, so let me cut to the chase:

- Downloaded WinMFS
- Turned off PC (running Vista 32-bit)
- Unplugged Tivo, took off case cover (Torx-10 screws), unplugged SATA/power cable from Tivo HD, removed HD chassis from Tivo (Torx-10 screws), removed Tivo HD from HD chassis (Torx-15 screws), placed Tivo drive in PC, connected to SATA
- Turned on PC
- Ran WinMFS (right-click on the executable, select "Run as Administrator")
- Selected the Tivo drive and chose truncated backup, and wrote the backup to my local Windows hard drive (turned out to be ~400MB)
- Turned off PC, removed Tivo drive, placed new WD 1TB drive in PC, connected to SATA
- Turned on PC
- Ran WinMFS, right-click to run as admin
- Selected the WD 1TB drive, and clicked restore tivo drive. When it was done, it asked if I wanted to add space, I clicked on "Yes." 
- When it was done, I turned off the PC!
- Removed WD 1TB drive, attached to HD chassis (w/Torx-15 screws), attached HD chassis back to case (Torx-10 screws), plugged SATA cable back in, slid case top back on and fastened to case (Torx-10 screws)
- Ran downstairs to hook up Tivo and turn on!

After an agonizing wait (probably about 4 minutes) the Tivo intro video finally started playing. I immediately went to my settings and see I have ~131 HD hours now (instead of the meager 20 HD hours that are there, stock)! Amazing. It had over a thousand SD hours listed as well...

And I was happy to see my season pass information was retained, and my CableCARD (multi-stream) still worked without problems!

Been a few hours and it still seems to work great. I'm running the HD with the standard settings (didn't try to change the acoustic settings w/the Hitachi utility), as the Tivo HD sits in a media cabinet and I can't hear it anyway, even with the door open.

The whole thing probably took me about an hour and a half, because I kept encountering things I had to work around.. like I couldn't find my Torx-15 screwdriver, then I had to figure out how to get the Tivo HD out of the chassis and into the PC, etc... but well worth the effort!

Thanks again to Spike and to all the forum posts for the hints and tips!


----------



## Joybob

jlib said:


> Hard drives are like freeways. The traffic just expands to match the capacity...


Tivo needs to work on a hard drive with infinite recording capacity. It's not that hard to do.

Just wait till the hard-drive fills up, then compress the shows to half size and repeat. Infinite storage. End of problem.


----------



## richsadams

tivobw said:


> I have upgraded my Tivo HD to 1TB. Thanks to Spike for WinMFS!!! It rocks. And thanks to all the folks for the tips and hints. Here's the story. Maybe it will help someone else. I know when I was reading through the forums that the little stories helped give me the confidence to try the upgrade.<snip>
> 
> Thanks again to Spike and to all the forum posts for the hints and tips!


 :up: :up: That's about the best step-by-step write up about upgrading an internal HDD I've seen to date! Nice work. I know it will help and give others confidence to do their own work in the future. I'm keeping a copy for posterity.


----------



## jlib

Yes, what a clear write-up! Where you been so long? It was funny that the hardest part of your project was remembering where your freakin' Torx screwdriver was. Upgrading the internal drive is really the way to go. It really is that easy, a testimony to the genius of spike2k5. Welcome to the Terabyte Tivo Club...


----------



## mportuesi

Well, this thread has UMF-ed me.

I went out to Best Buy today and bought the Western Digital "Green" WD10000CSRTL 1 TB drive as well, and I'm going to attempt the same internal upgrade on my S3. I plan to use the MFSLive disk rather than WinMFS, as I have Linux experience and I don't want to risk booting into Windows with a strange hardware configuration during the upgrade.


----------



## richsadams

mportuesi said:


> Well, this thread has UMF-ed me.
> 
> I went out to Best Buy today and bought the Western Digital "Green" WD10000CSRTL 1 TB drive as well, and I'm going to attempt the same internal upgrade on my S3. I plan to use the MFSLive disk rather than WinMFS, as I have Linux experience and I don't want to risk booting into Windows with a strange hardware configuration during the upgrade.


Everyone needs a little push now and then. 

FWIW I always used to use MFSLive, being comfortable with Linux as well...but there's no risk of corrupting the drive Using Windows XP/SP2 or Vista now and WinMFS is extremely easy to use. Either way is fine, just my two cents.

Let us know how it goes! :up:


----------



## spectrumsp

I picked up a new THD two weeks ago and have been very pleased with its performance to date...got the 9.2J update the other day and decided to add an external storage unit to add to the meager internal HDD... 

Read this and other threads to make sure I wouldn't get an expensive door stop, etc... 

Went to CC today and picked up the MX-1 for $39.95, then went to BB and bought the WD10000CSRTL for $279.00. 

Got home and installed the WD into the MX-1; unplugged the THD; plugged the MX-1 into the back of the THD; powered up the MX-1; finally powered up the THD. 

The unit restarted without a problem...I went to the systems info area and it indicated I still only had 20 hours of HD recording storage. I backed out and a window opened indicated the THD had discovered an external device and asked if I wanted to configure it...I said "Yes"...it then indicated it was an unsupported device. 

I re-booted the unit twice and even went into the systems tab and had it attempt to configure an external device...I continued to receive the same indication that it is an unsupported device. 

I did not change any jumper settings when I installed the HDD into the MX-1. 

I'm using the esata cable supplied with the MX-1. 

HELP, please!


----------



## HiDefGator

does the drive work if you plug it into a computer?


----------



## spectrumsp

Good idea, but I don't have an internal/external esata port available to try it out...


----------



## tivobw

jlib said:


> Yes, what a clear write-up! Where you been so long? It was funny that the hardest part of your project was remembering where your freakin' Torx screwdriver was. Upgrading the internal drive is really the way to go. It really is that easy, a testimony to the genius of spike2k5. Welcome to the Terabyte Tivo Club...


Thanks! I have posted before, not sure why it thinks this is my first post. Perhaps the posting DB/tracker got reset or something!

Yeah, I was wondering if anyone else would notice I've been a member for several years and that was my first post.. 

I was active on here several years ago, probably soon after I had joined, when I was about to upgrade my Series 2 AT&T Tivo (yeah, AT&T used to sell these!) after the stock HD crashed. That Tivo is still running strong in our media cabinet! I should crack it open sometime and see what's in there, but I *think* it's a 120GB or something, maybe a little bigger - it has a bit under 200 hr of SD recording capacity.

Back then (2002) that was a lot of space! It kills me that the Tivo HD now has a 1TB drive in it - and I'm still considering adding more! HD requires lots of data storage (but that picture is gorgeous).

Yeah, I couldn't find my Torx-15! Aside from Tivo hacking, I don't usually use these very often.. I think I had to use a Torx-10 a while back to tighten a nut on a T-Fal frying pan, but that's about it.

Feels good being in the 1TB club. Thanks!


----------



## SDJack

spectrumsp said:


> I picked up a new THD two weeks ago and have been very pleased with its performance to date...got the 9.2J update the other day and decided to add an external storage unit to add to the meager internal HDD...
> 
> Read this and other threads to make sure I wouldn't get an expensive door stop, etc...
> 
> Went to CC today and picked up the MX-1 for $39.95, then went to BB and bought the WD10000CSRTL for $279.00.
> 
> Got home and installed the WD into the MX-1; unplugged the THD; plugged the MX-1 into the back of the THD; powered up the MX-1; finally powered up the THD.
> 
> The unit restarted without a problem...I went to the systems info area and it indicated I still only had 20 hours of HD recording storage. I backed out and a window opened indicated the THD had discovered an external device and asked if I wanted to configure it...I said "Yes"...it then indicated it was an unsupported device.
> 
> I re-booted the unit twice and even went into the systems tab and had it attempt to configure an external device...I continued to receive the same indication that it is an unsupported device.
> 
> I did not change any jumper settings when I installed the HDD into the MX-1.
> 
> I'm using the esata cable supplied with the MX-1.
> 
> HELP, please!


I'm fairly certain eSata expansion with the TivoHD is limited to only the WD My DVR Expander as of now. As a matter of fact, although the 9.2 software is alleged to add esata support to the THD, I've yet to hear anyone successfully expand storage on a stock THD using the plug and play method and an external drive of any type.

Are you confusing the THD with the S3?


----------



## spectrumsp

It was my understanding that the MX-1 and the WD HDD had been successfully integrated into an external config with the THD...perhaps I've misread several of the posts...

I did go and attach the MX-1 to my XP machine using the USB port...XP recognized the device...

To clear up this issue with the THD, has anyone else been able to attach an MX-1 enclosure using any HDD...if so, which HDDs are successful?


----------



## spectrumsp

SDJack said:


> I'm fairly certain eSata expansion with the TivoHD is limited to only the WD My DVR Expander as of now. As a matter of fact, although the 9.2 software is alleged to add esata support to the THD, I've yet to hear anyone successfully expand storage on a stock THD using the plug and play method and an external drive of any type.
> 
> Are you confusing the THD with the S3?


If this is in fact the case, I recommend that the powers in charge establish two individual sticky threads regarding external storage for the S3 and THD so future misunderstanding don't occur...these misunderstandings can become VERY expensive...


----------



## tivobw

spectrumsp said:


> I picked up a new THD two weeks ago and have been very pleased with its performance to date...got the 9.2J update the other day and decided to add an external storage unit to add to the meager internal HDD...
> 
> Read this and other threads to make sure I wouldn't get an expensive door stop, etc...
> 
> Went to CC today and picked up the MX-1 for $39.95, then went to BB and bought the WD10000CSRTL for $279.00.
> [...]
> I re-booted the unit twice and even went into the systems tab and had it attempt to configure an external device...I continued to receive the same indication that it is an unsupported device.
> 
> I did not change any jumper settings when I installed the HDD into the MX-1.
> 
> I'm using the esata cable supplied with the MX-1.
> 
> HELP, please!


Hey there.. from what I have read in various forums, while the 9.2j update enables the eSATA port, the Tivo only natively recognizes some WD "MyBook" HD kit.. which I would personally avoid, since the max size that I saw in Best Buy was only 500GB (which is 1/2 the size of the drive you just bought!). I think it is also more expensive...

I think if you want to use the WD10000CSRTL via eSATA, you'll need to use WinMFS (Windows executable) or MFSLive (Linux boot CD). Check out spike's very helpful info at this link. That is a thread from someone who wanted to add an eSATA HD to their Tivo HD. Spike gives an overview of the steps in that post.

I'm not sure if anyone has tried to do that since getting the 9.2j update, but I think it would still work.

Thanks to Spike for WinMFS!!!!!! Best of luck, and I hope the stuff at mfslive helps.


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## tivobw

Sorry, I wrote "MyBook" HD kit above but I believe SDJack is right, and that it is the "WD My DVR Expander" that is the officially-supported eSATA drive. I don't know if Tivo has officially announced this yet, but I've seen other posts mentioning it.


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## spectrumsp

tivobw said:


> Hey there.. from what I have read in various forums, while the 9.2j update enables the eSATA port, the Tivo only natively recognizes some WD "MyBook" HD kit.. which I would personally avoid, since the max size that I saw in Best Buy was only 500GB (which is 1/2 the size of the drive you just bought!). I think it is also more expensive...
> 
> I think if you want to use the WD10000CSRTL via eSATA, you'll need to use WinMFS (Windows executable) or MFSLive (Linux boot CD). Check out spike's very helpful info at this link. That is a thread from someone who wanted to add an eSATA HD to their Tivo HD. Spike gives an overview of the steps in that post.
> 
> I'm not sure if anyone has tried to do that since getting the 9.2j update, but I think it would still work.
> 
> Thanks to Spike for WinMFS!!!!!! Best of luck, and I hope the stuff at mfslive helps.


Thanks for the advice and link...

I read what he suggested and the only problem is that I can't connect the two drives to my computer at the same time...I would have to do it thru the MX-1 enclosure using the USB connector one at a time, so I don't know if I can then "marry" the two drives...do you know if the two drives can be "married" if they are not connected at the same time?


----------



## jlib

spectrumsp said:


> _ read this and other threads to make sure I wouldn't get an expensive door stop, etc... _


_Sorry, to hear about your expensive doorstop. This is the thread you should pay attention to, though. Spike2k5 is the canonical source for upgrade methodology. The good news is that you can salvage your doorstop and use it either as a replacement internal drive or as a manually installed external eSATA drive. You just won't be able to plug'n'play._


----------



## jlib

spectrumsp said:


> ...the only problem is that I can't connect the two drives to my computer at the same time...I would have to do it thru the MX-1 enclosure using the USB connector one at a time, so I don't know if I can then "marry" the two drives...do you know if the two drives can be "married" if they are not connected at the same time?


Unfortunately, you will need to have them connected at the same time to manually marry them. Since you are going to have to open up the TiVo now in any case, you might just consider replacing the original drive with the new one (see tivobw's step by step instructions). You can use the enclosure connected via USB for the backup and restore steps. Internal is a better first upgrade step anyway.


----------



## 1283

If you're upgrading from the THD to 1TB, I would highly recommend replacing the internal drive. Adding a second drive for just 160GB is not really worth it.


----------



## snathanb

c3 said:


> If you're upgrading from the THD to 1TB, I would highly recommend replacing the internal drive. Adding a second drive for just 160GB is not really worth it.


I second that.

I upgraded my drive space because I travel frequently. I don't want the married/divorced/GSOD issues that seem to occur on external upgrades. I need to to stay up and running while I am not home.


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## spectrumsp

One last question, then I'll leave this alone...

If I upgrade the drive internally (which is what I'll probably do), I believe I read that the future P-n-P feature of the THD esata will be disabled...

Is that true?


----------



## greg_burns

spectrumsp said:


> One last question, then I'll leave this alone...
> 
> If I upgrade the drive internally (which is what I'll probably do), I believe I read that the future P-n-P feature of the THD esata will be disabled...
> 
> Is that true?


I thought I read the same. But upgrading internally as high as you can go still makes the most sense to me. You can always add more via eSata using MFSLive later.


----------



## aaronwt

mportuesi said:


> Well, this thread has UMF-ed me.
> 
> I went out to Best Buy today and bought the Western Digital "Green" WD10000CSRTL 1 TB drive as well, and I'm going to attempt the same internal upgrade on my S3. I plan to use the MFSLive disk rather than WinMFS, as I have Linux experience and I don't want to risk booting into Windows with a strange hardware configuration during the upgrade.


No problems with WinMFS. Plus if you really only have one PC for this you can connect the drives up to your Windows PC and continue to work on it normally while your drive is being copied.


----------



## HDTiVo

There is another option which is to use the external drive as the only drive. You have to reconnect the cable on the mother board so that the eSata port is plugged into the internal MB Sata port. Then plug the My Book into the eSata port.

This would make a future upgrade easy and make it easy to backup up your TiVo's drive from time to time. If you were intending to use the external drive anyway, this might be good for you.

(refering to TiVo HD)


----------



## greg_burns

HDTiVo said:


> There is another option which is to use the external drive as the only drive. You have to reconnect the cable on the mother board so that the eSata port is plugged into the internal MB Sata port. Then plug the My Book into the eSata port.


Is this as easy as you make it sound on the TivoHD? I remember wanting to do this with my S3 before I started cutting a holes in the grate on the bottom. Didn't look doable on the S3.


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## bare-a-kuda

tivobw said:


> I have upgraded my Tivo HD to 1TB. Thanks to Spike for WinMFS!!! It rocks.
> 
> ...
> ...
> 
> Thanks again to Spike and to all the forum posts for the hints and tips!


Great write-up!! I used the directions to upgrade my Tivo HD today. 131 HD hours, oh so nice!!


----------



## mportuesi

richsadams said:


> FWIW I always used to use MFSLive, being comfortable with Linux as well...but there's no risk of corrupting the drive Using Windows XP/SP2 or Vista now and WinMFS is extremely easy to use. Either way is fine, just my two cents.
> 
> Let us know how it goes! :up:


Right now the upgrade is in progress. The old drive is copying to the new. I'm using the MFSLive boot CD. There's another 2 hours and 15 minutes to go before it's done.

I've disconnected both of the normal drives in the PC, and then booting from the CD. That way the system's normal hard drives can't be involved, and nothing can happen to them.

I realize that WinMFS will probably do the job nicely, but call me paranoid!


----------



## tivobw

bare-a-kuda said:


> Great write-up!! I used the directions to upgrade my Tivo HD today. 131 HD hours, oh so nice!!


Excellent! Another satisfied customer, Spike!!! 1TB is so sweet.  :up: :up: :up:


----------



## tivobw

mportuesi said:


> Right now the upgrade is in progress. The old drive is copying to the new. I'm using the MFSLive boot CD. There's another 2 hours and 15 minutes to go before it's done.
> 
> I've disconnected both of the normal drives in the PC, and then booting from the CD. That way the system's normal hard drives can't be involved, and nothing can happen to them.
> 
> I realize that WinMFS will probably do the job nicely, but call me paranoid!


I was thinking the same thing before my upgrade. I was going to use my wife's old Dell, which is running XP SP2, as it has a CD-RW and two SATA ports. I figured, use Linux boot CD and just hook up the Tivo hard drive to SATA #1 and the new WD 1TB to SATA #2, then boot up and go! But the SATA power cable was too short, and I didn't want to try to shoehorn the WD 1TB into the 2nd hard drive bay.. it was just too much hassle.

So I crossed my fingers and hooked the drives up one at a time on my new Dell, which made me nervous, but I figured, hey, if it breaks, there is the repair utility as well. And of course, it didn't break, and all was fine, but I was still nervous!

Hope your upgrade goes well!


----------



## mportuesi

tivobw said:


> But the SATA power cable was too short, and I didn't want to try to shoehorn the WD 1TB into the 2nd hard drive bay.. it was just too much hassle.


One thing I noticed about the two drives. The old 250GB drive has both SATA and the old-school Molex power connectors. The new "Green" 1 TB drive only has the SATA power connector. They've phased out the Molex connectors in this generation of drives.

It turns out this wasn't much of an issue with my PC, but maybe it might be a problem for some.

Currently my drive copy is 60% complete, another 57 minutes to go.


----------



## spectrumsp

mportuesi said:


> One thing I noticed about the two drives. The old 250GB drive has both SATA and the old-school Molex power connectors. The new "Green" 1 TB drive only has the SATA power connector. They've phased out the Molex connectors in this generation of drives.
> 
> It turns out this wasn't much of an issue with my PC, but maybe it might be a problem for some.
> 
> Currently my drive copy is 60% complete, another 57 minutes to go.


What is the total time to accomplish the transfer?


----------



## old64mb

spectrumsp said:


> What is the total time to accomplish the transfer?


It tends to take a loooong time. From my native S3 drive to the 1 TB I think I averaged a little under 6 hours.

You're doing the right thing by just skipping the external drive headache. Spike has made MFSTools far, far more manageable than it was than four or five years ago when it really was a monstrously complex operation to put in an upgraded drive.

Also, remember to do the AAM command referred to earlier in this thread before you close up; takes all of 5 seconds and your drive will be far quieter.

Welcome to the 1 TB club. I have 250 Tivo suggestions ahead of my 30 HD hours sitting in the deleted folder. Among other things, it's just pleasant to record SD stuff in 1080i and not worry about do-not-delete for that half hour 1991 Simpsons episode forcing a new episode of Friday Night Lights off the Tivo. Having gone through this on my S2s before I upgraded, I honestly think that until you hit 100 hours of storage in your preferred broadcast quality the Tivo is just not as fun.


----------



## mportuesi

spectrumsp said:


> What is the total time to accomplish the transfer?


Over two hours, definitely not more than 3. Maybe two and a half hours to transfer all recordings on the stock 250GB drive over to the new one. I wasn't keeping track.

I did do the AAM command to set quiet mode on the drive before I took it out of the PC.

The copy is finished and the TiVo is reassembled. However a game of Metroid 3 (Wii) is currently going on the TV right now, so I have to wait for that to finish in order to try the TiVo out. Last time I walked past it sounded like a boss battle was in progress.


----------



## mportuesi

The Metroid game is over, and I've reconnected the TiVo. The operation appears to be a success. There was a nasty sound from the fan when I started it up. Perhaps I need to tighten down the screws more, or I knocked something else loose. But the unit did start up and it's working fine. All my recordings and my CableCARD configuration seems to be there.

Here's my procedure. I took tivobw's list of steps, and updated them for what I did in my scenario.

Procedure: replace the 250 GB internal drive in the stock Series 3 with the 1 TB "Green" drive, using the MFSLive tools.

- Downloaded MFSLive iso image
- Burned iso image to CD
- Used the MFSLive command generator (http://www.mfslive.org/cgen.php ) to generate the command line for upgrading the internal drive in my Series 3. I chose the option to save recordings.
- Turned off PC (dual-boot Windows XP and linux)
- Unplugged Tivo, took off case cover (Torx-10 screws), unplugged SATA/power cable from Tivo HD, removed HD chassis from Tivo (Torx-10 screws), removed Tivo HD from HD chassis (Torx-15 screws)
- Placed Tivo drives in PC, connected to SATA
- Turned on PC.
- Went to BIOS screen to verify that both drives were attached, and which one was what. Even though the 1 TB drive was attached to SATA cable 2, it showed up as drive 1 under the BIOS, with the original drive as drive 2. This is reverse of what I expected, but oh well.
- Rebooted PC from the MFSLive CD.
- Checked the kernel logs (dmesg | more) to make sure I knew which drive was which. In my case, /dev/sda turned out to be the 1 TB drive and /dev/sdb turned out to be the 250 GB original, so I needed to swap /dev/sda and /dev/sdb in the command line that the MFSLive command generator produced.
- Ran the command to transfer the data between the two drives. In my particular case, with the 1 TB installed first, this was:
backup -qTao - /dev/sdb | restore -s 128 -xzpi - /dev/sda 
This took over two hours. /dev/sdb was the original drive and /dev/sda is the new one in this example.
- Ran the command to set quiet mode on the drive:
hdparm -M 128 /dev/sda
- When it was done, I turned off the PC!
- Removed WD 1TB drive, attached to HD chassis (w/Torx-15 screws), attached HD chassis back to case (Torx-10 screws), plugged SATA cable back in, slid case top back on and fastened to case (Torx-10 screws)
- Ran upstairs to hook up Tivo and turn on!


----------



## Joybob

I haven't seen a definitive answer to this question so here it is.

Is it easier to upgrade internal then upgrade external or vice-versa?


----------



## GaryD9

Joybob said:


> I haven't seen a definitive answer to this question so here it is.
> 
> Is it easier to upgrade internal then upgrade external or vice-versa?


If you can kickstart, adding an external is easier. Otherwise, if you have to open up the TiVo case anyway, it's easier to upgrade the internal (as there are less parts to deal with.)

However, upgrading the internal might take a bit longer than simply pairing another drive...


----------



## Joybob

GaryD9 said:


> If you can kickstart, adding an external is easier. Otherwise, if you have to open up the TiVo case anyway, it's easier to upgrade the internal (as there are less parts to deal with.)
> 
> However, upgrading the internal might take a bit longer than simply pairing another drive...


No man. What I mean is. Will it be easier to add an external hard drive after I've upgraded the internal one or would it be easier to upgrade the internal HDD after I've added an external drive.

Or do both require a complex procedure?


----------



## tivobw

mportuesi said:


> The Metroid game is over, and I've reconnected the TiVo. The operation appears to be a success. There was a nasty sound from the fan when I started it up. Perhaps I need to tighten down the screws more, or I knocked something else loose. But the unit did start up and it's working fine. All my recordings and my CableCARD configuration seems to be there.
> [...]
> - Ran upstairs to hook up Tivo and turn on!


Way to go mportuesi!!!! Glad it worked - and thanks for updating the steps for MFSLive (Linux) boot CD folks! Welcome to the 1TB Club!!!    :up: :up: :up:

Nasty sound from the fan, I wonder what that was? Did you try unplugging the Tivo, waiting 10 seconds, and plugging it back in, to see if the sound happens again? Perhaps it was a one-time thing?


----------



## tivobw

Joybob said:


> No man. What I mean is. Will it be easier to add an external hard drive after I've upgraded the internal one or would it be easier to upgrade the internal HDD after I've added an external drive.
> 
> Or do both require a complex procedure?


I think it would be way easier to add an external hard drive after you've upgraded the internal one.

Adding an external HD after you've upgraded the internal one seems pretty easy - so several weeks/months after you've done your upgrade and swapped out the internal hard drive, you decide "Oh man, I need another TB of space.. 1TB just isn't enough!" So then, you would download WinMFS, turn off your PC, connect both the internal Tivo hard drive and the new hard drive to your PC, turn on the PC, run WinMFS, and go through the steps to "blesstivo" and utilize the additional HD space provided by the 2nd hard drive (the steps are documented on www.mfslive.org in the guides). It essentially "marries" the two drives, turning it into one big, fat storage area for Tivo recordings. By following this process, you shouldn't lose any recordings you may have on the first/internal Tivo hard drive. Then turn off the PC, unplug the drives, plug the internal Tivo HD back into the Tivo and put the case back on, place the second HD into the eSATA enclosure (Antec MX-1 is a good one) and plug it into the eSATA port on the Tivo, power on the eSATA HD, then turn on the Tivo. When it boots up it should see both drives as one big storage area.

As for upgrading the internal HD after you've upgraded the external one, that's a bit different. First, you would have to "divorce" the existing two drives, which would ruin your recordings and you'd lose them (as the recordings sometimes span the two drives). Then, you would need to copy the OS/bits from the internal tivo HD to another hard drive, to make that the big internal drive. Then you would need to connect the 2nd external/eSATA HD and "blesstivo" to "marry" them and have the big super duper storage area for your Tivo recordings. Then follow the same steps as above to get the drives back in the Tivo, enclosure etc. and power up.

I think that's right - someone follow-up if I'm wrong on that. If I were you I would definitely upgrade the internal first, and then later, if you need more space, it's a lot easier to just add an eSATA - and you don't lose your recordings.

Best of luck, whatever you decide!


----------



## mportuesi

tivobw said:


> Way to go mportuesi!!!! Glad it worked - and thanks for updating the steps for MFSLive (Linux) boot CD folks! Welcome to the 1TB Club!!!    :up: :up: :up:


Thanks! It was your original post that pushed me to do the upgrade; so I thought I'd do the same for someone else



tivobw said:


> Nasty sound from the fan, I wonder what that was? Did you try unplugging the Tivo, waiting 10 seconds, and plugging it back in, to see if the sound happens again? Perhaps it was a one-time thing?


I haven't restarted the machine since that first time. I wanted to wait and make sure the HDD upgrade was stable before I tackled the issue with the fan. The problem now is that the TiVo has a busy recording schedule evenings this week, so I might have to wait till next weekend to look into it. Currently, it is running silent so I'm letting sleeping dogs lie.


----------



## jlib

spectrumsp said:


> ...If I upgrade the drive internally (which is what I'll probably do), I believe I read that the future P-n-P feature of the THD esata will be disabled...
> 
> Is that true?


The key word is *future*. No one knows exactly what TiVO will do and TiVo hasn't said. It may not be a total show stopper even if so since you probably will be able to to manually marry an external drive as you can now in case you were ever to want a 2TB TiVO in the future. We'll have to see, though.


----------



## sfhub

For TiVo HD...

Does a device know what enclosure is attached to an eSATA port?

I was under the impression eSATA enclosures are basically direct connects to the drive itself and the enclosure is just providing power and cooling.

If that is the case then it doesn't matter which bare enclosure you get. All that matters is the drive you put in the enclosure matches one that is supported by TiVo, which currently is said to be WD My DVR.


----------



## jlib

WD could easily customize the firmware of the bare drive in the TiVo specified enclosure so that even if you obtained the equivalent model bare drive separately it could be distinguished. At one time Apple used to do that with hard drives. I have an old IBM drive that claims it is an Apple drive. It would be in the firmware of the drive where any distinguishing info would reside, not on the disk itself.


----------



## sfhub

jlib said:


> WD could easily customize the firmware of the bare drive in the TiVo specified enclosure so that even if you obtained the equivalent model bare drive separately it could be distinguished. At one time Apple used to do that with hard drives. I have an old IBM drive that claims it is an Apple drive. It would be in the firmware of the drive where any distinguishing info would reside, not on the disk itself.


An the question is if you stuck that drive in the Antec MX-1 would it work.

Alternately if someone hacked the drive identifier of the WD drive firmware would that work.

Basically 2 items that would be useful to know.
1) what mechanism is TiVo using to determine if a drive is "supported"
2) does that mechanism have anything to do with the enclosure

I'm guessing the answer to #2 is no.


----------



## Parkmad

FYI: My Series 3 just updated to 9.2j and the 1 TB WD was still recognized and functional. In fact, on the external storage line under system information, the model number and I guess serial number for the WD drive is now listed.


----------



## supie

I just bought the WD WD10EACS from FuturePowerPC.com for $291 which includes shipping and tax (exept for NYC) So this less that the recent BB price of $280 plus tax.

I also found the SIIG Sata cable at Buy.com for $8.99 plus tax and shipping. I bought the Antec MX1 from Circuit City for $39.99. Yes I know it 3 different vendors but the best prices today.


----------



## macrho

What a great thread! I picked up a TiVo HD when I was able to transfer my S2 lifetime. 
The whole upgrade process took about 45 minutes (as others have reported the most agonizing part was waiting for the system to boot)

I'm quite happy to be back with TiVo -- HD, a terrabyte and no more Comcast DVR! 

Color me happy


----------



## nexus99

supie said:


> I just bought the WD WD10EACS from FuturePowerPC.com for $291 which includes shipping and tax (exept for NYC) So this less that the recent BB price of $280 plus tax.
> 
> I also found the SIIG Sata cable at Buy.com for $8.99 plus tax and shipping. I bought the Antec MX1 from Circuit City for $39.99. Yes I know it 3 different vendors but the best prices today.


I am checking CC.com and the Antec is 59 bucks. Is there a special link or code maybe to get the 39 deal? I am probably going to go with the system you outlined above.

Anyone see any better prices on a good 1 TB drive?


----------



## supie

> I am checking CC.com and the Antec is 59 bucks. Is there a special link or code maybe to get the 39 deal? I am probably going to go with the system you outlined above.


I guess the MX1 at CC was limited time offer? The $291 on the WD 1TB was the best available last week, I spent fair amount of time finding this price. I sure if you wait and keep checking, over time a better price will come along. Time was running out for me because my 32Hours of HD is getting at the point where is wants to start deleting recorded shows and to save another $20 to $40 waiting no longer made sense.

Good Luck


----------



## Joybob

supie said:


> I guess the MX1 at CC was limited time offer? The $291 on the WD 1TB was the best available last week, I spent fair amount of time finding this price. I sure if you wait and keep checking, over time a better price will come along. Time was running out for me because my 32Hours of HD is getting at the point where is wants to start deleting recorded shows and to save another $20 to $40 waiting no longer made sense.
> 
> Good Luck


There are a bunch of eSATA enclosures and a bunch of different 1 TB hard drives. I don't understand why you guys insist on only using the WD with the MX1.


----------



## 1283

Joybob said:


> There are a bunch of eSATA enclosures and a bunch of different 1 TB hard drives. I don't understand why you guys insist on only using the WD with the MX1.


For the 1TB drives available now, and probably in the near future as well, the WD10EACS is the only one I would buy. Quiet and low power.


----------



## Joybob

c3 said:


> For the 1TB drives available now, and probably in the near future as well, the WD10EACS is the only one I would buy. Quiet and low power.


The Hitachi and Seagate 1 TB drives are 2 dB louder. Not enough of a difference.

The power consumption differences work out to be 8 watts while seeking. If you really worry about 8 watts of power then it's the drive for you. But Hitachi and Seagate drives have an extra 10 MB/s sequential read/write speed.

I'd go with performance.


----------



## richsadams

Hmmmm...me? I'd go with the recommendation of someone that's been modifying TiVo's for six or seven years rather than a a few weeks...but, hey, that's just me.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> Hmmmm...me? I'd go with the recommendation of someone that's been modifying TiVo's for six or seven years rather than a a few weeks...but, hey, that's just me.


You're just jealous of the fact that my drive has 16 more megs of Cache bro. 

You have some insecurity issues to deal with.


----------



## aaronwt

Joybob said:


> The Hitachi and Seagate 1 TB drives are 2 dB louder. Not enough of a difference.
> 
> The power consumption differences work out to be 8 watts while seeking. If you really worry about 8 watts of power then it's the drive for you. But Hitachi and Seagate drives have an extra 10 MB/s sequential read/write speed.
> 
> I'd go with performance.


The extra performance spec will make no difference. A 5400 rpm drive will give the same performance as a 7200rpm drive in a TiVo.
The TiVo doesn't come close to taxing the drive. 
I prefer the WD drive over the Hitachi only becuase the WD drive runs a few degrees cooler than the Hitachi. Performance wise in the TiVo they are identical.
I currently have two 1TB Hitachi drives, 1 in an S3 and one in a TiVoHD.
I have a 1TB WD drive in an S3 and sometime next month I will put another 1TB WD drive in my last S3.


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> You're just jealous of the fact that my drive has 16 more megs of Cache bro.
> 
> You have some insecurity issues to deal with.


Funny, no names were mentioned...why do you think I was referring to you?

BTW, when you grow up, have some experience and can carry on an adult conversation, please don't hesitate to write.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> Funny, no names were mentioned...why do you think I was referring to you?
> 
> BTW, when you grow up, have some experience and can carry on an adult conversation, please don't hesitate to write.


Where's the fun in that?


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> You're just jealous of the fact that my drive has 16 more megs of Cache bro.


Say, you also forgot to mention how "pretty" your shiny new drive is too! I know we're all jealous of that. 



Joybob said:


> Where's the fun in that?


Come on now...being in a state of arrested development might seem "fun", but there really are benefits to growing up, getting some experience as having the ability to carry on an adult conversation. Don't knock it until you've tried it. Better yet, ask your mom about it when she gets home.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> Say, you also forgot to mention how "pretty" your shiny new drive is too! I know we're all jealous of that.
> 
> Come on now...being in a state of arrested development might seem "fun", but there really are benefits to growing up, getting some experience as having the ability to carry on an adult conversation. Don't knock it until you've tried it. Better yet, ask your mom about it when she gets home.


I'm just trying to raise my post count. Why do you have to hate?


----------



## richsadams

Joybob said:


> I'm just trying to raise my post count. Why do you have to hate?


Ouch! "Hate" is a pretty strong word don't you think? I think one has to care to hate don't you? I don't hate you at all.

It was just such a w-i-d-e door...I couldn't resist. 

Not sure what you mean by raising your post count, but okay. Good luck on that. :up:

'Nuff said.


----------



## Joybob

richsadams said:


> Ouch! "Hate" is a pretty strong word don't you think? I think one has to care to hate don't you? I don't hate you at all.
> 
> It was just such a w-i-d-e door...I couldn't resist.
> 
> Not sure what you mean by raising your post count, but okay. Good luck on that. :up:
> 
> 'Nuff said.


I've pissed off a lot of people this week so. I didn't want to get on your bad side.


----------



## greg_burns

Joybob said:


> The Hitachi and Seagate 1 TB drives are 2 dB louder. Not enough of a difference.


http://www.endpcnoise.com/cgi-bin/e/decibels.html

x = bel rating of fan #1 or other component (louder component)
y = bel rating of fan #2 or other component (quieter component)
z = how much louder fan #1 is in comparison to fan #2

(3^x)/(3^y) = z

Doesn't that mean the WD would be 1/4 quieter than those other drives? That seems significant to me.

But maybe I am doing the math wrong.


----------



## aaronwt

Isn't a 3db increase twice the loudness?


----------



## greg_burns

aaronwt said:


> Isn't a 3db increase twice the loudness?


3dB is twice the power. Is that the same as twice the loudness? 

Looks like it is.


----------



## RoyK

greg_burns said:


> 3dB is twice the power. Is that the same as twice the loudness?
> 
> Looks like it is.


It's pretty complicated since perceptions are involved but it's commonly accepted that it takes about a 10dB power increase to perceive twice the loudness.


----------



## richsadams

Just a quick follow up on the OT of this thread. Has anyone using the WD 1TB "Green" drive had any issues? I'm about to pop one into our S3 and just wanted to be sure things are going smoothly for those using it. Thx in advance!


----------



## jrm01

richsadams said:


> Just a quick follow up on the OT of this thread. Has anyone using the WD 1TB "Green" drive had any issues? I'm about to pop one into our S3 and just wanted to be sure things are going smoothly for those using it. Thx in advance!


I've had mine in and running for a month without problems. I'm even using the eSATA cable that came with the MX enclosure without problems.


----------



## betacub

> Just a quick follow up on the OT of this thread. Has anyone using the WD 1TB "Green" drive had any issues? I'm about to pop one into our S3 and just wanted to be sure things are going smoothly for those using it. Thx in advance!


I have. I did an internal swap to the 1 TB using WinMFS (which appeared to execute without a hitch [no pun intended]) and have a couple of major issues.

1) The Now Playing List takes a long time to populate. Sometimes one or two lines will fill in before the rest, sometimes it takes several seconds before anything shows up at all.

2) Playback of HD recordings stutters. It's not the live broadcast stutter mentioned by most of the posters in the "Video Stutter on TiVo HD" thread. Rather, the playback will become very choppy during random parts. The video freezes and the audio cuts out for anywhere from a fraction of a second to a few seconds. Last night, it actually locked up the machine, which eventually rebooted itself. I believe the problem is embedded in the recording, as I can rewind and reproduce the stutter. Live broadcast is fine.

On the surface, it seems like a disc bandwidth issue. I haven't yet determined whether or not this occurs while recording a single program or two programs, but I do know it occurs with no concurrent playback.

Is there some other setting I should change?


----------



## richsadams

betacub said:


> I have. I did an internal swap to the 1 TB using WinMFS (which appeared to execute without a hitch [no pun intended]) and have a couple of major issues.
> 
> 1) The Now Playing List takes a long time to populate. Sometimes one or two lines will fill in before the rest, sometimes it takes several seconds before anything shows up at all.
> 
> 2) Playback of HD recordings stutters. It's not the live broadcast stutter mentioned by most of the posters in the "Video Stutter on TiVo HD" thread. Rather, the playback will become very choppy during random parts. The video freezes and the audio cuts out for anywhere from a fraction of a second to a few seconds. Last night, it actually locked up the machine, which eventually rebooted itself. I believe the problem is embedded in the recording, as I can rewind and reproduce the stutter. Live broadcast is fine.
> 
> On the surface, it seems like a disc bandwidth issue. I haven't yet determined whether or not this occurs while recording a single program or two programs, but I do know it occurs with no concurrent playback.
> 
> Is there some other setting I should change?


Interesting feedback. The menu slowdown is a worry. However Ive seen the same thing as you describe in #2 with our stock drive (and eSATA) - but no reboots. I believe it only started with v9.1 though (were now on v9.2.j). So Im not sure if its the new drive or TiVos signal processing itself.



jrm01 said:


> I've had mine in and running for a month without problems. I'm even using the eSATA cable that came with the MX enclosure without problems.


Great to hearalthough Im going to do an internal install like *betacub's * and take our eSATA drive and slip it into our new THD. Thanks! :up:

Anyone elses feedback on the WD 1TB Green drive would be welcome as well. Thx!


----------



## betacub

> Interesting feedback. The menu slowdown is a worry. However Ive seen the same thing as you describe in #2 with our stock drive (and eSATA) - but no reboots. I believe it only started with v9.1 though (were now on v9.2.j). So Im not sure if its the new drive or TiVos signal processing itself.


My stock drive behaved properly. The problem arose right after the swap, and persisted with both 8.1 and 9.2 (which showed up a week later).


----------



## 1283

betacub said:


> My stock drive behaved properly. The problem arose right after the swap, and persisted with both 8.1 and 9.2 (which showed up a week later).


Most likely you just have a bad drive. I don't have any issue with my two internal replacements, one in each S3.


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> Most likely you just have a bad drive. I don't have any issue with my two internal replacements, one in each S3.


Thanks for that *c3*! Also good news. :up:

*betacub*, here's a link to the WD Lifeguard Diagnostic Tool if you don't already have it:

http://support.wdc.com/download/

You can do a quick surface scan as well as a deep scan with it. I've gotten into the habit of checking all new HDD's JIC. I tested the WD already with the extended scan; one pass extended read, one pass extended write, and another pass extended read. It took about 12 hours - let it run overnight. Everything passed. Of course you wouldn't want to do that with your drive as it would wipe everything...but you could try a basic surface scan to eliminate the possibility of a bad drive.

Thanks again!

EDIT: I forgot, you could also try running TiVo's own diagnostic program (Kickstart 57 or 58) to see if that will resolve things.


----------



## 1283

I would highly recommend running reading and writing tests, multiple passes if possible, before putting the drive into service. I do that for all hard drives, not just for TiVo usage.


----------



## jcthorne

Just a heads up. Newegg dropped their price on the WD 1tb to $299 delivered. And without tax, that is cheaper than Best Buy. A $30 drop from last week. I ordered one for my THD and plan to do the upgrade using WinMFS this weekend.


----------



## nexus99

Do you know if they charge tax for California?


----------



## Canoehead

c3 said:


> I would highly recommend running reading and writing tests, multiple passes if possible, before putting the drive into service. I do that for all hard drives, not just for TiVo usage.


Any recommendations for tools / procedure ?


----------



## richsadams

Canoehead said:


> Any recommendations for tools / procedure ?


See my post above.


----------



## richsadams

nexus99 said:


> Do you know if they charge tax for California?


NewEgg.com is located in CA. so would charge tax if you're in CA. Or was that your question?


----------



## Lensman

BTW, I think the Seagate is more than 2dB louder - particularly when you're comparing seek noise with acoustic management turned on for the Hitachi and WD. You can't turn acoustic management on for the Seagate. I think this has already been talked about in another thread somewhere.


----------



## richsadams

Lensman said:


> BTW, I think the Seagate is more than 2dB louder - particularly when you're comparing seek noise with acoustic management turned on for the Hitachi and WD. You can't turn acoustic management on for the Seagate. I think this has already been talked about in another thread somewhere.


Stock PC type Seagate drives typically run about 2.9 to 3.8 bels, however the Seagate DB35 7200.3 PVR/DVR series drives (which are recommended) run between 2.7 to 2.9 bels. The WD 1TB Green drive is between 2.5 and 2.7 and the Hitachi Cinema Star 1TB is 2.9, both with the stock AAM setting of 128. All are acoustically about the same, "whisper quiet".

