# Where is Windows winmfs.exe in 2016? Steps for newbie to replace Series3 HD?



## teleskier (Mar 22, 2015)

OK  I cry uncle  after following so many dead links and reading so many outdated conflicting approaches from 2007 onward, I have confused myself to point of not knowing where to start.

Can someone point me to the current 2016 instructions for how to replace a failing internal Tivo Series3 drive?

What I have:

a second-hand Series3 Tivo with a failing 1TB disk that I did not install
a new 2TB WD AV-GP 3.5 Inch, SATA II, 64 MB Cache WD20EURS disk from ___amazon.com/WD-AV-GP-Video-Hard-Drive/dp/B0042AG9V8___ 
 a Windows-7 laptop (which I think is more recommended to use for this over my Mac laptop) to which I will attach two USB-to-SATA drive enclosures, one for the new WD20EURS, and the second for the old Tivo drive

What I think I need to do:

Remove all the deleted shows from Tivo disk
Can this really be done? Conflicting reports say this is worthless since disk xfer is byte-for-byte copy

Run the WD diags on new disk from PC
Find a Windows version of WinMFS
I found ___sourceforge.net/projects/mfstools___ - but this looks to be UNIX only
Where do I find the latest winmfs.exe for windows?

Follow the steps in __rosswalker.co.uk/tivo_upgrade/#winmfs___
Except skip the wdidle3 step since my WD20EURS is newer than 2013

msinfo (but I do not see how this works from Windows or winmfs.exe?)
mfsadd (but I do not see how this works from Windows or winmfs.exe?)
Or is it MfsSuperSize?

Is this all spelled out somewhere for 2016 steps with working links? Doesnt seem to exist.

Or is this easier done from the Mac? If yes, Im assuming there wont be a DMG, but are there suggested cmd-lines with switches to use from OSX xterm? Can I really run the WD diags from the Mac?

The instructions in the forum sticky at TiVo Community > Main TiVo Forums > TiVo Series3 HDTV DVRs >Drive Expansion and Drive Upgrade FAQ are based on the missing Windows winmfs.exe.

Any pointers would be appreciated.


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## unitron (Apr 28, 2006)

First of all, I'm assuming that this second hand TiVo has some sort of current subscription, either lifetime, or the previous owner has gotten a reference number from TiVo that you can use to transfer the current monthly or annual subscription to your account.

Because if not, due to a policy change a few months back affecting all TiVos older than the Premieres, no one will be able to get a subscription on it eve again, and it's only good for parts or to watch up what's already been recorded on it.

Let me know if it has a subscription, and confirm that we're talking about a TCD652160, and we'll go from there.

And check your PMs here at TCF.

You may not be able to send any yet, but you should be able to receive and read them.

Since you can't hook that WD20EURS directly to a SATA port on that laptop you may or may not be able to run WD's own diagnostic software long test on it.

I know you won't be able to use

wdidle3.exe

to disable Intellipark if that were necessary, but maybe the diagnostic software will run.

And considering that you most likely bought that drive from someone using Amazon's web site that isn't Amazon themselves or Western Digital themselves, I doubt it actually has a 3 year warranty which WD will honor.

It may well have been a return or removed from a WD external drive (the act of which terminated whatever warranty the external drive had).

Anyway, go here

http://www.ultimatebootcd.com/download.html

go down to where it says Mirror Sites, and click on the icon to the left of the first entry there which says "Automatically redirect to the best mirror based on your geo-location."

That will let you download the .iso file from which you make a bootable cd of the UBCD by burning it to cd-r "as an image".

You have to do it as an image (sort of a digital snapshot of the structure of the cd) so that all the right stuff is in the right places on the cd for it to be bootable.

Otherwise you get a cd with all of the files and software, but it won't boot.

The WD diagnostic software and a lot of other potentially very useful stuff is on there, although none of it is TiVo specific software.

Whenever one gets a new (to them) hard drive, from any source, one should run the manufacturer's diagnostic long test before putting the drive into service.


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## teleskier (Mar 22, 2015)

unitron said:


> Let me know if it has a subscription, and confirm that we're talking about a TCD652160, and we'll go from there.


