# Adding 3GB HDD to Roamio Plus - before or after initial setup of Roamio?



## CCourtney (Mar 28, 2006)

I ordered a Roamio Plus and a 3TB WD AV-Green. I was wandering if I should toss in the 3GB HDD before or after the initial setup? 

Anyone know if TiVo reads the HDD size at setup?


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## ggieseke (May 30, 2008)

I doesn't really matter. The drive that ships in a Roamio is completely blank.

You might want to keep the factory drive in for the initial setup and OS update. That means you'll have to repeat Guided Setup once you drop in the 3TB, but at least you would know that the TiVo itself is OK before voiding the warranty.


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## fcfc2 (Feb 19, 2015)

CCourtney said:


> I ordered a Roamio Plus and a 3GB WD AV-Green. I was wandering if I should toss in the 3GB HDD before or after the initial setup?
> 
> Anyone know if TiVo reads the HDD size at setup?


Hi,
The recommended preference is to do the upgrade first especially if there is a possible cost or activation issue with your cable company. This way you don't have to repair the cablecard right away. 
I am pretty sure Tivo can tell what hard drive was installed when if they want to. The common response is that cracking open the Tivo voids the warrantee but often if you have a warrantee issue and quietly replace the original hard drive before returning it, and keep your mouth shut, you probably won't have an issue, YMMV.


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## CCourtney (Mar 28, 2006)

fcfc2 said:


> Hi,
> The recommended preference is to do the upgrade first especially if there is a possible cost or activation issue with your cable company. This way you don't have to repair the cablecard right away.
> I am pretty sure Tivo can tell what hard drive was installed when if they want to. The common response is that cracking open the Tivo voids the warrantee but often if you have a warrantee issue and quietly replace the original hard drive before returning it, and keep your mouth shut, you probably won't have an issue, YMMV.


I've never had any costs associated w/ activating a CableCard in the past with them. I've done it on multiple TiVo's and even some Sony DHG's before TiVo had an HD Cable tuner box. While Comcrap has been a PIA getting things paired (especially the early days ~2004) in the past the last time (when they did a force swap out of Moto CC's for SciAlt CC's back around 2011 that actually went smooth.)


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## PCurry57 (Feb 27, 2012)

CCourtney said:


> I ordered a Roamio Plus and a 3GB WD AV-Green. I was wandering if I should toss in the 3GB HDD before or after the initial setup?
> 
> Anyone know if TiVo reads the HDD size at setup?


I hope that's a typo and your referring to a 3TB drive and not actually going down to a tiny 3GB drive


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## Fernwood (Sep 11, 2014)

I did it before I ever plugged the Roamio in. Was a breeze.


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## ej42137 (Feb 16, 2014)

1. If you replace the drive first, you don't have to repair cable cards.

2. Also, you don't have to go through the tedium of initial setup twice.

3. But you also don't get a chance to test your unit before invalidating the warranty. (Although people say TiVo has a _laissez faire_ attitude if you replace the old HD and don't bring it up. Myself, I've never had a warranty problem with a TiVo so I couldn't say.)

For my last four or five TiVos I've replaced the HD before doing anything else. I thing you should also consider either a Weaknees 6TB or a DIY 6TB. You can never have too much disk space!


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## husky55 (Feb 2, 2008)

6 TB is the size of my NAS which is not even half full. Do you have a recommended 6 TB for diy?


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## CCourtney (Mar 28, 2006)

ej42137 said:


> 1. If you replace the drive first, you don't have to repair cable cards.
> 
> 2. Also, you don't have to go through the tedium of initial setup twice.
> 
> ...


I considered going bigger, but I'm not that worried. I've been happy w/ just shy of 2TB's on 2 TiVoHD's for a long time (750GB, 160GB+1TB extender.) I've never been more than 1/2 full at any time. I've also got a 1TB extender that I could plug in (that's coming off my old unit.)

I've done the DIY route of imaging and putting it on another drive in the past, I just felt that 3TB is more than sufficient for my needs, so why bother.


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## CCourtney (Mar 28, 2006)

Well being paranoid of a failure, I went ahead and booted up the Roamio last night when I got it, and went through all the setup except CableCARD to make sure everything is working. 

Only hiccup was on the Network. I couldn't get it connected to the 2.4GHz wireless, I had to go to the 5GHz. I know the signal strength of the 5GHz isn't going to be as good at that location, but it appears to be good enough. I plan on going through the Wire Ethernet port in the final setup (I use a wireless AP Gateway to feed several items in my game room / man cave.) I've test and can get sustained transfers in excess of 100Mbps between equipment to either side of this setup (i.e. PC connect wired to the Wireless AP/Gateway and another PC connected wired to the my router.)