To compare:

10dBA - Normal Breathing
20dBA - Mosquito or Rustling Leaves
30dBA - A Whisper
40dBA - A Bubbling Brook, or a Refridgerator
50dBA - Normal Conversation
60dBA - Laugher
70dBA - Vaccuum Cleaner or Hairdryer
80dBA - City Traffic or a Garbage Disposal
90dBA - Motorcycle or Lawnmower
150dBA  My neighbors dog at 3 a.m. (Im sure of it!)


----------



## Joybob

Lensman said:


> BTW, I think the Seagate is more than 2dB louder - particularly when you're comparing seek noise with acoustic management turned on for the Hitachi and WD. You can't turn acoustic management on for the Seagate. I think this has already been talked about in another thread somewhere.


Yeah, I just walked by my cabinet with the TV off this morning and there's a pretty serious 'humming' going on. The wood seems to vibrate with the drive itself. I'm thinking some foam feet might help or moving the drive to the back of the cabinet?


----------



## aaronwt

My WD 1TB drive has been fine. I still haven't had a chance to put my second one in yet.
And whether the drive is 7200rpm or 5400 rpm it is more than fast enough for several HD streams. 6 years ago I used 5400rpm drives to record HD with my PC and they had no problem writing two HD streams and reading 2 streams concurrently. I also had several DirecTV HDTiVOs between 2004 and 2007. One had 5400rpm drives in it and the performence was identical to the boxes that had 7200 rpm drives.
The TiVo doesn't come anywhere close to pushing the hard drives.


----------



## betacub

Thanks for the suggestions, Rich. I'll try them out tonight.

I was prepping to yank the drive (and trying to figure out how to preserve my last two weeks worth of recording). If I do end up taking it back, I'll try the deep scan, since I want to clear the drive anyway.


----------



## mportuesi

Joybob said:


> Yeah, I just walked by my cabinet with the TV off this morning and there's a pretty serious 'humming' going on. The wood seems to vibrate with the drive itself. I'm thinking some foam feet might help or moving the drive to the back of the cabinet?


My 1 TB "Green" drive has no sound issues and it's been working like a champ in my S3 for over a week so far.


----------



## old64mb

Not absolutely positive this is the same drive, but it looks like Circuit City may have the external version of this on sale.

Link

Likely you can get another 10% off with the AAA coupon as well, putting this back to essentially where the original sale was.


----------



## lessd

old64mb said:


> Not absolutely positive this is the same drive, but it looks like Circuit City may have the external version of this on sale.
> 
> Link
> 
> Likely you can get another 10% off with the AAA coupon as well, putting this back to essentially where the original sale was.


Does anybody know if this uses a single 1Tb drive or two 500Gb drives ??


----------



## uforia

richsadams said:


> Just a quick follow up on the OT of this thread. Has anyone using the WD 1TB "Green" drive had any issues? I'm about to pop one into our S3 and just wanted to be sure things are going smoothly for those using it. Thx in advance!


I upgraded both my S3 and THD with this drive about 5 weeks ago. Did the internal swap. No problems whatsover (not related to the drives at least). Used WinMFS and it was a piece of cake. I did do an extensive drive test on both drives with the WD diagnostic tools and strongly recommend doing so first. It takes a while, but is worth it.

My THD had about 300 recordings and my NPL didn't show any slow down at all. Although I did specifically decide to do the internal upgrade due to reports that the eSATA upgrade would slow down the NPL when there were lots of shows.

Good luck to you. You'll be so glad you upgraded.


----------



## Joybob

lessd said:


> Does anybody know if this uses a single 1Tb drive or two 500Gb drives ??


The essential version only comes with USB 2.0 therefore it does not work with Tivo.


----------



## lessd

Joybob said:


> The essential version only comes with USB 2.0 therefore it does not work with Tivo.


I was talking about removing the drive and upgrading the internal drive of the TiVo so what i wanted to know does this unit have a single 1Tb drive or 2 500Gb drives.


----------



## richsadams

uforia said:


> I upgraded both my S3 and THD with this drive about 5 weeks ago. Did the internal swap. No problems whatsover (not related to the drives at least). Used WinMFS and it was a piece of cake. I did do an extensive drive test on both drives with the WD diagnostic tools and strongly recommend doing so first. It takes a while, but is worth it.
> 
> My THD had about 300 recordings and my NPL didn't show any slow down at all. Although I did specifically decide to do the internal upgrade due to reports that the eSATA upgrade would slow down the NPL when there were lots of shows.
> 
> Good luck to you. You'll be so glad you upgraded.


Cheers for that. Looks like several positive reports so far! :up:


----------



## richsadams

lessd said:


> I was talking about removing the drive and upgrading the internal drive of the TiVo so what i wanted to know does this unit have a single 1Tb drive or 2 500Gb drives.


For only a couple of dollars more, newegg.com has the WD 1TB "Green" drive available. Seems to be getting some good reviews from everyone here, is quieter, uses less power, etc. Just a thought.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136151

These folks have it for even less...

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10007017&prodlist=pricegrabber

We picked ours up from BB when it was on sale for $259 so I suspect with prices dropping it'll be even cheaper pretty soon.


----------



## Joybob

lessd said:


> I was talking about removing the drive and upgrading the internal drive of the TiVo so what i wanted to know does this unit have a single 1Tb drive or 2 500Gb drives.


My mistake.


----------



## jlib

Well it looks like a single drive enclosure. Since there is a 750 version also that makes me think it is a single drive inside. The triple interface claimed by Circuit City, though, doesn't jibe with WD specs as Joybob pointed out. If it is a single drive then it is the Green one since that is the only 1TB they make.


----------



## Joybob

jlib said:


> Well it looks like a single drive enclosure. Since there is a 750 version also that makes me think it is a single drive inside. The triple interface claimed by Circuit City, though, doesn't jibe with WD specs as Joybob pointed out. If it is a single drive then it is the Green one since that is the only 1TB they make.


I bought one thinking it had a eSATA port and I can confirm it's only 1 drive.


----------



## jlib

This is what their 2 drive enclosures look like. Anyone for 2 Terabytes?


----------



## zaknafein

I've been using this drive for a little over a week now, and it's been working flawlessly.


----------



## lessd

Joybob said:


> I bought one thinking it had a eSATA port and I can confirm it's only 1 drive.


Thanks..that what i wanted to know


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> Well it looks like a single drive enclosure. Since there is a 750 version also that makes me think it is a single drive inside. The triple interface claimed by Circuit City, though, doesn't jibe with WD specs as Joybob pointed out. If it is a single drive then it is the Green one since that is the only 1TB they make.


It's interesting that WD freely publishes all of the specs for the new WD 1TB Green drive, but almost nothing at all for the 1TB My Book Essential 2.0 Edition Hard Drive, or any of their other My Book products.

WD 1TB Green Drive specs

WD 1TB My Book Essential 2.0 Edition Hard Drive specs

They are either one in the same, or WD is hiding a new drive inside the latest My Book entry. It would be very interesting to have someone pop it open and see.

Also of note is that the bare WD 1TB Green drive carries a 3 year warranty and the My Book products only have a one year warranty.

It would seem logical that they'd use the same "green" marketing for the 1TB My Book if it is in fact the same drive, but maybe they're saving that for a newer entry into the field? Or might it be a different drive?


----------



## 1283

richsadams said:


> Also of note is that the bare WD 1TB Green drive carries a 3 year warranty and the My Book products only have a one year warranty.


Depends on the drive: http://support.wdc.com/warranty/policy.asp


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> Depends on the drive: http://support.wdc.com/warranty/policy.asp


I stand corrected. Since the OP was talking about the My Book Essential (which has a 1 year warranty) I stopped there.


----------



## betacub

It doesn't appear that my TivoHD (which I guess I didn't specify before) will do the Kickstart operations. I held the Pause button down for the entirety of the "Powering Up" screen (which was a few minutes), but I didn't get any of the described yellow light feedback. Do I have any other options before pulling the drive and running the WD util or taking it back?


----------



## richsadams

betacub said:


> It doesn't appear that my TivoHD (which I guess I didn't specify before) will do the Kickstart operations. I held the Pause button down for the entirety of the "Powering Up" screen (which was a few minutes), but I didn't get any of the described yellow light feedback. Do I have any other options before pulling the drive and running the WD util or taking it back?


Hmmm...there's no reason the KS procedures shouldn't work for you. A single light should illuminate during the "Powering Up" screen, just a moment before it switches to the "Almost there..." screen. It only lasts for about a second or two, hence the need to hold down the pause button during the "Powering Up" screen.

In any case, it couldn't hurt to pull the drive, hook it up to your PC and do a quick surface scan using the WD tools. That won't cause any of your recordings or programming to be lost. Otherwise a long read/write/read scan will really tell you if there's a problem with the drive, but everything would be lost and you'd need to re-image it with your original drive.

It does sound like a drive problem, but w/o diagnostics it's hard to tell. I'd give the KS procedures (particularly 57 and 58) another go...then test the drive.

Let us know how you get on. :up:


----------



## spectrumsp

Has anyone taken the TivoHD WD enclosure apart to remove the 500GB and replace it with the Green 1TB WD drive to see if the TivoHD will see it yet?...

If so, how'd it go...was the 1TB recognized?


----------



## GaryD9

betacub said:


> It doesn't appear that my TivoHD (which I guess I didn't specify before) will do the Kickstart operations. I held the Pause button down for the entirety of the "Powering Up" screen (which was a few minutes), but I didn't get any of the described yellow light feedback. Do I have any other options before pulling the drive and running the WD util or taking it back?


kickstart doesn't work with the TivoHD - only with the original Series3.


----------



## richsadams

GaryD9 said:


> kickstart doesn't work with the TivoHD - only with the original Series3.


The OP is referring to the TiVo diagnostics KS procedures (which work with all TiVo's), not KS62 to try and add an expansion drive.


----------



## 1283

spectrumsp said:


> Has anyone taken the TivoHD WD enclosure apart to remove the 500GB and replace it with the Green 1TB WD drive to see if the TivoHD will see it yet?...
> 
> If so, how'd it go...was the 1TB recognized?


The WD enclosure would not do anything that the 1TB drive cannot do by itself (inside a different enclosure).


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> The WD enclosure would not do anything that the 1TB drive cannot do by itself (inside a different enclosure).


That is correct, however I think he's asking if it's possible to buy the "approved" 500GB WD DVR Expander, remove the OEM HDD from the enclosure, install a larger drive and see if it will work with a THD.

IMO that would be a no as TiVo reads the drive model number directly from the HDD (this is the number that appears on the System Info screen once the drive is married). Enclosures by themselves do not have the ability to "communicate".

Conversely you should be able to remove the HDD from the "approved" WD DVR Expander enclosure, place it in another eSATA enclosure (say an Antec MX-1), connect it to a THD or S3 and TiVo should recognize it.


----------



## spectrumsp

richsadams said:


> That is correct, however I think he's asking if it's possible to buy the "approved" 500GB WD DVR Expander, remove the OEM HDD from the enclosure, install a larger drive and see if it will work with a THD.
> 
> IMO that would be a no as TiVo reads the drive model number directly from the HDD (this is the number that appears on the System Info screen once the drive is married). Enclosures by themselves do not have the ability to "communicate".
> 
> Conversely you should be able to remove the HDD from the "approved" WD DVR Expander enclosure, place it in another eSATA enclosure (say an Antec MX-1), connect it to a THD or S3 and TiVo should recognize it.


Reference your first para...you are correct...

I was one of the initial ones who attempted to add a MX-1 w/WD green 1TB to TivoHD for expansion...it is now attached to my HR20 and is preforming beautifully.

I was hoping to achieve an external 1TB storage capacity for the TivoHD, but it appears, at least for now, that this will be a future goal...here's hoping Spike comes thru with an idea...

(Yes, I know I can go thru the "Marry" process, but I don't want to open the box at this time and remove the internal drive.)


----------



## richsadams

spectrumsp said:


> Reference your first para...you are correct...
> 
> I was one of the initial ones who attempted to add a MX-1 w/WD green 1TB to TivoHD for expansion...it is now attached to my HR20 and is preforming beautifully.
> 
> I was hoping to achieve an external 1TB storage capacity for the TivoHD, but it appears, at least for now, that this will be a future goal...here's hoping Spike comes thru with an idea...
> 
> (Yes, I know I can go thru the "Marry" process, but I don't want to open the box at this time and remove the internal drive.)


Got it. Glad to hear the WD drive is performing well though.

I suspect Spike is working on it as we speak. He really should have a PayPal donation button.


----------



## uforia

This drive is now $279.99 at Newegg.com, free 3 day shipping. This is a great price and one of the better prices since initial Best Buy sale (actually better without the tax).

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?CMP=AFC-TechBargains&Item=N82E16822136151

I know this was posted a few days ago, but I believe the price dropped again.


----------



## richsadams

uforia said:


> This drive is now $279.99 at Newegg.com, free 3 day shipping. This is a great price and one of the better prices since initial Best Buy sale (actually better without the tax).
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?CMP=AFC-TechBargains&Item=N82E16822136151
> 
> I know this was posted a few days ago, but I believe the price dropped again.


Excellent! :up: $20 drop in a week...let's hope this keeps going!


----------



## MikeyB

richsadams said:


> Excellent! :up: $20 drop in a week...let's hope this keeps going!


I'm itching to buy something to go in my MX-1 encl. Let's hope someone will have it close to $259.99 again soon.


----------



## crumpler2000

I also noticed zipzoomfly has it for $276.80 and free shipping. I think I'm going to order one. I've bought stuff from them before and been very happy with their service.


----------



## Mack The Dog

crumpler2000 said:


> I also noticed zipzoomfly has it for $276.80 and free shipping. I think I'm going to order one. I've bought stuff from them before and been very happy with their service.


Doh - I just ordered it from them yesterday for $283.90!!


----------



## bkrodgers

We're down to $270 with free shipping at both ZipZoomFly and ClubIT. I wonder if that's as low as it's going to go or if it's going to keep on falling...

Is there any reason this isn't the perfect drive for a TivoHD? I haven't made it through all 301 posts, but from what I have seen here it's cooler, quieter, and even though it spins slower it's still plenty fast enough. At $270, it's a great deal too. Haven't seen any downsides! Now I just have to decide if I should pull the trigger at $270 or see if it goes lower. Decisions, decisions...


----------



## AbMagFab

It's a great drive. Hasn't been out long enough yet to see if there are longevity problems, but it has a 3-year warrantee (not as good as Seagate, but good). It's cool (10+ degrees cooler than other similar drives), and it's cheap.

27c/GB is a great deal. That's a pretty good price/GB for any drive.


----------



## 1283

bkrodgers said:


> I wonder if that's as low as it's going to go or if it's going to keep on falling...


I can guarantee that the price will keep falling.


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> I can guarantee that the price will keep falling.


 +1 :up:

I can remember when 50MB drives were $270!


----------



## bkrodgers

richsadams said:


> +1 :up:
> 
> I can remember when 50MB drives were $270!


Oh, well yeah, over the long term, sure. I'm more interested in what's going to happen over the next few weeks. My gut says hold out a bit and see if we hit $250 (or less!), but part of me wants the coolness of not having to worry about storage space at all.

Of course, it sounds like there might not be as much new stuff on TV for awhile, depending on how long the strike lasts. So waiting it out might not be so hard. (Not trying to go off topic...I would have linked to the topic for that but I'm too new. )

Oh, and yes, I remember when 50MB drives were $270 as well. Tivo didn't exist yet then. It was the dark ages, and I don't miss it. I'm glad to live in a world where I can get 1TB for $270. I'm just trying to figure out how long until we live in a world where I can get 1TB for $250 or less.


----------



## aaronwt

Best Buy has some more 12% off coupons this weekend. Maybe it will go on sale again on Sunday. With 12% off it should make for a great price like before.


----------



## jrock

$249.00 with free shipping at VLP.com

http://www.vlp.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=1189

I found this on froogle today, I have been searching the past week looking for cheaper prices. I'm not sure about this company but the price is great.

-Joe


----------



## richsadams

jrock said:


> $249.00 with free shipping at VLP.com
> 
> http://www.vlp.com/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=1189
> 
> I found this on froogle today, I have been searching the past week looking for cheaper prices. I'm not sure about this company but the price is great.
> 
> -Joe


I'd be very wary of VLP. They're using ZenCart for the web site architecture; an open source (free) software program. Nothing wrong with that, but it doesn't indicate a professional, quality company. I could build their web site and have it up and running in about two hours or less. The real red flag to me is that they have no information under "Shipping and Returns". The website has a zero out of 10 Google page rank. It appears that this particular site was activated on October 6, 2006 and has no incoming links.

My guess is that it's a home based, one man show using a drop ship model (carrying no inventory and only placing orders with third party vendors for direct shipment as incoming orders are received). But thats just a guess.

It looks fairly risky IMO and for a little more money I think I'd stick with a reputable, known quantity like newegg.com ($279). But it would be good to hear about the experience from anyone that orders from them.


----------



## tivobw

richsadams said:


> Just a quick follow up on the OT of this thread. Has anyone using the WD 1TB "Green" drive had any issues? I'm about to pop one into our S3 and just wanted to be sure things are going smoothly for those using it. Thx in advance!


I've been running with the WD 1TB "green" drive in my TivoHD since 10/20 (about 2.5 weeks ago), and so far no issues. Haven't witnessed any video skipping, audio problems, jerky playback, etc. etc.

I'm also running 9.2j, or whatever the latest OS is for the TivoHD. The Tivo was a bit slow a few hours after it upgraded to 9.2j, probably re-indexing or something weird like that, since I haven't seen it since.

No regrets and so very happy I did the upgrade. It's comical... I now have over 70 items in the "recently deleted" folder. I can't wait to see how high the number gets before the Tivo has to finally delete something to free up space.  Thanks again to Spike for WinMFS!

BTW, I also just recently got a UPS for my Tivo. In my area they are upgrading the power lines (ugh) and we have been experiencing power outages of up to 30 minutes a few times a week. So they were kind enough to warn us about this in advance, which gave me time to get a UPS for the Tivo! I got this one at buy.com: http://www.buy.com/prod/belkin-ups-...urge-protection-550va/q/loc/101/10372172.html.

It's an OK UPS, but I prefer the APC ones. I ended up using the APC downstairs (same amp rating) with the Tivo, and use the Belkin upstairs, since I can connect the Belkin to the PC via USB and it can gracefully shut down the PC if the power is out a long period of time and my PC happens to be turned on. Neat stuff!


----------



## tivobw

richsadams said:


> For only a couple of dollars more, newegg.com has the WD 1TB "Green" drive available. Seems to be getting some good reviews from everyone here, is quieter, uses less power, etc. Just a thought.
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136151
> 
> These folks have it for even less...
> 
> http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10007017&prodlist=pricegrabber
> 
> We picked ours up from BB when it was on sale for $259 so I suspect with prices dropping it'll be even cheaper pretty soon.


Highly recommend the WB 1TB "green" drive. It's very quiet and the lower power usage is a plus - I think it keeps the Tivo cooler inside.

The drive also comes with a 3 year warranty, so if you buy it, save your receipt as proof of purchase! That way if the drive dies, you can submit a warranty claim and get a replacement.


----------



## tivobw

bkrodgers said:


> We're down to $270 with free shipping at both ZipZoomFly and ClubIT. I wonder if that's as low as it's going to go or if it's going to keep on falling...
> 
> Is there any reason this isn't the perfect drive for a TivoHD? I haven't made it through all 301 posts, but from what I have seen here it's cooler, quieter, and even though it spins slower it's still plenty fast enough. At $270, it's a great deal too. Haven't seen any downsides! Now I just have to decide if I should pull the trigger at $270 or see if it goes lower. Decisions, decisions...


So the question is, do you wait a month to save $70? (or however how much the price drops, who knows...)

It is up to you if you want to wait. At <$300 it was low enough for me to get it!


----------



## richsadams

tivobw said:


> I've been running with the WD 1TB "green" drive in my TivoHD since 10/20 (about 2.5 weeks ago), and so far no issues. Haven't witnessed any video skipping, audio problems, jerky playback, etc. etc.





tivobw said:


> Highly recommend the WB 1TB "green" drive. It's very quiet and the lower power usage is a plus - I think it keeps the Tivo cooler inside.
> 
> The drive also comes with a 3 year warranty, so if you buy it, save your receipt as proof of purchase! That way if the drive dies, you can submit a warranty claim and get a replacement.


Great stuff! Thanks very much for following up. Im still transferring recordings from the S3 to the PC and watching the rest as fast as possible.  Hopefully Ill be able to pop the WD 1TB Green drive inside soon.

Thanks again for the excellent feedback! :up:


----------



## 1283

tivobw said:


> The drive also comes with a 3 year warranty, so if you buy it, save your receipt as proof of purchase! That way if the drive dies, you can submit a warranty claim and get a replacement.


Check the warranty date at www.wdc.com. If the date is correct, you usually don't have to worry about keeping the receipt, unless their database somehow gets corrupted in the future.


----------



## greg_burns

c3 said:


> Check the warranty date at www.wdc.com. If the date is correct, you usually don't have to worry about keeping the receipt, unless their database somehow gets corrupted in the future.


Yeah, I've returned many drives (as part of work) to WD w/o need of a receipt. Only time I ever have an issue is if drive is expired or OEM. But plugging in the S/N on their web site will tell you that. :up:


----------



## aaronwt

c3 said:


> Check the warranty date at www.wdc.com. If the date is correct, you usually don't have to worry about keeping the receipt, unless their database somehow gets corrupted in the future.


I register all my WD drives on their site when I buy them. You can log in and see a list of all your drives you have registered and when the warranty expires on each drive.


----------



## bkrodgers

tivobw said:


> So the question is, do you wait a month to save $70? (or however how much the price drops, who knows...)
> 
> It is up to you if you want to wait. At <$300 it was low enough for me to get it!


Yeah, the other day I found myself thinking "it'd be nice to record that in HD, but I don't know if I want to take up the space." I decided that even if the drive drops another $10 or $20 in the next week or two, it was worth it to never have to think about HD space again. So I pulled the trigger, and now I have a project for this weekend. 

mmm...terabyte...


----------



## leighnjo

I just received delivery on an HD and am considering the WD 1 TB drive expansion. Does it require any accustical adjustment or can it be installed out of the box?


----------



## richsadams

leighnjo said:


> I just received delivery on an HD and am considering the WD 1 TB drive expansion. Does it require any accustical adjustment or can it be installed out of the box?


I adjusted the AAM on mine down to 128, but it was really very quiet at the stock setting, so your choice.


----------



## Koan

richsadams said:


> I adjusted the AAM on mine down to 128, but it was really very quiet at the stock setting, so your choice.


What effect does adjusting the AAM have on the drive other than noise reduction? Otherwise, wouldn't the drive be sold at its quietist level?


----------



## richsadams

Koan said:


> What effect does adjusting the AAM have on the drive other than noise reduction? Otherwise, wouldn't the drive be sold at its quietist level?


I'm not an expert, but as I understand it, reducing the AAM settings has a minor impact on seek times. That may be important for high-speed computing, server requirements and such, but TiVo doesn't come anywhere near demanding max read/write performance from today's HDD's. In fact the WD 1TB Green drives are "green" because they can still deliver fairly good performance in the 5400 RPM range, even though they are capable of 7200 RPM's. AFAIK it's a non-issue.


----------



## AbMagFab

Koan said:


> What effect does adjusting the AAM have on the drive other than noise reduction? Otherwise, wouldn't the drive be sold at its quietist level?


It can slow the drive down, basically. For Tivo's, this is a non-issue. For most setups, this is really a non-issue.


----------



## aaronwt

The WD 1TB at the 128 setting is dsefinietly quieter than the Hitachi 1TB at 128.
I have two of each of those drives and you can hear the difference in a quiet room or when you stick your ear near the TiVos.


----------



## bkdtv

aaronwt said:


> The WD 1TB at the 128 setting is dsefinietly quieter than the Hitachi 1TB at 128.
> I have two of each of those drives and you can hear the difference in a quiet room or when you stick your ear near the TiVos.


Do you notice any difference in responsiveness between your TiVos with the WD 1TB and the Hitach 1TB? For example, what is the difference in search times for a given wishlist?

Has anyone noticed reduced responsiveness with the WD 1TB? TiVo performance is supposed to be dependent on the random I/O performance of the internal drive, and the WD hasn't faired well in random I/O benchmarks.


----------



## aaronwt

The performance is identical from a user perspective. It was the same way when I had some DirecTV HDTiVos. One had two 5400 rpm drives and the other two had 7200rpm drives. There was no noticeable difference in performance between them. The TiVos don't come anywhere close to taxing the drives.

The only way I can tell a difference between the WD 1TB and the Hitachi 1TB is to listen to them in a quiet room or put my ear near them. The Hitachi is slightly louder. My Hitachi's also run 2 to 3 degrees hotter than my WD drives. But none of the boxes have any problems recording two streams, transferring a stream wand watching a stream simultaneously.


----------



## MScottC

Well, as I mentioned in another post, I installed the 1TB Green WD into my TiVo and this morning after the 9.2 upgrade, it rebooted and got stuck in at the "Powering up" screen. After running WD Diags on this drive, I used WinMFS to restore the kernel, and the TiVo seemed to be functioning just fine. A half hour later, the TiVo rebooted on its own again, and remained stuck in the "Powering Up" screen. Are there any jumper settings, or configs I can perform on this drive, perhaps some way of turning off the Variable RPM???
Any hints would be welcome

Scott


----------



## greg_burns

I would pull the drive and do a full read/write test as suggested earlier in this thread. Your drive may have a problem.



MScottC said:



> After running WD Diags on this drive...


Or is that what you already did?


----------



## MScottC

I did the quick test before... As I type this, the Full Extended test is running


----------



## 1283

MScottC said:


> perhaps some way of turning off the Variable RPM???


"For each GreenPower drive model, WD uses a different, *invariable* RPM."


----------



## MScottC

The drive passes the full complete test. I'm wondering where to go next.


----------



## vstone

richsadams said:


> +1 :up:
> 
> I can remember when 50MB drives were $270!


I reemeber my 5MB hard drive for my Apple II that cost $1500. So there1


----------



## jmpage2

MScottC said:


> Well, as I mentioned in another post, I installed the 1TB Green WD into my TiVo and this morning after the 9.2 upgrade, it rebooted and got stuck in at the "Powering up" screen. After running WD Diags on this drive, I used WinMFS to restore the kernel, and the TiVo seemed to be functioning just fine. A half hour later, the TiVo rebooted on its own again, and remained stuck in the "Powering Up" screen. Are there any jumper settings, or configs I can perform on this drive, perhaps some way of turning off the Variable RPM???
> Any hints would be welcome
> 
> Scott


Do you have it installed internally or externally?


----------



## MScottC

jmpage2 said:


> Do you have it installed internally or externally?


Internal


----------



## Lensman

What method did you use to copy over your old drive to your new drive?


----------



## Marc

I'm hoping that Best Buy drops the price on this drive within the next few weeks so I can get it price matched.

Having set up my new TiVo HD with all of my Season Passes, but now selecting HD content, I easily filled up the included 160 GB drive, so I went to Best Buy yesterday and bought this drive. Using WinMFS to copy the data using Mad Dog SATA/IDE enclosures (with USB 2.0 and eSATA ports, currently on sale at Radio Shack for $29.99 through today) was delightfully easy.


----------



## MScottC

Lensman said:


> What method did you use to copy over your old drive to your new drive?


WinMFS


----------



## Joybob

Hey, just wanted to say that Amazon seems to have 21% off the Antec MX-1, $55.36

The enclosure I ended up using is really insufficient for cooling and I may end up switching to the Antec.


----------



## jlib

Marc said:


> ...I went to Best Buy yesterday and bought this drive. Using WinMFS to copy the data using Mad Dog SATA/IDE enclosures...


Keep an eye out on its temp. It has a rated maximum temperature of 104 Fahrenheit (which is very low) and being fanless has a much smaller margin for error.

Edit: "It" = Mad Dog enclosure


----------



## Marc

My TiVo is currently reading 41C, which is about 105&#176;F.

Where did you see its rating for temperature? I looked at its specifications at wdc.com and didn't see it mentioned.


----------



## AbMagFab

jlib said:


> Keep an eye out on its temp. It has a rated maximum temperature of 104 Fahrenheit (which is very low) and being fanless has a much smaller margin for error.


The WD has a max temp of 104F? Seems unlikely, as that would make it mostly unusable except in very high ventilated machines.


----------



## doraemon

Hard drives are typically rated for about 55 or 60C max temperature. Some are also starting to add a max base casting temperature, which is usually quite a bit lower than ambient (40C max?).


----------



## jlib

Sorry for the lack of clarity! I was talking about the Mad Dog enclosure not the drive. It is the max the enclosure can deal with according to its specs. The WD Green just might be the best drive to put in such a fanless enclosure. Marc reports that the enclosure was only used for copying and temp is essentially within spec so all is well.


----------



## Marc

I only used the electronics from the enclosure to copy the data between the two drives. After that, I moved the drive back into the TiVo HD. I'm not going for an eSATA drive on the TiVo HD at this point.

The temperature I reported was from the TiVo HD's information screen. I don't know what the temperature of the drive would be in a much smaller enclosure with minimal airflow.


----------



## AbMagFab

jlib said:


> Sorry for the lack of clarity! I was talking about the Mad Dog enclosure not the drive. It is the max the enclosure can deal with according to its specs. The WD Green just might be the best drive to put in such a fanless enclosure. Marc reports temp is essentially within spec so all is well.


Gotcha.

In my full tower, with my RAID array (not for the Tivo), the WD's are definitely cooler than the Seagate's (AS's), by about 10 degrees.

The WD's in normal 5 1/4 slots run about 98-105F (low/heavy load).
The WD's in the 3 1/2 slots with the extra fan blowing over them run about 84-95F (low/heavy load).

The Seagate's in the same slots run 10-12F hotter all the time, during no-load and heavy-load.


----------



## bkdtv

Has anyone with a TivoHD had trouble using this drive with 9.2a?

A number of Series3 owners have reported a stuck on "Powering up.." since the upgrade to 9.2a over on the MFS forums, but I haven't seen any similar reports from TivoHD owners.


----------



## 1283

I just restarted my two units (S3 with 9.2a) without problem.


----------



## MScottC

c3 said:


> I just restarted my two units (S3 with 9.2a) without problem.


Did you restart via a menu reboot, or by repowering the unit? At least one person has stated that this makes a difference.


----------



## richsadams

bkdtv said:


> Has anyone with a TivoHD had trouble using this drive with 9.2a?
> 
> A number of Series3 owners have reported a stuck on "Powering up.." since the upgrade to 9.2a over on the MFS forums, but I haven't seen any similar reports from TivoHD owners.


Looks like it may be two isolated cases. Spike was able to test the S3/WD 1TB combo from scratch again...hard reboot and menu restart and it "It came right up w/o any problem".

More here.  - last post.


----------



## 1283

MScottC said:


> Did you restart via a menu reboot, or by repowering the unit? At least one person has stated that this makes a difference.


menu


----------



## MapleLeaf

richsadams said:


> Looks like it may be two isolated cases. Spike was able to test the S3/WD 1TB combo from scratch again...hard reboot and menu restart and it "It came right up w/o any problem".
> 
> More here.  - last post.


This is somewhat discouraging. I just ordered a WD10EACS drive from ZipZoomFly yesterday, but reading that thread, it's sounding like Spike is suspecting that there might be some sort of incompatibility between THD's and WD10EACS drives from ZipZoomFly (perhaps a bad batch??).


----------



## MikeyB

I haven't had any problems with my WD10EACS from NewEgg, so let's hope these are isolated to a specific batch of drives.


----------



## cr33p

Looks like Newegg has the 1TB WD green drive on sale for 269.99 with free shipping  here

Use promo code EMC1113HDD01


----------



## richsadams

MapleLeaf said:


> This is somewhat discouraging. I just ordered a WD10EACS drive from ZipZoomFly yesterday, but reading that thread, it's sounding like Spike is suspecting that there might be some sort of incompatibility between THD's and WD10EACS drives from ZipZoomFly (perhaps a bad batch??).


IIRC only one of them came from ZZF. They're a fairly large supplier so I'd think their inventory turns are pretty good. The odds of getting another bad drive (if that's actually the issue) are pretty low.

I always perform a "deep" disk diagnostic before using any drive anymore. The one I have passed with flying colors using one pass extended read, one pass extended write, and another pass extended read. It took about 12 hours but it's worth the peace of mind.

Link to the free Windows WD Lifeguard Diagnostic tool for the WD10EACS 1TB HDD.


----------



## spike2k5

MapleLeaf said:


> This is somewhat discouraging. I just ordered a WD10EACS drive from ZipZoomFly yesterday, but reading that thread, it's sounding like Spike is suspecting that there might be some sort of incompatibility between THD's and WD10EACS drives from ZipZoomFly (perhaps a bad batch??).


Two guys are having problems with the drives from ZZF on Tivo S3. Total of 5 WD 1TB Green drives. (WD10EACS)


----------



## richsadams

spike2k5 said:


> Two guys are having problems with the drives from ZZF on Tivo S3. Total of 5 WD 1TB Green drives. (WD10EACS)


Okay. Didn't one or both say they ran diagnostics and the drives passed? Wonder when the purchases were made - about the same time?


----------



## MScottC

richsadams said:


> Okay. Didn't one or both say they ran diagnostics and the drives passed? Wonder when the purchases were made - about the same time?


I'm one of the two having issues with this drvie. I ran a full non-destructive scan and all sectors passed I know we both purchased from ZZF at approximately the same time.


----------



## richsadams

MScottC said:


> I'm one of the two having issues with this drvie. I ran a full non-destructive scan and all sectors passed I know we both purchased from ZZF at approximately the same time.


Understood. Still having problems? Does it still hang on hard reboot, menu restart or both? Let us know if you've had the chance to make any changes...and thanks in advance. :up:

*MapleLeaf *will probably want to know if his was purchased about the same time.


----------



## bkdtv

I received a WD10EACS from ZipZoomFly on Monday and installed it in my TivoHD about an hour ago. I have no problem with reboots.

I used WinMFS to restore a truncated backup of 9.2a.


----------



## MapleLeaf

bkdtv said:


> I received a WD10EACS from ZipZoomFly on Monday and installed it in my TivoHD about an hour ago. I have no problem with reboots.
> 
> I used WinMFS to restore a truncated backup of 9.2a.


Cool, so if there was a problem with a bad batch, hopefully mine came out of the same batch as yours. 

And just to correct my previous post, I had actually ordered on Monday (the 12th), not Tuesday. I went with the free shipping, and it looks like it'll arrive today (Wednesday), but unfortunately, I likely won't be able to get around to performing the upgrade until Thanksgiving.


----------



## bkdtv

MapleLeaf said:


> Cool, so if there was a problem with a bad batch, hopefully mine came out of the same batch as yours.
> 
> Mine should be here today, but unfortunately, I likely won't be able to get around to performing the upgrade until Thanksgiving.


Most (all?) of those reporting problems seem to have the Series3, so it is possible the issue is specific to that box with this batch.


----------



## richsadams

FWIW, my WD 1TB HDD has a manufacture date of Sept. 5, 2007, DCM, HARCHV2AAB. I purchased it on Sept. 25th at a local BB.

As mentioned I ran WD's multi-pass diagnostics on it with no problems; however I have yet to install it in our S3. I'll post any issues that occur...knock on wood they won't. *touching head*


----------



## MScottC

This afternoon I decided to return my WD to ZZF and purchased the Hitachi 1TB deskstar from them... Hopefully this will do the trick.


----------



## richsadams

MScottC said:


> This afternoon I decided to return my WD to ZZF and purchased the Hitachi 1TB deskstar from them... Hopefully this will do the trick.


Wow, $289.99...that's a very good price! Let us know how it goes.


----------



## MScottC

I have my fingers crossed that this drive will do the trick. I only saw one person actually say they are using it (Spike from MFS, and I'll take his word). This isn't the CinemaStar, only the DeskStar. However it seemed to be the best fit of the available drives at ZZF for me to exchange for.


----------



## richsadams

MScottC said:


> I have my fingers crossed that this drive will do the trick. I only saw one person actually say they are using it (Spike from MFS, and I'll take his word). This isn't the CinemaStar, only the DeskStar. However it seemed to be the best fit of the available drives at ZZF for me to exchange for.


It ought to do the job. You will probably want to reduce the AAM setting down to 128 is all. From what' I've read, Hitachi's making some quality products these days.

Good luck and keep us posted! :up:


----------



## MapleLeaf

MScottC,

Just to clarify, were you trying to put the WD10EACS into an S3 or a THD? Sorry if you already mentioned it, but I didn't seem to see it in glossing over your previous posts in this thread.


----------



## MScottC

MapleLeaf said:


> MScottC,
> 
> Just to clarify, were you trying to put the WD10EACS into an S3 or a THD? Sorry if you already mentioned it, but I didn't seem to see it in glossing over your previous posts in this thread.


In a Series 3


----------



## aaronwt

Sometimes you get bad batches. Newegg had some bad batches of the 750GB WD drives too. They would die very quickly. I bought two from NEwegg and they both died on me within a week or two. WD replaced them quickly and the replacements were fine.


----------



## Dr_Diablo

thats usually the xase with a new drive... If it's going to fail it will do so within the first 24-48 hours


----------



## Bsteenson

Wow. Ordered the WD 1TB drive from ZipZoomFly, got it a couple of days later. Popped old drive out of TiVo and put it in computer, ran WinMFS to make Truncated backup. Popped new drive into computer and restored TiVo. Popped new drive in TiVo. Total time less than half an hour and now I have 144 hours of HD recording available!

This is incredible. Thank you so much to all the people who expend the time and energy to make these programs and processes possible.

Between WinMFS to expand space and TiVo.Net to load just about any formatted video onto TiVo, they have increased the value of my already-favorite electronic gadget immeasurably.

BS


----------



## MScottC

BS (as in your abbreviation and not bullsh*t) make sure you try a manual "restart the TiVo" as this issue hung at least two of us with this perticular drive on the S3. We may have had bad drives, or perhaps we have a TiVo issue. But for me, all seemed fine for a week, until the TiVo rebooted itself for a software upgrade. Repowering the TiVo (as in when you plug it in after installing the drive) works fine, but restarting the software without removing power is the issue.

Good luck

Scott


----------



## chrispitude

MScottC said:


> Repowering the TiVo (as in when you plug it in after installing the drive) works fine, but restarting the software without removing power is the issue.


My Tivo just did this with an older 300GB WD3200YS RE2 drive.

- Chris


----------



## turbovr6

MScottC said:


> I have my fingers crossed that this drive will do the trick. I only saw one person actually say they are using it (Spike from MFS, and I'll take his word). This isn't the CinemaStar, only the DeskStar. However it seemed to be the best fit of the available drives at ZZF for me to exchange for.


I got my drive from weaknees and it is a deskstar and not a cinemastar. Using it since September with no issues other than normal TivoHD BS. I paid a mint ($599 for drive and $30 for 3 year warranty). IMO was worth it for the service and support.


----------



## sfhub

MScottC said:


> BS (as in your abbreviation and not bullsh*t) make sure you try a manual "restart the TiVo" as this issue hung at least two of us with this perticular drive on the S3. We may have had bad drives, or perhaps we have a TiVo issue. But for me, all seemed fine for a week, until the TiVo rebooted itself for a software upgrade. Repowering the TiVo (as in when you plug it in after installing the drive) works fine, but restarting the software without removing power is the issue.


Have you compared firmware version #s of your drives vs the ones from others that appear to work for cold and warm reboots?


----------



## Bsteenson

What are all you guys talking about doing manual starts and reboots? I have had zero problems since dropping in the new 1 TB drive. Plugged it in and everything's working fine. Are you suggesting there will be problems coming at about the one week mark?

BS


----------



## bkdtv

Bsteenson said:


> What are all you guys talking about doing manual starts and reboots? I have had zero problems since dropping in the new 1 TB drive. Plugged it in and everything's working fine. Are you suggesting there will be problems coming at about the one week mark?


The issue with the 1TB WD only affects some Tivo Series3 owners. There are no reports of any problems with the TivoHD.


----------



## richsadams

Bsteenson said:


> What are all you guys talking about doing manual starts and reboots? I have had zero problems since dropping in the new 1 TB drive. Plugged it in and everything's working fine. Are you suggesting there will be problems coming at about the one week mark?
> 
> BS


As *bkdtv *mentioned, the issue is only with a couple of S3's/WD 1TB drives and it may be that both drives in question came from a bad batch (same supplier's stock, ordered at the same time). The problem they had manifested itself immediately. If yours is working fine (as are a number of others), there's no reason to suspect that there will be a problem later.


----------



## sfm

Bsteenson said:


> What are all you guys talking about doing manual starts and reboots? I have had zero problems since dropping in the new 1 TB drive. Plugged it in and everything's working fine. Are you suggesting there will be problems coming at about the one week mark?
> 
> BS


As others have noted, I wouldn't worry too much about this... I've had a WD 1TB drive in our S3 since 9/24 and have had no issues (drive is almost full... time to add 1TB ESATA!).


----------



## richsadams

sfm said:


> I've had a WD 1TB drive in our S3 since 9/24 and have had no issues (drive is almost full... time to add 1TB ESATA!).


----------



## uforia

The Friday local ad for Fry's had this drive for $269. The ad is for the Houston area, but could be at all Fry's. This is one of the best prices I've seen since the initial Best Buy deal for $259.

BTW, I have two of the WD 1TB drives. Running flawlessly in both an S3 and a Tivo HD for nearly 2 months now.


----------



## richsadams

uforia said:


> The Friday local ad for Fry's had this drive for $269. The ad is for the Houston area, but could be at all Fry's. This is one of the best prices I've seen since the initial Best Buy deal for $259.
> 
> BTW, I have two of the WD 1TB drives. Running flawlessly in both an S3 and a Tivo HD for nearly 2 months now.


Excellent find! They have it on line for $264.99 thorugh the 21st as well.

http://shop1.outpost.com/{nB6qQHH6X...K9rf8Tr8g**.node3?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG


----------



## jcthorne

Newegg is now selling the 1TB WD at $249 with coupon code BFITDEALSWD30

Thats $50 cheaper than I paid 2 weeks ago. WOW


----------



## crumpler2000

jcthorne said:


> Newegg is now selling the 1TB WD at $249 with coupon code BFITDEALSWD30
> 
> Thats $50 cheaper than I paid 2 weeks ago. WOW


I've been wanting to get one for a while, but this is the type of motivation I needed. Just ordered one. Thanks for the coupon code!:up:


----------



## richsadams

jcthorne said:


> Newegg is now selling the 1TB WD at $249 with coupon code BFITDEALSWD30
> 
> Thats $50 cheaper than I paid 2 weeks ago. WOW


Even better! :up:


----------



## Marc

For those looking for this drive locally, or perhaps available for a brick-and-mortar price match, CompUSA has this drive on sale for $299.99.