Yes, legit transferred lifetime and I believe it's a TCD652160 as it was the "20-hr" model before the seller added his 1TB disk. (652-0201-xxx = serial#).

I've had it for a year and lived with the infrequent skipping. But now that I recently deleted many old shows from a year ago, all the bad sectors seem to be free again, and the skips and pauses have reached an untenable point (5-8 long pauses and 1-3 reboots per 30min show).

Is there a way to delete (or not copy) all the old files/shows in the Deleted folder? I'm guessing not. I probably have 30 shows in Now Playing and 180 shows in Deleted.

Thanks for the help already.

I am going to see how I do this weekend....


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## unitron (Apr 28, 2006)

teleskier said:


> Yes, legit transferred lifetime and I believe it's a TCD652160 as it was the "20-hr" model before the seller added his 1TB disk. (652-0201-xxx = serial#).
> 
> I've had it for a year and lived with the infrequent skipping. But now that I recently deleted many old shows from a year ago, all the bad sectors seem to be free again, and the skips and pauses have reached an untenable point (5-8 long pauses and 1-3 reboots per 30min show).
> 
> ...


If you are sure you don't want to save or recover any of the shows in the Recently Deleted folder, you go into the Recently Deleted folder and for each show you want to permanently delete (and yes you have to do them one at a time) you use the up and down arrows to highlight the one you want to eliminate, hit the Clear button on the remote (bottom left hand corner of remote, below the 7) and when it pops up the "Are you sure" message, you hit the Select button on the remote to confirm that yes you really really do want to permanently erase the show.

If you hold the remote in your right hand and use your right thumb on the Clear button and your left thumb on the Select button, you can get a rhythm going and wipe them all out much more quickly than you might expect from all the steps involved.

Then, assuming the TiVo Fairy came in the night and put WinMFS on your PC, you hook up the drive and the replacement (after having used the WD diagnostic long test from the UBCD on that replacement drive to be sure there's nothing about it that's going to turn around and bite you anytime soon), launch WinMFS as administrator, Click File, Select Drive, and select the current TiVo drive, then it's something like Tools, Mfscopy, or Tools, Copy Drive or something like that, and that lets you specify the target drive, since the TiVo drive is already selected as the source.

If the target drive isn't showing up check the "Show mounted drives" box.

If that WD20EURS was taken from an external enclosure or was a return/refurb, it may have a Master Boot Record on it, which Windows would have detected.

That won't be a problem, WinMFS's copy function will overwrite it (which is why even with show mounted drives checked it won't show the one you boot the PC with and from which you load the Windows operating system).

It also lets you specify a swap partition size different from the default.

Go ahead and set it to 1000--that's only about 15 minutes of video worth of space and may be cheap insurance down the road if it needs the space to move things around to fix something.

If it offers anything about the partition layout (sometimes it does and sometimes it doesn't), you DO want the "advanced layout" (I think you have to check the box to avoid having it, but read the wording carefully to be sure).

Then you click the Start button (I think that's what it's called) and it starts the copying process.

Then the progress indicator seems to freeze and you go do something else for a long time and leave it alone.

Eventually if finishes.

When it does it tells you that you have extra space and asks if you want to expand.

You tell it NO. Trust me on this.

Then you go back to File, Select Drive and this time you select the drive to which you just did the copying, the new replacement drive.

Then you click on

mfsinfo

which I think will be under Tools, and it shows you stuff about the TiVo software on that new replacement drive, assuming nothing went wrong during the copy procedure.

I'm thinking the partition map will be showing 16 partitions, with 14 and 15 having labels that indicate they were added when the original 160GB drive was replaced with that 1TB you just copied, and the 16th partition will be large and will be an Apple Free Partition, which is how the Apple Partition Map refers to space that hasn't been partitioned.

Then if everything seems to be okay you close that out and go find

mfsadd

which I think is also under Tools.

This will take that Apple Free Partition and incorporate it into the 3rd MFS Media partition (the 15th), so that you will be left with only 15 partitions total.

