# Some questions on WD10EVCS



## msu-dawg (Jan 7, 2006)

I ordered and just received a WD10EVCS to use as a replacement for the standard drive inside my TivoHD. This will be the first time I have messed with SATA drives for anything and have a question or two.

Firstly, I knew my MB in my desktop machine had SATA capability cause I remembered seeing it in the BIOS once upon a time. So I opened the machine to be sure and did find the SATA-0 and SATA-1 connectors. I looked up the specs on the MB on Gateway website and am fairly sure that they are legacy 1.5 SATA rather than SATA 3.0. Will this cause any sort of problem hooking up the WD10EVCS or the original TivoHD drive?

As far as power, my PS only has Molex connectors. I know there are Molex to 15-pin SATA Power adapters available. Will this be OK to use? I see on the top of the WD10EVCS that it only lists requirement for 12V and 5V (but not the 3.3 V that the 15-pin SATA can also supply), so I'm thinking the Molex to SATA adapter should work for that. I'm not sure about the drive in the TivoHD though as I haven't cracked that open yet. Anyone know?

And I don't own a SATA data cable so I have to get one of those I suppose. Anything in particular I need to be aware of when picking one out or are they all pretty much the same?

I've already downloaded WinMFS but haven't installed yet- actually, just looked and I see it's only one exe file. Does it actually install or just run from one file?

I'll probably wait til the weekend to do the swap as I still have to find time to go pick up the required adapter, cables, etc. somewhere.

Any other usefull comments or suggestions welcome! Thanks!


----------



## Shawn95GT (Oct 7, 2005)

I installed this exact drive in my TivoHD last night. I used Instant Cake because my original drive was booting about 1 in every 6 times I tried and I didn't trust it.

On the first system I tried to do it on the SATA drives weren't getting assigned 'sda' 'sdb' etc. I went to Fry's looking for a SATA to IDE adapter but all they had was the USB to SATA ones and they were more money than I wanted to spend for something I was going to use once. I left empty handed.

I went home and tried another computer and it worked as I expected it to. 5 minutes later the 1TB monster was ready to drop in the TivoHD.

I give a HUGE thumbs up to Instant Cake. The only way it'd be any easier would be if it installed the drive in the Tivo for you.

Are you ditching the expander now that you'll have 1TB on-board? I'm moving mine to one of the S3s I think.


----------



## msu-dawg (Jan 7, 2006)

Shawn95GT said:


> Are you ditching the expander now that you'll have 1TB on-board? I'm moving mine to one of the S3s I think.


Probably so. Even though it passed Kickstart 54 (as did the internal for that matter), I'm not sure that I trust it to hook it back up. I might consider trying it, but since ALL of my recordings would then be split between my internal drive and the expander again, I'd lose everything if it started having issues and I had to divorce it.

And in reality, the existing internal (160GB is it?) + the 500GB external has been more than enough space for our recording habits. So the 1TB internal should be fine for now.

And from glancing at the drive upgrade FAQ, I think I'd have to hook the expander up to my computer with my new internal drive installed in order to use WinMFS to "marry" them together, as opposed to just plug it into the Tivo and it work. That's my interpretation anyway. And I'm not interested in the hassle.

Even if the expander is working fine I'm not sure that it's worth enough to sell so I'll probably just rip the drive out of the enclosure and add it to my desktop as an additional drive...... not that I really need the space there, but more is always better, right?


----------



## Shawn95GT (Oct 7, 2005)

Yeah I'm wondering if my problems weren't caused by the expander too.

I'll have to wait for a slow week on CBS / NBC to expand that Tivo.


----------



## lafos (Nov 8, 2004)

Shawn95GT said:


> On the first system I tried to do it on the SATA drives weren't getting assigned 'sda' 'sdb' etc.
> I went home and tried another computer and it worked as I expected it to. 5 minutes later the 1TB monster was ready to drop in the TivoHD.


On the first PC you tried, did you check the bios setup to see if the SATA ports were enabled? I have two SATA ports and IDE on my Dell E510, and it came with IDE drives. Hadn't installed any SATA drives, so when working on the TiVo HD, I have to enable them and disable them when I'm done, or the computer hangs looking for drives.


----------



## lafos (Nov 8, 2004)

msu-dawg said:


> Probably so. Even though it passed Kickstart 54 (as did the internal for that matter), I'm not sure that I trust it to hook it back up. I might consider trying it, but since ALL of my recordings would then be split between my internal drive and the expander again, I'd lose everything if it started having issues and I had to divorce it.
> 
> And in reality, the existing internal (160GB is it?) + the 500GB external has been more than enough space for our recording habits. So the 1TB internal should be fine for now.
> 
> ...


You are correct that you'd have to marry the drives on your PC; you can only marry to the original drive in the TiVo.

I'd hold on to the expander, as you can add it later if you decide you need the space. If you later divorce it, you'd lose any recordings made after the marriage.


----------



## msu-dawg (Jan 7, 2006)

lafos said:


> You are correct that you'd have to marry the drives on your PC; you can only marry to the original drive in the TiVo.
> 
> I'd hold on to the expander, as you can add it later if you decide you need the space. If you later divorce it, you'd lose any recordings made after the marriage.


Thanks for info. I put my WD10EVCS in computer last night and ran the 3-hour diagnostics with WD Data Lifeguard Diagnostics software. Everything was good with it this AM so I did the the Tivo upgrade and had no problems.

Everything is back up and running, reporting 157 HD hours.

I think I may use my Expander as an additional external HD for my computer. I ordered a SATA to eSATA backplate adapter to put into my computer for that purpose.


----------



## Shawn95GT (Oct 7, 2005)

lafos said:


> On the first PC you tried, did you check the bios setup to see if the SATA ports were enabled? I have two SATA ports and IDE on my Dell E510, and it came with IDE drives. Hadn't installed any SATA drives, so when working on the TiVo HD, I have to enable them and disable them when I'm done, or the computer hangs looking for drives.


For sure - the system had 2 SATA ports and one was the ROM and the other was the system's drive. I un-plugged the system drive and plugged in the Tivo drive in it's place.

I never got past mounting the SATA CD ROM.


----------