Since I paid full price for mine at Best Buy about a week and a half ago, I guess I'll swing by there tomorrow and get a price match.


----------



## spike2k5

Anyone else having problem soft rebooting with OEM version of this drive in Tivo S3?

4 people have reported having problems now.


----------



## 1283

It shouldn't matter if it's OEM or retail. Both of mine are retail and work fine, model WD10EACS-32ZJB0, firmware 01.01B01.


----------



## AbMagFab

jcthorne said:


> Newegg is now selling the 1TB WD at $249 with coupon code BFITDEALSWD30
> 
> Thats $50 cheaper than I paid 2 weeks ago. WOW


Is anyone able to get this promo code to work at newegg? It tells me it's invalid. I've tried for a couple days, thinking maybe it needed to get updated or had a limit.


----------



## gilbreen

AbMagFab said:


> Is anyone able to get this promo code to work at newegg? It tells me it's invalid. I've tried for a couple days, thinking maybe it needed to get updated or had a limit.


I just tried it and also got the same message about it being invalid.


----------



## lessd

AbMagFab said:


> Is anyone able to get this promo code to work at newegg? It tells me it's invalid. I've tried for a couple days, thinking maybe it needed to get updated or had a limit.


Worked for me on 11/12/07 without problem..who knows how long it was good for?


----------



## Mikeyis4dcats

anyone been a guinea pig for this yet? Best Buy has a Hitachi 1TB external drive for $199 (less 10% coupon). Seems like you could pull it out of the enclosure and use it in a Tivo.

http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/782358/

reportedly this is the drive inside:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145167&CMP=AFC-C8Junction


----------



## aaronwt

Mikeyis4dcats said:


> anyone been a guinea pig for this yet? Best Buy has a Hitachi 1TB external drive for $199 (less 10% coupon). Seems like you could pull it out of the enclosure and use it in a Tivo.
> 
> http://www.fatwallet.com/t/18/782358/
> 
> reportedly this is the drive inside:
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145167&CMP=AFC-C8Junction


I did that 3 months ago. I used two of the Hitachis. One is in a TiVoHD and one is in a Series 3 box. You can extract it from the enclosure in a few minutes.


----------



## GregComeLately

The NewEgg deal for the WD 1TB is at $250 right now w/free shipping, without having to fumble with coupons.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136151&CMP=AFC-C8Junction


----------



## richsadams

GregComeLately said:


> The NewEgg deal for the WD 1TB is at $250 right now w/free shipping, without having to fumble with coupons.
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136151&CMP=AFC-C8Junction


Nice find...now that I'm set TiVo-wise, I may _have _to upgrade my PC!


----------



## AbMagFab

GregComeLately said:


> The NewEgg deal for the WD 1TB is at $250 right now w/free shipping, without having to fumble with coupons.
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136151&CMP=AFC-C8Junction


Thanks! Yay! Just ordered 2... one to get rid of the 750GB external on one of my Tivo's, and one to expand my RAID array in my PC.


----------



## 1283

Circuit City has an external WD 1TB drive WDH1U10000N for $250 - $50 rebate. It has the same GP drive inside. It's currently sold out online, but you may be able to find one in the store.


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> Circuit City has an external WD 1TB drive WDH1U10000N for $250 - $50 rebate. It has the same GP drive inside. It's currently sold out online, but you may be able to find one in the store.


Okay...that does it! I _must _upgrade my PC now!


----------



## GregComeLately

Ha! I was just coming back to post that Circuit City deal, though I had second thoughts after seeing the recent comments about ordering @$250 based upon my last post (about the return of the NewEgg deal). But now that C3 already posted about the CC deal, I guess I'm off the hook.  

So we're sure that the external drive 1TB uses the same drive? If so, screaming deal if you can find one in store. 

I'm still unclear as to whether this has a 1 year or 3 year warranty. Earlier in the thread, I see that c3 said it "depends on the drive", with a link to the WD site, which answered nothing, really.. as far as I can tell. 

So what takes precedent here.. 1 year warranty because it's housed in a 'My Book Essential' external drive housing, or, still 3 year for the drive itself? I would think that if you go for warranty coverage, they'll look at the fact it was a My Book Essential purchase and default to the 1 year warranty.


----------



## David Platt

c3 said:


> Circuit City has an external WD 1TB drive WDH1U10000N for $250 - $50 rebate. It has the same GP drive inside. It's currently sold out online, but you may be able to find one in the store.


They've got this available online again, but for in-store pick-up only. If one of your local stores has one, grab it.

Circuit City's website is slow as hell this morning, but you can probably get through if you're patient!


----------



## jlib

David Platt said:


> ...If one of your local stores has one, grab it.


_Grab it_ is the operative word here because the rebate ends tomorrow.


----------



## Dssturbo1

http://pulverizer72.com/scans/cccoupon12-31.pdf

a friend of mine used this cc coupon and got the wd 1tb drive for ~$159. (he has to mail in the $50 rebate)

but it may not work at some cc stores, it does say no photocopies, and they may not let you combine it with the -$150 discount deal/rebate they are already giving you. but it did work for him

the usps sends those coupons out as part of the change of address packs. i used one earlier in the year to get -$40 off the $258 tivohd deal at cc


----------



## David Platt

David Platt said:


> They've got this available online again, but for in-store pick-up only. If one of your local stores has one, grab it.
> 
> Circuit City's website is slow as hell this morning, but you can probably get through if you're patient!


Well, looks like I spoke too soon. I tried placing an order yesterday morning to pick up at my local store, but it times out before I got a confirmation page. Later that day, I got a confirmation email saying the order went through and I could pick it up. I went to the store this morning, and they didn't have any left to give me, despite what the email said. On the plus side, I got a free $24 gift card because of Circuit City's "24 minutes or 24 dollars" policy.


----------



## ChrisMc73

I'm coming in late to this thread, but can you plug any eSata drive into that slot in the back of the Series 3 HD and it will work?


----------



## bkdtv

ChrisMc73 said:


> I'm coming in late to this thread, but can you plug any eSata drive into that slot in the back of the Series 3 HD and it will work?


Be sure to see the eSATA FAQ stickied to the top of the forum.

The quick answer is yes. But be aware that some PC eSATA drives are not designed to dissipate heat from 24/7 operation, and thus may not function reliably. Some PC eSATA drives also do not include the right cable.


----------



## 1283

Has anyone opened up the external drive from Circuit City? If so, I would be interested in what www.wdc.com shows when you check the warranty for the internal drive. Also, can the case be taken apart and put back together without damaging it? I won't get mine until Tuesday.


----------



## mappler

Just another positive note. Installed a WD 1TB in my TivoHD this past weekend (as the internal drive). Used the latest WinMFS to do the upgrade. Everything went flawlessly. Took a few hours to copy the contents (I had some HD shows on there that I wanted to keep). Very easy upgrade.


----------



## richsadams

mappler said:


> Just another positive note. Installed a WD 1TB in my TivoHD this past weekend (as the internal drive). Used the latest WinMFS to do the upgrade. Everything went flawlessly. Took a few hours to copy the contents (I had some HD shows on there that I wanted to keep). Very easy upgrade.


Excellent! Thanks for the feedback. :up:


----------



## crumpler2000

The 1TB external drive, WDH1U10000N is on sale at Newegg Plus 20% off from Paypal.
Add it to your cart then use coupon code EMC1126HDD03 to get it at $224.99, then use paypal to pay for it. Sometime in January Paypal will credit your account for 20% of the purchase price. Final cost = 224.99 - 45 = $179.99

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136186&Tpk=WDH1U10000N


----------



## crumpler2000

Same drive available for $219.00 from ZipZoomFly, if you don't want to deal with Paypal or don't have an account. I believe both Newegg and ZZF deals are for today only.

http://www.zipzoomfly.com/jsp/ProductDetail.jsp?ProductCode=10006965


----------



## pmrowley

Hmmm, the Newegg coupon says "only available for specific programs" when I tried to apply it...

*Edit* NM, I was accidentally trying to get the internal version. Still didn't work for the external version though. What's the trick to get it to apply?
-P


----------



## greg_burns

crumpler2000 said:


> The 1TB external drive, WDH1U10000N is on sale at Newegg Plus 20% off from Paypal.
> Add it to your cart then use coupon code EMC1126HDD03 to get it at $224.99, then use paypal to pay for it. Sometime in January Paypal will credit your account for 20% of the purchase price. Final cost = 224.99 - 45 = $179.99
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136186&Tpk=WDH1U10000N


Just to be clear this is a My Book USB, *not* a My DVR Expander SATA. I assume you are planning on just yanking the drive?


----------



## jerrymc

pmrowley said:


> Hmmm, the Newegg coupon says "only available for specific programs" when I tried to apply it...


Same here. And yes, this is for the My Book. Anyone have any success with this?

-Jerry


----------



## greg_burns

jerrymc said:


> Same here. And yes, this is for the My Book. Anyone have any success with this?
> 
> -Jerry


No. It is a USB external drive! You need eSATA. You can pull the drive* and use it in another enclosure, but only with a S3. *Not a TivoHD*. TivoHD only works with the approved My DVR Expander.

*And that is assuming the internal drive is SATA, probably a safe bet.


----------



## pmrowley

WD only makes SATA drives in sizes greater than 500GB. The MyBooks have a SATA to USB bridge interface built into the enclosure.

So, the idea is, you yank the drive and stick it into an eSATA enclosure, or inside the Tivo itself. (Personally, I want to upgrade my pair of 750GB Seagates to a pair of 1TB WD drives on my S3,)

-P


----------



## jerrymc

greg_burns said:


> No. It is a USB external drive! You need eSATA. You can pull the drive* and use it in another enclosure, but only with a S3. *Not a TivoHD*. TivoHD only works with the approved My DVR Expander.
> 
> *And that is assuming the internal drive is SATA, probably a safe bet.


Thanks, but I was referring to getting the Newegg deal to work. I'll be yanking the drive from the enclosure to use it.

-Jerry


----------



## greg_burns

jerrymc said:


> I'll be yanking the drive from the enclosure to use it.


With an S3, not TivoHD. Just so we are all on the same page. 

I guess you can use any drive internally. So my statement is only half true.


----------



## richsadams

jerrymc said:


> Thanks, but I was referring to getting the Newegg deal to work. I'll be yanking the drive from the enclosure to use it.
> 
> -Jerry


Cool. Can you do us all a favor and post the drive's model number when you do pull it out? It will be interesting to find out if it's anything other than the WD 1TB GP drive we've been discussing here. :up:


----------



## Bsteenson

Another deal, in similar price range, Buy.com has $232.25 for the 1 TB WD external USB drive if you want to yank the drive.

BS


----------



## GregComeLately

The 20&#37; off through PayPal deal is over, apparently. At least as it pertains to any NewEgg orders.

It ended at least a few hours ago. Supposedly PayPal ran out of the funds designated for the NewEgg order discounts. Poor PayPal promo planning, too much volume too soon, or some such. Any way you slice it, a screw up.


----------



## jlib

Just to cloud the issue of which 1TB drive to get:

*Western Digital vs Hitachi vs Seagate vs Samsung*








The good news for us as consumers is that four titans fighting it out for market share can only mean continuing downward pressure on pricing.


----------



## GregComeLately

interesting, jlib.

While I had been tempted by a few of these very recent WD 1TB deals floating about, I ultimately decided that I could stand to wait for more price drops to come, at least as it pertains to expanding my Tivo. 

With the writers strike going on, I think that I can manage my limited disc space for the next few months or however long the strike ends up lasting. Then, when it ends and we get back to full scale new programming, I'll take advantage of inevitably better HD deals when I really will be needing the extra Tivo drive space.


----------



## betacub

richsadams said:


> Hmmm...there's no reason the KS procedures shouldn't work for you. A single light should illuminate during the "Powering Up" screen, just a moment before it switches to the "Almost there..." screen. It only lasts for about a second or two, hence the need to hold down the pause button during the "Powering Up" screen.
> 
> In any case, it couldn't hurt to pull the drive, hook it up to your PC and do a quick surface scan using the WD tools. That won't cause any of your recordings or programming to be lost. Otherwise a long read/write/read scan will really tell you if there's a problem with the drive, but everything would be lost and you'd need to re-image it with your original drive.
> 
> It does sound like a drive problem, but w/o diagnostics it's hard to tell. I'd give the KS procedures (particularly 57 and 58) another go...then test the drive.
> 
> Let us know how you get on. :up:


My update:

(background from many pages back: my WD 1TB upgrade gave me two nasty symptoms: 1) excruciating delays populating the Now Playing list and 2) stuttering/stalling/hitching during HD playback)

So, after trying the Kickstart diagnostics, and running the WD scan, I still had no luck. Since I was near the end of my return period, I just took it back and got a new one. I decided to do all the diagnostics first this time around, and one of the first things I noticed was that the deep scan was estimating around 8 hours (through a USB<->SATA adapter), vs 10+ hours on the old drive.

The scan completed successfully, so I popped the drive back in and proceeded to watch the Ohio State vs Michigan game in HD on about a 30 minute delay. I also tried actively deleting programs while it was recording, which occurred to me as a possible culprit for tying up some faulty I/O component. I didn't notice a single hiccup through 4 hours of playback. Woo.

I also watched a couple of historically problematic HD programs later in the week, and all is still well. Looks like it was indeed faulty hardware.

Thanks for all the suggestions and help, guys


----------



## richsadams

betacub said:


> My update:
> 
> (background from many pages back: my WD 1TB upgrade gave me two nasty symptoms: 1) excruciating delays populating the Now Playing list and 2) stuttering/stalling/hitching during HD playback)
> 
> So, after trying the Kickstart diagnostics, and running the WD scan, I still had no luck. Since I was near the end of my return period, I just took it back and got a new one. I decided to do all the diagnostics first this time around, and one of the first things I noticed was that the deep scan was estimating around 8 hours (through a USB<->SATA adapter), vs 10+ hours on the old drive.
> 
> The scan completed successfully, so I popped the drive back in and proceeded to watch the Ohio State vs Michigan game in HD on about a 30 minute delay. I also tried actively deleting programs while it was recording, which occurred to me as a possible culprit for tying up some faulty I/O component. I didn't notice a single hiccup through 4 hours of playback. Woo.
> 
> I also watched a couple of historically problematic HD programs later in the week, and all is still well. Looks like it was indeed faulty hardware.
> 
> Thanks for all the suggestions and help, guys


Excellent news! Glad to hear things are back to normal. Sometimes everything looks right, but it's just not.

Enjoy the games! :up:


----------



## dougdingle

Some people are having "menu-based reboot" issues with the OEM drive mounted internally, but how about people who put the drive in external enclosures? Any issues? 

I got one of these from Newegg for just under $180 delivered after paypal rebate, and I'd hate to have to return it...


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> Some people are having "menu-based reboot" issues with the OEM drive mounted internally, but how about people who put the drive in external enclosures? Any issues?
> 
> I got one of these from Newegg for just under $180 delivered after paypal rebate, and I'd hate to have to return it...


I'm in the same boat to some extent. I have the WD 1TB GP drive waiting for an internal install on our S3. I've been following this and the MFSLive threads closely.

AFAIK there were three (possibly four) OEM drives purchased from ZipZoomfly which were installed internally on S3's that had menu restart issues. However IIRC there haven't been any reports of problems with eSATA applications. That said, I don't recall anyone saying that they used an OEM drive for their eSATA expansion.

I picked my drive up at BB very early on, but it's the full-package/retail version. Is newegg selling the OEM drive or the package version?


----------



## spike2k5

Rich,
list has grown to 4 vendors and around 10 OEM drives for both THD and S3.

It's best to avoid WD 1TB OEM green drives.

I have not heard anyone having problems with the retail version.


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> Just to cloud the issue of which 1TB drive to get:
> 
> *Western Digital vs Hitachi vs Seagate vs Samsung*
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> The good news for us as consumers is that four titans fighting it out for market share can only mean continuing downward pressure on pricing.


I went back and re-read the article noted above and found this statement:



> ...the Caviar GP drives are now available as RAID Edition models that have been validated for 24/7 operation.


Does anyone know what the difference is and how to tell the difference between a "RAID Edition model" of the WD 1TB GP drive and anything else?  Is that what's possibly shipping inside the latest WD My Book 1TB?

I'm still satisfied that the one I have is fine, but I'm curious to know if there are two versions of the drive out there and what the distinction is...if there is any.

FWIW, the drive I have is the retail Model #WD10EACS - 32ZJB0.


----------



## richsadams

spike2k5 said:


> Rich,
> list has grown to 4 vendors and around 10 OEM drives for both THD and S3.
> 
> It's best to avoid WD 1TB OEM green drives.
> 
> I have not heard anyone having problems with the retail version.


Good and bad news. Thanks Spike! :up:

EDIT: Now I'm wondering if the OEM drives are the "RAID Edition" models noted above and that's why they're having issues. The reference is on page 3 of the article about half-way down.

Also noted that in this review of the WD 1TB GP Drive at Tom's Hardware that they are reviewing model # WD10EACS - 00ZJBO, whereas the one I have is model #WD10EACS - 32ZJB0. I'm no drive expert so it might not mean anything at all though. Hmmm.


----------



## Big Rick

richsadams said:


> Does anyone know what the difference is and how to tell the difference between a "RAID Edition model" of the WD 1TB GP drive and anything else?  Is that what's possibly shipping inside the latest WD My Book 1TB?


About $100. 

I'm not sure either, but supposedly they have less vibration and are slightly cooler. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that they're being selected, not manufactured differently.


----------



## richsadams

Big Rick said:


> About $100.
> 
> I'm not sure either, but supposedly they have less vibration and are slightly cooler. I wouldn't be surprised to find out that they're being selected, not manufactured differently.


Interesting. According to all of the bench tests I've seen the WD 1TB is already one of the coolest running drives available. In fact the only drive that runs cooler is a WD 160GB SATA drive.

I haven't seen anyone advertising a "RAID Edition". Wonder if they're just supplying them to internal clients?


----------



## spike2k5

richsadams said:


> Tom's Hardware that they are reviewing model # WD10EACS - 00ZJBO, whereas the one I have is model #WD10EACS - 32ZJB0. I'm no drive expert so it might not mean anything at all though. Hmmm.


Good find. You might be right.

My Retail version that works is WD10EACS-32ZJB0.
One of the user reported having problem with WD10EACS-00ZJB0


----------



## richsadams

spike2k5 said:


> Good find. You might be right.
> 
> My Retail version that works is WD10EACS-32ZJB0.
> One of the user reported having problem with WD10EACS-00ZJB0


Wait...could this be an "Ah-ha!" moment? Are model # WD10EACS-00ZJB0 OEM's?

Glad to hear the one I have is the same as the one that's working for you. Phew!

Hopefully others can report back on which drive they have (by the specific model #) and which ones are troublesome. Can you ask the folks on your forum when you have time?

Thanks!


----------



## spike2k5

richsadams said:


> Wait...could this be an "Ah-ha!" moment? Are model # WD10EACS-00ZJB0 OEM's?


It's more like D'oh!



richsadams said:


> Hopefully others can report back on which drive they have (by the specific model #) and which ones are troublesome. Can you ask the folks on your forum when you have time?
> Thanks!


I think most people returned them already but will ask.


----------



## Canoehead

I have an OEM From ZipZoom that is running fine in my TivoHD, for whatever that is worth.


----------



## richsadams

Canoehead said:


> I have an OEM From ZipZoom that is running fine in my TivoHD, for whatever that is worth.


Good to know. :up: It would be interesting to know the model number if you ever have occasion to pop the cover again.


----------



## spike2k5

Canoehead said:


> I have an OEM From ZipZoom that is running fine in my TivoHD, for whatever that is worth.


Have you tried rebooting from the menu?


----------



## AbMagFab

spike2k5 said:


> Good find. You might be right.
> 
> My Retail version that works is WD10EACS-32ZJB0.
> One of the user reported having problem with WD10EACS-00ZJB0


32 = Retail
00 = OEM

I don't think there's anything magical about this, as many people have working OEM versions of this drive in PC's, and I'd find it hard to believe there is something super-secret different about it that harms a Tivo.

In any case, I have 8 of these, 6 are retail, 2 are OEM, one retail and one OEM in Tivo's (the rest in a PC), and none so far are having any problems.


----------



## spike2k5

AbMagFab said:


> 32 = Retail
> 00 = OEM
> 
> I don't think there's anything magical about this, as many people have working OEM versions of this drive in PC's, and I'd find it hard to believe there is something super-secret different about it that harms a Tivo.
> 
> In any case, I have 8 of these, 6 are retail, 2 are OEM, one retail and one OEM in Tivo's (the rest in a PC), and none so far are having any problems.


I don't know if you are aware exactly what the problem is.

Drive works fine in THD and S3 but they can't reboot from the menu.

It simply hangs at "Welcome screen".

Only way to get it started is by pulling the power cable and reconnecting.

Drives are from 4 different vendors including Newegg, well over 10 different drives, both THD and S3.

All are OEM drives. One person got a retail drive from BB after many problems with OEM version and got it working on Tivo S3.


----------



## richsadams

AbMagFab said:


> 32 = Retail
> 00 = OEM.


 Good feedback, thanks.



AbMagFab said:


> I don't think there's anything magical about this, as many people have working OEM versions of this drive in PC's, and I'd find it hard to believe there is something super-secret different about it that harms a Tivo..


Are there _many _people w/OEM's in service? Not arguing, but IIRC most of the positive posts here were for the retail models and the ones (all?) causing the menu restart issues were OEM models.

Thanks again for the feedback. I'm still wondering if there's something to the OEM model being different in some respect or if there were just a batch that were problematic? It's good to hear that the OEM as well as the retail versions you have in your TiVo's are humming along fine. :up:


----------



## bizzy

Likely a jumper or firmware setting that causes the drive to spin up when power is applied, instead of when it recieves an explicit command to spin up over its sata interface.

I'd be surprised if this was not a setting easily changed once we figure out where it is.


----------



## richsadams

AbMagFab said:


> 32 = Retail
> 00 = OEM
> 
> I don't think there's anything magical about this, as many people have working OEM versions of this drive in PC's, and I'd find it hard to believe there is something super-secret different about it that harms a Tivo.
> 
> In any case, I have 8 of these, 6 are retail, 2 are OEM, one retail and one OEM in Tivo's (the rest in a PC), and none so far are having any problems.


Spike brings up a good point. Have you tried a menu restart on your TiVo with the OEM drive?


----------



## richsadams

bizzy said:


> Likely a jumper or firmware setting that causes the drive to spin up when power is applied, instead of when it recieves an explicit command to spin up over its sata interface.
> 
> I'd be surprised if this was not a setting easily changed once we figure out where it is.


There was some discussion about that on the MFSLive Forum a while back. (Plus some back-and-forth regarding OEM Vs retail...OEM's being a problem.)

WD specs refer to a "PM2 enabled power-up from standby" setting, etc.

Again, I'm not an expert so I'll step back and let you guys sort it out. It'll be good to get to the bottom of this if there is one.


----------



## AbMagFab

spike2k5 said:


> I don't know if you are aware exactly what the problem is.
> 
> Drive works fine in THD and S3 but they can't reboot from the menu.
> 
> It simply hangs at "Welcome screen".
> 
> Only way to get it started is by pulling the power cable and reconnecting.
> 
> Drives are from 4 different vendors including Newegg, well over 10 different drives, both THD and S3.
> 
> All are OEM drives. One person got a retail drive from BB after many problems with OEM version and got it working on Tivo S3.


So you're basically saying a sample size of one is how you're determine the cause/effect?

WD has sold many many of these drives. They are mostly working fine.

I'd sooner chalk this up to something people are doing consistently wrong on the restore, or a bug in WinMFS, than something strange with the drives.


----------



## spike2k5

If it were just WinMFS then I would say it's due to my bad coding and move on but same thing happens on mfstools restored drives as well.

If it's one or two then I would say user error, but it's way to many.

I'm glad you are not having problem with the OEM drives. 

I don't think I heard your answer on menu restart though.

Have you tried it?


----------



## jcthorne

I have an OEM drive from NewEgg and it reboots fine from the menu.

Just a sample of one. I was actually afraid to try but had to know 

Its been working fine since I installed it internally using a full copy in WinMFS.

With the drive filling up with movies and such and the prices dropping, I am thinking about getting an Antec enclosure and adding a second one externally.


----------



## dougdingle

richsadams said:


> I picked my drive up at BB very early on, but it's the full-package/retail version. Is newegg selling the OEM drive or the package version?


The one I got was OEM (WD10EACS-00ZJB0), shipped wrapped in bubble wrap.

I got it to put into an MX-1 external enclosure with the SIIG cable, but I can't get to it until Sunday. I'll try various reboot scenarios and report back.


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> I went back and re-read the article noted above and found this statement:
> 
> ...the Caviar GP drives are now available as RAID Edition models that have been validated for 24/7 operation.
> 
> Does anyone know what the difference is and how to tell the difference between a "RAID Edition model" of the WD 1TB GP drive and anything else?  Is that what's possibly shipping inside the latest WD My Book 1TB?


 The WD RAID Edition Green 1 TB is very new and is not widely available yet. It would not be put in a consumer product like the My Book. Note that the comment "validated for 24/7 operation" is just made up by the author. All of WD's drives are capable of 24/7 operation and none are "validated."

The reason a RAID Edition drive of any brand may be a better choice in a RAID Enclosure under heavy access is that RE drives have a lower rotational vibration (so they tend not to interfere as much with their closely packed enclosure mates) by using vibration cancellation techniques (in WD's case called RAFF). RAFF is not of any value for isolated individual drives, though.

Additionally, the use of a Time Limited Error Recovery algorithm allows the RAID controller to be the arbiter of error recovery. The TLER default on a RE drive is actually a good feature for TiVo and actually usable by a TiVO as is unlike so-called DVR drives which require a special command set to access their lazy error correction, which the TiVO is not capable of.

Those are pretty much the only significant differences. In the case of WD, their RE version of the Green 1TB has half the random vibration of the standard version and a maximum error timeout of 7 seconds. They usually have a longer warranty hence are more expensive than an equivalent commodity drive.


----------



## 1283

Other than the retail/OEM model, the firmware version should be checked. 32ZJB0 (retail) with 01.01B01 works fine.


----------



## DCIFRTHS

jlib said:


> ... The reason a RAID Edition drive of any brand may be a better choice in a RAID Enclosure under heavy access is that RE drives have a lower rotational vibration (so they tend not to self-destruct their closely packed enclosure mates ) by using vibration cancellation techniques (in WD's case called RAFF). RAFF is not of any value for isolated individual drives, though.
> 
> Additionally, the use of a Time Limited Error Recovery algorithm allows the RAID controller to be the arbiter of error recovery. The TLEC default on a RE drive is actually a good feature for TiVo and actually usable by a TiVO as is unlike so-called DVR drives which require a special command set to access their lazy error correction, which the TiVO is not capable of. ...


This is the information I was able to dig up the other night after reading the review linked to a few posts up. I also believe that the _Time Limited Error Recovery_ feature would be beneficial for TiVo installations. I wasn't able to locate the RAID version in stock anywhere. If anyone finds the RAID version from a reputable vendor, please post back.

Any good deals on the WD retail 1TB non-RAID version? I haven't seen any lately...


----------



## mappler

I received the OEM version of WD10EACS 1TB drive from Fry's. Installed the Friday after Thanksgiving into a TivoHD with the full version of WinMFS (whatever the latest version was on the Friday). My unit reboots just fine from the menu. I have had zero problems after 5 days of operation. I don't know which model number it was however. 

-Matt


----------



## aaronwt

Mine are listed as WD10000CSRTL on my registration page at Western Digital. I bought two from Best Buy in September.


----------



## chazas

I have 1TB WC Caviar drive, model no. WD10EACS00ZJB0 according to the WD website, that I bought from ZipZoomFly. In my recollection, the listing said it was retail, but it showed up only in a foil wrapper. It's installed in an Antec MX1 via eSATA. No problems with a menu restart.


----------



## richsadams

mappler said:


> I received the OEM version of WD10EACS 1TB drive from Fry's. Installed the Friday after Thanksgiving into a TivoHD with the full version of WinMFS (whatever the latest version was on the Friday). My unit reboots just fine from the menu. I have had zero problems after 5 days of operation. I don't know which model number it was however.
> 
> -Matt


Thanks for the feedback...the more the better. :up:

Are you sure what you bought was an OEM version? The drives I've seen at Fry's locally are the retail version...normal retail box w/CD ROM, SATA cable, screws, etc. An OEM is just the bare drive and nothing else.


----------



## richsadams

chazas said:


> I have 1TB WC Caviar drive, model no. WD10EACS00ZJB0 according to the WD website, that I bought from ZipZoomFly. In my recollection, the listing said it was retail, but it showed up only in a foil wrapper. It's installed in an Antec MX1 via eSATA. No problems with a menu restart.


Thanks for posting as well. The model number you have is for an OEM.

It seems the menu restart issue is isolated to OEM _internally _installed drives so you should be in the clear. :up:


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> The WD RAID Edition Green 1 TB is very new and is not widely available yet. It would not be put in a consumer product like the My Book. Note that the comment "validated for 24/7 operation" is just made up by the author. All of WD's drives are capable of 24/7 operation and none are "validated." <snip>
> 
> Those are pretty much the only significant differences. In the case of WD, their RE version of the Green 1TB has half the random vibration of the standard version and a maximum error timeout of 7 seconds. They usually have a longer warranty hence are more expensive than an equivalent commodity drive.


All good info and makes sense. I've always questioned the "validated for 24/7 operation" statement myself...but I have seen it posted on manufacturer's web sites as well. Just doesn't make sense though unless they're running some specific long-term diagnostics I suppose.

Thanks for the update. :up:


----------



## mappler

richsadams said:


> Thanks for the feedback...the more the better. :up:
> 
> Are you sure what you bought was an OEM version? The drives I've seen at Fry's locally are the retail version...normal retail box w/CD ROM, SATA cable, screws, etc. An OEM is just the bare drive and nothing else.


I purchased from Fry's online, and it was just a bare drive in an anti-static bag with nothing else. I installed it internally, with no external drive.

-Matt


----------



## AbMagFab

mappler said:


> I purchased from Fry's online, and it was just a bare drive in an anti-static bag with nothing else. I installed it internally, with no external drive.
> 
> -Matt


If you happen to connect it to a PC any time soon, check the model/serial number info. It should show 00 or 32 (see a couple earlier posts for the complete number).

00 is the one people are claiming is a problem.


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> I've always questioned the "validated for 24/7 operation" statement myself...but I have seen it posted on manufacturer's web sites as well.


It is sort of a legacy from last century when high-end SCSI drives were the only drives you dared use in an enterprise environment both from the standpoint of performance and simple longevity. Current standard drives are so good that longevity is no longer an issue. It may be better to use RAID edition enterprise style drives in 24/7 multi-user environments but that has more to do with the specific performance conditions of a corporate RAID environment than the ability to be operated 24/7. You will be hard pressed to find the phrase "certified for 24/7 use" or "validated for 24/7 use" from any of the manufacturers now because the distinction is meaningless.

About the most you will find these days are vague marketing terms like "worry free 24/7 operation" but really that could apply to any of their drives. Even 2.5" laptop sized drives are used in server environments now. The only thing any drive is certified to are certain industry technical standards like SATA, SCSI, etc. Now, it could be said that some single drive external enclosures with a slow interface such as USB and no or inadequate active cooling are not cut out for constant use and that would most likely be true but the drive they contain could be taken out and put in an active 24/7 environment to no detrimental effect.


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> It is sort of a legacy from last century when high-end SCSI drives were the only drives you dared use in an enterprise environment both from the standpoint of performance and simple longevity. Current standard drives are so good that longevity is no longer an issue. It may be better to use RAID edition enterprise style drives in 24/7 multi-user environments but that has more to do with the specific performance conditions of a corporate RAID environment than the ability to be operated 24/7. You will be hard pressed to find the phrase "certified for 24/7 use" or "validated for 24/7 use" from any of the manufacturers now because the distinction is meaningless.
> 
> About the most you will find these days are vague marketing terms like "worry free 24/7 operation" but really that could apply to any of their drives. Even 2.5" laptop sized drives are used in server environments now. The only thing any drive is certified to are certain industry technical standards like SATA, SCSI, etc. Now, it could be said that some single drive external enclosures with a slow interface such as USB and no or inadequate active cooling are not cut out for constant use and that would most likely be true but the drive they contain could be taken out and put in an active 24/7 environment to no detrimental effect.


Indeed, that all makes sense. I used SATA drives in the last SuperMicro Server I put together and they almost beat out the specs for the old SCSI drives...and ran a lot cooler.


----------



## richsadams

mappler said:


> I purchased from Fry's online, and it was just a bare drive in an anti-static bag with nothing else. I installed it internally, with no external drive.
> 
> -Matt


Got it. Since there's a nearby store I forget that you can buy from them online. Thanks and glad it's doing well for you! :up:


----------



## cr33p

Has anyone had any issues with an OEM 750 gb WD drive? I have just recently went throough 2 drives from Fry's that are having issues, the first was extremely loud, the second wont even boot and is having issues being detected to load via WinMFS, I was able to successfully run all WD diag tools on the drive and it passes.


----------



## spike2k5

cr33p said:


> Has anyone had any issues with an OEM 750 gb WD drive? I have just recently went throough 2 drives from Fry's that are having issues, the first was extremely loud, the second wont even boot and is having issues being detected to load via WinMFS, I was able to successfully run all WD diag tools on the drive and it passes.


I have not heard any issues with WD OEM 750GB.
If it's too loud, set AAM to 128 and will help.

If it doesn't show up in WinMFS, try delete format option first.


----------



## cr33p

spike2k5 said:


> I have not heard any issues with WD OEM 750GB.
> If it's too loud, set AAM to 128 and will help.
> 
> If it doesn't show up in WinMFS, try delete format option first.


The first drive was loud in a abnormal way, not like just being a little louder then normal, it was sounding like my sh**ty Seagate drive does, anyways so I sent it back for an xchange, the new drive worked fine, it loaded it booted, then locked up, restarted and never got past the welcome powering up screen. I then try to restore it once more and windows see's the drive but tells me it in an unrecognizable disc, wont allow me to initialize it or anything, I then try to boot it to a windows machine directly from a Sata header rather then my usb-sata converter, no dice wont pass post, I then bang it in my hand a few times and voila it is recognized and I run the WD tools on it all night and through today. I then re image it and boot the drive, wont pass powering up, try to re image it once more same scenario, wont get detected properly, get past that and re image the drive once more with a different image for sh*ts and grins, finally we pass the powering up screen only to be in a constant loop, then I get the GSOD, that lasted 1 minute and rebooted to the powering up screen. This has to be a bad HDD wouldnt you agree? BTW I have tried this drive in more then one machine as well


----------



## MapleLeaf

I purchased my WD 1TB from ZipZoomFly on Nov. 12. It shipped the same day and I received it two days later.

Here's some of the info from the drive label:

WD10EACS
WD Caviar SE16
MDL: WD10EACS-00ZJB0
Date: 29 SEP 2007
DCM: HARCHT2AAB
WD P/N: WD10EACS-00ZJB0

The drive arrived in just an anti-static bag and a styrofoam-like housing. So the plain packaging coupled with the model number seems to confirm that this is the OEM model.

Someone mentioned a firmware number in one of the earlier posts, but I wasn't able to locate such a number on the drive label.

Anyway, I replaced the internal 160Gb drive in my TivoHD with this drive on Thanksgiving Day. I used MFSLive v1.3b to set AAM to 128 and then I used WinMFS Beta Build 6 to image the drive. So it's been about a week now and as far as I can tell, everything is running smoothly. I've recorded about two dozen shows (mostly HD) and watched about half of them. No problems as far as I can tell. I've also tried the "Restart the Tivo HD DVR" option from the "Restart or Reset System" menu twice and it successfully rebooted both times (I waited about 15 minutes between the two attempts).

I was somewhat worried after reading of the reboot problem with the OEM model of the drive, but as far as I can tell, even though I seem to have the OEM model, I don't seem to be experiencing the problem.


----------



## MScottC

I was one of the two original posters with the WD 1TB Green drive issue. It was an INTERNAL installation in the original S3 (not the HD). The problem is/was only on a software reboot (instigated either by the user or by the TiVo itself to update the software). The drive was an OEM (arrived in only a plastic bag, with no parts) from ZipZoomFly. I believe others have reported this issue with drives from other online dealers but all were OEM drives.

I found the firmware of the drive by using a freeware Accoustic Management program (found on the interwebs using Gooogle). I solved the problem by exchanging it for a Hitachi DeskStar 1TB


----------



## 1283

Upgraded a relative's THD with an OEM drive from Newegg. Rebooted from the menu many times without any problem. The OEM drive's firmware is the same as the retail drive's.


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> Upgraded a relative's THD with an OEM drive from Newegg. Rebooted from the menu many times without any problem. The OEM drive's firmware is the same as the retail drive's.


Thanks for that. :up:

So it seems that the WD 1TB GP OEM HDD/menu restart failures are isolated to internal installs on Series3's only then.


----------



## Thos19

richsadams said:


> So it seems that the WD 1TB GP OEM HDD/menu restart failures are isolated to Series3's only then.


It sure seems that way. I'm getting ready to give up. 

Thos.


----------



## richsadams

Thos19 said:


> It sure seems that way. I'm getting ready to give up.
> 
> Thos.


I wouldn't give up just yet. Spike's quite good at chasing down these kinds of issues and may come up with a solution. I wonder what it is in the S3's architecture that's causing this one little glitch? 

No chance of telling whomever you bought your OEM drive from that it doesn't work and getting a retail version eh?

You've done a lot of work to get this far...hang in there! :up:


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> ...WD specs refer to a "PM2 enabled power-up from standby" setting, etc.


"If PM2 is enabled and not supported byBIOS, the drive does not spin up and therefore is not detected by the system."​Has this element been eliminated as a source of the problem? The very nature of OEM drives is that they are configured for the manufacturer who originally ordered them. If this setting does make any difference that could explain why some have a problem but some don't. We have already determined there is no difference in the firmware. The problem itself doesn't make much sense unless there is something affecting spinup upon warm reboot.


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> "If PM2 is enabled and not supported byBIOS, the drive does not spin up and therefore is not detected by the system."​Has this element been eliminated as a source of the problem? The very nature of OEM drives is that they are configured for the manufacturer who originally ordered them. If this setting does make any difference that could explain why some have a problem but some don't. We have already determined there is no difference in the firmware. The problem itself doesn't make much sense unless there is something affecting spinup upon warm reboot.


Makes perfect sense and that's why I added that after I saw reference to it on Spike's forum. No idea if it's been addressed though. Perhaps Spike can chime in.


----------



## cr33p

Update to my dilemma, I have successfully been able to get my Tivo HD to boot with my new 750 gb WD hdd, the only way I have been able to accomplish this was to backup the original stock 160 drive and use its image, I tried 3 seperate images I have had since my other unit was introduced to the house. Shouldnt I be able to use an image from any unit? Then just clear & delete everything?


----------



## Thos19

Not that it was helpful, but here is what WD gave me for an answer when I asked if there was ANY differenence between the two drives:

_Dear Thomas,

Thank you for your reply.

From a drive functionality standpoint, there is no difference other then the drive stamp -32 vs -00 which just shows that the -32 was sold to resellers and the -00 is for retail.

Please let us know if we can be of further assistance.

Sincerely,
Don S.
Western Digital Service and Support
http://support.wdc.com_

Obviously, there is a difference.

Thos.


----------



## MScottC

richsadams said:


> Makes perfect sense and that's why I added that after I saw reference to it on Spike's forum. No idea if it's been addressed though. Perhaps Spike can chime in.


I am going to post two of my posts from the MFSLive Forum regarding this issue and PM

Posted: Tue Nov 13, 2007 2:56 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I found this PDF on the WD sight regarding Power Management on these drives. Regarding PM2 "This mode enables controlled spinup by spinup command in accordance with ATA standard and is mainly for server/workstation environments operating in multiple-drive configurations." from http://www.wdc.com/en/library/eide/2579-001037.pdf. I'm wondering if this plays in at all. I may try adding this jumper when I get home from work this evening.

Scott

AND

Posted: Tue Nov 13, 2007 8:45 pm Post subject:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I just got home and the first thing I tried was installing the drive in the TiVo with pins 3 and 4 jumpered, which enabled "PM2". When TiVo powered up, the drive did not spin at all. As I suspected, the drive is waiting for a command to spin up as needed. I was sort of hoping my expectations were wrong, and that I was misreading the documentation; i.e. that jumpering it would force the drive to spin full time.

When I removed the jumper, and repowered, TiVo booted up fine. I then did a "restart" and it hung up again. 


As I wrote here via those two posts... The PM jumper makes the situation even worse.

Scott


----------



## richsadams

Thos19 said:


> Not that it was helpful, but here is what WD gave me for an answer when I asked if there was ANY differenence between the two drives:
> 
> _Dear Thomas,
> 
> Thank you for your reply.
> 
> From a drive functionality standpoint, there is no difference other then the drive stamp -32 vs -00 which just shows that the -32 was sold to resellers and the -00 is for retail.
> 
> Please let us know if we can be of further assistance.
> 
> Sincerely,
> Don S.
> Western Digital Service and Support
> http://support.wdc.com_
> 
> Obviously, there is a difference.
> 
> Thos.


Nice job following up with them. :up:

Their answer seems odd though. Wouldn't what they said be backwards? Wouldn't the OEM model (00) be the ones wholesale/resellers have (newegg, zipzoom, etc.) and the retail model (32) be the one that WD packaged for retail sale? Hmmm. Doesn't really matter, but it still sounds like there's a difference somehow. Still


----------



## richsadams

MScottC said:


> I am going to post two of my posts from the MFSLive Forum regarding this issue and PM
> As I wrote here via those two posts... The PM jumper makes the situation even worse.
> 
> Scott


Got it...I remember reading that now. Shot in the dark, but not the results we/you were hoping for.

Thanks!


----------



## sheriffA

instead of me reading all 16 pages...

I just bought a 1TB WD (WDH1U10000N) for my tivo series 3, will it work?

It was only 269.99 from BB


----------



## richsadams

sheriffA said:


> instead of me reading all 16 pages...
> 
> I just bought a 1TB WD (WDH1U10000N) for my tivo series 3, will it work?
> 
> It was only 269.99 from BB


 It depends on what you mean by "work". As an external drive for your TiVo Series3? The short answer is no as that model only has a USB connection and your TiVo requires an eSATA drive/connection.