It'll say something about a partition being over 1.2TB in size. Tell it you DO want to create one bigger than that. (again, I forget how they word it exactly).

When that finishes, go back to

mfsinfo

and make sure everything looks okay and that the partition map shows all of the space in use and only 15 partitions.

Then shut things down and put the new drive in the TiVo and fire it up.

Of course while you have the TiVo opened up you really need to check the power supply for any signs of bulging or "doming" on the electrolytic capacitors on the power supply circuit board, and if you have a voltmeter and know how to use it it would be a good idea to check the output voltages as well, since not all failing capacitors show visual signs.

You can, and should, do the visual inspection with the power cord not plugged in, but voltage measurements would have to be done with the TiVo's power cord plugged in, which means the open power supply circuit board could maybe kill you if you touched it in the wrong place, so learn more about how to do those measurements safely if you need to.

If you're going to be an owner of a Series 2 or Series 3 platform TiVo model, you should familiarize yourself with the "capacitor plague" problem and how to deal with it:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=473394

It's a lot of pages, but go ahead and read it all.


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## teleskier (Mar 22, 2015)

I manually permanently deleted all the old shows.

Now the first immediate problem... looking through the unopened electro-static plastic on my Amazon WD20EURS drive that LOOKS new... I am shocked to see a manufacture date of 14-Nov-2012 !!! (Those before 2013 need wdidle)

It's also too late to return this drive (bought in Jan 2016).

Does this mean I am dead in the water and should quit now?

I haven't owned a desktop PC for over a decade, where I thought I read that wdidle can't be run across USB-to-SATA enclosure boxes from laptops.

I think I also read that the only time Intelligent-Park affects the Tivo is during soft-reset, where I don't plan on doing that, and if it happens, one would simply unplug the power and hard reboot. (My Tivo doesn't have 24/7 internet, I manually connect it once a week, so SW updates should be rare).

Others found when they ran wdidle on their WD20EURS that Park was already disabled out of the box.

Should I blaze ahead with this drive w/o wdidle and cross my fingers... or eat the old bad WD20EURS drive and get a new drive first before proceeding?

The WD20EURS really should come off the recommended drive list - I saw it mentioned here everywhere even in recent posts - when I should have been searching to buy the newer WD20EURX to avoid <2013 dates (apparently).

[UPDATE: My particular WD20EURS worked out fine, see my "success" post below]


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## ggieseke (May 30, 2008)

As long as you know about the soft boot problem if Intellipark is enabled and you're willing to unplug it when necessary, who cares?

I'd worry more about the drive itself. Is it really new and has just been sitting on the shelf somewhere, or is it a refurb? Probably no warranty either.

You are correct - wdidle3 requires a direct SATA connection.


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## teleskier (Mar 22, 2015)

Amazon order says "Condition: New - New Drive. Expedited Shipping. 1 yr Warranty"

Re-read the amazon page - many people said they used it fine for Tivo internal drive - but who knows what year their particular shipped device was manufactured.

I'm going to risk it... will open the package tonight and start... wish me luck.


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## ggieseke (May 30, 2008)

teleskier said:


> Amazon order says "Condition: New - New Drive. Expedited Shipping. 1 yr Warranty"
> 
> Re-read the amazon page - many people said they used it fine for Tivo internal drive - but who knows what year their particular shipped device was manufactured.
> 
> I'm going to risk it... will open the package tonight and start... wish me luck.


Good luck, but test it first with the WD factory diagnostics. Any drive that passes a full "write zeros" test followed by the long read test is good to go in my book.


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## teleskier (Mar 22, 2015)

Running WD Extended Test now - 40 mins in - 17 hours to go - no bad sectors so far.


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## unitron (Apr 28, 2006)

teleskier said:


> I manually permanently deleted all the old shows.
> 
> Now the first immediate problem... looking through the unopened electro-static plastic on my Amazon WD20EURS drive that LOOKS new... I am shocked to see a manufacture date of 14-Nov-2012 !!! (Those before 2013 need wdidle)
> 
> ...