Now it sit's waiting on the 3TB HDD which should come tonight, but not sure if I'll be able to slap it in tonight, as I've got a farewell happyhour to go to w/ some colleagues.


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## CCourtney (Mar 28, 2006)

Updated to 3TB, working great, CableCARD setup - all channels but premiums coming through. They said, it may take some time for the system to download the access information for those channels. I don't recall that issue on my TiVoHD's but we'll see.


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## UCLABB (May 29, 2012)

CCourtney said:


> Updated to 3TB, working great, CableCARD setup - all channels but premiums coming through. They said, it may take some time for the system to download the access information for those channels. I don't recall that issue on my TiVoHD's but we'll see.


I suppose that's possible, but. I put a cc I had in my Premiere into my new Roamio and of course got all channels but premium. I then called Charter and as soon as he input the last item on pairing, voila, the premiums were all working and we were done.

Good luck, but I don't think you're done.


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## CCourtney (Mar 28, 2006)

UCLABB said:


> I suppose that's possible, but. I put a cc I had in my Premiere into my new Roamio and of course got all channels but premium. I then called Charter and as soon as he input the last item on pairing, voila, the premiums were all working and we were done.
> 
> Good luck, but I don't think you're done.


I called again this morning, and this time after the initial checks I got put through to the CableCARD folks. Did the obligatory power cycle after they re-paired the card. Still wasn't working. I have a truck rolling between 10-12 this morning, with a note to bring a cablecard. I give it less than 50% odds that the truck will have a cablecard, but who knows.


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## UCLABB (May 29, 2012)

CCourtney said:


> I called again this morning, and this time after the initial checks I got put through to the CableCARD folks. Did the obligatory power cycle after they re-paired the card. Still wasn't working. I have a truck rolling between 10-12 this morning, with a note to bring a cablecard. I give it less than 50% odds that the truck will have a cablecard, but who knows.


I suspect your cable card is fine. It just needs to be unpaired first. That's the first thing I told the tech I talked to Wednesday: it's a card I had in another device, unpair it first and I gave him the card number. But, if they bring a new card, it should go smoother for you.


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## BruinGuy (Apr 16, 2015)

CCourtney said:


> Updated to 3TB, working great, CableCARD setup - all channels but premiums coming through. They said, it may take some time for the system to download the access information for those channels. I don't recall that issue on my TiVoHD's but we'll see.


That's my story, three weeks ago. New Roamio Plus, put in a 3TB drive, transferred cable card from Windows Media Center and then I got everything but HBO. Spent over an hour on the phone with tech support. They said it was almost like cable card was in read only mode as they couldn't write any changes to it. They never got HBO to work and had to send a new card.


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## CCourtney (Mar 28, 2006)

UCLABB said:


> I suspect your cable card is fine. It just needs to be unpaired first. That's the first thing I told the tech I talked to Wednesday: it's a card I had in another device, unpair it first and I gave him the card number. But, if they bring a new card, it should go smoother for you.


It could be, that said, I did swap out my CCard that was in my TiVoHD (that died and is subsequently being replaced) at the store to attempt to avoid such a scenario. I'll make the suggestion that they attempt to un-pair the card first and then re-pair the card.


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## UCLABB (May 29, 2012)

CCourtney said:


> It could be, that said, I did swap out my CCard that was in my TiVoHD (that died and is subsequently being replaced) at the store to attempt to avoid such a scenario. I'll make the suggestion that they attempt to un-pair the card first and then re-pair the card.


I guess I missed that you had already gotten a new card. The question is, was it a new card and clean or just one that was turned in and not unpaired.


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## CCourtney (Mar 28, 2006)

UCLABB said:


> I guess I missed that you had already gotten a new card. The question is, was it a new card and clean or just one that was turned in and not unpaired.


It was a new 'Used' card. I had a selection of 6 cards ranging from 'bad' to 'no way in hell'. That said, when the Tech called me and asked if I picked up a new card, I almost laughed. I said, that it should indicate in the service notes, that you should roll with a new card as I have installed the cable card already provided by the Comcast store and I am having issues.

He said, ok, but he's not sure what he will be able to do and asked if I still wanted him to come out. I said, it's better than nothing because the people who handle the cable card will likely make more of an effort to resolve the issue if a tech is on sight.

Then I asked him to see if they can un-pair and then re-pair the card in case there was a pairing issue. I went home right after that (I work 5min from home) and checked and they still weren't working. And waited, when he rolled up, I checked again, and holy cow batman, it was working.

I opened the door and told him, and he said, that it was probably the un-pair and re-pairing of the cards. He decided to call it in before he got out there.

So all is good in TiVoLaNd should be a few more years until I have to deal with them again.


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