Probably not the answer you were hoping for...reading does help sometimes. 

Best bet is to read the very first post on the Official eSATA Drive Expansion in 9.2: FAQ + Discussion thread.

If you're searching for a 1TB plug and play eSATA drive there are a couple of options, both WD and Apricorn have models you could use. More here.


----------



## greg_burns

richsadams said:


> It depends on what you mean by "work". As an external drive for your TiVo Series3? The short answer is no as that model only has a USB connection and your TiVo requires an eSATA drive/connection.
> 
> Probably not the answer you were hoping for...reading does help sometimes.


All is not lost though. Since he has an S3, he can buy an eSata external enclosure and use the drive in it. I recommend the Antec MX-1.

Perhaps that was his intention all along. Although could have saved a few bucks by buying the bare drive.


----------



## richsadams

greg_burns said:


> All is not lost though. Since he has an S3, he can buy an eSata external enclosure and use the drive in it. I recommend the Antec MX-1.
> 
> Perhaps that was his intention all along. Although could have saved a few bucks by buying the bare drive.


True enough. But I think opening the My Book drives voids the warranty doesn't it?

Since he just bought it, it might be better to just return it and buy the bare drive and MX-1 enclosure.

Or if he's looking for a quick P&P solution, the new WD 1TB eSATA drive - $299 @ Costco (if he's a member) or the Apricorn 1TB DVR Xpander for $329 (after rebate).


----------



## jlib

MScottC said:


> ...The PM jumper makes the situation even worse.


 OK, thanks for clarifying that. I hadn't read the MFS Live forum yet. I will make it a point to keep up with it. So, we still have a genuine mystery here.


----------



## sheriffA

Thanks guys. I am a member of costco and i didn't open it yet so problem sovled


----------



## richsadams

sheriffA said:


> Thanks guys. I am a member of costco and i didn't open it yet so problem sovled


Good to hear. :up:

The aggravating part is that the actual WD 1TB drive is almost certainly the very same one in both WD's as well as Apricorn's products. I understand that there's an added cost for an eSATA/Firewire/USB bridge...but another $40 or $50+?! 

Anyway, enjoy all of that new-found recording space!


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

So are the reported problems with the WD10EACS with the original Series 3 box and not the TiVoHD?


----------



## MScottC

jlib said:


> OK, thanks for clarifying that. I hadn't read the MFS Live forum yet. I will make it a point to keep up with it. So, we still have a genuine mystery here.


As far as I know, no one has actually solved the issue. We've all just worked our way around it. In my case, by using a different brand of drive.

To the poster who asked



Tidal_Wave_One said:


> So are the reported problems with the WD10EACS with the original Series 3 box and not the TiVoHD?


Please scan back. This has been discussed over and over, both here and on the MFS forum.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

Are there any reported problems with the *WD10EACS* when used with a *THD internally*?


----------



## sheriffA

Thanks again,

Instead of me returning to BB and then Costco will the following WD Drive work WD10000CSRTL

It is available from BB too:
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...igital+1tb+sata&type=product&id=1186003685416


----------



## richsadams

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Are there any reported problems with the *WD10EACS* when used with a *THD internally*?


It is a bit confusing. In a nutshell:

It looks like the menu restart problem lies with the OEM model # WD10EACS - 00ZJBO (sold as a bare drive) of the WD 1TB GP HDD only and _only _when installed internally in a Series3 TiVo, not TiVo HD's.

The retail version, model # WD10EACS - 32ZJB0, sold in CE stores (boxed w/cable, CD ROM, hardware, etc.) does not seem to present any problems for Series3's or TiVo HD's when installed internally.

So as *MScottC *points out, based on earlier posts the answer to your question would be no.

Hope that helps.


----------



## aaronwt

sheriffA said:


> Thanks again,
> 
> Instead of me returning to BB and then Costco will the following WD Drive work WD10000CSRTL
> 
> It is available from BB too:
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...igital+1tb+sata&type=product&id=1186003685416


I'm using two of those I purchased in September when they were $260. They have been working fine in my Series 3 boxes.


----------



## richsadams

sheriffA said:


> Thanks again,
> 
> Instead of me returning to BB and then Costco will the following WD Drive work WD10000CSRTL
> 
> It is available from BB too:
> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...igital+1tb+sata&type=product&id=1186003685416


That drive is actually the original subject of this thread.

The link to BB is for the hard drive only, no enclosure, eSATA cable, etc.

It would work if you wanted to install it internally using WinMFS.

It would also work if you were to buy an enclosure (such as Antec's MX-1) and install it for use as an external drive.

As it is a drive only, it will not work out of the box as a P&P drive. The eSATA drive sold at Costco will.


----------



## richsadams

aaronwt said:


> I'm using two of those I purchased in September when they were $260. They have been working fine in my Series 3 boxes.


Indeed...and continued good news. :up: However the OP was originally looking for a eSATA P&P solution.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

richsadams said:


> It is a bit confusing. In a nutshell:
> 
> It looks like the menu restart problem lies with the OEM model # WD10EACS - 00ZJBO (sold as a bare drive) of the WD 1TB GP HDD only and _only _when installed internally in a Series3 TiVo, not TiVo HD's.


Ok, thank you... it is confusing also because it seems people refer to Series 3 and I don't know if that includes the THD or not. According to TiVo, the THD is a Series 3 too.

I think I will wait until there is a "slickdeal" on that drive. I missed it where you could get it for less than $200 with the PayPal rebate.


----------



## JKay

Hey Rich, is that new 1TB drive becoming a paper weight on your desk

For the sake of clarification; I used the old fashion method of setting up my retail WD 1TB Green Drive for internal use. I imaged the original S3 250 Gig drive to the 1TB drive and then expanded it to take advantage of all the real-estate. 

The new drive was installed back in September and everything worked properly. I didnt see any problems until the recent TiVo software upgrades started installing and I found the TiVo interface became some what sluggish.

The WD 1TB Green Drive has worked perfectly, however I wish I could go back about 3 revisions on the TiVo software and block future updates.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

Does the TiVo, when operating normally, become more sluggish as the HD space increases? Or is something wrong if this happens?


----------



## richsadams

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Ok, thank you... it is confusing also because it seems people refer to Series 3 and I don't know if that includes the THD or not. According to TiVo, the THD is a Series 3 too.
> 
> I think I will wait until there is a "slickdeal" on that drive. I missed it where you could get it for less than $200 with the PayPal rebate.


The newer TiVo HD's are indeed considered Series3's (says so on the front panel). However everyone here refers to them as TiVo HD's and the "original" TiVo Hi-def model as the Series3.

Deals on the WD 1TB GP HDD pop up on a regular basis now. I paid $259 a while back (September?) and I think the lowest I've seen recently (w/o having to do back flips of some sort) was $249. Your price will come around sooner or later.


----------



## richsadams

JKay said:


> Hey Rich, is that new 1TB drive becoming a paper weight on your desk
> 
> For the sake of clarification; I used the old fashion method of setting up my retail WD 1TB Green Drive for internal use. I imaged the original S3 250 Gig drive to the 1TB drive and then expanded it to take advantage of all the real-estate.
> 
> The new drive was installed back in September and everything worked properly. I didn't see any problems until the recent TiVo software upgrades started installing and I found the TiVo interface became some what sluggish.
> 
> The WD 1TB Green Drive has worked perfectly, however I wish I could go back about 3 revisions on the TiVo software and block future updates.


Wow, what a memory! Yes, I'm still looking at it...been waiting for the questions to clear up...plus watch some old recordings..."Almost there. Just a few more minutes". 

Good to hear everything is working for you...mostly anyway. I can't wait to swap mine out...although with the writer's strike it's getting thin out there and I don't need the space at the moment. But the time will come!

Hey, since you're familiar with WinMFS, etc., maybe you can help the fellow with this post out...he's trying to upgrade and has a couple of problems. :up:


----------



## richsadams

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Does the TiVo, when operating normally, become more sluggish as the HD space increases? Or is something wrong if this happens?


IIRC *JKay's *the first to note a menu slow-down with the new drive. The symptom has been reported many times elsewhere and is attributed to various and assorted causes including software upgrades, eSATA drives, the Recently Deleted folder filling up, HDD's (other types), etc.

The WD 1TB's are new enough and IMO haven't been in service long enough see any bugs like that. They may only begin to appear now or later. We'll have to wait and see if *JKay's *TiVo just needs some coffee  or if it's actually something to be concerned about.

I guess the answer to your question is that so far, no it's not usual...but again we're charting some new territory with larger and larger HDD's


----------



## mikeyts

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Ok, thank you... it is confusing also because it seems people refer to Series 3 and I don't know if that includes the THD or not. According to TiVo, the THD is a Series 3 too.


If you go to TiVo's product list page you see the "TiVo® Series2 DT DVR", "TiVo® HD DVR" and "TiVo® Series3 HD DVR". "Series3" is the only unique name that we were given for the product; confusing, piss-poor marketing, IMHO .


----------



## greg_burns

mikeyts said:


> If you go to TiVo's product list page you see the "TiVo® Series2 DT DVR", "TiVo® HD DVR" and "TiVo® Series3 HD DVR". "Series3" is the only unique name that we were given for the product; confusing, piss-poor marketing, IMHO .


What happened to the "TiVo® Series3 HD D*M*R" branding? That is what mine says on its face.


----------



## richsadams

greg_burns said:


> What happened to the "TiVo® Series3 HD D*M*R" branding? That is what mine says on its face.


You win!  We've been waiting for the price to to continue to drop before replacing our S2's, so we're TiVo HD challenged at the moment.

For now, going by this photo - "Series3" on the front and this photo - "Series3" on the box.

Same as yours?


----------



## greg_burns

richsadams said:


> Same as yours?


You asking me?

Too small to make out your picture of that TivoHD, but my S3 (the real McCoy ) says "The Series3 HD Digital Media Recorder" on the front and box.

http://www.tivolovers.com/photos/series3-review-photos/









http://www.tivolovers.com/photos/tivo-hd-review-photos/


----------



## richsadams

greg_burns said:


> You asking me?
> 
> Too small to make out your picture of that TivoHD, but my S3 (the real McCoy ) says "The Series3 HD Digital Media Recorder" on the front and box.


Yesiree, that's what our S3 looks like as well...and the THD also says "Series3" on the front...so it can be a bit confusing for the newly minted TiVoDevotee.


----------



## aaronwt

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Does the TiVo, when operating normally, become more sluggish as the HD space increases? Or is something wrong if this happens?


The first thing I do when I add my new drives is completely fill it up. All my boxes are full of HD content and I have no sluggishness.


----------



## Bodie

aaronwt said:


> The first thing I do when I add my new drives is completely fill it up. All my boxes are full of HD content and I have no sluggishness.
> 
> 3 x Series3(131 HD hours)(6 CC with FIOS)(2 x WD 1TB, Hitachi 1TB)
> TiVoHD(131 HD hours)(2 CC with FIOS)(Hitachi 1TB)
> TiVoHD(98 HD hours)(WD 750GB)


 That's a LOT of HD!!! How do you watch it all? (And here I'm just considering my second S3...lol)


----------



## dougdingle

cr33p said:


> Update to my dilemma, I have successfully been able to get my Tivo HD to boot with my new 750 gb WD hdd, the only way I have been able to accomplish this was to backup the original stock 160 drive and use its image, I tried 3 seperate images I have had since my other unit was introduced to the house. Shouldnt I be able to use an image from any unit? Then just clear & delete everything?


Apparently not. I believe the drive image is married to the unit in all previous TiVo version, and so I assume it's the same with the HD units. Which begs the question asking how those "drop in replacement" drive upgrades work. Perhaps they ask for your service number and embed it into the image somehow...


----------



## greg_burns

dougdingle said:


> Apparently not. I believe the drive image is married to the unit in all previous TiVo version, and so I assume it's the same with the HD units. Which begs the question asking how those "drop in replacement" drive upgrades work.


Images are model specific only.



dougdingle said:


> Perhaps they ask for your service number and embed it into the image somehow...


I believe the TSN is burned into the motherboard's ROM.


----------



## aaronwt

greg_burns said:


> Images are model specific only.
> 
> I believe the TSN is burned into the motherboard's ROM.


Over the Summer I used a drive from one Series 3 in another Series 3 and it worked fine after a Clear and delete. Just like in the past with the HDTiVos I had from DirecTV.


----------



## greg_burns

aaronwt said:


> Over the Summer I used a drive from one Series 3 in another Series 3 and it worked fine after a Clear and delete. Just like in the past with the HDTiVos I had from DirecTV.


Yep. Just can't use a 240 image on a 540. Nor a TivoHD image on an S3.


----------



## mappler

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Does the TiVo, when operating normally, become more sluggish as the HD space increases? Or is something wrong if this happens?


I recently (friday after Thanksgiving) put a 1TB drive in my TivoHD. Through absolutely no scientific tests, just personal observation, I feel my TivoHD is operating slightly faster than it was pre-upgrade. Not a HUGE difference, but the menus seem "peppy". As I said, I did no actual testing or performance measurement of this, so I could be totally wrong..

-Matt


----------



## AbMagFab

dougdingle said:


> Apparently not. I believe the drive image is married to the unit in all previous TiVo version, and so I assume it's the same with the HD units. Which begs the question asking how those "drop in replacement" drive upgrades work. Perhaps they ask for your service number and embed it into the image somehow...


Any image from the same model (e.g. any Series 3 image will work on any Series 3).

If it's not from the exact same machine, you'll need to do a C&DE, but that's it.

(This last step is where the OEM 1TB drive tends to completely fail, for what it's worth.)


----------



## AbMagFab

So anyone have any luck getting the OEM WD 1TB to work in a S3? Or should I swap my OEM with a non-OEM from my RAID array?


----------



## fluffie

thank you so much - i am now another successful upgrade to 1TB TiVoHD!!!! yay for me.  i almost got one of the external 500GB mydvrexpanders but canceled the order when it seemed like they were out of stock indefinately. now i am so glad i did! thanks!!!!!!


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

fluffie said:


> thank you so much - i am now another successful upgrade to 1TB TiVoHD!!!! yay for me.  i almost got one of the external 500GB mydvrexpanders but canceled the order when it seemed like they were out of stock indefinately. now i am so glad i did! thanks!!!!!!


What 1TB drive did you get? Any problems?


----------



## fluffie

i used the western digital green. the only problem i ran into was vista-related. i mounted the drives in a sata to usb enclosure. my vista machine did not want to recognize it but XP had no problem.


----------



## richsadams

AbMagFab said:


> So anyone have any luck getting the OEM WD 1TB to work in a S3? Or should I swap my OEM with a non-OEM from my RAID array?


If you're planning on an internal install and you can swap the OEM for the retail version, that's what I'd do. Based on all of the previous posts about the menu restart issue on S3's and the WD 1TB GP OEM drives it might save you some headaches IMHO.

If you're planning on using it as an expansion drive it appears that there's no problem. In fact according to this post, Apricorn is using the very same drive in their 1TB DVR Xpander eSATA drives.


----------



## dougdingle

So I've been running diagnostics on the drive for about 8 hours now in an open MX-1 case, and the drive is barely warm to the touch. Anyone running it in a fanless case with good results?


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> So I've been running diagnostics on the drive for about 8 hours now in an open MX-1 case, and the drive is barely warm to the touch. Anyone running it in a fanless case with good results?


Since it'll be running 24/7 I wouldn't risk an eSATA drive w/o a fan cooled enclosure. However, if there was ever one that would probably have the least problems with heat; it would be the WD 1TB GP drive. Under stress tests it's the second coolest drive on the market.










From this review at Tom's Hardware.


----------



## dougdingle

Thanks. It's an interesting dilemma when the drive is quieter than the fan cooling it...


----------



## Mack The Dog

I am using one of these drives in an MX-1 on my TiVoHD. Everything has worked well for over a month now. Within the past week, I have experienced a great deal of stuttering and random pausing (for 3 or more seconds) during recorded shows. This has made recorded shows practically unwatchable. One thing that I have noticed is that the light on the MX-1, which normally flickers constantly, goes dark prior to the stuttering. Has anyones else experienced this and/or does anyone have advice on how to resolve this issue?

Thanks in advance.


----------



## dougdingle

I have two MX-1's hooked to two Series 3 boxes, and I've never seen the blue light on the MX-1 flicker - always on solid. Strange...

Anyway, sorry to say but it sure sounds like the drive is dying...


----------



## Mack The Dog

dougdingle said:


> I have two MX-1's hooked to two Series 3 boxes, and I've never seen the blue light on the MX-1 flicker - always on solid. Strange...
> 
> Anyway, sorry to say but it sure sounds like the drive is dying...


Hmmm - I don't like the sound of that. Maybe I misspoke about the flickering - the light was practically on all of the time, it just seemed to flicker with the normal "crunching" sound that the drive was making. Are there any diagnostics that I could do on the drive? Any other suggestions?


----------



## richsadams

Mack The Dog said:


> Hmmm - I don't like the sound of that. Maybe I misspoke about the flickering - the light was practically on all of the time, it just seemed to flicker with the normal "crunching" sound that the drive was making. Are there any diagnostics that I could do on the drive? Any other suggestions?


Sorry to hear that you're having trouble. The most common cause for what you're seeing is a bad eSATA cable/connection. Check that your eSATA cable is snugly connected at both ends. Or it could be a bad cable. Are you using the cable that came with the MX-1? There were a number of reports of those being bad for several months, but (until possibly now) that seemed to have cleared up. You may have received one out of a some "older" inventory. The SIIG Serial ATA external cable is the recommended replacement.

If the cable is secure and good it could also be a problem with the HDD itself as *dougdingle *points out. There are a couple of options. One would be to run TiVo's diagnostics called "Kickstarts". The two that would apply are Kickstart 57 and/or 58.

Depending on which one you use, they may fix what ails it. I would recommend trying them in this order:

1. Kickstart 57
2. Kickstart 58

If that doesn't help you can easily run a diagnostic program on the drive since you're comfortable pulling it out and connecting to your PC. Western Digital's Lifeguard Diagnostic program will work on most drives. (There are also a number of commercial programs that you can buy.) Running a basic surface scan will keep your recordings intact. That will usually discover any problems but if not you may have to run a full/deep scan; one pass extended read, one pass extended write, and another pass extended read. That can take about 12 hours or more and it WILL wipe out the TiVo recordings you've made since installing the drive.

If you do remove the drive, remember to follow these steps:

1. Unplug TiVo.
2. Unplug your eSATA drive and cable from TiVo.
3. Do not plug TiVo back in until you reconnect the eSATA drive (or you will have to divorce the eSATA drive and lose your recordings).

When reconnecting your eSATA drive follow these steps:

1. Connect the eSATA cable to TiVo and the eSATA drive.
2. Plug the eSATA drive in and turn it on. Wait 10 - 15 seconds for the drive to spin up to speed.
3. Plug TiVo in and it will never know the drive went missing.

It's remotely possible that your TiVo's internal HDD is the problem or the imaging you originally did is acting up for some reason. That's unlikely since you should have seen an issue right away. TiVo's diagnostics may clean it up or it may not. Your last option would be to divorce your eSATA drive from TiVo (again, losing any recordings made since you first connected it) and see if it runs normally. If not, you may need to re-image the drive or if it is going bad, replace it.

Hope that helps and let us know how it goes.

BTW, our MX-1's blue light barely flickers when it's active&#8230;it's almost imperceptible. However others here have said that they can see a definite flicker. It may depend on the HDD itself.


----------



## brettatk

Rich,

I think I have this down, but could you please confirm this for me. From what I gather using the OEM version of the WD 1TB Green drive will work internally for a Tivo HD, but it can cause problems if used internally on a S3 HD Tivo. I'm getting a Tivo HD today and plan on upgrading the internal drive to the WD 1TB OEM version after my cable company gets the CableCards working properly. Just want to make sure this will not cause me problems down the road. Thanks!!


----------



## richsadams

brettatk said:


> Rich,
> 
> I think I have this down, but could you please confirm this for me. From what I gather using the OEM version of the WD 1TB Green drive will work internally for a Tivo HD, but it can cause problems if used internally on a S3 HD Tivo. I'm getting a Tivo HD today and plan on upgrading the internal drive to the WD 1TB OEM version after my cable company gets the CableCards working properly. Just want to make sure this will not cause me problems down the road. Thanks!!


Based on numerous posts here...that seems to be the case. When the OEM version of these drives are installed internally they give TiVo Series3's heartburn on a menu restart for some unknown reason.

No guarantees...and others with success stories can chime in...but the OEM _or _retail models of the drive seem to work without a problem in TiVo HD's.

We're going to replace our S2's w/THD's pretty soon and I'll probably do the same thing...so thanks for blazing the trail! :up:


----------



## brettatk

richsadams said:


> Based on numerous posts here...that seems to be the case. When the OEM version of these drives are installed internally they give TiVo Series3's heartburn on a menu restart for some unknown reason.
> 
> No guarantees...and others with success stories can chime in...but the OEM _or _retail models of the drive seem to work without a problem in TiVo HD's.
> 
> We're going to replace our S2's w/THD's pretty soon and I'll probably do the same thing...so thanks for blazing the trail! :up:


Thanks for the confirmation. I was getting lightheaded after reading through the entire thread. If I can get my CableCard's installed early next week I'll do the upgrade then. I'll be sure to let you know if I run into any trouble using the OEM WD drive.


----------



## Mack The Dog

Rich-

Thanks for the suggestions above. I am using the recommended SIIG cable. Trying the Kickstart 57 is running now - I'll probably run Kickstart 58 as well, just to be sure.

My fingers are crossed...


----------



## Mack The Dog

Ok, I did both Kickstarts and the problem is still there. I ran the basic WD Diagnostic and the drive passed. I then contacted WD tech support and gave them a rundown of what had done. They told me to do the extended diagnostic and that this would NOT erase any data from the drive. Once that is done, if the drive shows errors they will replace - if it doesn't, I am not sure what options I have. He did ask what system I was running the drive in - I didn't know, so I answered by saying "The drive had been working well up until a week or so ago."

One thing that seemed bizarre was that in the opening screen of the WD Diagnostic you can right click on the drive and get "Properties." The internal drive on my machine (a laptop) indicated that the Health was "Good." For the WD drive, the Health category said "Warning" - I gave this tidbit of information to tech support and he didn't offer any answers, just said that I need to run the full diagnostic.

09:02:36 left to go on the test...


----------



## AbMagFab

Mack The Dog said:


> One thing that seemed bizarre was that in the opening screen of the WD Diagnostic you can right click on the drive and get "Properties." The internal drive on my machine (a laptop) indicated that the Health was "Good." For the WD drive, the Health category said "Warning" - I gave this tidbit of information to tech support and he didn't offer any answers, just said that I need to run the full diagnostic.
> 
> 09:02:36 left to go on the test...


Did you open up the SMART data? I think Warning is related to SMART errors, which would clearly mean drive failure.


----------



## dougdingle

Mack The Dog said:


> One thing that seemed bizarre was that in the opening screen of the WD Diagnostic you can right click on the drive and get "Properties." The internal drive on my machine (a laptop) indicated that the Health was "Good." For the WD drive, the Health category said "Warning" - I gave this tidbit of information to tech support and he didn't offer any answers, just said that I need to run the full diagnostic.
> 
> 09:02:36 left to go on the test...


I got the identical warning on the identical drive with those diagnostics, but it passed the extended diagnostics test (and other tests for 3 or 4 days) before being hooked to my S3 and has so far recorded about 40 hours of HD with no issues.

I suspect the warning may have something to do with the drive's OEM status or not being initialized for Windows use, and not actual drive problems, but can't be sure, of course.


----------



## richsadams

Mack The Dog said:


> Ok, I did both Kickstarts and the problem is still there. I ran the basic WD Diagnostic and the drive passed. I then contacted WD tech support and gave them a rundown of what had done. They told me to do the extended diagnostic and that this would NOT erase any data from the drive. Once that is done, if the drive shows errors they will replace - if it doesn't, I am not sure what options I have. He did ask what system I was running the drive in - I didn't know, so I answered by saying "The drive had been working well up until a week or so ago."
> 
> One thing that seemed bizarre was that in the opening screen of the WD Diagnostic you can right click on the drive and get "Properties." The internal drive on my machine (a laptop) indicated that the Health was "Good." For the WD drive, the Health category said "Warning" - I gave this tidbit of information to tech support and he didn't offer any answers, just said that I need to run the full diagnostic.
> 
> 09:02:36 left to go on the test...


Thanks for the additional info...all good.

They're right, running the program's extended diagnostic won't wipe the content and is a good idea. What I do before I use a drive now is an extended read/write/read, the write part would wipe any existing content. As long as it's read-only, you should be good to go. IIRC there are other posts somewhere on the forum that said that even when their drive passed the extended diagnostics it still failed so I guess theres no guarantee. If this drive passes inspection the next step will be to test your internal drive I suppose.

Not sure about the warning message as I havent ever seen it. As *AbMagFab *said, it sounds worrisome, but then as *dougdingle *suggests, it may be nothing to worry about. 

Good luck and let us know what happens! :up:


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

This seems like a good deal on a 750GB drive ($150 with free shipping) but I'm holding out for the 1TB at $200 or so.

http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?threadid=680907


----------



## Mack The Dog

AbMagFab said:


> Did you open up the SMART data? I think Warning is related to SMART errors, which would clearly mean drive failure.


I did not open the SMART data. In the SMART data column, it says "? Not Available." The drive is in the MX-1 connected to a laptop via USB - I am not sure if SMART data is available over USB (I suspect not).

The indepth scan is still going, so this may be jumping the gun. What happens if the drive passes the diagnostic, I hook it back up to my TiVo and still experience the same issues? I am pretty sure that the problem is related to this drive in the MX-1 and not the internal drive since the light on the front goes dark whenever I experience the problem.


----------



## AbMagFab

Mack The Dog said:


> I did not open the SMART data. In the SMART data column, it says "? Not Available." The drive is in the MX-1 connected to a laptop via USB - I am not sure if SMART data is available over USB (I suspect not).
> 
> The indepth scan is still going, so this may be jumping the gun. What happens if the drive passes the diagnostic, I hook it back up to my TiVo and still experience the same issues? I am pretty sure that the problem is related to this drive in the MX-1 and not the internal drive since the light on the front goes dark whenever I experience the problem.


Yeah, you can only see SMART data when connected directly via SATA, no enclosure.

I would suggest you do that once before committing to the drive. SMART corrections won't show up anywhere else, and can mask a failing drive for quite a while. If it's slight, it's normal. If it's increasing, it could be a problem that will bite you.


----------



## Mack The Dog

Mack The Dog said:


> The indepth scan is still going, so this may be jumping the gun.


A dialog window just popped up after seven and a half hours:

"Too many bad sectors detected."

I take it that this means that I'll be getting a new drive. WD customer service is now closed, so I'll have to wait for tomorrow (or more likely Monday) to find out how to proceed.

Thanks to *richsadams*, *AbMagFab* and *dougdingle* for the help and advice.


----------



## greg_burns

Mack The Dog said:


> I take it that this means that I'll be getting a new drive. WD customer service is now closed, so I'll have to wait for tomorrow (or more likely Monday) to find out how to proceed.


You can fill out an RMA online.

http://support.wdc.com/warranty/selection.asp?custtype=end


----------



## richsadams

Mack The Dog said:


> A dialog window just popped up after seven and a half hours:
> 
> "Too many bad sectors detected."
> 
> I take it that this means that I'll be getting a new drive. WD customer service is now closed, so I'll have to wait for tomorrow (or more likely Monday) to find out how to proceed.
> 
> Thanks to *richsadams*, *AbMagFab* and *dougdingle* for the help and advice.


Sorry to hear about your drive.  But glad that's it's sorted out and that it's not a TiVo issue. It's much easier to pop in a new drive than try to diagnose a TiVo related problem and ultimately end up having to replace it.

I can't remember if you told us...but if not, can you give us the model number before you send it back? I'm curious to know if it was an OEM drive or a retail version.

It should have one of these numbers on the drive label:

WD 1TB OEM HDD: Model # WD10EACS-*00ZJB0*

WD 1TB Retail HDD: Model # WD10EACS-*32ZJB0*

WD shouldn't give you any grief...I hear they're pretty good about replacing them right away.


----------



## Mack The Dog

Rich-

Going by your chart, it was an OEM drive. I logged onto the WD support site (thanks greg) and was able to select the expidited method where they send me a new drive and I have 30 days to send my old one back. The site says I should receive the drive within 3-5 days.

I will now wait for the drive, and try to figure out my options with MFSCopy (whether I want to try to copy from the old drive to the new to preserve my recordings).

Thanks again for the help and advice.


----------



## richsadams

Mack The Dog said:


> Rich-
> 
> Going by your chart, it was an OEM drive. I logged onto the WD support site (thanks greg) and was able to select the expidited method where they send me a new drive and I have 30 days to send my old one back. The site says I should receive the drive within 3-5 days.
> 
> I will now wait for the drive, and try to figure out my options with MFSCopy (whether I want to try to copy from the old drive to the new to preserve my recordings).
> 
> Thanks again for the help and advice.


Thanks for checking. It's good to keep track of these things. :up:


----------



## doctord

I have been using the oem WD 1TB drive in my S3 for a few weeks. I have had no problems. The only problem I had with the whole process was the initial full copy of my existing drive using WinMFS. It froze twice but I was sucessful on the third attempt. While I was doing the transfer from my old 500GB Maxtor drive, the difference in temperature of the drives was dramatic. The WD was barely warm to the touch while the Maxtor was hot.


----------



## titsataki

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> This seems like a good deal on a 750GB drive ($150 with free shipping) but I'm holding out for the 1TB at $200 or so.
> 
> http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?threadid=680907


This is the one?

you guys think it would drop over $50 soon?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136151


----------



## richsadams

titsataki said:


> This is the one?
> 
> you guys think it would drop over $50 soon?
> 
> http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136151


That's one version of the drive we've been discussing and that some are using.

However, beware that if you're going to do an internal install on a Series3 the OEM version which newegg and other online resellers offer has caused menu restart problems. (See earlier posts). They seem to work okay when installed internally in TiVo HD's and as eSATA drives for both models.

You can find the retail version which reportedly works in all situations at various CE stores.

IMHO I don't see them dropping to under $200 any time soon but you may find a rebate offer or something similar.


----------



## jlib

doctord said:


> I have been using the oem WD 1TB drive in my S3 for a few weeks. I have had no problems...


Can you verify that you have no menu restart problems with your system? That is, restarting via the menu command rather than unplugging and replugging in the S3 manually.


----------



## aaronwt

Has it been determined what the difference is between the retail and the OEM version that would cause the problems? My two drives were retail versions but I'm probably going to get a couple more to replace my two Hitachi 1TB drives and use my Hitachis in my PCs.


----------



## AbMagFab

aaronwt said:


> Has it been determined what the difference is between the retail and the OEM version that would cause the problems? My two drives were retail versions but I'm probably going to get a couple more to replace my two Hitachi 1TB drives and use my Hitachis in my PCs.


What the difference is? No. And since it works in the THD and not the S3, it might even be SATA-controller specific.

I have one OEM in my THD with no problems. I tried putting one in my S3 and it croaked. I couldn't get it to reboot from a C&DE.

I also have a PC RAID array with these, and my hot spare was a retail version. So I just swapped the two and my S3 is fine.

Stay away from the OEM versions of these for S3's.


----------



## sender_name

i too have an OEM 1tb wd. It does not work. i did a winmfs copy and when installed the S3 hangs on the startup screen. I let it sit for an hour...nothing..I tried unplugging it and then plugging it back in quickly...nothing. I am goin to copy the drive again but NOT do the full expansion to 144hrs from 133hrs...I will update


----------



## richsadams

sender_name said:


> i too have an OEM 1tb wd. It does not work. i did a winmfs copy and when installed the S3 hangs on the startup screen. I let it sit for an hour...nothing..I tried unplugging it and then plugging it back in quickly...nothing. I am goin to copy the drive again but NOT do the full expansion to 144hrs from 133hrs...I will update


Thanks for that. Others have reported that the OEM drive works fine w/S3's on a hard reboot, but hangs on a menu restart. So your initial experience is that it hangs at the Powering up screen no matter what? That may just be a problem with the image...or possibly a bad drive I suppose, but not likely IMO.

Thanks again, good luck and let us know how it goes.


----------



## sender_name

Ok, no dice. I wiped the WD1tb oem, recopied from my original drive, DID NOT expand and it still would not work...IDK what the issue is but these OEM's just do not want to work. I left the case cover off when i powered up and could hear the drive spin up, and 'seek' but it never got off of the initial startup screen after 10 min. THe original drive takes less than 90sec to get to the almost there...I guess I will have to get a retail 1gb and throw this one in my next pc i build next year


btw, i am using winmfs...I might try something else, but i am convinced they are incompatible


----------



## richsadams

Hmmm...if you can exchange it for a retail version that's probably best. But again, the other OEM's do boot up okay, it's just the menu restart that's a problem w/S3's. Sounds more like something is wrong with the drive. But if you're going to exchange it, no need to run any diagnostic tests on it. Hang in there...things will work sooner or later!


----------



## titsataki

richsadams said:


> That's one version of the drive we've been discussing and that some are using.
> 
> However, beware that if you're going to do an internal install on a Series3 the OEM version which newegg and other online resellers offer has caused menu restart problems. (See earlier posts). They seem to work okay when installed internally in TiVo HD's and as eSATA drives for both models.
> 
> You can find the retail version which reportedly works in all situations at various CE stores.
> 
> IMHO I don't see them dropping to under $200 any time soon but you may find a rebate offer or something similar.


I am not ready to spend the $350 on the retail. My Tivo e-SATA works fine for now. I will wait and keep looking.

Cheers

Nick


----------



## AbMagFab

richsadams said:


> Hmmm...if you can exchange it for a retail version that's probably best. But again, the other OEM's do boot up okay, it's just the menu restart that's a problem w/S3's. Sounds more like something is wrong with the drive. But if you're going to exchange it, no need to run any diagnostic tests on it. Hang in there...things will work sooner or later!


This isn't entirely true. If you do a C&DE, your S3 is basically dead. It will never reboot fully, no matter what you do.

So a long as you are restoring from the original image of that S3 (not trying to backup/restore an already modified S3), and as long as you never do a C&DE, you'll be fine.

Otherwise, the OEM drive won't work at all.


----------



## doctord

jlib said:


> Can you verify that you have no menu restart problems with your system? That is, restarting via the menu command rather than unplugging and replugging in the S3 manually.


I previously reported that I am sucessfully running an oem WD green 1TB drive, that I purchased from Newegg during the $249 deal, internally in my S3. I finally got around to trying a menu restart last night and it re-booted with no issues. My experience contrasts with the experience others were reporting.


----------



## richsadams

AbMagFab said:


> This isn't entirely true. If you do a C&DE, your S3 is basically dead. It will never reboot fully, no matter what you do.
> 
> So a long as you are restoring from the original image of that S3 (not trying to backup/restore an already modified S3), and as long as you never do a C&DE, you'll be fine.
> 
> Otherwise, the OEM drive won't work at all.


Well that's a new wrinkle. If I understand your post correctly you're saying that if someone performs a clear and delete everything on a stock TiVo drive and then uses that drive to image a new/larger drive that it will brick a Series3 when trying to use the upgraded drive? I'd never heard of that...and I'm not clear as to why.

I thought a C&DE deleted recordings, Wish Lists, Season Passes, guided setup, etc. but you're saying it deletes the files needed to use the drive to upgrade as well? Interesting. Is that applicable to all TiVo's?

If that is the case I would imagine that the original drive could be reinstalled to get TiVo working again. Then what would need to be done to get the drive back to a state where it will be useful as an image for a new drive; run guided setup?

I don't think that fact has ever been included in any of the forum's directions or on MFSLive and if that's the case it certainly should be. I can imagine some people that aren't interested in keeping their current WL's, SP's, etc. thinking that it would speed things up to do a C&DE before imaging a new drive.

Thanks in advance for any additional info.


----------



## richsadams

doctord said:


> I previously reported that I am successfully running an oem WD green 1TB drive, that I purchased from Newegg during the $249 deal, internally in my S3. I finally got around to trying a menu restart last night and it re-booted with no issues. My experience contrasts with the experience others were reporting.


That's very useful information, thanks!

You didn't happen to jot down the full drive model number by chance? I'd be interested in knowing if it's the exact same one as we've been talking about or if there is possibly a third model in the wild now. If you have it and can post it that would be welcome.

Enjoy all of that new recording space! :up:


----------



## richsadams

titsataki said:


> I am not ready to spend the $350 on the retail. My Tivo e-SATA works fine for now. I will wait and keep looking.
> 
> Cheers
> 
> Nick


Understood. I paid $259 at BB when the drives first came out and I think some others have found them on sale for a little bit less since then. Like everything else electronic, they'll come down to a price you can live with pretty soon.


----------



## sender_name

i have been poking around...Can someone tell me exactly what i should be doing as far as running diagnostics on the 1tb oem drive to confirm that the drive is not faulty? Thanks...
Also, do you have to mount the drive to do these diagnostics, or can i plug it in and go?



Oh DoctorD , what method did you use for imaging your 1tb?


----------



## shaggy2002

I am upgrading to the 1 TB Green WD drive and am trying to do a surface scan as described in the thread. Is the Extended test considered the surface scan? Or is it a different option?


----------



## richsadams

sender_name said:


> i have been poking around...Can someone tell me exactly what i should be doing as far as running diagnostics on the 1tb oem drive to confirm that the drive is not faulty? Thanks...
> Also, do you have to mount the drive to do these diagnostics, or can i plug it in and go?


The retail version of the drive comes with the WD Data Lifeguard Tools on the CD ROM included in the package.

If you have the OEM version you can download the program here:

http://support.wdc.com/download/index.asp?cxml=n&pid=40&swid=3

The instructions for downloading and using the program are on the web page below the download button.

You can do a quick test and an extended test without wiping the content. One or the other will usually find any problems. However you may have to perform a write/read test. Keep in mind that if you perform a write/read test you will lose all of the recordings made since you installed the drive.



shaggy2002 said:


> I am upgrading to the 1 TB Green WD drive and am trying to do a surface scan as described in the thread. Is the Extended test considered the surface scan? Or is it a different option?


Most problems will be found with a basic surface scan. I always like to run a full read/write/read test on new drives before I install them. That takes about 12 hours.


----------



## doctord

sender_name said:


> Oh DoctorD , what method did you use for imaging your 1tb?


I used WinMFS to do a full copy of my previous 500GB drive; expanded to 1TB and supersized. The copy took 3 tries as it froze the first two. Third time was a charm.


----------



## aaronwt

DId it actually freeze? Many time with WinMFS it looks like it's frozen but it's still working in the background. At least that's how it's always worked for me everytime I've used it. I just leave it alone working in the background and after an hour or two, depending on how much has to be copied, it will be finished.


----------



## Marc

When I did a drive copy with WinMFS that took a long time, I used the Task Manager to monitor its progress. I enabled the columns for I/O Read Bytes and I/O Write Bytes. They pretty closely matched the capacity of the drive when the copy finished, so it seems to be a fairly accurate metric in the absence of WinMFS's own progress bar.


----------



## sender_name

thanks richsadams...time to mess around w/ my 1tb oem...So far DoctorD is one of the few OEM success stories i have found..as far as erasing the drive, that is no prob. I have my original 250gb in the unit and a saved image from winmfs. Thanks for the info


----------



## myosh

Has anyone tried the Western Digital 1TB My Book Home (WDH1CS10000N) on the TiVoHD or Series3? My local Costco (Santa Clara, CA) has this drive on sale for $279.99.

I picked one up but it's going to be a backup drive for my Mac. Just curious if anyone has used this drive on their TiVo.


----------



## sender_name

i believe if you open the case it is the same exact wd1000 drive and you can throw it right in the unit...


----------



## richsadams

myosh said:


> Has anyone tried the Western Digital 1TB My Book Home (WDH1CS10000N) on the TiVoHD or Series3? My local Costco (Santa Clara, CA) has this drive on sale for $279.99.
> 
> I picked one up but it's going to be a backup drive for my Mac. Just curious if anyone has used this drive on their TiVo.


Several people have tried it and unfortunately the drive in question does not work as an eSATA drive, nor should it be used as an internal drive for a TiVo Series3 unit.

TiVo Series3's and TiVo HD's do not recognize the drive for expansion. Speculation as to why has to do with the enclosure's three-way bridge (USB/Firewire/eSATA). More info can be found on the first post of the Official eSATA Drive Expansion in 9.2: FAQ + Discussion thread.

The drive inside the enclosure is almost certainly an OEM version which has (in all but one reported case) failed to work as an internal drive in TiVo Series3's due to failed menu restarts. You can read earlier posts on this thread for more information.

Bottom line is that the Western Digital 1TB My Book Home external HDD is not recommended for use with any TiVo.


----------



## richsadams

sender_name said:


> i believe if you open the case it is the same exact wd1000 drive and you can throw it right in the unit...


That would be nice if it were true, but as mentioned above, the OEM verison of the drive in question won't work with a Series3 internally or externally and should probably be avoided all together if possible. Only the retail version is recommended for Series3 internal or external applications.

The "retail" version of this drive can usually be purchased from brick and mortar CE stores like Circuit City, Best Buy, etc. They come in a box which includes a CD ROM, cable and mounting hardware, like this. (The retail version can usually be found for considerably less than the current BB price when it is on sale.)

The only way to tell the difference is by the full model number:

WD 1TB OEM HDD: Model # WD10EACS-*00ZJB0*

WD 1TB Retail HDD: Model # WD10EACS-*32ZJB0*


----------



## sender_name

yeah, you're right, I was wondering what kind of a drive they put in there...THey 1tb retail can be found online under the product number WD10000CSRTL
that is the retail....

BTW as far as my OEM goes...
I have tried the WINMFS + no supersize 2x =Hangs on Welcome, Powering Up...
Winmfs w/ supersize 1x hangs on welcome

bumwines knoppix copy also hangs on welcom, powering up. I have left each running at least 15 min...all failed.
THe drive itself functions perfectly, as verified by the western digital tools posted earlier...Basically DON'T buy the OEM..that is it. There has been 1 case reported here of it working, and 1 on the newegg comments...after that, nada...I will be picking up a retail drive, it is onsale on Amazon for like 265 right now.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

sender_name said:


> I will be picking up a retail drive, it is onsale on Amazon for like 265 right now.