The WD20EURX has its own problems with something called Power Up In Standby, which, when I got one in 2014, I would have had to specifically take measures to enable, but WD is apparently now shipping them with it enabled with no warning or indication.

If you use the search feature of this site and plug in

unitron WD20EURX

you should find the recent threads discussing this problem.


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## teleskier (Mar 22, 2015)

Woohoo! Success!

The process was actually much easier than I feared. The steps and help here helped quite a bit - thank you.

My Tivo boots, the old shows are there, and the cherry on top - I can even soft reset ("restart") the Tivo without issues or pulling the cord.

My notes/tips:

The 2TB WD20EURS from 2012 worked fine - I did not have to run wdidle
I clicked Supersize after Msfadd, but it seemed to do nothing, Msfinfo text did not change
I went from 1TB 142 HD hours to 2TB 316 HD hours
Given the overnight Msfcopy where you're sleeping anyway, next time I wouldn't go so crazy clearing the NowPlaying and Delete folders. I blew away entire seasons of shows that I might have wanted to watch. (Plus side - I now have those 16 hours of my life back)
I can't believe how QUIET this disk is!! At first I thought I must have forgotten to connect the power. The old 1TB Hitachi disk was so LOUD in its seek and reading that you could hear it clear across the room. Finally my Tivo is as quiet as my beloved much older Sony DHG DVR (that is still running w/ original disks, I am convinced that the Tivo-use-model of always recording everything 24/7 kills disks. I do put Tivo in Standby every night, but not sure it'll help to extend disk life, guess we'll see. The prior owner was record heavy, even recording all those let-Tivo-guess 'maybe' shows 24/7 which killed his Hitachi in short order).


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

teleskier said:


> I clicked Supersize after Msfadd, but it seemed to do nothing, Msfinfo text did not change
> I went from 1TB 142 HD hours to 2TB 316 HD hours
> I can't believe how QUIET this disk is!! At first I thought I must have forgotten to connect the power. The old 1TB Hitachi disk was so LOUD in its seek and reading that you could hear it clear across the room. Finally my Tivo is as quiet as my beloved much older Sony DHG DVR (that is still running w/ original disks, I am convinced that the Tivo-use-model of always recording everything 24/7 kills disks. I do put Tivo in Standby every night, but not sure it'll help to extend disk life, guess we'll see. The prior owner was record heavy, even recording all those let-Tivo-guess 'maybe' shows 24/7 which killed his Hitachi in short order).


It was probably already supersized from the earlier upgrade to 1TB (I'd have to

I've always found the WD AV drives to be very quiet. We've always recorded Suggestions for the 16 years that we've owned TiVo's and not had any drive issues. The WD 1TB AV drives that we had in our 2 S3's were still working well after 6 1/2 years when I upgraded to 2TB drives primarily for the space. I had an earlier drive in one of our S1's that was still working after 8 years.

Scott


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## unitron (Apr 28, 2006)

In a TiVo the hard drive is pretty much running all the time.

Even in standby it has to deal with stuff like downloading guide data and sorting it all out and updating where it is in all of that as time passes.

In applications like a PC, I think you'd probably get more life out of a drive by turning it on and leaving it on rather than submitting it to shut down and start up (especially start up) every day.

Start up is almost always the most stressful time for most anything electrical or electronic, from lightbulbs to supercomputers to radio and television transmitters to you name it.


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## studio12h (May 24, 2010)

So where did you find WinMFS? I love the line - Then, assuming the TiVo Fairy came in the night and put WinMFS on your PC...
I need this Fairy badly


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## HerronScott (Jan 1, 2002)

studio12h said:


> So where did you find WinMFS? I love the line - Then, assuming the TiVo Fairy came in the night and put WinMFS on your PC...
> I need this Fairy badly


Check out this post which has 2 download links listed.

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=10796585#post10796585

Scott


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## cannonz (Oct 23, 2011)

unitron said:


> It also lets you specify a swap partition size different from the default.
> 
> Go ahead and set it to 1000--that's only about 15 minutes of video worth of space and may be cheap insurance down the road if it needs the space to move things around to fix something.
> .


Does this help prevent the occasional SO2 error?


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