Where? It comes up $390.85 for me! Ouch.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...t_shr?_encoding=UTF8&m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&v=glance


----------



## dougdingle

Marc said:


> When I did a drive copy with WinMFS that took a long time, I used the Task Manager to monitor its progress. I enabled the columns for I/O Read Bytes and I/O Write Bytes. They pretty closely matched the capacity of the drive when the copy finished, so it seems to be a fairly accurate metric in the absence of WinMFS's own progress bar.


Brilliant. Thanks.:up:


----------



## teemu

I just want to add my own OEM WD drive experience into the mix here. There really does appear to something pretty fishy with the OEM drives. I installed the 1TB drive in my HD as a replacement drive using WinMFS. Worked brilliantly for about 1.5 months. Then, last week, after a power failure, the HD refused to boot. I tried everything! I did the extended tests the WD utility, wiped the drive with 0's, etc. The diagnostics were clean, the wipe worked perfectly. I even mounted the drive in XP, copied hundreds of gigs back and forth, checked for errors, etc. Nothing. Drive is clean, but it just won't work in the HD. I can get it to boot without expanding the space, but that's not much use. So now I'm back to my original 160GB drive in the HD and a 1TB drive sitting on my desk. I can't really understand why it worked for as long as it did. Plenty of hard reboots and menu restarts in the 1.5 months that it worked. Weird. Stay away from the OEM drives!


----------



## AbMagFab

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Where? It comes up $390.85 for me! Ouch.
> 
> http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...t_shr?_encoding=UTF8&m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&v=glance


Look at "New & Used"... I wouldn't feel comfortable buying from those no-namers though... I'd bet it's the OEM drive from them.


----------



## richsadams

dougdingle said:


> Brilliant. Thanks.:up:


Even better is using Windows Process Explorer (freebie from MS). After you install it, run it, click on "Options" and click Use in lieu of Task Manager (or something to that effect). From then on the program will run instead of Task Manager. It is much more robust and detailed. It also allows you to hunt down and kill any program that happen to hang immediately.

However, as others have said, the WinMFS program can take a while to run so give it time.


----------



## georgepds

richsadams said:


> Even better is using Windows Process Explorer (freebie from MS).


FWIIW procexp was written by the fellow who figured out that Sony was putting a root kit on their DVDs. He ran sysinternals.com, with loads of great freeware, till last year, when MS bought him out

Every MS computer I own has procexp on it

--G


----------



## jraneses

All,

Late last week, the stock hard drive in one of my TiVo S3s died, so I started looking into replacing it with either a 750 GB or 1 TB Western Digital. After having read this and other threads, I decided to go with the 1 TB WD green drive. Given how expensive the retail version (WD10000CSRTL) is currently running, I took a hard look at the OEM version. Some of the posts here have expressed various issues with it, so I was hesitant to pick it up.

Over the weekend, I noticed Best Buy was running a sale on the WD My Book Essential 1 TB external drive (WDH1U10000N) for about $242 with a 12&#37; reward zone discount. The external model is known to contain the OEM version of the green drive, so I considered buying the external model, pulling the drive out, and possibly use the empty enclosure to house one of my spare SATA drives.

In the end, I couldn't pass up the deal, and I'm pleased to say that everything worked out beautifully. I was able to pull the drive out of the WDH1U10000N with minimal effort and no damage to the enclosure, which was a big plus. The model number of the enclosed drive is WD10EACS-00ZJB0, manufactured September 2007.

I swapped out the failed drive in the S3 with the 1 TB green drive, and thus far, it's been working great. Of the noted issues I've seen reported about the OEM version of the drive, I haven't had any problems restarting the S3 whatsoever. Regular menu restarts work fine, as do hard restarts.

System information is reporting 131 hours of HD recording, 1244 standard definition. 

Cheers,

Jason


----------



## richsadams

jraneses said:


> All,
> 
> Late last week, the stock hard drive in one of my TiVo S3s died, so I started looking into replacing it with either a 750 GB or 1 TB Western Digital. After having read this and other threads, I decided to go with the 1 TB WD green drive. Given how expensive the retail version (WD10000CSRTL) is currently running, I took a hard look at the OEM version. Some of the posts here have expressed various issues with it, so I was hesitant to pick it up.
> 
> Over the weekend, I noticed Best Buy was running a sale on the WD My Book Essential 1 TB external drive (WDH1U10000N) for about $242 with a 12% reward zone discount. The external model is known to contain the OEM version of the green drive, so I considered buying the external model, pulling the drive out, and possibly use the empty enclosure to house one of my spare SATA drives.
> 
> In the end, I couldn't pass up the deal, and I'm pleased to say that everything worked out beautifully. I was able to pull the drive out of the WDH1U10000N with minimal effort and no damage to the enclosure, which was a big plus. I swapped out the failed drive in the S3 with the 1 TB green drive, and thus far, it's been working great. Of the noted issues I've seen reported about the OEM version of the drive, I haven't had any problems restarting the S3 whatsoever.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Jason


Thanks for the update Jason, much appreciated. :up:

Couple of things that will help our "record keeping". If you have it, can you please post the full model number of the drive you installed internally in your Series3? It will look like one of these (could possibly be a different number):

WD10EACS-*00ZJB0* or WD10EACS-*32ZJB0*

Also to clarify, have you tried a regular menu restart (not unplugged reboot) and if so how did it go?

Thanks again and congrats on bringing your TiVo back to life!


----------



## teemu

jraneses said:


> All,
> 
> Late last week, the stock hard drive in one of my TiVo S3s died, so I started looking into replacing it with either a 750 GB or 1 TB Western Digital. After having read this and other threads, I decided to go with the 1 TB WD green drive. Given how expensive the retail version (WD10000CSRTL) is currently running, I took a hard look at the OEM version. Some of the posts here have expressed various issues with it, so I was hesitant to pick it up.
> 
> Over the weekend, I noticed Best Buy was running a sale on the WD My Book Essential 1 TB external drive (WDH1U10000N) for about $242 with a 12% reward zone discount. The external model is known to contain the OEM version of the green drive, so I considered buying the external model, pulling the drive out, and possibly use the empty enclosure to house one of my spare SATA drives.
> 
> In the end, I couldn't pass up the deal, and I'm pleased to say that everything worked out beautifully. I was able to pull the drive out of the WDH1U10000N with minimal effort and no damage to the enclosure, which was a big plus. The model number of the enclosed drive is WD10EACS-00ZJB0, manufactured September 2007.
> 
> I swapped out the failed drive in the S3 with the 1 TB green drive, and thus far, it's been working great. Of the noted issues I've seen reported about the OEM version of the drive, I haven't had any problems restarting the S3 whatsoever. Regular menu restarts work fine, as do hard restarts.
> 
> System information is reporting 131 hours of HD recording, 1244 standard definition.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Jason


Just out of curiosity, did you happen to notice if any of the 4 jumpers were closed?

FWIW, my drive is also a WD10EACS-00ZJB0 dated in September of 2007. No jumpers.


----------



## jraneses

teemu said:


> Just out of curiosity, did you happen to notice if any of the 4 jumpers were closed?
> 
> FWIW, my drive is also a WD10EACS-00ZJB0 dated in September of 2007. No jumpers.


From what I recall, there were no jumpers closed on the drive.

For what it's worth, I used the Weaknees SATA iso during the drive upgrade, only retaining the TiVo operating system, omitting any recordings. Afterward, I fired up the Hitachi drive feature tool. DFT noted the acoustics were already set to 128 on the new drive, so it wasn't necessary to bring it down.


----------



## sender_name

waaait a minute...you got a WD10EACS-00ZJB0 to work...How the heck do we flash the firmware on an OEM 1tb and get these damn things to be compatible already....


----------



## teemu

Not sure who you're asking, but I had an OEM drive working for about 1.5 months. Added as an internal replacement for the 160GB in the HD. It suddenly stopped working and I've been unable to get it to work like it did. I used WinMFS to do the upgrade and the 1st time through, everything went according to plan. No problems.


----------



## sender_name

i was talking about jranses...he said


> In the end, I couldn't pass up the deal, and I'm pleased to say that everything worked out beautifully. I was able to pull the drive out of the WDH1U10000N with minimal effort and no damage to the enclosure, which was a big plus. The model number of the enclosed drive is WD10EACS-00ZJB0


that is the model that also arrives as an OEM drive...the 00JB0...somehow the drive is capable of working in a series 3 when removed from that enclosure, but not when bought oem...That means that there must be something done to the firmware to make it compatible w. the sata enclosure and perhaps this process could be applied to an OEM drive of the same model #...I would love to see if the oem's can be inserted into that enclosure and if they work. I bet the oems are shipped w/ out some sort of software update that the enclosed drives get...to save money


----------



## mattack

teemu said:


> Not sure who you're asking, but I had an OEM drive working for about 1.5 months. Added as an internal replacement for the 160GB in the HD. It suddenly stopped working and I've been unable to get it to work like it did. I used WinMFS to do the upgrade and the 1st time through, everything went according to plan. No problems.


dumb question, but are you sure you didn't hit some specific limit, like maybe fill it up over halfway or something, when it suddenly stopped working?

i.e. if the upgrade didn't work right, the addressing *could* have worked up until you hit a certain block value that didn't match what the Tivo filesystem thought it meant.


----------



## jraneses

richsadams said:


> That's possible, but I'm still waiting for *jraneses *to answer two questions from my earlier post.
> 
> It sounds like he may have tried a menu restart but this needs to be confirmed. And I don't know if he'll be able to deliver, but we really need the full drive model number to determine if it is in fact the OEM version, the retail version (unlikely, but possible) or a whole other version all together (not likely either, but also possible).
> 
> The other concern is *teemu's* post regarding his OEM drive working but then failing completely although it passes all diagnostic tests and works with his computer.
> 
> Without *jraneses' *replies plus Teemu's post not to mention almost a dozen other's failed experiences with the OEM drive in their Series3's, I'd still be very cautious about doing anything with them...if in fact the ones in the My Book version are OEM's that is.
> 
> My take would be that if there is a firmware difference between the OEM we've been dealing with as well as the retail version, there would likely be a model number difference as well.


Rich, I went ahead and updated my original post earlier in the day to keep all the relevant info in one spot. Please refer to that post, but indeed, my drive model matches the OEM model number you supplied, manufactured in September 2007. In regard to the restart methods tested, both soft (menu) and hard resets work fine.


----------



## richsadams

*jraneses *, thanks for that...got it all now. Phew...seems we're both posting at the same time. I'll kick back and watch for a while. 

Well...you're another pioneer! Thanks! :up:


----------



## jraneses

richsadams said:


> *jraneses *, thanks for that...got it all now. Phew...seems we're both posting at the same time. I'll kick back and watch for a while.
> 
> Well...you're another pioneer! Thanks! :up:


Probably not a pioneer, but definitely a guinea pig. 

I thought long and hard before I cracked open the enclosure, because if things didn't work out, knowing Best Buy I'd have had a hell of a time returning the drive.


----------



## teemu

mattack said:


> dumb question, but are you sure you didn't hit some specific limit, like maybe fill it up over halfway or something, when it suddenly stopped working?
> 
> i.e. if the upgrade didn't work right, the addressing *could* have worked up until you hit a certain block value that didn't match what the Tivo filesystem thought it meant.


I think my 1TB was nearly full when it stopped working (mostly Tivo Suggestions!). The frustrating part about all this is that I can't even get the drive to work after low level formatting it. Passes all the Western Digital diagnostics and low level formatted without a problem. After wiping with 0's the drive should be like it was the day that I got it and managed to make it work. I've tried using WinMFS to make a copy, I've tried the the boot cd, restoring my truncated backup from the day I did the original upgrade, a recent truncated restore, etc. Nothing works. The truncated restores that I tried should have had different Tivo OS versions. Spike over at MFSForums mentions something about the drive firmware and the Tivo Prom Firmware not playing nicely together. If that's the case, I can't really understand how it worked for 1.5 months before crapping out. And keep in mind, I CAN make it work if I don't expand my 1TB drive. It'll gladly let me waste 840GB!


----------



## 1283

teemu said:


> I And keep in mind, I CAN make it work if I don't expand my 1TB drive.


This indicates problem(s) with the backup, restore, or WinMFS. I don't believe the drive is the problem here.


----------



## AbMagFab

ZipZoomFly has the Hitachi 1TB on sale for $289. Great price, great drive...


----------



## shaggy2002

SO i upgraded my drive last weekend which was super easy. I didn't set AM on it because it was so quiet during the surface scan and winmfs copy. Since putting into production I do hear the drive now. Mainly when multiple recordings are happening or while I am watching a recording while one records. Will it hurt anything if I apply the AM to it now?


----------



## Lensman

shaggy2002 said:


> Will it hurt anything if I apply the AM to it now?


Nope, no problem with that!


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

Amazon seems to have the WD 1TB Green drive for $305.39 (RETAIL) now with free shipping. Looks like J&R is even a little cheaper... for those of you who may want the RETAIL version which supposedly has fewer problems for some reason. Not a great deal, but a lot better than the previous $390 price.


----------



## richsadams

AbMagFab said:


> ZipZoomFly has the Hitachi 1TB on sale for $289. Great price, great drive...


That is a good price and so far no one has posted any problems with the Hitachi's. :up:


----------



## Marc

Is there a difference on the warranty between the retail and OEM Western Digital drives? I'm thinking about picking up a couple of them for an HP MediaSmart box, and if the price were close enough, a longer warranty on a retail box might be worthwhile to consider the extra cost.


----------



## AbMagFab

Marc said:


> Is there a difference on the warranty between the retail and OEM Western Digital drives? I'm thinking about picking up a couple of them for an HP MediaSmart box, and if the price were close enough, a longer warranty on a retail box might be worthwhile to consider the extra cost.


Same. Three years for both. Only difference is OEM drive is problematic in the S3 (not the THD).

I have a couple OEM and Retail drives in my PC RAID-5 array, no problems at all.


----------



## richsadams

Marc said:


> Is there a difference on the warranty between the retail and OEM Western Digital drives? I'm thinking about picking up a couple of them for an HP MediaSmart box, and if the price were close enough, a longer warranty on a retail box might be worthwhile to consider the extra cost.


As AbMagFab mentions, three-years for either one.

Here's the link to WD's Warranty Info:

http://support.wdc.com/warranty/policy.asp#policy

Interesting that the TiVo "approved device" is only warranted for one-year.


----------



## teemu

I found a little more time to play with my OEM drive. Now I've found that I can consistently restore a backup in WinMfs, NOT add the extra space and boot my Tivo. Everything works as it should. If I do a Restart from the menu, Tivo boots. If I just pull the plug and plug it back in, drive won't boot ever again. If I restore and add the extra space, drive won't boot. 

Time to throw in the towel? Anybody want to buy a slightly used OEM WD 1TB HD?  Works everywhere but my TivoHD!


----------



## brettatk

teemu said:


> I found a little more time to play with my OEM drive. Now I've found that I can consistently restore a backup in WinMfs, NOT add the extra space and boot my Tivo. Everything works as it should. If I do a Restart from the menu, Tivo boots. If I just pull the plug and plug it back in, drive won't boot ever again. If I restore and add the extra space, drive won't boot.
> 
> Time to throw in the towel? Anybody want to buy a slightly used OEM WD 1TB HD?  Works everywhere but my TivoHD!


Has anyone else using a THD had problems with the OEM WD drive? I bought one two weeks ago and it's been working great ever since in my THD. I've pulled the power a couple of times and it's booted back up fine. This has me scared that maybe I'll have problems down the road.


----------



## teemu

I think I'm an anomaly here. Mine worked fine for about 45 days until our power failed. When the power came back, this mess started!


----------



## Marc

richsadams said:


> Here's the link to WD's Warranty Info:
> 
> http://support.wdc.com/warranty/policy.asp#policy


Thank you very much for the pointer. I'm pleased to see that they have consistent warranties, making it easier for me to choose the less expensive drive when I don't need the bonus accessories.



> Interesting that the TiVo "approved device" is only warranted for one-year.


So, technically speaking, one can have a TiVo HD with a connected hard drive, both with one-year warranties, or a TiVo HD with a voided warranty and a hard drive with a three-year warranty.


----------



## teemu

Just noticed that Best Buy has a Hitachi DeskStar 1TB drive on sale for $279.99 and free shipping. Online only, but that looks like a pretty good price.


----------



## lessd

teemu said:


> I found a little more time to play with my OEM drive. Now I've found that I can consistently restore a backup in WinMfs, NOT add the extra space and boot my Tivo. Everything works as it should. If I do a Restart from the menu, Tivo boots. If I just pull the plug and plug it back in, drive won't boot ever again. If I restore and add the extra space, drive won't boot.
> 
> Time to throw in the towel? Anybody want to buy a slightly used OEM WD 1TB HD?  Works everywhere but my TivoHD!


Try using the jumper on the back of the drive and set it to 1.5Mhx from 3Mhz xfer.


----------



## teemu

Tried that a little while back. No difference.


----------



## Ben_Jamin75

Ok, I want to upgrade my TiVoHD, but I'm confused... which drive is better?
I cross referenced info from NewEgg. Sounds as though one is designed as a "enterprise environments"... does that mean it better for a tivo or worse?

Best Buy
Hitachi - *DeskStar* 1TB Drive $279.99
Model: OA34915


Newegg said:


> *Hitachi Deskstar 7K1000*. Perpendicular magnetic recording technology Ramp load design increases shock protection and power savings Thermal monitoring and fly height control enhance reliability Three low-power idle modes boost power efficiency Silent seek acoustics achieve ultra-quiet operation Host/drive authentication for hardware security


ZipZoomFly
Hitachi - *UltraStar* 1TB Drive $289.99
Model: OA35772


Newegg said:


> *Hitachi Ultrastar A7K1000*World's first terabyte hard drive for the enterprise  Ideal for lower duty cycle storage in enterprise environments Targeted 1.2 million hours MTBF Enhanced Rotational Vibration Safeguard (RVS) for robust performance in multi-drive environments


----------



## jlib

They are functionally identical except the Ultrastar has unneeded RVS and lacks needed selectable silent seek. It also has a 2 year longer warranty (hence the higher price).


----------



## titsataki

Ben_Jamin75 said:


> Ok, I want to upgrade my TiVoHD, but I'm confused... which drive is better?
> I cross referenced info from NewEgg. Sounds as though one is designed as a "enterprise environments"... does that mean it better for a tivo or worse?
> 
> Best Buy
> Hitachi - *DeskStar* 1TB Drive $279.99
> Model: OA34915
> 
> ZipZoomFly
> Hitachi - *UltraStar* 1TB Drive $289.99
> Model: OA35772


Also New egg has the Cinemastar Hitachi:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822145169



> HITACHI CinemaStar 7K1000 HCS721010KLA330 (0A35274) 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive - OEM
> 
> CinemaStar hard disk drives are optimized for streaming consumer electronics with quiet acoustics and low power management for optimum customer satisfaction and field reliability.
> 
> Applications
> HD DVRs
> DVD/HDD recorders
> DVR-capable set-top boxes (STBs) and TVs
> Digital audio jukeboxes
> Media servers
> Surveillance DVRs


Price $319.99

Here is the Manufacturers' web page:

http://www.hitachigst.com/portal/site/en/menuitem.368c8bfe833dee8056fb11f0aac4f0a0/

http://www.hitachigst.com/portal/site/en/menuitem.6893bc7a231364ae4bda9f30eac4f0a0/

http://www.hitachigst.com/tech/techlib.nsf/techdocs/FA382AA29BE6C7D38625725700810FD8/$file/CinemaStar7K1000_010307_final.pdf


----------



## jlib

The TiVo can't make use of any of the CinemaStar's extra features. It sees it as just an expensive Deskstar.


----------



## teemu

Spike over at MFSLive seems to feel that the Deskstar is the equivalent of the Cinemastar once you use the AAM utility to make it nice and quiet. No good reason to blow the extra $40-$50.


----------



## Ben_Jamin75

jlib said:


> They are functionally identical except the UltraStar has unneeded RVS and lacks needed selectable silent seek. It also has a 2 year longer warranty (hence the higher price).


Thanks.

Adding in taxes & shipping cost, the UltraStar is actually cheaper for me.


----------



## MJ-bos

I'm running the WD GP 1Tb drive on my Tivo HD and without any tweaking, it's about the quietest drive I've ever (not) heard. No stutters, jitters, or problems of any kind so far (1week).

Good greif do the suggestions pile up with dual tuners! Now that we're hooked on HD, I can already see wanting another 1Tb drive. A 2Tb Tivo... the mind reels.

Cheers,
mj


----------



## richsadams

MJ-bos said:


> I'm running the WD GP 1Tb drive on my Tivo HD and without any tweaking, it's about the quietest drive I've ever (not) heard. No stutters, jitters, or problems of any kind so far (1week).
> 
> Good greif do the suggestions pile up with dual tuners! Now that we're hooked on HD, I can already see wanting another 1Tb drive. A 2Tb Tivo... the mind reels.
> 
> Cheers,
> mj


Thanks for the update...good to hear everything is going well...and silent. :up:

2Tb's?!


----------



## Bsteenson

MJ-bos said:


> Good grief do the suggestions pile up with dual tuners! Now that we're hooked on HD, I can already see wanting another 1Tb drive. A 2Tb Tivo... the mind reels.
> 
> Cheers,
> mj


I scroll down to suggestions, see (289) or some such number and just chuckle to myself. Who'd a thunk it!

Also using WD GP and working flawlessly, going into second month.

BS


----------



## DCIFRTHS

MJ-bos said:


> I'm running the WD GP 1Tb drive on my Tivo HD and without any tweaking, it's about the quietest drive I've ever (not) heard. No stutters, jitters, or problems of any kind so far (1week).
> 
> Good greif do the suggestions pile up with dual tuners! Now that we're hooked on HD, I can already see wanting another 1Tb drive. A 2Tb Tivo... the mind reels.
> 
> Cheers,
> mj





Bsteenson said:


> I scroll down to suggestions, see (289) or some such number and just chuckle to myself. Who'd a thunk it!
> 
> Also using WD GP and working flawlessly, going into second month.
> 
> BS


Are you using it externally or did you replace the internal drive?


----------



## brettatk

DCIFRTHS said:


> Are you using it externally or did you replace the internal drive?


I'm also using the OEM WD 1TB drive in my Tivo HD. It's ran perfect since I installed it but that has only been 2 weeks ago. I replaced the internal drive with the WD one.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

MJ-bos said:


> I'm running the WD GP 1Tb drive on my Tivo HD and without any tweaking, it's about the quietest drive I've ever (not) heard. No stutters, jitters, or problems of any kind so far (1week).
> 
> Good greif do the suggestions pile up with dual tuners! Now that we're hooked on HD, I can already see wanting another 1Tb drive. A 2Tb Tivo... the mind reels.
> 
> Cheers,
> mj


I want the WD 1TB "green" drive when there's a good deal on it... mainly because it is low power and low heat.

As for suggestions, I turned them off... I don't even have enough time to watch all that I want to watch in my season passes anyway.

I'm happy to see that a lot of people seem to be running the WD drive just fine, especially with the THD, which is what I have.


----------



## Lensman

richsadams said:


> 2Tb's?!


A 2TB HD box isn't that much different from an old 200-300GB SD box.

DVRs are just about the only application of hard drives that makes the new 1TB drives seem normal-sized. For everything else they're just crazy-big.


----------



## 1283

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> As for suggestions, I turned them off... I don't even have enough time to watch all that I want to watch in my season passes anyway.


I rarely even visit the suggestions folder, but the number of recordings in that folder is a good free space indicator.


----------



## aaronwt

Lensman said:


> A 2TB HD box isn't that much different from an old 200-300GB SD box.
> 
> DVRs are just about the only application of hard drives that makes the new 1TB drives seem normal-sized. For everything else they're just crazy-big.


Not when you have terabytes of data that needs to be stored.


----------



## Lensman

aaronwt said:


> Not when you have terabytes of data that needs to be stored.


True, but I'd be hard pressed to name any non-AV application - and I'm including the NSA because I'd claim that their needs *are* AV.

It's crazy to me that I have more storage available to me at home than my company does in their datacenter.


----------



## AbMagFab

Lensman said:


> True, but I'd be hard pressed to name any non-AV application - and I'm including the NSA because I'd claim that their needs *are* AV.
> 
> It's crazy to me that I have more storage available to me at home than my company does in their datacenter.


DVR's aren't the only AV application. Some folks have tons of AV on their servers.

Your original statement was specific to DVR's. I think it would be more accurate if it was about AV in general, whether on a DVR or file server or wherever.


----------



## sender_name

we don't want to scare people, the WD 1tb OEM works FINE w/ the TIVO HD, but NOT with the series 3. If you bought an OEM w/ a series 3 you can get an enclosure and use it as an external (antec mx-1) and have 1.250 TB... 

I have a series 3 and I am still trying/waiting for a solution to the OEM madness...


----------



## lrhorer

MJ-bos said:


> Good greif do the suggestions pile up with dual tuners! Now that we're hooked on HD, I can already see wanting another 1Tb drive. A 2Tb Tivo... the mind reels.


Well, when I consider the first hard drives I ever purchased were a pair of 12MB 12" removable media drives for a Nicolet 20 bit minicomputer at $8000 each (about $45,000 each in today's dollars), I suffer an apoplectic fit at the mention of a drive in excess of 1Gb, let alone 1TB. When I hear prices like .028 *CENTS* per megabyte, I want to tear out what little hair I have left at having paid $500 (the modern day equivalent of over $2000) for a 90KB floppy drive.

On the other hand, if a 2TB TiVo blows your mind, come see my system. I have a 250G + 750G Series III, a 1TB + 1TB Series III, a stock (but not for long) 160G HD TiVo, and a 4TB (soon to be 5TB) RAID 5 array server hosting Galleon running under Linux Debian Etch on a 3.0 GHz AMD Athalon 64 x 2 with 2G of memory. The array has slots for 7 more drives for a maximum of 10TB using 1TB hard drives. I can simultaneously upload and download at top speed to all 3 TiVos and still easily transfer an additional 200 Mbps to other systems. Right now it has a little bit more than 2.5 TB of videos on it, including every episode of the original Star Trek and Star Trek: The Next Generation.

I'm happy. 

Oh , and by the way, the 2Tb TiVo is currently completely full of scheduled recordings. Suggestions are turned on, but there's no place to record them.


----------



## lrhorer

Lensman said:


> True, but I'd be hard pressed to name any non-AV application - and I'm including the NSA because I'd claim that their needs *are* AV.


Seismic data can run into many Gigabytes. The Census bureau can also make use of very large arrays. After all, with 300,000,000 citizens, it doesn't take very much data at all per person to fill up 1TB. Not only that, but even still photographs and radiograms can take up a huge amount of data. The best digital cameras max out somewhere around 20 megapixels or so, but a full bandwidth resolution limited scan of a high quality large format Kodachrome transparency can run over 100 Gigapixels. Of course, that said, compressed content, even 1080P content can't hold a candle to uncompressed HD content. An uncompressed 1080i digital stream would fill up a 1TB hard drive in about 20 minutes - if the drive could write that fast.



Lensman said:


> It's crazy to me that I have more storage available to me at home than my company does in their datacenter.


Yeah, I know what you mean.


----------



## AbMagFab

sender_name said:


> we don't want to scare people, the WD 1tb OEM works FINE w/ the TIVO HD, but NOT with the series 3. If you bought an OEM w/ a series 3 you can get an enclosure and use it as an external (antec mx-1) and have 1.250 TB...
> 
> I have a series 3 and I am still trying/waiting for a solution to the OEM madness...


It's only the WD Green OEM drive. You can still buy for the S3 internal:

1TB Hitachi OEM
1TB Hitachi Retail
1TB WD Green Retail
Any <1TB Seagate, Hitachi, WD, etc., internal, OEM and Retail

It's really not that big a deal.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

I bought this:
http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=47734&t=698704

Suppose to have a WD green drive in it. I plan on removing the drive and putting it in my TivoHD. $210 shipped. Then I'll also have an external case if I need it.


----------



## jlib

Well, you definitely got the deal you were holding out for. Nice price for the WD Green OEM. Good to see it finally back in stock there. Note to any considering it: it is only good for salvaging the drive out of as Tidal_Wave_One did or for use as an external USB drive on your PC.


----------



## richsadams

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> I bought this:
> http://forums.slickdeals.net/showthread.php?sduid=47734&t=698704
> 
> Suppose to have a WD green drive in it. I plan on removing the drive and putting it in my TivoHD. $210 shipped. Then I'll also have an external case if I need it.


Sweet! :up:

It's probably the WD OEM drive, but when you pop it out, can you post the full model number for us?

TIA!


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

richsadams said:


> It's probably the WD OEM drive, but when you pop it out, can you post the full model number for us?


Sure, will do. Hope it works!


----------



## bgtees

richsadams said:


> Sweet! :up:
> 
> It's probably the WD OEM drive, but when you pop it out, can you post the full model number for us?
> 
> TIA!


Just received mine today, here's the model number:

WD10EACS-00ZJB0

It has the big "GreenPower" sticker on top of the drive, so I think this is the right one. Hell of a deal for $209. The drive was a bit of PITA to get out of the case, now I just need to receive my TivoHD so I have something to do with this drive.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Sure, will do. Hope it works!


It's a WD10EACS - 00ZJB0

Manufactured Oct 6 2007

I wish it was easier to remove from the case but I got it out. Will now try to upgrade...


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

UPDATE:

Some issues I had upgrading my TiVoHD:

* Getting the 1TB drive out of the 1TB My Book enclosure was more difficult than I thought. I will probably trash the drive enclosure. If interested, I paid $210 shipped for the WD10EACS "green" drive (1TB WD My Book) from clubit.com.
* There was a screw holding the drive in the TiVo that was hard to get to with my screwdriver.
* (ADDED 2007-12-30) After removing the new drive from the enclosure and booting up XP with it connected, XP mounted it and it did not show up in WinMFS. I had to use the Disk Management tool to delete the partition. This probably wouldn't be an issue with a new OEM or retail drive since it would not have any partitions on it already.
* The progress of WinMFS wasn't very well known - it would be nice if it would not seem to get stuck.
* The first boot-up attempt failed - never got past the "powering up" screen. Disconnecting and reconnecting the power got to the "just a few minutes more screen" and seemed to boot just fine. HD hours was up to 144! YEAH!
* Restarting the TiVoHD from the menu command worked
* Now I have to figure out what HDNet is doing with Star Trek Enteprise. It doesn't seem to be on this Monday.


----------



## richsadams

bgtees said:


> Just received mine today, here's the model number:
> 
> WD10EACS-00ZJB0
> 
> It has the big "GreenPower" sticker on top of the drive, so I think this is the right one. Hell of a deal for $209. The drive was a bit of PITA to get out of the case, now I just need to receive my TivoHD so I have something to do with this drive.





Tidal_Wave_One said:


> It's a WD10EACS - 00ZJB0
> 
> Manufactured Oct 6 2007
> 
> I wish it was easier to remove from the case but I got it out. Will now try to upgrade...


Yes indeed, the WD10EACS - 00ZJB0 is the OEM version of the drive. It should work well for internal installs on TiVo HD's (but NOT on Series3's).

Thanks for the pioneering info and keep up the good work! :up:


----------



## richsadams

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> UPDATE:
> 
> Some issues I had upgrading my TiVoHD:
> 
> * Getting the 1TB drive out of the 1TB My Book enclosure was more difficult than I thought. I will probably trash the drive enclosure. If interested, I paid $210 shipped for the WD10EACS "green" drive (1TB WD My Book) from clubit.com.
> * There was a screw holding the drive in the TiVo that was hard to get to with my screwdriver.
> * The progress of WinMFS wasn't very well known - it would be nice if it would not seem to get stuck.
> * The first boot-up attempt failed - never got past the "powering up" screen. DIsconnecting and reconnecting the power got to the "just a few minutes more screen" and seemed to boot just fine. HD hours was up to 144! YEAH!
> * Restarting the TiVoHD from the menu command worked
> * Now I have to figure out what HDNet is doing with Star Trek Enteprise. It doesn't seem to be on this Monday.


 Great info...thanks! :up:

That last one is of real concern though.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> UPDATE:
> 
> Some issues I had upgrading my TiVoHD:
> 
> * Getting the 1TB drive out of the 1TB My Book enclosure was more difficult than I thought. I will probably trash the drive enclosure. If interested, I paid $210 shipped for the WD10EACS "green" drive (1TB WD My Book) from clubit.com.
> * There was a screw holding the drive in the TiVo that was hard to get to with my screwdriver.
> * The progress of WinMFS wasn't very well known - it would be nice if it would not seem to get stuck.
> * The first boot-up attempt failed - never got past the "powering up" screen. DIsconnecting and reconnecting the power got to the "just a few minutes more screen" and seemed to boot just fine. HD hours was up to 144! YEAH!
> * Restarting the TiVoHD from the menu command worked
> * Now I have to figure out what HDNet is doing with Star Trek Enteprise. It doesn't seem to be on this Monday.


Forgot to say:
* After removing the new drive from the enclosure and booting up XP with it connected, XP mounted it and it did not show up in WinMFS. I had to use the Disk Management tool to delete the partition. This probably wouldn't be an issue with a new OEM or retail drive since it would not have any partitions on it already.


----------



## llcj

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Forgot to say:
> * After removing the new drive from the enclosure and booting up XP with it connected, XP mounted it and it did not show up in WinMFS. I had to use the Disk Management tool to delete the partition. This probably wouldn't be an issue with a new OEM or retail drive since it would not have any partitions on it already.


Thanks for the info...FYI, for those looking (and don't feel like waiting), Circuity City has it for $260 - 10% for in-store pickup ($234). Not as good of a deal, but good enough for (impatient) me!


----------



## sender_name

I just got a new Retail 1tb western dig. from amazon for $252 shipped. It came from a company called superdeal and the drive ID is the WD10EACS-32ZJB0

This is my second drive..I had an OEM 00ZJB0 that of course did not work for my Series 3...


----------



## richsadams

sender_name said:


> I just got a new Retail 1tb western dig. from amazon for $252 shipped. It came from a company called superdeal and the drive ID is the WD10EACS-32ZJB0
> 
> This is my second drive..I had an OEM 00ZJB0 that of course did not work for my Series 3...


WD10EACS-32ZJB0 is the retail version. :up: It should work well with your Series3.

That's a good price as well!


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

sender_name said:


> I just got a new Retail 1tb western dig. from amazon for $252 shipped. It came from a company called superdeal and the drive ID is the WD10EACS-32ZJB0
> 
> This is my second drive..I had an OEM 00ZJB0 that of course did not work for my Series 3...


Let us know if it works. I still find it strange that retail will work but OEM won't.

My OEM WD 1TB has so far been working fine in my TiVoHD... but it's only been a few days so far.


----------



## AbMagFab

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> Let us know if it works. I still find it strange that retail will work but OEM won't.
> 
> My OEM WD 1TB has so far been working fine in my TiVoHD... but it's only been a few days so far.


I have personal experience with all combinations (00=OEM, 32=Retail):

- TivoHD - retail and OEM WD green drive work fine
- S3 - Retail works fine, OEM fails on reboot after C&DE or soft reboot

I was skeptical as well, but it's a fact. I happen to have a bunch of Tivo's and a bunch of these drives (RAID5 array), so I was able to quickly swap the OEM and retail versions to see the immediate differences.


----------



## sender_name

richsadams said:


> WD10EACS-32ZJB0 is the retail version. :up: It should work well with your Series3.
> 
> That's a good price as well!


 It worked great! It was a WD10EACS-32ZJB0. No problems yet. Did the mfs w/ supersize...I have 140+ HOURS of hd now...and the drive is super quite. It solved my cabinet resonance issue too...The stock HD was resonating in the wood cabinent and I had to put one of those rubber keyboard wrist guards under the feet to quiet it...But i could still hear it. Now it is silent...

Now..if they could end this damn strike so I can fill er up!

again, ONLY the retail WD10EACS-32ZJB0 drive will work inside a series 3

My only oddity that i MIGHT have noticed...The hd pic quality on the drive that i transferred over via winmfs seems just a hair fuzzy or something...I might just be insane...but it really does look a tad 'off'...same with the tivo menus etc. I have it set for 1080i output...I have to mess with it this weekend if it still seems odd.


----------



## dougdingle

sender_name said:


> My only oddity that i MIGHT have noticed...The hd pic quality on the drive that i transferred over via winmfs seems just a hair fuzzy or something...I might just be insane...but it really does look a tad 'off'...same with the tivo menus etc. I have it set for 1080i output...I have to mess with it this weekend if it still seems odd.


There is absolutely nothing drive related that could cause this. Nothing. The drive records the digital stream and spits it back out. The electronics in the S3 then make video out of it. Ones and zeros can't be fuzzy.

If there really is an issue, I would start by re-seating all the signal cables at the S3 and the monitor it's feeding.

Also, check the S3 setup to make sure "video smoothing" has not been turned on accidentally. There are some bugs in the S3 software that lose track of some settings on a power-off reboot, such as the front panel LED toggle.


----------



## Tidal_Wave_One

dougdingle said:


> There is absolutely nothing drive related that could cause this. Nothing. The drive records the digital stream and spits it back out. The electronics in the S3 then make video out of it. Ones and zeros can't be fuzzy.


While I doubt it's the drive too, you never know. What if the drive put out some sort of interference (EMF) that caused it? Doubtful, but I think possible.


----------



## AbMagFab

Tidal_Wave_One said:


> While I doubt it's the drive too, you never know. What if the drive put out some sort of interference (EMF) that caused it? Doubtful, but I think possible.


Assuming he's using HDMI this doesn't make sense. It's a digital signal, so it wouldn't get fuzzy. It could get sparklies, but that's it.

I suppose if he switched from HDMI to Component, that would make it looks a little fuzzier.


----------



## Stylin

Well, I'm in a pickle! Just read the entire thread. I have an S3 and WD OEM (1TB) from Newegg. Was planning on doing the internal drive upgrade this week, and have now found out that OEM drive will give issues. Problem is that my return period with Newegg is over, and they don't carry the retail version WD drive...
Has anyone found a solution/workaround for upgrading the S3 with WD OEM? Would upgrading the drive firmware do it? 
Any other suggestions?


----------



## richsadams

Stylin said:


> Well, I'm in a pickle! Just read the entire thread. I have an S3 and WD OEM (1TB) from Newegg. Was planning on doing the internal drive upgrade this week, and have now found out that OEM drive will give issues. Problem is that my return period with Newegg is over, and they don't carry the retail version WD drive...
> Has anyone found a solution/workaround for upgrading the S3 with WD OEM? Would upgrading the drive firmware do it?
> Any other suggestions?


Unfortunately everything that anyone can think of has been tried to get the OEM drives to work w/Series3's internally. AFAIK there's no known work around.

You do have the option of using it as an external (eSATA) expansion drive if you install it in a recommended enclosure like the Antec MX-1. It comes with everything you need and there's even a video on their web site to show you how to insert your drive. TiVo setup is easy too as it will connect via plug and play. More info here.

Of course you could always swap it for something else. I hear there's a good swap and bartering thread here somewhere.


----------



## Stylin

Whew! Ok, I have made some progress...I called WD today and explained the situation - drives are not exactly the same, need #-32ZJB0 instead. They thought I was NUTS and kept on insisting that drives are identical, I should exchange at retailer, maybe I need a dvr expander etc.!! Anyway, I asked to speak with a Suprv - they said one would call me back. I just got off the phone with him, tho he also thinks I'm crazy, he was very helpful and definitely had a better understanding of my issue than the previous Rep. Told him for some unknown reason #00ZJB0 stalls the TiVo, but #32ZJB0 does not, can I pleasssssse simply exchange my (new/still sealed) drive for the 32ZJB0. He said sure no problem, but I need to open the sealed drive or else they will send it back to me, and we're doing "advanced replacement" where the other drive should arrive in 3-5 days. They preautho'd my cc for $379.80 until the other drive is returned. I'm crossing my fingers that I receive the correct drive - he assured I would...BTW, he also told me that there system shows the #00ZJBO as retail also...
I'll update when drive arrives, plus when upgrade is complete. 
Thks all for the great posts/help!


----------



## 1283

At least one person has reported that a -00 version works fine with S3, and at least one person has reported that a retail-boxed version (unknown model number, but probably -32) also has the soft reboot problem.

If someone has access to a SATA analyzer, I think this mystery can be easily solved.


----------



## richsadams

Stylin said:


> Whew! Ok, I have made some progress...I called WD today and explained the situation - drives are not exactly the same, need #-32ZJB0 instead. They thought I was NUTS and kept on insisting that drives are identical, I should exchange at retailer, maybe I need a dvr expander etc.!! Anyway, I asked to speak with a Suprv - they said one would call me back. I just got off the phone with him, tho he also thinks I'm crazy, he was very helpful and definitely had a better understanding of my issue than the previous Rep. Told him for some unknown reason #00ZJB0 stalls the TiVo, but #32ZJB0 does not, can I pleasssssse simply exchange my (new/still sealed) drive for the 32ZJB0. He said sure no problem, but I need to open the sealed drive or else they will send it back to me, and we're doing "advanced replacement" where the other drive should arrive in 3-5 days. They preautho'd my cc for $379.80 until the other drive is returned. I'm crossing my fingers that I receive the correct drive - he assured I would...BTW, he also told me that there system shows the #00ZJBO as retail also...
> I'll update when drive arrives, plus when upgrade is complete.
> Thks all for the great posts/help!


Excellent work! But $379.80?!  Yikes! Hopefully they'll give you credit as soon as they receive your drive. Earlier I considered telling you to go out and buy the retail version, take it out of the box, put yours in and then return it. But that would have been less than honest. Probably would have been bad karma as someone with a Series3 would have probably bought it and then come here swearing the retail version wont work either. 

WD's lack of understanding doesn't surprise me. Some folks have had troubles with their WD My DVR Expander and when they tried to get an exchange TiVo told them to call WD and WD swore they had to deal with TiVo.  (Turns out WD is responsible even if the drive was purchased from TiVo). But that's OT.

In any case, once you get the new retail drive you should be in business. Don't be afraid to drop by if you have any upgrade questions...there are lots of nice/helpful folks here. Well, at least the majority are mostly harmless.


----------



## rcliff

I just received a warranty replacement WD10EACS-00ZJB0 from Western Digital (manufacture date 12/21/07) that I would like to use internally in my S3. Has anyone tried jumper settings to resolve the soft boot problem? Two options on this particular drive potentially of interest are PUIS (power up in standby) and SSC (spread spectrum clocking). Very curious if anyone has tried putting a jumper on either of these


----------



## richsadams

rcliff said:


> I just received a warranty replacement WD10EACS-00ZJB0 from Western Digital (manufacture date 12/21/07) that I would like to use internally in my S3. Has anyone tried jumper settings to resolve the soft boot problem? Two options on this particular drive potentially of interest are PUIS (power up in standby) and SSC (spread spectrum clocking). Very curious if anyone has tried putting a jumper on either of these


That was one of my first thoughts a few months ago and it's already been discussed and tried. You can go back through the posts here and find more specific information about the OEM drive issues including jumper settings, etc. on this thread at the MSFLive Forum.

You can certainly give your OEM drive a try in your S3 but many others (over a dozen IIRC) have already found that it fails on a menu restart...meaning that it will fail to reboot after any upgrade. The retail version, Model # WD10EACS-*32ZJB0* is the way to go with Series3's.


----------



## rcliff

richsadams said:


> That was one of my first thoughts a few months ago and it's already been discussed and tried. You can go back through the posts here and find more specific information about the OEM drive issues including jumper settings, etc. on this thread at the MSFLive Forum.
> 
> You can certainly give your OEM drive a try in your S3 but many others (over a dozen IIRC) have already found that it fails on a menu restart...meaning that it will fail to reboot after any upgrade. The retail version, Model # WD10EACS-*32ZJB0* is the way to go with Series3's.


Thanks, I'll check out that thread. Perhaps my drive could have newer firmware as well since it is so new so it might be worth a try regardless.

If it doesn't work properly, can I put the drive in an Antec MX-1 external enclosure or will I have the same problem?


----------



## AbMagFab

What's worse is that the OEM completely fails if you do a C&DE. I could probably live with it if I could only reboot by unplugging, but the C&DE is a showstopper.

Most people don't see this because they are restoring a backup from the same Tivo. But if you restore from another backup, you're screwed. And if at any future time you need to C&DE, you're totally screwed (there's no way to get your box to fully boot).


----------



## richsadams

rcliff said:


> Thanks, I'll check out that thread. Perhaps my drive could have newer firmware as well since it is so new so it might be worth a try regardless.
> 
> If it doesn't work properly, can I put the drive in an Antec MX-1 external enclosure or will I have the same problem?


Others are using the OEM version as expansion drives with both Series3s and TiVo HDs with no reported issues.

I completely forgot about the "clear and delete everything" problem *AbMagFab *points out...a deal breaker indeed.

If you do give it a go...let us know how it turns out. It would be terrific if we could simply say something like "only use OEM drives manufactured after such-and-such date". You would certainly be inducted into the Pioneers Club!


----------



## jlib

rcliff said:


> ...Has anyone tried jumper settings to resolve the soft boot problem? Two options on this particular drive potentially of interest are PUIS (power up in standby) and SSC (spread spectrum clocking). Very curious if anyone has tried putting a jumper on either of these


I don't know about SSC but I think the power up jumper has been ruled out.


----------



## rcliff

I'll give it a try this weekend and report back results. It's good to know that if it fails I can always go over to CC and pick up an MX-1 but I would still prefer to have a nice clean internal install.


----------



## Stylin

richsadams said:


> Excellent work! But $379.80?!  Yikes! Hopefully they'll give you credit as soon as they receive your drive. Earlier I considered telling you to go out and buy the retail version, take it out of the box, put yours in and then return it. But that would have been less than honest. Probably would have been bad karma as someone with a Series3 would have probably bought it and then come here swearing the retail version wont work either.


So true! If I wasn't so panicked I prolly would've thought to do exchange lol. BUT, prior to purchasing I had called WD and asked if the drives were the same, and they said yes (truthfully I didn't ask/know about the -00 vs -32 issue at the time). Yesterday I realized that I had a log of the call on my phone records, so that gave me the confidence to go to bat. If they are telling customers that they are the same, and indeed there is a slight variation then I feel they should exchange. 
Must admit I am nervous about the upgrade - but know if I just read and am patient it'll work. I'm no whiz, but as I always say getting TiVo and being a member of TCF has made me a gadget/tech geek (and I luuuv it lol!!). I upgraded my S2's via "instant cake" and it took me about 4 hrs (master drive, slave drive - WTH?? lol), when it shoulda taken me 15 min lol.
I'll be using a friends Compaq SR5110nx http://www.amazon.com/Compaq-Presario-SR5110NX-Desktop-Processor/dp/B000RNDZ5M/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1199993616&sr=8-1
to do the S3, and I have recordings to move over...I've read the procedures and "think" I get it, but it'll be my 1st time using MFSlive. Crossing fingers I get the correct drive and all goes well...


----------



## rcliff

mfscopy in winmfs under way now with usb to sata adapters. WD data lifeguard tool shows firmware rev 1B01. Will report back results in the morning.

P.S. winmfs seems VERY easy to use. I remember upgrading my series 1's back in the old days and this is like night and day.


----------



## 1283

Both -00 and -32 versions have the same firmware 01.01B01.

Before spending hours doing the mfscopy, you should be able to backup and restore (just a few minutes) to test the soft reboot issue.


----------



## rcliff

Wow 10 hours later and it's still not done. Progress bar has 2 blocks just as I left it last night. Task manager shows 2 instances of winmfs running but "not responding". I thought it might have hung but I checked I/O read/writes in task manager and it shows about 227,000,000,000 Bytes so it would seem it's almost done with the original 250Gb drive.


----------



## rcliff

c3 said:


> Before spending hours doing the mfscopy, you should be able to backup and restore (just a few minutes) to test the soft reboot issue.


Good point, but then again if for some reason this does work, I'll be good to go, recordings and all. I also wanted to test winfms, in case I end up doing this with another drive later.


----------



## tivoROCKSme

Well, it's been an exciting 24 hours in my TivoHD life. Yesterday afternoon my Insight cable guy (technically now it's Comcast as they just bought Insight in my area) showed up on time for the cable card install. The card install went smooth, AND he brought a multi stream card that customer service said they didn't have. Then, after he left I installed my new WD OEM 1TB drive from New Egg, and it went super smooth. I wasn't expecting the drive software to preserve my recordings. This morning I called DirecTV to give them the bad news, a decade long customer was leaving them. They weren't too happy, but I was sure to tell them the reason was because they didn't have a DVR with the TIVO interface. The rep seemed stunned that my primary reason was that they couldn't offer me an HD DVR with Tivo. Kinda left her speechless as she couldn't offer my anything to "save the sale" so to speak. 
Time to go setup some new season passes.


----------



## spike2k5

rcliff said:


> Wow 10 hours later and it's still not done. Progress bar has 2 blocks just as I left it last night. Task manager shows 2 instances of winmfs running but "not responding". I thought it might have hung but I checked I/O read/writes in task manager and it shows about 227,000,000,000 Bytes so it would seem it's almost done with the original 250Gb drive.


If you use SATA port it's lot faster 3-4 hrs.
USB 2.0 takes slightly longer.

10+ hours sounds like you are using USB 1.0 perhaps?

How full was your 250GB drive?

Winmfs->tools->mfsinfo->misc tab 
on the bottom, you will see % free


----------



## rcliff

spike2k5 said:


> If you use SATA port it's lot faster 3-4 hrs.
> USB 2.0 takes slightly longer.
> 
> 10+ hours sounds like you are using USB 1.0 perhaps?
> 
> How full was your 250GB drive?
> 
> Winmfs->tools->mfsinfo->misc tab
> on the bottom, you will see % free


Drive had 3% available and it finished after 11 hours. It booted with 144 HD hours, 1367 SD. Testing softboot now...


----------



## rcliff

#&#37;[email protected]!

It didn't work. I guess I shouldn't really be surprised but this whole issue doesn't really make a lot of sense. 

For the record, I can verify that I tried all of the following with no luck...

Tivo boots normally from cold start with WD10EACS-00ZJB0
Fails soft restart with no jumpers installed
Fails soft restart with jumper 3-4 installed SSC (spread spectrum clocking)
Fails soft restart with jumper 7-8 installed
Fails to cold boot with jumper 1-2 installed PUIS (power up in standby)
Fails to cold boot with with separate SATA power supply


----------



## richsadams

rcliff said:


> #%[email protected]!
> 
> It didn't work. I guess I shouldn't really be surprised but this whole issue doesn't really make a lot of sense.
> 
> For the record, I can verify that I tried all of the following with no luck...
> 
> Tivo boots normally from cold start with WD10EACS-00ZJB0
> Fails soft restart with no jumpers installed
> Fails soft restart with jumper 3-4 installed SSC (spread spectrum clocking)
> Fails soft restart with jumper 7-8 installed
> Fails to cold boot with jumper 1-2 installed PUIS (power up in standby)
> Fails to cold boot with with separate SATA power supply


Thanks very much for the updates and all of your hard work. :up:

Your experience continues to confirm that the WD 1TB GP OEM Drive (WD10EACS-*00ZJB0*) should not be used as an internal upgrade for TiVo Series3's and that the retail version (WD10EACS-*32ZJB0*) is the way to go.

It is frustrating and confusing because as C3 said, the firmware is the same for both. AFAIK no one has been able to distinguish why one works and the other doesn't. 

Thanks again. You get an A for effort! Hopefully you can return it or exchange it or perhaps use it as an expansion drive.


----------



## rcliff

Ok, now I'm really done with this drive. I went over to BB and bought the retail version. Sealed box and after I open I find another WD10EACS-00ZJB0 NOT 32ZJB0. I tried this drive anyway with a mfsrestore and it fails the soft restart. My recommendation is to avoid this drive in series 3 installs at all cost.


----------



## rcliff

Ok, now I'm really po'd. The truncated restore apparently did something to my cablecards and I get a message about reporting host ID and binding to my cable provider every time I change channels even though the channels do come in after hitting clear.


----------



## Ben_Jamin75

rcliff said:


> Ok, now I'm really po'd. The truncated restore apparently did something to my cablecards and I get a message about reporting host ID and binding to my cable provider every time I change channels even though the channels do come in after hitting clear.


You may need to rerun guided setup.

If that doesn't help, call your cable company and ask them to send a reset signal to the card(s).


----------



## lessd

rcliff said:


> Ok, now I'm really done with this drive. I went over to BB and bought the retail version. Sealed box and after I open I find another WD10EACS-00ZJB0 NOT 32ZJB0. I tried this drive anyway with a mfsrestore and it fails the soft restart. My recommendation is to avoid this drive in series 3 installs at all cost.


OK I have put about 10 of these drives into HD-TiVos without any problems when they (the WD 1TB drive) first came out and Best Buy had them for $259. My retail box has a UPC of 7 18037 12333 2 model WD10000CSRTL, does that match your retail box ? I don't want to take the TiVo apart to look at the drive model number itself, but if i have to do any more i would like to know if your box has a different code on it from my box.


----------



## sfhub

rcliff said:


> Ok, now I'm really po'd. The truncated restore apparently did something to my cablecards and I get a message about reporting host ID and binding to my cable provider every time I change channels even though the channels do come in after hitting clear.


Did you do a clear & delete everything at some point or use a different image? That will break your CableCARD pairing and you will need to call in with the new generated #s to get the pairing re-done.


----------



## richsadams

rcliff said:


> Ok, now I'm really done with this drive. I went over to BB and bought the retail version. Sealed box and after I open I find another WD10EACS-00ZJB0 NOT 32ZJB0. I tried this drive anyway with a mfsrestore and it fails the soft restart. My recommendation is to avoid this drive in series 3 installs at all cost.


That's a first! I think I would have just returned it. I'd certainly take it back and tell them that it didn't work. It would be interesting if you get another one to see what the model number is.

Does the box that it came in have the same UPC code as *lessd *mentions below?

The (other) retail versions of the drive are working fine for many people now. If WD is suddenly shipping the OEM drive in the retail box that would certainly be worth noting but yours is a first AFAIK so I wouldn't make a blanket statement about them just yet.



lessd said:


> OK I have put about 10 of these drives into HD-TiVos without any problems when they (the WD 1TB drive) first came out and Best Buy had them for $259. My retail box has a UPC of 7 18037 12333 2 model WD10000CSRTL, does that match your retail box ? I don't want to take the TiVo apart to look at the drive model number itself, but if i have to do any more i would like to know if your box has a different code on it from my box.


I also bought my WD 1TB GP drive (WD10EACS-32ZJB0) from BB when they were $259 and the UPC on the box that I have is the same as yours.


----------



## 1283

There is no direct relationship between the retail box model number/UPC and the actual drive model inside the box. This applies to ALL of the major brands. WD10000CSRTL simply means 1TB drive in the CS family in a retail box. We're the only ones calling -00 as OEM and -32 as retail. Usually it doesn't matter because they're supposed to be functionally equivalent. Unfortunately, the TiVo S3 is very picky about something.


----------



## rcliff

Ben_Jamin75 said:


> You may need to rerun guided setup.
> 
> If that doesn't help, call your cable company and ask them to send a reset signal to the card(s).


I did not run guided setup. All I did was use mfsbackup and restore to make the truncated copy. When I booted with the truncated backup the Tivo immediately said something about acquiring channel info and that's when the problem started occurring. I did not have this issue when I did the full copy so it would seem that the truncated copy misses something required by my Cablecards.

What's worse is I called Cablevision and they insisted that they couldn't reset the cards and only Tivo has the technology to help and insisted that I must call Tivo. What utter BS. I called back later and got someone else with more sense and the cards were working normally within 5 minutes after they sent a signal and a cold boot.


----------



## rcliff

lessd said:


> OK I have put about 10 of these drives into HD-TiVos without any problems when they (the WD 1TB drive) first came out and Best Buy had them for $259. My retail box has a UPC of 7 18037 12333 2 model WD10000CSRTL, does that match your retail box ? I don't want to take the TiVo apart to look at the drive model number itself, but if i have to do any more i would like to know if your box has a different code on it from my box.


Yep, the box has the identical UPC code and model number


----------



## rcliff

richsadams said:


> That's a first! I think I would have just returned it.


I'll tell you why I didn't. After careful examination I noticed that although the model WD10EACS-00ZJB0 was the same the controller board was slightly different so my thinking was that this drive might work since no one else seems to have had a problem with the retail package. So since I already had done a full mfscopy to my existing green drive I pulled the controller on the new drive and put it on the one with the data. For some reason, it would not boot at all and so it would appear there are additional differences between these drives even with identical model numbers. I put both drives back together and then did the mfsrestore to the new retail drive which worked but exhibited the same exact soft restart problem as the original.


----------



## richsadams

rcliff said:


> I'll tell you why I didn't. After careful examination I noticed that although the model WD10EACS-00ZJB0 was the same the controller board was slightly different so my thinking was that this drive might work since no one else seems to have had a problem with the retail package. So since I already had done a full mfscopy to my existing green drive I pulled the controller on the new drive and put it on the one with the data. For some reason, it would not boot at all and so it would appear there are additional differences between these drives even with identical model numbers. I put both drives back together and then did the mfsrestore to the new retail drive which worked but exhibited the same exact soft restart problem as the original.


Thanks for that. This is a very interesting development. I'm really tempted to buy one of the retail drives just to see what's inside. I see it's on sale at BB for $299...which is still $40 more than I paid for mine so I wouldn't keep it (really don't need another one). I'm just really curious about what WD is up to.

Anyway, your feedback will be very valuable to those that come after. :up:


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> There is no direct relationship between the retail box model number/UPC and the actual drive model inside the box. This applies to ALL of the major brands. WD10000CSRTL simply means 1TB drive in the CS family in a retail box. We're the only ones calling -00 as OEM and -32 as retail. Usually it doesn't matter because they're supposed to be functionally equivalent. Unfortunately, the TiVo S3 is very picky about something.


Understood about the UPC, makes sense. However the difference in models obviously matters to WD or they wouldn't be manufacturing two different ones. Or is it the case (based on Cliff's experience) that WD is only manufacturing one model...the OEM now? 

I understand enough about HDD's to be dangerous. It seems like someone who has the expertise could narrow down what that exact difference is though.


----------



## lessd

rcliff said:


> Yep, the box has the identical UPC code and model number


I guess that ends the use of that drive, dam !!!


----------



## ilh

Is this OEM drive only a problem with the S3, or S3 and THD?


----------



## sfhub

ilh said:


> Is this OEM drive only a problem with the S3, or S3 and THD?


Only an issue as the S3 internal drive. Other configurations appear to be ok.

Many folks could soft reboot fine with the -32 version as S3 internal and many people could not soft reboot successfully with the -00 version as S3 internal drive.


----------



## ilh

Thanks. I'm keeping my eyes open for an upcoming THD internal upgrade.


----------



## ashu

Darn! I was going to use a plethora of Best buy RewardZone certificates and a generous Christmas gift (BB Gift Card) to pick up the 1Tb Green WD today. Glad I checked here. Knowing my patience and time constraints - I would have been seriously po'd if I had received an OEM version in the box. 

I'm just going to go in and see how much the Seagate 1TB 7200.11 is instead - the BB flier says they're 20&#37; off this week. (Wrong place to ask, but anyone know of any issues with th 7200.11 and the S3 - as an internal upgrade drive, offhand - other than the fact they have noisy seek?)

Double darn. I wanted the quieter, low-power-consumption green drive.
Thanks for posting your experience, rcliff. Hmm - pity you had to waste so much time to figure it out for the rest of us (and yourself). I'll stick with Seagate henceforth, methinks.


----------



## richsadams

ashu said:


> Darn! I was going to use a plethora of Best buy RewardZone certificates and a generous Christmas gift (BB Gift Card) to pick up the 1Tb Green WD today. Glad I checked here. Knowing my patience and time constraints - I would have been seriously po'd if I had received an OEM version in the box.
> 
> I'm just going to go in and see how much the Seagate 1TB 7200.11 is instead - the BB flier says they're 20% off this week. (Wrong place to ask, but anyone know of any issues with the 7200.11 and the S3 - as an internal upgrade drive, offhand - other than the fact they have noisy seek?)
> 
> Double darn. I wanted the quieter, low-power-consumption green drive.
> Thanks for posting your experience, rcliff. Hmm - pity you had to waste so much time to figure it out for the rest of us (and yourself). I'll stick with Seagate henceforth, methinks.


I wouldn't write off the WD 1TB GP drive at BB yet. Cliff's is the first, one and only report saying that he found the OEM drive inside a retail box.

If it were me I'd buy the WD drive and open it up to see which one it is. My money is on it being the normal retail drive (WD10EACS-32ZJB0). The model number is printed right on the drive label so there won't be any need to actually open anything except the shrink wrap on the box. If it is the OEM drive you can easily return it (and let us know!).

I love Seagate drives myself, but AFAIK no one has tried that particular one (too new/expensive at the moment IMHO).


----------



## ashu

I could. But at 299, is it really worth it (despite all my gift cards/RZ coupons) to take a chance that a stuck up manager may refuse to take it back once I've opened it and confirmed it's a 00- and not a 32-?

Especially when it IS available for $280 online.

As for the Seagate ... the 1TB 7200.11 is 275 shipped at Newegg now.


----------



## DaveDFW

I'm using the Seagate 7200.11 1tb (also bought from Newegg!), and I didn't have any issues. 

The 7200.11 is much quieter than the 7200.10 which was I previously had. The 7200.10 was unusable in the bedroom because of its constant clacking.

The S3 runs about 49C with the 7200.11, about the same temperature as with the original drive installed.

TTYL
David


----------



## richsadams

ashu said:


> I could. But at 299, is it really worth it (despite all my gift cards/RZ coupons) to take a chance that a stuck up manager may refuse to take it back once I've opened it and confirmed it's a 00- and not a 32-?
> 
> Especially when it IS available for $280 online.
> 
> As for the Seagate ... the 1TB 7200.11 is 275 shipped at Newegg now.


Understood and your call of course. FWIW I've never had any problems returning anything to BB. On the other hand everything I've ever returned to Newegg incurred a restocking fee (10% I think) so if I can buy something in a B&M store, that's always my first choice. Plus I have no patience and when I've decided I want to do something&#8230;well&#8230;I want it NOW doggone it! But that's just me. 

That's a good price for the Seagate. The only downside is that you can't adjust the AAM which is generally 258 as opposed to the WD 1TB which can be "quieted down" to 128. I can't hear mine inside our Series3 unless I put my ear on the case. If drive noise isn't an issue (and David says the Seagate is okay too) not a big deal then.

I'd certainly like to hear how it goes either way. :up:


----------



## sirfergy

Reviews of the 7200.11 show it has poor read/write performance, so I would be curious what kind of impact that has while recording two HD shows and watching an HD show.


----------



## jlib

sirfergy said:


> Reviews of the 7200.11 show it has poor read/write performance, so I would be curious what kind of impact that has while recording two HD shows and watching an HD show.


The reviews seem to be across the board but most are favorable. Taking one example:

_The Barracuda 7200.11 offers the best low-level benchmark results, jumping over 100 MB/s read or write transfer rates..._​
So, if you need 19.4 Mb/s for each HD stream the drive is sitting idle for over 40% of the time. The TiVo, even when maxed out, is not much of a challenge for current hard drives.


----------



## DaveDFW

The hard drive is even less busy than that--the HD stream is measured in megabits/sec and the hard drive transfer rates are in megabytes/sec.

100 megabytes/sec is about 800 megabits/sec, so that's about 40 simultaneous HD streams at around 20 megabits/sec.

I don't think a Tivo is stressing a modern hard drive very much. 

TTYL
David


----------



## sfhub

Well, I don't think TiVo stresses modern drives either but those #s quoted are usually for optimal sequential reads or writes. If you start introducing non-sequential reads with multiple write streams those #s go down. You might get this if one thread is doing reading for playback, 2 threads are writing for the 2 tuner buffers, another thread is servicing MRV, with all the files scattered on different areas of the disk. This is not approaching server level truely random access but is definitely more taxing than sequential read/write quoted in the marketing literature.


----------



## jlib

DaveDFW said:


> The hard drive is even less busy than that--the HD stream is measured in megabits/sec and the hard drive transfer rates are in megabytes/sec...


Oh, yeah, that's right. Thanks for the correction. Always getting the Mb and the MB mixed up. So, the Tivo drive is idle about 92% of the time (in a perfect world). And even if we allow for real world overhead it is probably still idle twice as much as I said before. So, even less to worry about as far as bandwidth is concerned!


----------



## rcliff

I called back Western Digital to try to get the -32ZJB00 replacement. After several calls to India they insist that any numbers after WD10EACS are meaningless and that the drives are technically identical. After going back and forth and insisting that this is not the case, they told me a support supervisor would call me back shortly which never happened.


----------



## richsadams

rcliff said:


> I called back Western Digital to try to get the -32ZJB00 replacement. After several calls to India they insist that any numbers after WD10EACS are meaningless and that the drives are technically identical. After going back and forth and insisting that this is not the case, they told me a support supervisor would call me back shortly which never happened.


How frustrating! Wonder who *Stylin *talked to (according to this post) at WD to get her replacement? Maybe she can get us another phone number.


----------



## richsadams

Here's a head's up...Spike at MFSLive posted the following today:



> I just picked up this drive from local BB (retail package) and it's got a drive w/ model number ending with xxx-00ZJB0.
> 
> I ran some tests and of course it doesn't work on Tivo S3 (TCD648250B) after menu reboot.
> 
> Exact error message from serial out:
> 
> ide_read_sector timed out
> 
> autoboot failed to read boot sector
> 
> Service number is xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx.
> 
> What is password?
> 
> So basically after it reboots from menu, drive doesn't get recognized by Tivo boot prom so it goes into service mode where it asks for a password.
> On the front panel, all lights should be on and will get stuck indefinitely until you pull the plug and put it back in.
> 
> I've posted picutre of two retails boxes. One on the left is is old retail package and drive works. One on the right is the new retail package that contains drive that doesn't work on S3. Of course if you buy an OEM drive, it doesn't work either.


Here are the pics...new and old










Original Box - Drive model *32ZJB0* 
Works in all TiVo Series3's and TiVo HD's internally and as eSATA










New Box - Drive model *00ZJB0* - Works only as external/eSATA w/TiVo Series3 and both internal and external w/TiVo HD's

The model I purchased back in September and installed in our Series3 was the original and is working fine. Looks like WD is no longer shipping that one. 

Cheers to Spike for that! :up:

EDIT: Forgot...also thanks to *rcliff *for noting/comfirming the same. :up:


----------



## jdsnov73

I was in BestBuy this last weekend and saw both boxes and wasn't sure what was different about them. Thanks.


----------



## rcliff

Rich, it does indeed sound like the -32 has been replaced by the -00 and this would mean the end for this drive model as a series 3 internal upgrade. I'm not going to bother trying to get WD to replace this any more with a -32 because I'm guessing they don't exist anymore. I already RMA'd once and received the -00 drive. I hope you (and everyone else here) gets years of trouble free use from your -32 drive because any in warranty failures will likely be replaced by -00 drives since WD considers them "technically identical".


----------



## ilh

I wonder what the quirk with the S3 and the -00 is all about, especially if the HD doesn't have the same problem and the -00s are supposedly fine in other applications such as PCs. I suppose there is no incentive for TiVo to fix the software for this since internal drive upgrades aren't officially supported.


----------



## 1283

I did encounter a soft reboot problem with the -00 drive and a Dell PC's SATA port. That particular drive had other issues and had to be returned, so it's hard to say if there is a wider compatibility problem.


----------



## KraziJoe

ashu said:


> Darn! I was going to use a plethora of Best buy RewardZone certificates and a generous Christmas gift (BB Gift Card) to pick up the 1Tb Green WD today. Glad I checked here. Knowing my patience and time constraints - I would have been seriously po'd if I had received an OEM version in the box.
> 
> I'm just going to go in and see how much the Seagate 1TB 7200.11 is instead - the BB flier says they're 20% off this week. (Wrong place to ask, but anyone know of any issues with th 7200.11 and the S3 - as an internal upgrade drive, offhand - other than the fact they have noisy seek?)
> 
> Double darn. I wanted the quieter, low-power-consumption green drive.
> Thanks for posting your experience, rcliff. Hmm - pity you had to waste so much time to figure it out for the rest of us (and yourself). I'll stick with Seagate henceforth, methinks.


Did you find a Seagate 1TB drive in store? Looking online, they do not have any Seagate 1TB drives. All I see is 750Gb and lower.


----------



## sirfergy

My local best buy had both models in stock. Thanks for the tip on which box to buy. I was able to grab the -32 model.


----------



## sirfergy

Is it safe to use the WD Data Lifeguard Tools 11.2 for DOS to set the AAM before using this for my TiVo? Or is the only safe way to use hdparm in linux?


----------



## greg_burns

sirfergy said:


> Is it safe to use the WD Data Lifeguard Tools 11.2 for DOS to set the AAM before using this for my TiVo? Or is the only safe way to use hdparm in linux?


Sure. Can you do that with Data Lifegaurd?  You can also use hdparm or Hitachi Feature Tool. They all do the same thing.

You can do it before putting in your Tivo or later on if you want. Won't hurt anything.


----------



## sirfergy

Thanks. It's a shame the AAM isn't set correctly from the factory.


----------



## brettatk

sirfergy said:


> Thanks. It's a shame the AAM isn't set correctly from the factory.


Did you connect it and then realize it was too loud or did you just read on here some people said when they got it they had to adjust the AAM? I bought the WD Green drive and never touched the AAM settings. I can sit about a foot away and cannot hear anything.


----------



## bizzy

sirfergy said:


> Thanks. It's a shame the AAM isn't set correctly from the factory.


The problem is that 'correct' varies depending on application. It leaves the factory set correctly for the fastest seek times, which is probably the safest assumption on usage that they could make.


----------



## sirfergy

The latter.


----------



## brettatk

sirfergy said:


> The latter.


Once you have it running in your Tivo and if you hear noise you can always lower the AAM setting then. Of course I can understand why you might want to go ahead and do it with the Tivo box open. I had a problem running the Hitachi Tool on my drive so I didnt worry about it. Luckily the drive runs pretty quiet as is.


----------



## 1283

brettatk said:


> I bought the WD Green drive and never touched the AAM settings. I can sit about a foot away and cannot hear anything.


With AAM=128, I can still hear the seeks a few feet away. It's one of the quietest drives available, but it's not silent.


----------



## sirfergy

And 128 is the quietest setting right?


----------



## 1283

yes


----------



## sirfergy

So my -32 model made in Sept 2007 worked like a charm in my S3


----------



## richsadams

sirfergy said:


> So my -32 model made in Sept 2007 worked like a charm in my S3


Mine too. :up: Let's just hope that they outlast the 3 year warranty...we'd probably end up with an OEM replacement. Guess I could pop it into my TiVo HD, but I really don't need a TB of space on that one. Nor do I want to buy another drive for the S3.


----------



## ashu

Whew - I'm glad I didn't buy. I stopped by the BB, and saw the drives, and thought the better of it. All of them were the 'new' design box, implying -00s. Close call!

Waiting for the Seagate 7200.11 to drop below 225.


----------



## chrispitude

Does this apply to the Western Digital Caviar GP WD7500AACS too? It's $159 shipped on NewEgg. Very tempting if it will work!

- Chris


----------



## richsadams

chrispitude said:


> Does this apply to the Western Digital Caviar GP WD7500AACS too? It's $159 shipped on NewEgg. Very tempting if it will work!
> 
> - Chris


No, that's a whole other model, 750GB, etc. AFAIK there wouldn't be a problem using that one as an internal or external drive. You'd probably want to adjust the AAM down to 128 before installing it using the Hitachi Feature Tool.

http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm#FeatureTool


----------



## chrispitude

richsadams said:


> No, that's a whole other model, 750GB, etc. AFAIK there wouldn't be a problem using that one as an internal or external drive. You'd probably want to adjust the AAM down to 128 before installing it using the Hitachi Feature Tool.


Pulled the trigger - will let everyone know how it works out!

- Chris


----------



## 1283

richsadams said:


> No, that's a whole other model, 750GB, etc. AFAIK there wouldn't be a problem using that one as an internal or external drive.


I would not count on it. Usually all the drives in the family would share the same firmware, controller, etc. Whatever is causing the WD10EACS-00 incompatibility may affect other models in the GP line as well.


----------



## richsadams

c3 said:


> I would not count on it. Usually all the drives in the family would share the same firmware, controller, etc. Whatever is causing the WD10EACS-00 incompatibility may affect other models in the GP line as well.


True enough...but folks here (including TiVo) have been using various WD hard drives for a number of years...Caviar's included w/o any issues AFAIK. It will be interesting if anything comes up.

My advice would be to buy WD drives from local brick and mortar stores that have a good return policy until things clear up.

I'm a Seagate guy myself, but the 1TB WD HDD our S3 has seems to be working fine...fingers crossed.


----------



## richsadams

chrispitude said:


> Pulled the trigger - will let everyone know how it works out!
> 
> - Chris


Thanks Chris...we'll look forward to your feedback. :up:


----------



## 1283

richsadams said:


> True enough...but folks here (including TiVo) have been using various WD hard drives for a number of years...Caviar's included w/o any issues AFAIK.


Yes, but they're not drives from the GP product line.

BTW, Fry's has both 1TB and 750GB GP bare drives.


----------



## ashu

richsadams said:


> True enough...but folks here (including TiVo) have been using various WD hard drives for a number of years...Caviar's included w/o any issues AFAIK. It will be interesting if anything comes up.
> 
> My advice would be to buy WD drives from local brick and mortar stores that have a good return policy until things clear up.
> 
> I'm a Seagate guy myself, but the 1TB WD HDD our S3 has seems to be working fine...fingers crossed.


Umm, FYI the linked $159/750GB WD WAS a new 750GB version of the (now-dreaded) OEM Green Performance drive!

Fingers crossed is right


----------



## richsadams

ashu said:


> Umm, FYI the linked $159/750GB WD WAS a new 750GB version of the (now-dreaded) OEM Green Performance drive!


Yes, 750GB as I pointed out in my previous post. Whether it matches the OEM specs of the 1TB drive or not is unknown.

I wouldn't consider the GP drives "dreaded" really. Mine and many others are working perfectly fine (in the right circumstances of course). They run cooler than all but one other (smaller) drive on the market and are very quiet. Just the opposite of one of the Seagate drives I have in my computer...runs hot and what a racket! 

It will be interesting to see if there are any issues with other WD GP drives though.


----------



## old64mb

richsadams said:


> Mine too. :up: Let's just hope that they outlast the 3 year warranty...we'd probably end up with an OEM replacement. Guess I could pop it into my TiVo HD, but I really don't need a TB of space on that one. Nor do I want to buy another drive for the S3.


Wow, so much to catch up on since I was one of the pioneers for these things back in September.

I second the hope that they outlast the warranty or sometime soon they work out a different control board. Mine are still going along fine, and I wouldn't call them dreaded - the original version of the GP was probably one of the best drives ever made for upgrading any DVR. Just read the end of the thread first to find out how they've "progressed" before you buy into our hype!


----------



## Burt Spielman

ashu said:


> Waiting for the Seagate 7200.11 to drop below 225.


Ashu, I had problems with a pair of Seagate 7200.11 1TB drives during my "upgrade from an already (WeaKnees) upgraded 750GB Seagate internal and add new external" procedure. They were very noisy, and ultimately didn't work. I RMA'd them to Newegg and bought Hitachi Deskstars instead, which work fine. Seagate has announced a DB35 version of their 1TB drive, which will, presumably, exhibit the same performance as the DB35 750GB drive I replaced. If you're going to wait for Seagate, I'd suggest that you wait until the DB35 1TB is available.


----------



## chrispitude

Okay, the 750GB GP drive came yesterday evening. Since I had previously copied my failing factory 250GB drive over to a spare 320GB drive, I could not copy again and keep my problems. Instead, I went to the MFSLive interactive command generator and used the following line to do the copy:



Code:


backup -f 9999 -qso - /dev/sda | restore -s 128 -xzpi - /dev/sdb

When I put the new drive in the Tivo and started it up, it started up normally and went to the main menu. I hit Now Playing and tried to play something to see if it would play, and it told me that the program was not recorded due to lack of signal (expected). A few seconds later, the screen went black and the Tivo rebooted. Partway through the reboot, I got my first GSOD.

I powered down, brought the drive over to my PC and recopied again. This time when I powered up the Tivo, I intended to do a Clear & Delete Everything. This time, the screen went black just as I was going through the menus, and again it reset itself.

Is this the failure mode shown by the 1TB models too? If so, it appears the 750GB models are also incompatible in the same way.

Edit: the model number on the drive label is WD7500AACS-00ZJB0.

- Chris


----------



## richsadams

chrispitude said:


> Okay, the 750GB GP drive came yesterday evening. Since I had previously copied my failing factory 250GB drive over to a spare 320GB drive, I could not copy again and keep my problems. Instead, I went to the MFSLive interactive command generator and used the following line to do the copy:
> 
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> backup -f 9999 -qso - /dev/sda | restore -s 128 -xzpi - /dev/sdb
> 
> When I put the new drive in the Tivo and started it up, it started up normally and went to the main menu. I hit Now Playing and tried to play something to see if it would play, and it told me that the program was not recorded due to lack of signal (expected). A few seconds later, the screen went black and the Tivo rebooted. Partway through the reboot, I got my first GSOD.
> 
> I powered down, brought the drive over to my PC and recopied again. This time when I powered up the Tivo, I intended to do a Clear & Delete Everything. This time, the screen went black just as I was going through the menus, and again it reset itself.
> 
> Is this the failure mode shown by the 1TB models too? If so, it appears the 750GB models are also incompatible in the same way.
> 
> Edit: the model number on the drive label is WD7500AACS-00ZJB0.
> 
> - Chris


No, the WD 1TB GP models work in every way except that the OEM version (00ZJB0) hangs at the "Welcome, powering up" screen on a soft reboot when installed internally in the Series3.

What you're seeing (particularly if you got the GSOD) is more likely either programing or hard drive failure. Programming/data corruption would be my guess since your original drive failed, you may be copying corrupted data to the new drive.

So I'm not sure what's causing it or what the remedy would be other than testing your new drive to see if it has any bad sectors, etc. using the WD Lifeguard Diagnostic program.

That's not to say that there won't be issues with your WD 750GB GP drive in a TiVo, but the symptoms are not that of the 1TB version.

You may want to try a fresh image by using Instant Cake.


----------



## chrispitude

Interesting... the copy was from the 320GB, which is a fully working drive. In fact, I plugged the 320GB back in and the Tivo is running just as great as ever.

I've got an RMA number to return this 750GB drive. I wonder what I should try next to see if the 750GB really is compatible?

- Chris


----------



## richsadams

chrispitude said:


> Interesting... the copy was from the 320GB, which is a fully working drive. In fact, I plugged the 320GB back in and the Tivo is running just as great as ever.
> 
> I've got an RMA number to return this 750GB drive. I wonder what I should try next to see if the 750GB really is compatible?
> 
> - Chris


Hmmm, that _is _strange and should work it seems. I guess testing the drive would be an easy next step. The other would be to get a new image OR just try another drive I suppose. The Seagate DB35 750GB drives are working very well for a number of folks here.

It would be valuable to know if the WD GP series is the issue or if it's something else. But then we can't expect you to be a guinea pig here. 

Keep us posted! :up:


----------



## jlib

That command is going to truncate (not copy programs). The guide doesn't have a command line listed but does mention under "Option 1.3 To copy everything from expanded Tivo drive to another bigger drive" that "This option is built into WinMFS..." You said WinMFS doesn't work?



chrispitude said:


> Okay, the 750GB GP drive came yesterday evening. Since I had previously copied my failing factory 250GB drive over to a spare 320GB drive, I could not copy again and keep my [programs]. Instead, I went to the MFSLive interactive command generator and used the following line to do the copy:
> 
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> backup -f 9999 -qso - /dev/sda | restore -s 128 -xzpi - /dev/sdb


----------



## 1283

chrispitude said:


> Since I had previously copied my failing factory 250GB drive over to a spare 320GB drive, I could not copy again and keep my problems.


I have not used MFSLive, but I used WinMFS to copy from an upgraded 500GB to 1TB with all of the recordings.


----------



## chrispitude

Hi folks,

I ran the command above because attempting to copy the programs over on the upgraded drive does not work with MFSLive. I don't have a Windows box so I can't run WinMFS to do a copy of an already-upgraded drive.

I did some more testing. To rule out a copy-of-a-copy being the problem, I next copied my original factory drive over to the 750GB GP drive with all programs included. The new drive started up and ran fine. I was even able to go into Now Playing and delete everything. However, when I went into Settings and told it to call home to force an update, it started connecting and then crashed and rebooted, and hung on that reboot.

I pulled the drive and did a full surface scan with WDDIAG, and the drive passed. So, I think I will just have to concede that the 750GB -00 doesn't work either. That's a real shame too, because with the AAM set to 128 the drive was absolutely silent.

I was able to do an online chat with a Newegg customer support rep and explain that the drive is incompatible with my Tivo, and they were kindly willing to skip the usual 15&#37; restocking fee as a one-time concession. They even emailed me a pre-paid UPS return label. Nothing lost except 

Edit: I also appear to have begun every paragraph with "I, I, I!" I'm normally not so self-centered!

- Chris


----------



## Marc

Best Buy has these (Western Digital "Green") drives on sale again for $299.99. Not as good as $259, but still better than their $350 price tag.

My local Best Buy had three on the shelf, two in the new packaging and one in the original black box.


----------



## Marc

Marc said:


> My local Best Buy had three on the shelf, two in the new packaging and one in the original black box.


Going for the original black box still ended up getting me a -00 (OEM) drive.

That's okay for me since I have TiVo HDs and not Series 3s, and this particular drive is actually going into an HP MediaSmart server anyway.


----------



## sirfergy

Fry's has em for $259 if you're interested.


----------



## Marc

Well, I was hoping to get a -32 drive, so that's why I went to Best Buy since I could buy a retail box instead of going OEM.

For mail-order OEM drives, NewEgg has them for $254.99.


----------



## zenisu

sirfergy said:


> Fry's has em for $259 if you're interested.


At my Fry's (Downers Grove, IL) they were $289 OEM, and of course they only had the 00 model. The 00 is fine for me since mine isn't an S3. Not the best price in the world, but I'm an impatient sort. Popped it in after winmfs and it works like a champ.


----------



## 1283

zenisu said:


> At my Fry's (Downers Grove, IL) they were $289 OEM


You may be able to order online at frys.com (currently $265) for in-store pickup.


----------



## mike_flood

cr33p said:


> Just thought Id let everyone know I saw the sales ad today for BB and they have the new WD Green 1TB hard drives for sale, 259.00 after 90 dollar instant savings. What a steal.


* Here's a list of known vendors that sell the WD10EVCS drive*
This is from what used to be called "Froogle Google"
http://www.google.com/products?q=WD10EVCS&btnG=Search+Products
Please understand that just because a vendor is listed doesn't mean that they are reputable or have stock on handl.


----------



## richsadams

mike_flood said:


> * Here's a list of known vendors that sell the WD10EVCS drive*
> This is from what used to be called "Froogle Google"
> http://www.google.com/products?q=WD10EVCS&btnG=Search+Products
> Please understand that just because a vendor is listed doesn't mean that they are reputable or have stock on handl.


Thanks for the post. It's interesting because this is apparently a different drive than the OP and the rest of us have been talking about. The model number is different, they call this newer one the "WD AV-GP" indicating that it's specifically for DVR use and although the differences are only marginal, the specs are slightly different as well:

Specs for the "original" WD10EACS

Specs for the "new" WD10EVCS

Do you have one of these drives by chance? I think we'd all be very interested in knowing what the full model number on the drive is (xx00 OEM Vs xx32 retail, etc.) and if it the "new" WD10EVCS drive will work as an internal upgrade for the Series3.

FYI, as *Marc *mentioned, Newegg currently has the  WD10EACS OEM 1TB GP drive at $254.99. NOTE: This is the one that _cannot _be used as an internal upgrade on the Series3 but will work as an eSATA drive for either the Series3 or TiVo HD as well as an internal hard drive upgrade for the TiVo HD.


----------



## ilh

FWIW, we've been buying some NewEgg OEM WD5000AAKS at the office. Our first batch of 10 was all -00xx and a recent batch is -75xx. I bring this up just as further evidence that OEM != -00xx and that WD seems to change those "batch" numbers or whatever they are without warning.


----------



## richsadams

ilh said:


> FWIW, we've been buying some NewEgg OEM WD5000AAKS at the office. Our first batch of 10 was all -00xx and a recent batch is -75xx. I bring this up just as further evidence that OEM != -00xx and that WD seems to change those "batch" numbers or whatever they are without warning.


Thanks for that. I'm sure it's mostly (or only) us (we?) TiVo geeks that pay any attention to these sorts of things. I'm sure the WD folks are surprised when anyone asks about those kinds of details.

I posted the new WD A/V Drive info on the Official eSATA Drive Expansion in 9.2: FAQ + Discussion thead. We'll see what comes back. BTW, thanks to *Mike *for finding this info. :up:


----------



## DCIFRTHS

richsadams said:


> Thanks for that. I'm sure it's mostly (or only) us (we?) TiVo geeks that pay any attention to these sorts of things. I'm sure the WD folks are surprised when anyone asks about those kinds of details.
> 
> I posted the new WD A/V Drive info on the Official eSATA Drive Expansion in 9.2: FAQ + Discussion thead. We'll see what comes back. BTW, thanks to *Mike *for finding this info. :up:


Rich. Thanks for keeping this thread very easy to read with your summaries. Great job !!!


----------



## richsadams

DCIFRTHS said:


> Rich. Thanks for keeping this thread very easy to read with your summaries. Great job !!!


It's a labor of love...kinda twisted huh?


----------



## jlib

mike_flood said:


> * Here's a list of known vendors that sell the WD10EVCS drive*
> This is from what used to be called "Froogle Google"
> http://www.google.com/products?q=WD10EVCS&btnG=Search+Products
> Please understand that just because a vendor is listed doesn't mean that they are reputable or have stock on handl.


And, of course, none of them have stock on hand and none of the prices are particulalry good compared to the readily available WD10EACS.


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> ... the specs are slightly different as well:
> 
> Specs for the "original" WD10EACS
> 
> Specs for the "new" WD10EVCS


Here are the applicable differences:


Code:


 Drive     Random       Idle       R/W Power
 Model     Vibration    Acoustics  Dissipation
____________________________________________
WD10EACS   0.008 g²/Hz   25 dBA    7.5 Watts
WD10EVCS   0.004 g²/Hz   24 dBA    7.4 Watts

Note that Idle Acoustics would be irrelevent since the drive will never be idle. 
The Seek Acoustics are the same (25 dBA). 
For all practical purposes these drives are identical.


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> Here are the applicable differences:
> 
> 
> Code:
> 
> 
> Drive     Random       Idle       R/W Power
> Model     Vibration    Acoustics  Disipation
> ____________________________________________
> WD10EACS   0.008 g²/Hz   25 dBA    7.5 Watts
> WD10EVCS   0.004 g²/Hz   24 dBA    7.4 Watts
> 
> Note that Idle Acoustics would be irrelevent since the drive will never be idle.
> The Seek Acoustics are the same (25 dBA).
> For all practical purposes these drives are identical.


 :up: The unknown is if they've changed whatever it is that's causing the WD10EACS's soft reboot problems with the Series3. I suspect the only way we'll find out is when someone does an actual install/upgrade.

It'll also be interesting to see if TiVo eventually blesses this drive in the form of a 750GB and/or 1TB My DVR Expander.


----------



## Bodhammer

richsadams said:


> Yes, 750GB as I pointed out in my previous post. Whether it matches the OEM specs of the 1TB drive or not is unknown.
> 
> I wouldn't consider the GP drives "dreaded" really. Mine and many others are working perfectly fine (in the right circumstances of course). They run cooler than all but one other (smaller) drive on the market and are very quiet. Just the opposite of one of the Seagate drives I have in my computer...runs hot and what a racket!
> 
> It will be interesting to see if there are any issues with other WD GP drives though.


Can anyone else confirm that the WD7500AACS will have problems in the Tivo HD?

I ordered one from yesterday Newegg before I found this thread.

Thanks,
Bod


----------



## greg_burns

Bodhammer said:


> Can anyone else confirm that the WD7500AACS will have problems in the Tivo HD?


Haven't the issues been isolated to the S3, not the TivoHD?

See Sec III #6
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=370784


----------



## eabu

Whatever you do, DON'T get the Hitachi 1Tb Cinema Drive (I got mine at buy.com), it is loud and makes alot of thumping sounds, just absolutely unacceptable. Even though I applied AAM (Advanced Acoustic Management) to it with the Hitachi Feature Tool CD to 128.


----------



## Bodhammer

greg_burns said:


> Haven't the issues been isolated to the S3, not the TivoHD?
> 
> See Sec III #6
> http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=370784


I was just reading this: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5915985#post5915985

I'll give it a try when it arrives and report out. This is my first attempt at a SATA upgrade. I did about 20 IDE upgrades on Series 1 and 2 Tivos.


----------



## 1283

Bodhammer said:


> I was just reading this: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5915985#post5915985
> 
> I'll give it a try when it arrives and report out. This is my first attempt at a SATA upgrade. I did about 20 IDE upgrades on Series 1 and 2 Tivos.


Your link is for the S3, not HD. Something else is wrong with that upgrade because even the -00 drive in the S3 should not crash the TiVo.


----------



## jlib

eabu said:


> Whatever you do, DON'T get the Hitachi 1Tb Cinema Drive (I got mine at buy.com), it is loud and makes alot of thumping sounds, just absolutely unacceptable. Even though I applied AAM (Advanced Acoustic Management) to it with the Hitachi Feature Tool CD to 128.


I am going to suggest you have a defective drive. What you report is not normal behavior. The CinemaStar should already be as quiet as it can get and would never be considered a noisy drive. If you are easily able to return it, do. If you can save money by replacing it with a Deskstar, do that also. If not then have Hitachi replace it under warranty.


----------



## aaronwt

Must be a bad drive. The 1TB Hitachi drives are extremely quiet. The WD drives might only be ever so slightly quieter. The difference between them is very small.


----------



## husky55

quote:

"FYI, as Marc mentioned, Newegg currently has the WD10EACS OEM 1TB GP drive at $254.99. NOTE: This is the one that cannot be used as an internal upgrade on the Series3 but will work as an eSATA drive for either the Series3 or TiVo HD as well as an internal hard drive upgrade for the TiVo HD."

@Richsadams,

Are you absolutely sure of this? I have a Tivo HD and this WD is my first choice to replace my factory original drive (internal) until I heard some ramblings at MFSLIVE forums about the problem after a power loss (either by unplugging or otherwise). Some drives (WD 10EACS OEM 1TB GP) apparently failed in the HD after a few weeks or months.

Would the Hitachi Deskstar be a better alternative?

This is kind of scaring for me.

Thanks,


----------



## richsadams

eabu said:


> Whatever you do, DON'T get the Hitachi 1Tb Cinema Drive (I got mine at buy.com), it is loud and makes alot of thumping sounds, just absolutely unacceptable. Even though I applied AAM (Advanced Acoustic Management) to it with the Hitachi Feature Tool CD to 128.


I agree with *aaronwt *and *jlib*, your Hitachi Cinema Star drive should be _very _quiet. The specs for the Hitachi indicate that the noise level averages 29 to 30 dBA. By comparison some HDD's can be as loud as 50 dBA. The WD 1TB GP HDD spec list 25 to 27 dBA. It's the second quietest drive on the market. I know I can't hear ours unless I press my ear to the TiVo case.

Your Hitachi is a good candidate for a return/replacement IMO. Hopefully you don't have too many shows saved up.


----------



## richsadams

husky55 said:


> Are you absolutely sure of this? I have a Tivo HD and this WD is my first choice to replace my factory original drive (internal) until I heard some ramblings at MFSLIVE forums about the problem after a power loss (either by unplugging or otherwise). Some drives (WD 10EACS OEM 1TB GP) apparently failed in the HD after a few weeks or months.
> 
> This is kind of scaring for me.
> 
> Thanks,


Welcome to the forum. :up:

Quite a few TCF and MFSLive forum members (including yours truly) have been working on this since August or so. If you take some time and read the various posts prior to this one you'll find that the drive in question has been used as an internal upgrade for a number of TiVo HD's without a problem. The issue was limited to soft reboots (menu restarts) when the OEM version of the drive was used as an internal upgrade on the TiVo Series3. AFAIK there are no reports of actual drive failures to date (although drives can be DOA and do fail, but nothing indicates that these drives are out of the normal service parameters).

If you follow all of the upgrade instructions at http://www.mfslive.org your TiVo HD should work perfectly fine. Nothing to be afraid of. 

The Hitachi DeskStar is a fine drive as well, however you'd want to adjust the Automatic Acoustic Management (AAM) setting down to 128 to make it run more quietly using the Hitachi Feature Tool.

Others that have performed the TiVo HD internal upgrade can chime in too.


----------



## keenanSR

richsadams said:


> I agree with *aaronwt *and *jlib*, your Hitachi Cinema Star drive should be _very _quiet. The specs for the Hitachi indicate that the noise level averages 29 to 30 dBA. By comparison some HDD's can be as loud as 50 dBA. The WD 1TB GP HDD spec list 25 to 27 dBA. It's the second quietest drive on the market. I know I can't hear ours unless I press my ear to the TiVo case.
> 
> Your Hitachi is a good candidate for a return/replacement IMO. Hopefully you don't have too many shows saved up.


Just to add my .02 cents, I have 3 of the Hitachi's, all removed from the original USB enclosure, and they're all very, very quiet. Using 1 as an external for the Series 3, 1 for external on a DirecTV HR20-700 and 1 in a desktop PC, haven't had a single problem with any of them.


----------



## husky55

@richsadams,

Thanks for the informative and kind response. I did read most of the information about this WD OEM drive. The thing which spook me was the few reports at the msflive forum which reported WD OEM used as HD internal drive failing to work properly. Your post correctly pointed out that there several successes with the HD and WD OEM drive. That was and is my preferred combination.

I am little hesitant about the Hitachi Deskstar because there were a few reports at newegg about DOAs.

Anyway, I plan to order some drive soon and to post my experience in a few days.

Thanks again for your help.


----------



## yukit

richsadams said:


> Welcome to the forum. :up:
> 
> Quite a few TCF and MFSLive forum members (including yours truly) have been working on this since August or so. If you take some time and read the various posts prior to this one you'll find that the drive in question has been used as an internal upgrade for a number of TiVo HD's without a problem. The issue was limited to soft reboots (menu restarts) when the OEM version of the drive was used as an internal upgrade on the TiVo Series3.
> ...
> 
> Others that have performed the TiVo HD internal upgrade can chime in too.


I received the 1TB WD OEM drive from NewEgg about a week ago.
Just finished the installation in Tivo HD on Sat. It seems to be working just fine including the soft restart option.

I did not write down the specific model/serial # of the drive. I will update if I get around to remove the cover for the data point.


----------



## greg_burns

yukit said:


> I received the 1TB WD OEM drive from NewEgg about a week ago.
> Just finished the installation in *Tivo HD* on Sat. It seems to be working just fine including the soft restart option.
> 
> I did not write down the specific model/serial # of the drive. I will update if I get around to remove the cover for the data point.


Isn't this just an S3 issue? 
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=5940265#post5940265


----------



## richsadams

yukit said:


> I received the 1TB WD OEM drive from NewEgg about a week ago.
> Just finished the installation in Tivo HD on Sat. It seems to be working just fine including the soft restart option.
> 
> I did not write down the specific model/serial # of the drive. I will update if I get around to remove the cover for the data point.


Excellent. Thanks for the feedback. :up: Good to know it's working fine in your THD. If it's an OEM from Newegg, the model number is almost certainly WD10EACS-*00ZJB0*.



greg_burns said:


> Isn't this just an S3 issue?


Yep. An earlier poster was concerned about putting one of the OEM versions in his TiVo HD...needed a little reassurance.


----------



## SGR215

*1.5TB Dual SATA Drive/Enclosure for $67.99!*

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/...il.aspx?c=us&l=en&cs=19&sku=A1319048#Overview

It's obviously a screw up on Dell's part. We'll see if it ships.

Edit: It's dead. I guess Dell noticed when people started ordering 20+. (It was on SlickDeals front page even)


----------



## aaronwt

The normal price is $950? What a rip off.


----------



## richsadams

aaronwt said:


> The normal price is $950?


----------



## TiVo Steve

http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=4208469

WD10000CSRTL

Anyone know if this will work internally in a TiVo HD?

Thanks...


----------



## aaronwt

I thought the only boxes that had a prblem with the OEM version was the Series 3 boxes. I know personally that the retail version of this drive works fine in the TiVoHD boxes and the Series 3 boxes. I'm using two of them right now.


----------



## brigont

Aaron,

How long have you been using the WD QB Drives? I just ordered one from J&R and am curious about historical reliability.

At $239, I also picked up the 3 year extended warrantee for an additional $40. Couldn't pass it up

Between this and a 1TB WD MyBook Pro connected via firewire on my home PC (tivo to go), I'm in for the long haul.

Thanks

BG



aaronwt said:


> I thought the only boxes that had a prblem with the OEM version was the Series 3 boxes. I know personally that the retail version of this drive works fine in the TiVoHD boxes and the Series 3 boxes. I'm using two of them right now.


----------



## richsadams

TiVo Steve said:


> http://www.jr.com/JRProductPage.process?Product=4208469
> 
> WD10000CSRTL
> 
> Anyone know if this will work internally in a TiVo HD?
> 
> Thanks...


Yes, that drive will work fine in your TiVo HD. $239.99 is a very good price. :up:


----------



## jlib

aaronwt said:


> I thought the only boxes that had a problem with the OEM version was the Series 3 boxes. I know personally that the retail version of this drive works fine in the TiVoHD boxes and the Series 3 boxes. I'm using two of them right now.


The most recent reports are that WD is no longer making a distinction between the OEM drive in the mylar bag and the drive in the retail box. Neither works well for the S3 only as an internal drive. Perfectly fine for all other uses.


----------



## 1283

brigont said:


> I also picked up the 3 year extended warrantee for an additional $40. Couldn't pass it up


The WD drive already has 3-year warranty. The 3-year extended warranty period seems to start on the date of purchase. If so, there is nothing to extend.

In 3 years, 1TB drive should be less than $100.


----------



## brigont

C3

Good call - Just RMA'd the extended warranty and the Sata cable I purchased as it came with one. I wish they listed the box contents on J&R.

That's $50 bones in my pocket...

If you're in NJ - Beers are on me!

BG



c3 said:


> The WD drive already has 3-year warranty. The 3-year extended warranty period seems to start on the date of purchase. If so, there is nothing to extend.
> 
> In 3 years, 1TB drive should be less than $100.


----------



## richsadams

Are you sure there'll be any beer left after the NY Giants victory party?


----------



## brigont

WD 1TV Greenpower Caviar GP. installed and original 160 drive has been put away carefully for future use. 

I used the "backup" function, working 1 drive at a time. 

result:

144 Hours HD
9000 Hours SD (like I care about SD). 

1TB backup drive on home PC via tivo 2 go

Verizon coming on friday to install fios.... woo friggidy hoo!

Thanks again to everyone for their posts, recommendations, and support. 

Brian


----------



## brigont

That's what tequila is for!



richsadams said:


> Are you sure there'll be any beer left after the NY Giants victory party?


----------



## jlib

brigont said:


> WD 1TV Greenpower Caviar GP...
> 
> 144 Hours HD
> 9000 Hours SD


 Even if we remove the presumptive extra 0 digit typo you should have more SD for that amount of HD. Is this what your info screen is saying?


----------



## richsadams

brigont said:


> That's what tequila is for!


Ah...I stand (for the moment) corrected! 

Congrats on the new drive and enjoy! :up:


----------



## richsadams

jlib said:


> Even if we remove the presumptive extra 0 digit typo you should have more SD for that amount of HD. Is this what your info screen is saying?


I think he was kidding, kind of exaggerating...a bit. Mine is 144 HD, 1367 SD. I'd wager his is the same.


----------



## jlib

richsadams said:


> I think he was kidding, kind of exaggerating...a bit. Mine is 144 HD, 1367 SD. I'd wager his is the same.


Ah, OK. Just witless me not getting the joke.


----------



## brigont

jlib,

Truth is... I did not even bother to look at the SD number. It's my mental malfunction, I only think in HD.

My numbers match Rich's 144 HD, 1367 SD

-BG



jlib said:


> Even if we remove the presumptive extra 0 digit typo you should have more SD for that amount of HD. Is this what your info screen is saying?


----------



## husky55

Just want to thank you all for all your help, specifically richsadams for his encyclopedic knowledge and for his willingness to share even during Sunday Superbowl weekend.

I recorded the Superbowl in HD and a couple of hours of "The Wire" and with Tivo Suggestions, my original 160GB in the Tivo HD seems to be about 80&#37; full. So expanding the storage was not even an option, it's a must for me ( I would assume it's for most of most of us recording in HD).

Anyway, I bought the retail WD10000CSRTL from JR (Excellent NY store) which has the drive WD10EACS-00ZJB0 (same OEM drive as the one at Newegg) and has now installed it in my HD.

Thanks again,


----------



## richsadams

husky55 said:


> Jut want to thank you all for all your help, specifically richsadams for his encyclopedic knowledge and for his willingness to share even during Sunday Superbowl weekend.
> 
> I recorded the Superbowl in HD and a couple of hours of "The Wire" and with Tivo Suggestions, my original 160GB in the Tivo HD seems to be about 80% full. So expanding the storage was not even an option, it's a must for me ( I would assume it's for most of most of us recording in HD).
> 
> Anyway, I bought the retail WD10000CSRTL from JR (Excellent NY store) which has the drive WD10EACS-00ZJB0 (same OEM drive as the one at Newegg) and has now installed it in my HD.
> 
> Thanks again,


Thanks for the kind words...but credit goes to everyone here...particularly the pioneers and of course Spike for giving us the MFSLive programs. :up:

Now you can watch people's eyes  when you tell them that your TiVo has 1 terabyte of disk space (in your best Tim Taylor guy voice).  Enjoy!


----------



## Bodhammer

What should I use for jumper settings on a WD7500AACS for internal use in a TivoHD?

Thanks,
bod


----------



## richsadams

Bodhammer said:


> What should I use for jumper settings on a WD7500AACS for internal use in a TivoHD?
> 
> Thanks,
> bod


None. AFAIK you're one of the first people to use this newer drive in a TiVo HD. Let us know how it goes. :up:


----------



## Bodhammer

richsadams said:


> None. AFAIK you're one of the first people to use this newer drive in a TiVo HD. Let us know how it goes. :up:


I used WinMFS to make a backup and then I attemped to do MFSCopy and save my shows. I tried 3 times and it locked up saying ~35 minutes to go while copying the MFS Media. I then hooked the drive back up to the tivo and deleleted everything in the recently deleted folder giving me 71% free space on the 160 hour drive. WinMFS hung at 10 minutes remaining. Appears to be a somewhat common problem: http://mfslive.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=331

I then just did a restore and add and put the drive in the unit. Booted fine. It showed all the old programs but they wouldn't play. I deleted them all. I played with the unit for about 30 minutes. Had both tuners recording HD channels while I REW and FWD in a program. No issues, no macroblocks.

System shows 107 HD hours and 1015 SD Hours. Temp is 42°C with both tuners recording, ambient is about 65°F in the house. Drive is WD7500AACS - 00ZJB0. Drive is remarkably quiet - I could not hear it while doing MFS, I cannot hear it in the Tivo. I did not change AAM.

Everything is so far so good. I will report if I start seeing issues.

- Bod


----------



## richsadams

Bodhammer said:


> I used WinMFS to make a backup and then I attemped to do MFSCopy and save my shows. I tried 3 times and it locked up saying ~35 minutes to go while copying the MFS Media. I then hooked the drive back up to the tivo and deleleted everything in the recently deleted folder giving me 71% free space on the 160 hour drive. WinMFS hung at 10 minutes remaining. Appears to be a somewhat common problem: http://mfslive.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=331
> 
> I then just did a restore and add and put the drive in the unit. Booted fine. It showed all the old programs but they wouldn't play. I deleted them all. I played with the unit for about 30 minutes. Had both tuners recording HD channels while I REW and FWD in a program. No issues, no macroblocks.
> 
> System shows 107 HD hours and 1015 SD Hours. Temp is 42°C with both tuners recording, ambient is about 65°F in the house. Drive is WD7500AACS - 00ZJB0. Drive is remarkably quiet - I could not hear it while doing MFS, I cannot hear it in the Tivo. I did not change AAM.
> 
> Everything is so far so good. I will report if I start seeing issues.
> 
> - Bod


Congratulations on your new drive!

As an FYI IIRC Spike has mentioned a couple of times that WinMFS may appear to hang...no response, etc., but that it in fact is still working and when it's finished the screen will update. I think some have confirmed that by watching their task manager.

Thanks again for the feedback. :up:


----------



## RichB

richsadams said:


> Congratulations on your new drive!
> 
> As an FYI IIRC Spike has mentioned a couple of times that WinMFS may appear to hang...no response, etc., but that it in fact is still working and when it's finished the screen will update. I think some have confirmed that by watching their task manager.
> 
> Thanks again for the feedback. :up:


I am trying an update to an WD 1TB OEM drive with no progress. I am going from an almost full 500MG to a 1TB. How long should that take. I am getting a littles worried 3 hours and a blank screen.

Also, has anyone reported on the WD10EVCS drive working or not working?

If this does not go anywhere, I think I can return 2 of them to NewEgg and just order either the Server drive of the WD10EVCS if I knew they were going to work of course 

- Rich


----------



## sirfergy

Wait more than 3 hours. I would expect that to take a long time. Are you doing it via SATA or USB?


----------



## husky55

RichB said:


> I am trying an update to an WD 1TB OEM drive with no progress. I am going from an almost full 500MG to a 1TB. How long should that take. I am getting a littles worried 3 hours and a blank screen.
> 
> Also, has anyone reported on the WD10EVCS drive working or not working?
> 
> If this does not go anywhere, I think I can return 2 of them to NewEgg and just order either the Server drive of the WD10EVCS if I knew they were going to work of course
> 
> - Rich


You can check Winmfs progress by 1. open task manager to see if it is running properly or 2. move your mouse over the the program screen. If it's an hourglass instead of an arrow then your program crashed.

I have an Orthos (stress tested) stable system, and Winmfs crashed 3 times on me. My system never crashed before.


----------



## RichB

sirfergy said:


> Wait more than 3 hours. I would expect that to take a long time. Are you doing it via SATA or USB?


I am using SATA.

- Rich


----------



## RichB

husky55 said:


> You can check Winmfs progress by 1. open task manager to see if it is running properly or 2. move your mouse over the the program screen. If it's an hourglass instead of an arrow then your program crashed.
> 
> I have an Orthos (stress tested) stable system, and Winmfs crashed 3 times on me. My system never crashed before.


Taskmgr shows 1 core flagt out running winMFS and the cursor is an hourglass.

- Rich


----------



## husky55

RichB said:


> Taskmgr shows 1 core flagt out running winMFS and the cursor is an hourglass.
> 
> - Rich


Then your WINMFS top should show "Not Responding" and your application has crashed. Another pointer, your HD light does not flicker (not running, if you have the HD light connected), then it's another sign that your program died.


----------



## sirfergy

HD light is a good indicator, and if you don't have one check the disk perf counters. If there is activity it's still running.


----------



## RichB

Thanks all. 

I restarted it and it started to work. I ran out of time, so I will try again tomorrow.

- Rich


----------



## rcliff

I've finally moved on from this saga and gave up on the WD10EACS. I picked up a Hitachi HDS721010KLA330 and everything went like clockwork. Soft reboot issue is gone and the drive is very very quiet. My WD10EACS will find a new home as server storage soon.


----------



## RichB

I got the WinMFS Copy to complete and as expected the OEM WD drive booted once and not again.

I currently trying the 
Western Digital Caviar RE2 GP WD1000FYPS and will report back.

Does anyone know if you should and how you go about setting AAM on the WD's?

If this does not work, what 1TB should I use for cool and quiet operation?

Thanks,

Rich


----------



## jlib

RichB, it would be very valuable information to know if the soft-reboot problem extends to other members of the family such as the WD1000FYPS. On paper, that is a great TiVo drive (defaults to lazy error correction). Thanks for trail blazing. Hopefully you have the option of return or alternate use if it it doesn't work. For AAM setting you can use the Hitachi Feature Tool boot disk or any Linux boot disk and the hdparm command. 128 is the quietest setting.


----------



## RichB

jlib said:


> RichB, it would be very valuable information to know if the soft-reboot problem extends to other members of the family such as the WD1000FYPS. On paper, that is a great TiVo drive (defaults to lazy error correction). Thanks for trail blazing. Hopefully you have the option of return or alternate use if it it doesn't work. For AAM setting you can use the Hitachi Feature Tool boot disk or any Linux boot disk and the hdparm command. 128 is the quietest setting.


Alas, the drive does NOT work. It does not soft-boot.
I wonder if this is feature of the S3 software that could be corrected. I have 2 drives to RMA to NewEgg. Great 

- Rich


----------



## jlib

RichB said:


> Alas, the drive does NOT work. It does not soft-boot.
> I wonder if this is feature of the S3 software that could be corrected...


The unfortunate thing is that since internal HD upgrades are an unsupported feature TiVo is not likely to put any resources to fixing it. WD would be more likely to want to fix it but that likelihood is next to nil.


----------



## RichB

jlib said:


> The unfortunate thing is that since internal HD upgrades are an unsupported feature TiVo is not likely to put any resources to fixing it. WD would be more likely to want to fix it but that likelihood is next to nil.


But it is odd that the TiVo HD works fine with all of the other 1TB green disks. This suggests that either party could be at fault or out of spec.
Perhaps WD could fix it, TiVo could fix it with software, or it cannot be fixed by TiVo since it is a hardware problem.

I believe TiVo ships with WD drives, so this incompatibility could be troublesome going forward.

I guess I have to buy a Hitachi next.

- Rich


----------



## Acropora

Thanks for trying Rich. What's interesting is that Weaknees sells a WD 1TB drive for their internal upgrade. Maybe they found a way to make them work or bought a ton of the old 32 drives. I'm thinking of going Deskstar also but the reliability reviews at newegg are disconcerting and supposedly they are louder than the WD drives. I'd consider getting the WD1000FYPS for a 1TB external upgrade but supposedly it's good for RAID but not single desktop use from what I read.


----------



## RichB

Acropora said:


> Thanks for trying Rich. What's interesting is that Weaknees sells a WD 1TB drive for their internal upgrade. Maybe they found a way to make them work or bought a ton of the old 32 drives. I'm thinking of going Deskstar also but the reliability reviews at newegg are disconcerting and supposedly they are louder than the WD drives. I'd consider getting the WD1000FYPS for a 1TB external upgrade but supposedly it's good for RAID but not single desktop use from what I read.


The WD1000FYPS is the drive I just tried and it does not work in the S3.

- Rich


----------



## husky55

RichB said:


> The WD1000FYPS is the drive I just tried and it does not work in the S3.
> 
> - Rich


The original S3 is discontinued so I guess a replacement will be shipping soon (just my wild guess). I agree that Tivo will not be doing anything to improve a discontinued product.

FYI, my THD is recognized as an S3 in System Info. THD, for whatever reason seems to work with the the WD TB in my signature.

Another option for S3 owners would be to use an eSATA enclosure with your WD TB drive. It was reported that it would work.


----------



## 1283

husky55 said:


> FYI, my THD is recognized as an S3 in System Info.


"Series 3" is the generation/family. 648 is the S3. 652 is the THD.


----------



## 1283

This is not really directly related to this thread, but here it goes. Has anyone had problem opening up the cover of TiVoHD? I just bought one, and the cover would only slide back about 1/16" and would not go any further.


----------



## RichB

c3 said:


> This is not really directly related to this thread, but here it goes. Has anyone had problem opening up the cover of TiVoHD? I just bought one, and the cover would only slide back about 1/16" and would not go any further.


Yes. Gently pull the sides near the front out a bit and it should come off.

- Rich


----------



## 1283

RichB said:


> Yes. Gently pull the sides near the front out a bit and it should come off.
> 
> - Rich


Thank you!!! That worked. :up:


----------



## Acropora

RichB said:


> The WD1000FYPS is the drive I just tried and it does not work in the S3.
> 
> - Rich


You tried it as an external drive and it didn't work?


----------



## greg_burns

Acropora said:


> You tried it as an external drive and it didn't work?


Internal. He mentioned the soft boot problem.


----------



## ciper

27 pages, mostly off topic, can someone at least post the current great deal on hard drives?


----------



## greg_burns

ciper said:


> 27 pages, mostly off topic, can someone at least post the current great deal on hard drives?


This thread is pretty much on topic as far as that WD drive goes.

You may want to resurrect this thread for that question.


----------



## RichB

Acropora said:


> You tried it as an external drive and it didn't work?


I have decided to stay internal only.
I got the sense that the S3 was end-gamed and there would be more effort applied to the HD so I decided to cut over to HD's and sell by 2 and my brothers S3.

This finicky drive thing does not sit well with me.

(so people understand the relevance, I wish to stay with the low power 1TB green drives support and M-Card that is available only in the HD)

- Rich


----------



## greg_burns

I thought the low power feature of these WDs would never get used when in a Tivo? Guess I haven't been following along as closely as I thought... 



Televisionary said:


> Considering that their "Green" selling point is that they save energy by sleeping and/or using lower-power modes when not needed, I would say the designers' first thought wasn't 24/7 instantaneous availability. A TiVo would never use these green features.





c3 said:


> The *operating power* is much lower than other drives, so it's "green" in that sense. The terms "DVR drives" and "24x7 drives" are mostly marketing.


That clears that up.


----------



## AbMagFab

greg_burns said:


> I thought the low power feature of these WDs would never get used when in a Tivo? Guess I haven't been following along as closely as I thought...


The drive itself runs at closer to 5400 RPM, instead of the faster, hotter, and more power consuming 7200 RPM. That makes it more green.

Cooler = less power = greener. Even if in the Tivo it isn't taking advantage of all the green capabilities.


----------



## Moebius

Update: Just noticed the WD10000CSRTL is on sale for $229 at BestBuy right now. I'm trying to be a good boy and wait till I pay off the new TiVoHD before charging a hard drive on it, but it's getting kind of tempting.


----------



## husky55

Moebius said:


> Update: Just noticed the WD10000CSRTL is on sale for $220 at BestBuy right now. I'm trying to be a good boy and wait till I pay off the new TiVoHD before charging a hard drive on it, but it's getting kind of tempting.


I bought this WD retail package from JR in NY. The WD drive inside the box is the one in my signature.

Quiet, green power and hopefully reliable. Works great so far.


----------



## sirfergy

Darn, 1 day past the 30 day window for getting the price adjusted.


----------



## RichB

husky55 said:


> I bought this WD retail package from JR in NY. The WD drive inside the box is the one in my signature.
> 
> Quiet, green power and hopefully reliable. Works great so far.


Are you using this in an S3 or HD?

- Rich


----------



## dwit

RichB said:


> Are you using this in an S3 or HD?
> 
> - Rich


See signature.


----------



## Marc

sirfergy said:


> Darn, 1 day past the 30 day window for getting the price adjusted.


I am so glad that you posted that. I was thinking that it was a 14-day window (my last big experience with price matching was with a notebook computer), and I purchased my drive 21 days ago.

Free money!


----------



## supie

This is a great price I just bought one for $351 and going to go back and get the refund for the difference. (bought two weeks ago)

Reminder if you want to install the 1TB WD10EACS internally be sure it is this Model and UPC code on the outside of the box is: Model WD10000CSRTL - UPC of 7 18037 12333 2 and when you open the box the drive will have Model WD10EACS-*32*ZJBO This is the one you want.

For internal you do not want WD10EACS-*00*ZJBO, however the later drive will work fine for an External Drive.

Note: I only know about the S3, I am not sure what works on the Tivo HD.


----------



## AbMagFab

supie said:


> This is a great price I just bought one for $351 and going to go back and get the refund for the difference. (bought two weeks ago)
> 
> Reminder if you want to install the 1TB WD10EACS internally be sure it is this Model and UPC code on the outside of the box is: Model WD10000CSRTL - UPC of 7 18037 12333 2 and when you open the box the drive will have Model WD10EACS-*32*ZJBO This is the one you want.
> 
> For internal you do not want WD10EACS-*00*ZJBO, however the later drive will work fine for an External Drive.
> 
> Note: I only know about the S3, I am not sure what works on the Tivo HD.


They all work with the S3.

And for what it's worth, I just bought one in the old package (with the partial green instead of the half green box), and it's a 00, not a 32. No biggie, but I was surprised.

And the drive is $229 at BB, not $220.


----------



## richsadams

To Clarify (because someone will ask)...

WD 1TB OEM HDD: Model # WD10EACS-*00ZJB0* works as an eSATA/expansion drive for the Series3 or as an internal upgrade _or _expansion drive with the TiVo HD. However, it does NOT work as an internal hard drive upgrade on the Series3 (soft reboot hang).

WD 1TB Retail HDD: Model # WD10EACS-*32ZJB0* works internally or as an expansion drive on _both _the Series3 and TiVo HD.

As noted however, it appears that the only model of this drive that is now shipping is the WD10EACS-*00ZJB0*.


----------



## jlib

AbMagFab said:


> supie said:
> 
> 
> 
> ...For internal you do not want WD10EACS-*00*ZJBO, however the later drive will work fine for an External Drive...
> 
> 
> 
> They all work with the S3...
Click to expand...

AbMagFab, since you have 2 upgraded S3s, can you clarify your comment in light of what richadams and others have concluded concerning internal use of the WD10EACS with the S3?


----------



## donaudio

What is the difference between the WD10EACS and the WD10EVCS? I couldn't find it in the forum


----------



## richsadams

donaudio said:


> What is the difference between the WD10EACS and the WD10EVCS? I couldn't find it in the forum


The WD10EACS is the first/original 1TB hard drive from Western Digital designed for "normal" computer use and the original subject of this thread. This is the one that came in two flavors, a "retail" model (WD10EACS-*32ZJB0*) sold at B&M stores like Best Buy and an "OEM" version (WD10EACS-*00ZJB0*) which was sold by online wholesalers like newegg.com. As noted above, the retail version worked in all situations but the OEM version did not. Also as noted above, it appears that only the OEM version is being sold now in both retail packaging and as an OEM drive. A number of people (including yours truly) have used this drive (the retail version in my case) to upgrade their TiVo's.

The WD10EVCS is a new hard drive line (500GB, 750GB & 1TB) from Western Digital designed specifically for DVR use. It's not readily available at this point.

Both are based on WD's "green" power conserving, low temp GP line of hard drives.


----------



## sathead

Just picked up the 1TB WD10EACS-00ZJB0 at BB for $229.
Put it in my unRAID server for the parity drive, runs quiet and stayed at 32°C (89.6°F) while writing for 4.5 hours straight yesterday.
Nice drive.... nice price


----------



## dalesd

Bodhammer said:


> I used WinMFS to make a backup and then I attemped to do MFSCopy and save my shows. I tried 3 times and it locked up saying ~35 minutes to go while copying the MFS Media. I then hooked the drive back up to the tivo and deleleted everything in the recently deleted folder giving me 71% free space on the 160 hour drive. WinMFS hung at 10 minutes remaining. Appears to be a somewhat common problem: http://mfslive.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=331
> 
> I then just did a restore and add and put the drive in the unit. Booted fine. It showed all the old programs but they wouldn't play. I deleted them all. I played with the unit for about 30 minutes. Had both tuners recording HD channels while I REW and FWD in a program. No issues, no macroblocks.
> 
> System shows 107 HD hours and 1015 SD Hours. Temp is 42°C with both tuners recording, ambient is about 65°F in the house. Drive is WD7500AACS - 00ZJB0. Drive is remarkably quiet - I could not hear it while doing MFS, I cannot hear it in the Tivo. I did not change AAM.
> 
> Everything is so far so good. I will report if I start seeing issues.
> 
> - Bod


I installed the same drive this weekend. Western Digital Caviar GP WD7500AACS 750GB. No significant problems. I followed the directions in the FAQ and transferred my recordings with Mfscopy. The gui went to "not responding" after a minute or two, but I left it alone and it all worked.

Interestingly, it only shows 98 hours of HD in the system information screen. I can't explain that.

I did a stress test of my own: while recording two HD shows, and transferring another with pyTivo, I watched a HD recording. No problems.


----------



## dwit

dalesd said:


> ...Interestingly, it only shows 98 hours of HD in the system information screen. I can't explain that...


Did you miss the "Supersize" step?


----------



## richsadams

dalesd said:


> I installed the same drive this weekend. Western Digital Caviar GP WD7500AACS 750GB. No significant problems. I followed the directions in the FAQ and transferred my recordings with Mfscopy. The gui went to "not responding" after a minute or two, but I left it alone and it all worked.
> 
> Interestingly, it only shows 98 hours of HD in the system information screen. I can't explain that.
> 
> I did a stress test of my own: while recording two HD shows, and transferring another with pyTivo, I watched a HD recording. No problems.


Good information. :up: Do you have a TiVo HD or a Series3? As *dwit *points out, the "supersize" step should get you the additional recording space.


----------



## dalesd

richsadams said:


> Good information. :up: Do you have a TiVo HD or a Series3? As *dwit *points out, the "supersize" step should get you the additional recording space.


It's a TiVoHD.

I didn't explicitly turn on Supersize through the menu, but I did click Yes when it asked if I wanted to expand the drive. That's the same thing, right?


----------



## richsadams

dalesd said:


> I didn't explicitly turn on Supersize through the menu, but I did click Yes when it asked if I wanted to expand the drive. That's the same thing, right?


Yes there's a difference between expanding and "supersizing". You would have had to turn on the "supersize" option.










It's not a huge difference...another 8 or 9 HD hours IIRC so it may or may not be worth it to you to repeat the process.


----------



## RichB

richsadams said:


> Yes there's a difference between expanding and "supersizing". You would have had to turn on the "supersize" option.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> It's not a huge difference...another 8 or 9 HD hours IIRC so it may or may not be worth it to you to repeat the process.


It is odd, some expansions did not supersize so after MFSCopy and the expand. I then selected the new disk and set superSize on and it warned me that it was already on but it was supersized. You should not have to recopy to supersize. I think all it does is allow you to use the TiVo reserved space.

- Rich


----------



## richsadams

RichB said:


> It is odd, some expansions did not supersize so after MFSCopy and the expand. I then selected the new disk and set superSize on and it warned me that it was already on but it was supersized. You should not have to recopy to supersize. I think all it does is allow you to use the TiVo reserved space. - Rich


Supersize frees up the extra reserved space used for storing tivoclips. According to Spike you can turn supersize on and off at any time by running mfssupersize utility but if you use mfstools to backup|restore, you will loose that ability.

For more details there's a whole thread about supersizing on the MFS Forums.


----------



## richsadams

I noticed that the new Western Digital WD10EVCS GP AV/DVR drive line listed on the WD web site is starting to show up for sale at online sites. The 1TB model is retailing at buy.com for $245.99 w/free shipping but it shows "Temporarily Sold Out". It's also listed at ProVantage.com for $268.20, but as a "Special Order". Other sites list it as "Coming Soon." I'm betting they just haven't received their supply yet.

Since it's so new it hasn't been tested as an internal upgrade in a Series3 or TiVo HD for compatibility. Anyone care to be the first on their block to try one once they become available? Certification in the TiVo Pioneer Club (with the wide variety of associated benefits) is guaranteed!


----------



## RichB

richsadams said:


> Since it's so new it hasn't been tested as an internal upgrade in a Series3 or TiVo HD for compatibility. Anyone care to be the first on their block to try one once they become available? Certification in the TiVo Pioneer Club (with the wide variety of associated benefits) is guaranteed!


Wait just a minute. I did not receive my membership after testing the Western Digital Caviar RE2 GP WD1000FYPS (which did not work in an S3 BTW) 

- Rich


----------



## richsadams

RichB said:


> Wait just a minute. I did not receive my membership after testing the Western Digital Caviar RE2 GP WD1000FYPS (which did not work in an S3 BTW)
> 
> - Rich


Did you complete and submit your application form in triplicate?


----------



## RichB

richsadams said:


> Did you complete and submit your application form in triplicate?


I be sure to do that. I cannot wait for my official baseball cap 

- Rich


----------



## richsadams

RichB said:


> I be sure to do that. I cannot wait for my official baseball cap
> 
> - Rich


And the glow in the dark socks...stunning!


----------



## RichB

I have an TiVo HD up and running with a 1TB WD10EACS and all is well. Now that it is on the desk next to me, I notice some fairly audible seeking noise. 

I have a Vista system used for WinMFS but I cannot find the disks with the Hitachi AAM tool. WinMFS is happy. Any ideas on how to set AAM on WD10EACS?

Thanks,

- Rich


----------



## greg_burns

RichB said:


> I have a Vista system used for WinMFS but I cannot find the disks with the Hitachi AAM tool. WinMFS is happy. Any ideas on how to set AAM on WD10EACS?


You can dowload Hitachi Feature Tool from here.


----------



## richsadams

To reset the acoustics on most all hard drives except Seagate (which doesn't offer that feature) you can use the Hitachi Feature Tool:

http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm#FeatureTool

I just copied the program to a floppy, connected the WD drive via a regular SATA cable and booted the PC from the floppy disk. The program will show all of the drives attached to your PC. IIRC you can choose the AAM setting from the file menu and then the drive you want to adjust. Their current level will be displayed (usually 258?) and you can use the slider in the utility to change the number. Save, exit, remove the drive and ta-dah!

The WD10EACS is already pretty quiet, but dialing it back to 128 will improve things a bit. I really didn't notice a lot of difference. If you're noise sensitive you can also buy drive mounting kits that include rubber or silicone washers and such to isolate the drive from the case a bit more. I've seen them for sale at Fry's but couldn't find it on their web site.

The WD10EACS is (with the exception of one smaller drive) currently the quietest drive on the market.









To compare:

10dBA - Normal Breathing
20dBA - Mosquito or Rustling Leaves
30dBA - A Whisper
40dBA - A Bubbling Brook, or a Refrigerator
50dBA - Normal Conversation
60dBA - Laugher
70dBA - Vacuum Cleaner or Hairdryer
80dBA - City Traffic or a Garbage Disposal
90dBA - Motorcycle or Lawnmower
150dBA - My neighbor's dog at 3 a.m. (I'm sure of it!)


----------



## RichB

Thanks all.
It worked on a different computer and the TiVo is a good deal quieter.
I think I may look for the isolators for that little bit extra.

- Rich


----------



## husky55

There is a lot of questions regarding what HD is best for Tivo. This is a pretty fair review of the TB WD RE2-GP and Seagate 7200.11.

http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3161

I chose the WD in my signature based on this review. The Hitachi Deskstar is interesting. I am surprised that the new Seagate did not perform any better.


----------



## aaronwt

richsadams said:


> To reset the acoustics on most all hard drives except Seagate (which doesn't offer that feature) you can use the Hitachi Feature Tool:
> 
> http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm#FeatureTool
> 
> I just copied the program to a floppy, connected the WD drive via a regular SATA cable and booted the PC from the floppy disk. The program will show all of the drives attached to your PC. IIRC you can choose the AAM setting from the file menu and then the drive you want to adjust. Their current level will be displayed (usually 258?) and you can use the slider in the utility to change the number. Save, exit, remove the drive and ta-dah!
> 
> The WD10EACS is already pretty quiet, but dialing it back to 128 will improve things a bit. I really didn't notice a lot of difference. If you're noise sensitive you can also buy drive mounting kits that include rubber or silicone washers and such to isolate the drive from the case a bit more. I've seen them for sale at Fry's but couldn't find it on their web site.
> 
> The WD10EACS is (with the exception of one smaller drive) currently the quietest drive on the market.
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> To compare:
> 
> 10dBA - Normal Breathing
> 20dBA - Mosquito or Rustling Leaves
> 30dBA - A Whisper
> 40dBA - A Bubbling Brook, or a Refrigerator
> 50dBA - Normal Conversation
> 60dBA - Laugher
> 70dBA - Vacuum Cleaner or Hairdryer
> 80dBA - City Traffic or a Garbage Disposal
> 90dBA - Motorcycle or Lawnmower
> 150dBA  My neighbors dog at 3 a.m. (Im sure of it!)


What is a floppy


----------



## jlib

husky55 said:


> There is a lot of questions regarding what HD is best for Tivo. This is a pretty fair review of the TB WD RE2-GP and Seagate 7200.11.
> 
> http://www.anandtech.com/storage/showdoc.aspx?i=3161


The review is actually for the WD Caviar-GP (WD10EACS) not the WD RE2-GP (WD1000FYPS) although it would not make any difference as far as the performance benchmarks go.


----------



## richsadams

aaronwt said:


> What is a floppy


Nothing a little Viagra wouldn't fix. Or is that what you were asking about?


----------



## DJ Rogue

I guess i'll use my first post to embarrass myself by asking a silly question that i've been doing my best for the past couple of hours to find the answer on my own so I wouldn't have to embarrass myself... 

But...

I bought this HD before the sale ended. I'll be getting a new TiVo HD soon. I'm planning on taking out the HD that comes with the TiVo and putting in the new HD before I even plug the TiVo in and activate it.

Now, my question is...is that possible or do I need to use that WinMFS program?

Thanks for any responses and sorry to ask something that's probably been asked and answered 3,462,942 times already..


----------



## greg_burns

DJ Rogue said:


> I bought this HD before the sale ended. I'll be getting a new TiVo HD soon. I'm planning on taking out the HD that comes with the TiVo and putting in the new HD before I even plug the TiVo in and activate it.
> 
> Now, my question is...is that possible or do I need to use that WinMFS program?


Assuming you bought a bare drive, then no you can't just do that. You first need to prep it. One way to do that it to use WinMFS (and its MFSCopy function followed by MFSAdd) to copy the OS from your original drive to the new one, then expand it to fill the remaining free space.


----------



## richsadams

DJ Rogue said:


> I guess i'll use my first post to embarrass myself by asking a silly question that i've been doing my best for the past couple of hours to find the answer on my own so I wouldn't have to embarrass myself...
> 
> But...
> 
> I bought this HD before the sale ended. I'll be getting a new TiVo HD soon. I'm planning on taking out the HD that comes with the TiVo and putting in the new HD before I even plug the TiVo in and activate it.
> 
> Now, my question is...is that possible or do I need to use that WinMFS program?
> 
> Thanks for any responses and sorry to ask something that's probably been asked and answered 3,462,942 times already..


Welcome to the forum. As Greg says, you'll need to run WinMFS to copy the content of the original drive to your new drive and then expand it. It's quite simple to do...it'll take more time to R&R the drive than running the actual program.

It would be best to fire TiVo up before you do anything IMHO. It won't affect your upgrade one way or another. It's possible that something might be wrong with it and every once in a while they are DOA (Rare, but it happens). I'd perform the upgrade once you see that everything is working properly.

Best of luck and let us know how it goes. :up:


----------



## DJ Rogue

Thanks guys! UPS just dropped off the TiVo... Fingers crossed (that I don't screw it up)


----------



## oldnacl

I have a TiVo HD and first added an external drive (Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750) but found frequent video and audio issues like audio getting way out of synch, so I divorced the drive, set up and installed a 1TB WD "Green" - since then, far fewer issues but I see occasional freezing of the audio/video that is recoverable only by a reboot. This has happened a couple times in a month, but it is irritating. I don't recall that happening with the original 160GB drive.

Is this something I should just live with or is there a better alternative than using what I have in there now?


----------



## richsadams

oldnacl said:


> I have a TiVo HD and first added an external drive (Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750) but found frequent video and audio issues like audio getting way out of synch, so I divorced the drive, set up and installed a 1TB WD "Green" - since then, far fewer issues but I see occasional freezing of the audio/video that is recoverable only by a reboot. This has happened a couple times in a month, but it is irritating. I don't recall that happening with the original 160GB drive.
> 
> Is this something I should just live with or is there a better alternative than using what I have in there now?


I've had the same WD 1TB drive in our Series3 for a while now and haven't noticed any issues. Do you see problems only on recordings, when watching "live" TV (although that's basically a recording as you're watching the buffer) or both? Any issues with menus being slow, etc.? Overall it sounds like a hard drive problem but if things improved after removing the eSATA drive it could be something else.

TiVo has built in diagnostic programs you can run called "Kickstarts". One of them may resolve the issues you're seeing.

It could be a signal/cable card or HDD problem. A fairly easy way to find out would be to drop the original drive back in (providing you put it on a shelf) and see if it continues. If so it's likely a signal issue which could be a TiVo I/O processing or tuner problem or a cable card problem. You can narrow down the signal problem by checking the TiVo diagnostics screens to see if there are corrected and/or uncorrected errors, check signal strength and SNR readings. Having the cable card(s) re-hit/re-paired may resolve it or they may need to be replaced. If everything looks okay signal-wise, you may need to contact TiVo to replace the box. (Just leave the original drive in it and don't tell them that you performed any upgrades of course as that voids the warranty.)

Or you could pull the upgraded drive and run some diagnostics on it with the WD Lifeguard Diagnostic program to see if it has some bad sectors, problems with the read/write heads, etc. (Running the basic diagnostics won't affect the content.)

Good luck and let us know what you find out.


----------



## rturrentine

oldnacl said:


> I have a TiVo HD and first added an external drive (Seagate FreeAgent Pro 750) but found frequent video and audio issues like audio getting way out of synch, so I divorced the drive, set up and installed a 1TB WD "Green" - since then, far fewer issues but I see occasional freezing of the audio/video that is recoverable only by a reboot. This has happened a couple times in a month, but it is irritating. I don't recall that happening with the original 160GB drive.
> 
> Is this something I should just live with or is there a better alternative than using what I have in there now?


I don't think the sync problem is because of the drive because others, including myself, have had the same problem with the stock drive. A reboot corrects it. I've only had the problem twice so far but that's about once per month on my Tivo HD. Usually I would suggest the drive though.

I did upgrade my internal drive this weekend to the WD GP 1TB drive from Best Buy. If I don't have the problem anymore and there are no software upgrades, then maybe it was the drive.


----------



## oldnacl

Thanks for the replies. To clarify, I don't recall any freezing issues with the 160 GB drive. I've had the unit close to a year. After setting up the stock drive to use the non-approved external Seagate Pro, I saw occasional, but significant, audio sync issues and video "skipping". These were frequent enough that after a couple weeks I swapped out the stock drive for the 1 TB WD Green and did not reconnect the external drive. 

It's been about 3 weeks now and I experience the complete freeze twice, once on a recorded show that I watched (or, actually, tried to watch) delayed by a couple days. Not many days after that I turned on the TV to a frozen screen that was a "suggestion" recording in progress. In both cases, I rebooted from the menu. I haven't seen the problem for a few days now, but I also haven't watched a whole lot of programs.

I wonder if the Tivo "suggestion engineer" is perhaps over using the machine in it's enthusiasm to fill up a TB of space. At this moment, recording on one tuner and watching another recorded program, the temp is 45 degrees - normal - as reported in the System Information. As I recall, that was the temperature showing when I checked with both tuners recording shortly after I installed the drive.

If it happens again, I'll pull the Green drive and put the stock one back in to see if the issue repeats.


----------



## sirfergy

Something I've noticed is what appears to be dropped frames in the recordings since I added the 1TB drive. Has anyone else noticed this? It occurs only occasionally and seconds of a show will dissappear.


----------



## richsadams

sirfergy said:


> Something I've noticed is what appears to be dropped frames in the recordings since I added the 1TB drive. Has anyone else noticed this? It occurs only occasionally and seconds of a show will dissappear.


The dropped frame issue (if it's the same one I'm thinking of) has been reported before - with stock hard drives. I believe it appeared after the last software upgrade (v9.2a). This seems to be TiVo's way of attempting to remedy the tiling/pixilization/macorblocking issue that was fairly rampant in the previous upgrade (v9.2).

My take is that it's TiVo's way of moving past a recording "glitch" (technical term ). Previously the "glitch" would be played and subtle to large macroblocking would take place. Now it seems to FF past the "glitch" and sometimes it's accompanied by a momentary audio drop. I see it happen once in a while on both our Series3 w/1TB HDD as well as our stock TiVo HD.

So if we're talking about the same thing, I don't think it's a hard drive issue, but TiVo's way of handling errors with this version of the software.


----------



## sirfergy

That makes sense, but on some shows it's enough that I can't watch since enough drops out I cannot follow what's happening anymore.


----------



## richsadams

sirfergy said:


> That makes sense, but on some shows it's enough that I can't watch since enough drops out I cannot follow what's happening anymore.


That doesn't sound good...no pun intended.

Might be worth checking the diagnostics screens to see if there are corrected and/or uncorrected errors when it happens as well as the SNR and signal strength. Might be a cable card/signal issue or it could in fact be the hard drive after all or the processor having I/O problems.

Is there any pattern to it...such as always on HD channels or the same channel or certain times such as when recording two programs? Hmmm...


----------



## TiVo Bob W

Hi, has anyone used either of the following WD RE2-GP drives for an internal upgrade of a S3? WD7500AYPS or WD5000ABPS. I am already running a WD1000FYPS mounted in a Antec MX-1 for eSATA expansion but appear to be having issues with my internal drive and would like to replace it with a drive in the same series.

While I have your attention. Has anyone else had a problem with their S3 restarting after a power failure? Hard drive spins up and appears to be seeking data (can hear R/W head moving). No other functions appear to be working, IE: remote, LED's, OLED or cooling fan. If I let the system sit for about 10 minutes before I plug it in, it will boot normally.

Thanks, Bob


----------



## jlib

TiVo Bob W said:


> Hi, has anyone used either of the following WD RE2-GP drives for an internal upgrade of a S3? WD7500AYPS or WD5000ABPS.


No, but until someone does you would probably have to assume it won't work (unless you want to be the guinea pig).


----------



## richsadams

TiVo Bob W said:


> While I have your attention. Has anyone else had a problem with their S3 restarting after a power failure? Hard drive spins up and appears to be seeking data (can hear R/W head moving). No other functions appear to be working, IE: remote, LED's, OLED or cooling fan. If I let the system sit for about 10 minutes before I plug it in, it will boot normally.
> 
> Thanks, Bob


Invest in a UPS/Surge protector. Power spikes, brown-outs, failures and the like can corrupt data on your TiVo's hard drive or potentially damage it beyond repair. We have this one on all of our TiVo's and they work flawlessly. It's very inexpensive insurance.


----------



## TiVo Bob W

richsadams said:


> Invest in a UPS/Surge protector. Power spikes, brown-outs, failures and the like can corrupt data on your TiVo's hard drive or potentially damage it beyond repair. We have this one on all of our TiVo's and they work flawlessly. It's very inexpensive insurance.


I have a whole house surge protector and the TiVo is plugged into a TripLite UPS. This has been the case since unit was new. I my have had this issue from the beginning but never noticed as this was our first power disruption since the unit was purchased.


----------



## richsadams

TiVo Bob W said:


> I have a whole house surge protector and the TiVo is plugged into a TripLite UPS. This has been the case since unit was new. I my have had this issue from the beginning but never noticed as this was our first power disruption since the unit was purchased.


Understood. I've seen them putting those whole house surge protection units in the Holmes on Homes TV shows...they look great.

So it sounds like you're talking about an extended power failure; one longer than your UPS can support. If that's the case, it would appear that there may be a problem if TiVo is unable to boot up properly. It's possible that the power supply is failing or more specifically a capacitor in the power supply if you can wait 10 minutes and do a hard reboot. The other possibility would be a failing hard drive as you suspect, but waiting 10 minutes shouldn't make any difference in that case.  Perhaps some others here will have some theories.

If you're going to replace the internal drive you might want to stick with one of the recommendations in the first post of the Official eSATA Drive Expansion in 9.2: FAQ + Discussion thread (#27). As *jlib *points out, the drives you've mentioned are untested and IIRC there have been two reports of the WD 750GB GP drives (besides the OEM 1TB) not working as internal upgrades on the Series3's due to the soft reboot issue. Of course, you could become a member of the Pioneer's Club. 

Let us know how it goes. :up:

P.S. Were you affected by the massive power failure we saw on TV yesterday?  What a nightmare!


----------



## TiVo Bob W

richsadams said:


> It's possible that the power supply is failing or more specifically a capacitor in the power supply if you can wait 10 minutes and do a hard reboot.
> 
> Let us know how it goes. :up:
> 
> P.S. Were you affected by the massive power failure we saw on TV yesterday?  What a nightmare!


Yes, it appears to be the power supply. I have started a new thread with the hopes of finding a replacement without have to send the unit off to TiVo.

Our power was out for a few hours during the "massive power failure". Just a little longer than our UPS could keep the S3 running.

Sorry for bringing this thread OT . Now, back to the hard drive thread . . .

Bob


----------



## richsadams

TiVo Bob W said:


> Yes, it appears to be the power supply. I have started a new thread with the hopes of finding a replacement without have to send the unit off to TiVo.
> 
> Our power was out for a few hours during the "massive power failure". Just a little longer than our UPS could keep the S3 running.
> 
> Sorry for bringing this thread OT . Now, back to the hard drive thread . . .
> 
> Bob


Glad to hear that the power is back on! Sorry to hear that the power supply is not doing its job though. It's unusual that the PS in a newer unit like yours would fail. The most common point of failure are the electrolytic caps (the little upside down cans on the PS board) which can degrade. AFAIK no one is selling after market power supplies for the Series3 or TiVo HD's yet. You might want to check with weaknees.com. They don't list them, but might be able to help. You can also e-mail them: [email protected]. Otherwise I think it's back to the factory for a replacement.

Best of luck and let us know how it goes.


----------



## chrispitude

The WD7500AACS is now $140 shipped at the Egg.

- Chris


----------



## lessd

chrispitude said:


> The WD7500AACS is now $140 shipped at the Egg.
> 
> - Chris


This drive worked great until the date on the drive went to Jan 2008 than it would not boot on a TiVo-HD (652160), the drives dated Dec 2007 and earlier worked great but two out of two dated Jan 2008 did not work. If anybody gets any of these drives with 2008 dates on them to work in a TiVo-HD I would like to know. I tested the drives in three different TiVo-HD units with the same results (some would boot once but not a second time). I am using WinMFS V8 to image the drives. (Newegg took them back without a re-stocking charge)


----------



## aaronwt

chrispitude said:


> The WD7500AACS is now $140 shipped at the Egg.
> 
> - Chris


It figures. I bought one a couple of weeks ago on sale for $140 and then last week I bought 3 more at $160. All for my HP MediaSmart server. If I would have waited one week I could have saved $60.
Definitely a much lower cost per GB then the 1TB version.


----------



## aaronwt

lessd said:


> This drive worked great until the date on the drive went to Jan 2008 than it would not boot on a TiVo-HD (652160), the drives dated Dec 2007 and earlier worked great but two out of two dated Jan 2008 did not work. If anybody gets any of these drives with 2008 dates on them to work in a TiVo-HD I would like to know. I tested the drives in three different TiVo-HD units with the same results (some would boot once but not a second time). I am using WinMFS V8 to image the drives. (Newegg took them back without a re-stocking charge)


Well I was going to get another one since they are $140 but I guess i'll just use the 750GB I bought last year(Not the green version) to put in this TiVoHD I just bought for my girlfriend. At least I only got charged $100 total to switch two Lifetime boxes to the new TiVoHD and an old Series 3 I have.


----------



## buddhawood

aaronwt said:


> Well I was going to get another one since they are $140 but I guess i'll just use the 750GB I bought last year(Not the green version) to put in this TiVoHD I just bought for my girlfriend. At least I only got charged $100 total to switch two Lifetime boxes to the new TiVoHD and an old Series 3 I have.


How did you get them to transfer for only $100?


----------



## aaronwt

buddhawood said:


> How did you get them to transfer for only $100?


For the first one they actually charged me nothing but then dropped the service to the Lifetime tiVo with one tuner(instead of giving it one year of service) and I needed to keep that one in service. So they charged me $100 since they made a mistake. On the second one they did the same thing again and didn't charge me, only with that Lifetime TiVo with one Tuner I didn't need to keep it activated. I guess I got lucky.


----------



## chrispitude

And for those Series 3 owners out there (like me!), the 750GB Samsung Spinpoint F1 drive is now on sale for $140 shipped at the 'Egg:

Samsung Spinpoint F1 at the 'Egg

It's a fast, virtually silent drive. It runs a couple watts higher than the WD GP, but it's a 7200rpm drive (versus the GP's 5400pm) and has very good performance. My first choice for the S3 would have been a GP, but in practice this is likely just as good (and perhaps a bit snappier under heavy drive activity).

Credit goes to Fatwallet (this thread).

- Chris


----------



## aaronwt

I've never seen any performance difference in the HD TiVos when using a 5400rpm or 7200rpm drive. They would perform identically. The few HD streams that the TiVo uses doesn't come anywhere close to taxing a 5400 rpm drive. 
Although I have noticed a difference when switching between the AM settings.


----------



## RichB

aaronwt said:


> I've never seen any performance difference in the HD TiVos when using a 5400rpm or 7200rpm drive. They would perform identically. The few HD streams that the TiVo uses doesn't come anywhere close to taxing a 5400 rpm drive.
> Although I have noticed a difference when switching between the AM settings.


Can you elaborate? 
I have set AAM to 128 on my WD 1TB drives, is that likely to be a performance issue?

- Rich


----------



## lrhorer

richsadams said:


> Nothing a little Viagra wouldn't fix. Or is that what you were asking about?


No, no. I heard about one once. They were a kind of coaster for coffee cups used by programmers who spent far too much time staring at something called a BRT. Or maybe it was a DRT? I don't know, something like that.


----------



## lrhorer

RichB said:


> I guess I have to buy a Hitachi next.


You mentimed 1TB drives, so this may not be an issue for you, but beware the Hitachi Deskstar 500G drives. I have an otherwise perfectly functional Hitachi Deskstar 500G drive and the TiVo HD will not boot with it. No way, no how.


----------



## ciper

Frys has the 1tb drive for 229 right now http://shop1.outpost.com/product/5433109


----------



## aaronwt

RichB said:


> Can you elaborate?
> I have set AAM to 128 on my WD 1TB drives, is that likely to be a performance issue?
> 
> - Rich


That is the setting I have my drives on. The performance is fine I just remember when the AM setting is off, which you wouldn't want in a TiVo, there seemed to be a difference when doing the 30 second skip or fast forwarding. If I remember correctly. Either way it was only a very minor difference.


----------



## bmgoodman

On the "soft reboot" problem when using a WD green drive as an internal replacement, WD doesn't want to be involved:

Thank you for contacting Western Digital Customer Service and Support.

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

So I guess I'll be looking to do business with one of their competitors.


----------



## richsadams

bmgoodman said:


> On the "soft reboot" problem when using a WD green drive as an internal replacement, WD doesn't want to be involved:
> 
> Thank you for contacting Western Digital Customer Service and Support.
> 
> I'm sorry but there is nothing that we can do. All drive replacements for a TiVO are authorized by TiVO and tested to ensure that they work. If you are replacing it with a drive that hasn't been tested or approved by them, then it most likely will not work.
> 
> So I guess I'll be looking to do business with one of their competitors.


According to brewman on this post, the new DVR dedicated WD10EVCS AV-GP 1TB hard drive works w/o any problems in the Series3. It's no longer on sale at Fry's, but $269.99 is still a fair price.


----------



## tonejones

After browsing this thread a bit it looks like the WD10EACS should work fine as an internal drive for the TivoHD (not Tivo Series 3) regardless of which type they end up shipping.

Buy.com looks to have a fantastic sale on the EACS today. Search for the WD10EACS and you'll see two drives. The one that comes with "Full Feature Backup Software" is only $189.99 with free budget shipping. Might be OEM but, from what i've gathered, it should still work with a TivoHD. Please correct me if I'm wrong.


----------



## dtphonehome

If you're not using this as an internal for S3, here's a great deal:
http://www.buy.com/prod/1tb-sata-16...hard-drive-with-full/q/loc/101/206895079.html


----------



## richsadams

tonejones said:


> After browsing this thread a bit it looks like the WD10EACS should work fine as an internal drive for the TivoHD (not Tivo Series 3) regardless of which type they end up shipping.
> 
> Buy.com looks to have a fantastic sale on the EACS today. Search for the WD10EACS and you'll see two drives. The one that comes with "Full Feature Backup Software" is only $189.99 with free budget shipping. Might be OEM but, from what i've gathered, it should still work with a TivoHD. Please correct me if I'm wrong.


Welcome to the forum! :up:

You are correct, Western Digital's WD10EACS will indeed work as an internal hard drive upgrade for TiVo HD's (however as noted, not with Series3's which need the the new DVR dedicated WD10EVCS AV-GP for internal upgrades).

dtphonehome, $189 is a very good price for sure and AFAIK the lowest we've seen it yet. It will certainly make some of us wince a little as we paid a bit more...$259 in my case but I know there are others here that paid full boat, $350+  when they were introduced back in August or so.

BTW, ours has been flawless since day one. 

Enjoy the new space!


----------



## dtphonehome

richsadams said:


> dtphonehome, $189 is a very good price for sure and AFAIK the lowest we've seen it yet. It will certainly make some of us wince a little as we paid a bit more...$259 in my case but I know there are others here that paid full boat, $350+  when they were introduced back in August or so.
> 
> BTW, ours has been flawless since day one.
> 
> Enjoy the new space!


Good to know your's is working well! I actually paid $169, as I had a buy.com $20 coupon expiring on Monday. I'd share it but it's linked to my email address. I was planning on using it in an Antec MX-1 from Amazon, but the consensus seems to be it would be wiser to use it internally. So I guess the enclosure will go unused for now.


----------



## greg_burns

dtphonehome said:


> Good to know your's is working well! I actually paid $169, as I had a buy.com $20 coupon expiring on Monday. I'd share it but it's linked to my email address. I was planning on using it in an Antec MX-1 from Amazon, but the consensus seems to be it would be wiser to use it internally. So I guess the enclosure will go unused for now.


If you have an S3 you can't use it internally (softboot problem). If you have a TivoHD you can't use the Antec MX-1 + that drive (WD10EACS) externally.


----------



## Jadedone

I saw where a poster successfully installed a WD*10EVCS* drive in an S3.

Yesterday I swapped out my previously upgraded 1TB WD*10EACS* for a new 1TB WD*10EVCS* in my S3. I purchased it from http://www.buy.com/prod/western-digital-av-gp-wd10evcs-hard-drive-1tb-serial-ata-300-serial/q/loc/101/206827123.html for $235. (packaged well but free shipping is very slow).

Using the WinMFS copy function took 4:45 hours with a sata/esata connection.

I took the old *10EACS* drive and installed it in a stock Tivo HD.

Both drives are cool and quiet.

Now my S3 can soft boot.
I wanted to thank the posters for the info and spike for the great program!


----------



## dtphonehome

greg_burns said:


> If you have an S3 you can't use it internally (softboot problem). If you have a TivoHD you can't use the Antec MX-1 + that drive (WD10EACS) externally.


I haven't heard anything about a problem using this with the MX-1...what's the problem? Anyway, I'll be using it as in internal on a refurb THD.


----------



## greg_burns

dtphonehome said:


> I haven't heard anything about a problem using this with the MX-1...what's the problem? Anyway, I'll be using it as in internal on a refurb THD.


You can't use any external drive with the TivoHD accept the Western Digital's My DVR Expander. The S3 is grandfathered and has no such restriction.


----------



## ilh

dtphonehome said:


> If you're not using this as an internal for S3, here's a great deal:
> http://www.buy.com/prod/1tb-sata-16...hard-drive-with-full/q/loc/101/206895079.html


Thanks for the pointer!

I was all set to get a WD7500AACS for $140ish, about $100 less than the WD10EACS at NewEgg and many places. $200 shipped from Buy.com with a new-customer coupon was too tempting for me. My THD will be much happier with 1TB instead of 160GB. My recent switch to HD recordings (just retired the SDTV) really made 160GB painful.

--Lee


----------



## dtphonehome

greg_burns said:


> You can't use any external drive with the TivoHD accept the Western Digital's My DVR Expander. The S3 is grandfathered and has no such restriction.


Sure you can....you have to jump through some hoops, but it can be done. Check out the FAQ!


----------



## chewy2314

ilh said:


> Thanks for the pointer!
> 
> I was all set to get a WD7500AACS for $140ish, about $100 less than the WD10EACS at NewEgg and many places. $200 shipped from Buy.com with a new-customer coupon was too tempting for me. My THD will be much happier with 1TB instead of 160GB. My recent switch to HD recordings (just retired the SDTV) really made 160GB painful.
> 
> --Lee


Lee,
Please post your results... I couldn't get the 750Gb nor 500Gb to work.


----------



## ilh

Will do.

--Lee


----------



## greg_burns

dtphonehome said:


> Sure you can....you have to jump through some hoops, but it can be done. Check out the FAQ!


Guess I need to. That is news to me.


----------



## richsadams

greg_burns said:


> Guess I need to. That is news to me.


I think the OP means that if you R&R the TiVo HD's internal drive and marry the new expansion drive to it using WinMFS, that you can use most eSATA drives in an MX-1 as an expansion drive successfully. But an MX-1 won't work with a TiVo HD via P&P no matter what kind of drive is in it...only Western Digital's My DVR Expander will. But then you knew that.


----------



## richsadams

dtphonehome said:


> I haven't heard anything about a problem using this with the MX-1...what's the problem? Anyway, I'll be using it as in internal on a refurb THD.


That should work fine. Let us know how it goes! :up:


----------



## greg_burns

richsadams said:


> I think the OP means that if you R&R the TiVo HD's internal drive and marry the new expansion drive to it using WinMFS, that you can use most eSATA drives in an MX-1 as an expansion drive successfully. But an MX-1 won't work with a TiVo HD via P&P no matter what kind of drive is in it...only Western Digital's My DVR Expander will. But then you knew that.


Yeah, after I posted I remembered that was possible. That is twice now I've forgotten that when responding.


----------



## yargok

I've tried two drives, one from best buy and one from buy.com and neither worked in my tivo hd. They are both the wd10eacs 00xxxx drives, the ones that aren't supposed to work in the series 3, but should work in tivo hd. I wasn't able to get either of them to work. One was manufactured Late Feb 08, he other 12/7/07. Looks like these drives are a bust on the tivo.


----------



## rodbac

> Looks like these drives are a bust on the tivo.


I haven't read the thread yet- is anyone else having trouble with the WD "green" drives in the THD??

I'm ready to bet anyone in here $1000 that I can plug one of these drives into my THD right now and have it work swimmingly....


----------



## richsadams

rodbac said:


> I haven't read the thread yet- is anyone else having trouble with the WD "green" drives in the THD??


Perhaps you should read the thread? Then read the very first post on the Official eSATA Drive Expansion in 9.2: FAQ + Discussion sticky thread for all of the info you need on the subject.

The short answer to your question is yes and no. The recommended drive is the newer Western Digital AV GP 1TB drive which can be used successfully to upgrade both the TiVo HD and Series3.

With regard to your offer...


----------



## rodbac

> Perhaps you should read the thread? Then read the very first post on the Official eSATA Drive Expansion in 9.2: FAQ + Discussion sticky thread for all of the info you need on the subject.


Sorry for missing that- the EACS drive isn't eSATA, though. [edit- read it and didn't see what you might be referring to- sorry, but can you tell me what you're talking about?]



> The recommended drive is the newer Western Digital AV GP 1TB drive which can be used successfully to upgrade both the TiVo HD and Series3.


My point is "recommended" drives come out of the same bin as everything else most of the time.



> With regard to your offer...


What was confusing besides my hesitation before knowing exactly what everyone was discussing?


----------



## rodbac

I'd also like to ask, after reading that post based on this:



> You want an "eSATA II" cable. The TiVo expects the longer connector found on eSATA II cables.


What the hell is an "eSATA II" cable"? There's no such thing I've ever heard of nor that I can find in the spec, especially that differentiates among them based on some length of the connector.

*All* eSATA cables are SATA II compliant, I believe (I'll correct myself with prejudice if I'm wrong)...


----------



## richsadams

rodbac said:


> I'd also like to ask, after reading that post based on this:
> 
> What the hell is an "eSATA II" cable"? There's no such thing I've ever heard of nor that I can find in the spec, especially that differentiates among them based on some length of the connector.
> 
> *All* eSATA cables are SATA II compliant, I believe (I'll correct myself with prejudice if I'm wrong)...


Your questions have been covered numerous times on several threads. As recommended go ahead and read the very first post on the Official eSATA Drive Expansion in 9.2: FAQ + Discussion sticky thread. That will answer most if not all of your questions and give you the background you need to make any comments with some credibility. If you still have questions on subjects that weren't covered in the sticky, feel free to ask. :up:


----------



## richsadams

rodbac said:


> I'd also like to ask, after reading that post based on this:
> 
> What the hell is an "eSATA II" cable"? There's no such thing I've ever heard of nor that I can find in the spec, especially that differentiates among them based on some length of the connector.
> 
> *All* eSATA cables are SATA II compliant, I believe (I'll correct myself with prejudice if I'm wrong)...


Not all eSATA cables are created equal. Some have longer connectors than others.

The recommended hard drives (and cables, etc.) have been tested by many folks here (including yours truly) over a period of months and in some cases more than a year. They are proven to work in their respective/listed applications and configurations. There are others that have been proven _not _to work for various reasons and are to be avoided. It's pretty simple really.


----------



## richsadams

rodbac said:


> Sorry for missing that- the EACS drive isn't eSATA, though. [edit- read it and didn't see what you might be referring to- sorry, but can you tell me what you're talking about?]


The discussion was about the WD 1TB OEM HDD: Model # WD10EACS-*00ZJB0* being different than the WD 1TB Retail HDD: Model # WD10EACS-*32ZJB0*. Both drives became available last August. The later drive worked as an upgrade for both TiVo HD's and Series3's (I have one in our Series3), the former only worked in TiVo HD's due to soft reboot failures in the Series3's. Both can be used as eSATA drives for both TiVo models.

The newer Western Digital AV GP 1TB DVR dedicated drives have been used to upgrade both the TiVo HD and Series3 models successfully. That's why they are recommended.



rodbac said:


> My point is "recommended" drives come out of the same bin as everything else most of the time.


The recommended drive is not the one the OP was talking about.



rodbac said:


> What was confusing besides my hesitation before knowing exactly what everyone was discussing?


What is confusing is why you would jump into a thread and make statements like that without knowing what you were talking about.

Nuff said.


----------



## lessd

yargok said:


> I've tried two drives, one from best buy and one from buy.com and neither worked in my tivo hd. They are both the wd10eacs 00xxxx drives, the ones that aren't supposed to work in the series 3, but should work in tivo hd. I wasn't able to get either of them to work. One was manufactured Late Feb 08, he other 12/7/07. Looks like these drives are a bust on the tivo.


I have one of the WD green drives I got at Best Buy at the original price (and when they first came out) of $259 and it works in all modes in the TiVo-HD.


----------



## ilh

I just installed a WD10EACS-00ZJB0 in a TiVo HD the other night, and the first 24 hours were OK. This morning upon turning on the TV it was frozen solid in the middle of Live TV. After a power cycle it froze up and spontaneously rebooted itself within 30 minutes. I'm now running Kickstart 57, and if that doesn't fix the problem this drive is definitely coming out of my THD. Bummer.

I would say this drive is not a safe bet for the THD. My WD10EACS was built 2/20/08.

--Lee


----------



## rodbac

> What is confusing is why you would jump into a thread and make statements like that without knowing what you were talking about.
> 
> Nuff said.


Hey, fair enough- I'll read further back before commenting next time to make sure I'm clear about exactly which drives you're talking about.


----------



## richsadams

rodbac said:


> Hey, fair enough- I'll read further back before commenting next time to make sure I'm clear about exactly which drives you're talking about.


No problem...I'm easily confused as it is anyway.


----------



## jlib

rodbac said:


> ...What the hell is an "eSATA II" cable"? There's no such thing I've ever heard of nor that I can find in the spec, especially that differentiates among them based on some length of the connector...


Technically you are correct but the reality is that many of the early cables are not to spec. Users have had to cut away the insulation to allow the connector to seat further in. There are some known good brands of cables that work with the S3 and HD. Whether vendors should call them eSATA II is a separate issue. Basically, others have tested certain cables and they are known good. Buying anything else may or may not work and is a crapshoot.


----------



## brettatk

ilh said:


> I just installed a WD10EACS-00ZJB0 in a TiVo HD the other night, and the first 24 hours were OK. This morning upon turning on the TV it was frozen solid in the middle of Live TV. After a power cycle it froze up and spontaneously rebooted itself within 30 minutes. I'm now running Kickstart 57, and if that doesn't fix the problem this drive is definitely coming out of my THD. Bummer.
> 
> I would say this drive is not a safe bet for the THD. My WD10EACS was built 2/20/08.
> 
> --Lee


Strange, I've had the WD10EACS-00ZJB0 drive installed in my Tivo HD since early December and have not had any trouble with it. Perhaps you just got a bad drive.


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## ilh

It turns out my problem is early drive failure, not some TiVo incompatibility. I thoroughly tested the drive in my PC using WD's diagnostics before TiVo installation, so I thought that was unlikely. However, after pulling the drive from the TiVo, it now fails the quick SMART test. I'm going to RMA it through WD and give the WD10EACS another try.

--Lee


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## aaronwt

At least the WD RMA process is painless. I had to get two drives replaced a year or two ago. I was able to print out a reduced cost shipping label from the WD website and the replacements have been working fine ever since.


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## kpfleming

I can confirm after installing two WD10EACS-00D6B1 drives (OEM from newegg) into my S3s (running the 11.0 software) that the soft reboot problem still exists. They work fine otherwise, although I do not have a PC with an SATA port at my disposal so I couldn't set the AAM down to 128, but they are pretty quiet anyway (and much quieter than the 300GB Barracuda 7200.9 I had temporarily installed into one of them when the factory drive started failing).

I'll let my friends know I have some 1TB drives available and swap them out with S3-friendly models when I get a chance... I can live with the soft reboot problem for now.


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## richsadams

kpfleming said:


> I can confirm after installing two WD10EACS-00D6B1 drives (OEM from newegg) into my S3s (running the 11.0 software) that the soft reboot problem still exists.


Thanks very much for the update and the added data point. That's disappointing to hear, but good to know. :up:


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## aaronwt

I can't believe how much the price of these drives have dropped.


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## Dr_Diablo

http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...abComputerSP&sp=+brand+skuid&usc=abcat0500000

How bout one of theses TB externals?


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## jlib

Dr_Diablo, try this more appropriate thread


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## richsadams

Dr_Diablo said:


> http://www.bestbuy.com/site/olspage...abComputerSP&sp=+brand+skuid&usc=abcat0500000
> 
> How bout one of theses TB externals?


Waaaayyyyy too expensive! (Plus one doesn't work with TiVo at all.)

This newer Fantom GreenDrive 1TB has recently been reported as successful by several members. It uses a WD GP drive and at $89.99 is a very good deal.

As jlib points out, a visit to the Official eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion sticky thread will give you all the info you need.

Happy expanding!


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## Ben_Jamin75

richsadams said:


> Waaaayyyyy too expensive! (Plus one doesn't work with TiVo at all.)
> 
> This newer Fantom GreenDrive 1TB has recently been reported as successful by several members. It uses a WD GP drive and at $89.99 is a very good deal.
> 
> As jlib points out, a visit to the Official eSATA Drive Expansion: FAQ + Discussion sticky thread will give you all the info you need.
> 
> Happy expanding!


Does anyone know if the hard drive inside this enclosure would work as an internal drive on a TiVo HD?

So far this is looking like the best deal for a 1 TB drive.


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## richsadams

Ben_Jamin75 said:


> Does anyone know if the hard drive inside this enclosure would work as an internal drive on a TiVo HD?
> 
> So far this is looking like the best deal for a 1 TB drive.


IIRC someone checked and found a WD10EACS drive inside the Fantom enclosure...and if I'm not remembering correctly, it's almost certain that it is. Only recently has anyone else begun offering "green" drives. So it should work, however on another post they said that there are "tamper proof" stickers on the enclosure that if damaged would void the warranty so not worth it IMO.

I'd spend another ten bucks and get one from buy.com w/free shipping. That way you know what you're getting, can return it if necessary and get the WD warranty. :up:


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## Ben_Jamin75

Thanks Rich!!!

I ordered the one you recommended and with the coupon i found, it was $95.94 with free shipping/handling. It's the "budget" 7-9 day shipping but I can wait.

MUCH better price than the $166.86 I paid for a drive January 2008


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## richsadams

Ben_Jamin75 said:


> Thanks Rich!!!
> 
> I ordered the one you recommended and with the coupon i found, it was $95.94 with free shipping/handling. It's the "budget" 7-9 day shipping but I can wait.
> 
> MUCH better price than the $166.86 I paid for a drive January 2008


Nice find. Enjoy!


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## GreenMonkey

bump

Since this seems to be the main discussion thread for WD greenpower drives.

My TivoHD got stuck in a reboot loop and I chose to try a HDD replacement rathre than sending it for service.

Since we had a superbowl gathering planned and the Tivo is our only device with an HD tuner (1 tuner-less projector and 1 tuner-less 37" LCD) and I don't have time to work on it during the week, I ran out to BB.

I found a Simpletech external super-green [re]drive on clearance for $76 in it that the description suggested it probably had a WD GP drive in it. Called a buddy for a quick google search and found out, yup.

Disassembled and found a 500GB WD5000AAVS in it (8MB cache OEM only edition, not well documented).

Long story short, instantcake worked fine and the Tivo is up and running on the WD50000AAVS just fine so far. (getting the Tivo to update to the latest software now).

Just figured I'd mention it in case anyone else ended up with an -AAVS drive.

BTW: I've run another 500GB GP drive in my media server for about 9 months now, no problems.


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## richsadams

Thanks for that. :up: Actually this thread should have died a while back. The place for current discussions of recommended drives, upgrades, etc. is the Official eSATA Drive Expansion and Drive Upgrade FAQ sticky thread. It has everything anyone needs to know about upgrading TiVo Series3's, HD's and HDXL's including recommended hard drives and Section V covers internal upgrades.

Congrats and enjoy the game!


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## GreenMonkey

Will update the other thread, thanks!


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## cit1991

Fry's has the green WD 1TB for $109 through 2/12.


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## richsadams

cit1991 said:


> Fry's has the green WD 1TB for $109 through 2/12.


FYI, the WD10000CSRTL is the retail version of the WD10EACS which does NOT work as an internal hard drive upgrade on the Series3 due to a soft reboot issue. However it will work fine as an internal hard drive upgrade for the TiVo HD or as an eSATA drive on the Series3 (or TiVo HD w/modifications - see first post of the Official eSATA Drive Expansion and Drive Upgrade FAQ sticky thread for more info.).

For a couple of dollars more, the recommended WD10EVCS will work as an internal or eSATA hard drive with all models. It's designed for DVR use and is quieter.

Seems like forever ago when I actually paid $259 for a 1TB drive...but it was just a little over a year ago. Sigh.


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## alyssa

Amazon has an OEM wd10evcs's for $112 with free ship


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## Chiparoo

I've been seeing WD10EADS drives lately (appearing at even lower prices). Anyone know if these will work in a TiVo HD?


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## richsadams

Chiparoo said:


> I've been seeing WD10EADS drives lately (appearing at even lower prices). Anyone know if these will work in a TiVo HD?


Yes, the WD10EADS is succesfully being used as an internal upgrade in TiVo HD's by several TCF memebers. Me? I'd spend a few dollars more and get the recommended WD10EVCS which is a DVR dedicated hard drive and skip the AAM adjustments, etc.

A visit to the Official eSATA Drive Expansion and Drive Upgrade FAQ sticky thread is in order. It has everything you need to know about upgrading your TiVo including recommended hard drives and Section V covers internal upgrades.

TiVo Series3 owners should note per the sticky,



> The new Western Digital WD10EADS does not work as an internal upgrade on the TiVo Series3. For 1TB internal drive upgrades, Series3 owners should stick to the WD10EVCS and WD10EVVS.


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## Chiparoo

Thanks! Yes I've used many WD10EVCS in the past and they work great in HD and Series 3 . I'll stick with them.


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## richsadams

Chiparoo said:


> Thanks! Yes I've used many WD10EVCS in the past and they work great in HD and Series 3 . I'll stick with them.


Happy upgrading!


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## davismv

Hello... I'm new to Tivocommunity and plan to become active on the board.

For what it's worth... I just upgraded and replaced my Tivo HD 160GB drive with a 1TB Green Western Digital WD10EACS-32ZJB0. 

I purchased the drive OEM from microcenter's retail store in Westmont, IL for $94.99.

I used the Fujitsu disk management tool to change the AAM to 128, and used WinMFS.

My unit is operating perfectly without issue now for over 6 days!


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## ZeoTiVo

davismv said:


> Hello... I'm new to Tivocommunity and plan to become active on the board.
> 
> For what it's worth... I just upgraded and replaced my Tivo HD 160GB drive with a 1TB Green Western Digital WD10EACS-32ZJB0.
> 
> I purchased the drive OEM from microcenter's retail store in Westmont, IL for $94.99.
> 
> I used the Fujitsu disk management tool to change the AAM to 128, and used WinMFS.
> 
> My unit is operating perfectly without issue now for over 6 days!


welcome - looks like you are off to a fine start :up:


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## richsadams

davismv said:


> Hello... I'm new to Tivocommunity and plan to become active on the board.


Welcome to the forum! Nice work. Enjoy! :up:


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