# Upgrades, Images, Hooch, Oh My!



## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

OK, so I've bought two WD Caviar Green 500Gb SATA drives, on recommendation from here, to upgrade both my dad's and my tivo. I'm waiting on a couple of SATA to IDE adapters from Hong Kong (eBay).

So my dad's is gonna be a straight clean, fresh install, from an original 40gb, to which I would also like to add Mode 0 (if it's not too much hassle), and EndPad (this is important), to start automatically on a reboot. He won't have any kind of network card, so it'll need to be done pre-install.

I probably have too many important programmes to lose on mine, so I think I'll have to do a transfer, again, as long as it's not too much hassle. It's currently a 200gb drive, and my 2nd upgrade since I got tivo many moons ago. I have a network card, and will run tivoweb also. I don't really need Mode 0 as I don't have an HD telly at the mo, but would add it if it's easy enough.

Am I best to request an image from the appropriate thread on here, and then add the extras?
Will the image be OK for these large, SATA drives?
The Hooch thing seems quite good, albeit a little dear - but it says on the homepage 'only IDE not SATA' - does that mean it won't work with these drives?
Are there any other caveats I need to know about this process - for example, does it matter if I get an 2.5.5 image, or 2.5.5a?
Can anyone point me to the best/most up to date tutorials/files for this process?

Nobody will be happy (Dad, Mum, Wife, Kids) if I screw up these Tivos!

Thanks in advance.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

If you use an IDE/SATA adapter in the upgrade PC and the target drive shows up as hdb,hdc or hdd then you should be able to use Hooch.


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## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

The image begging thread only does a basic 2.5.5 image - which shouldn't be a problem if one of your TiVos is on 2.5.5a. The mothership (TiVo) will notice that you're on an 'old' version of the software and upgrade you on a daily call to 2.5.5a.

If you install 2.5.5a and the mothership thinks you're on 2.5.5 then you'll have a broken TiVo in a few days as the TiVo and mothership get confused and stop doing daily calls successfully.

So, 2.5.5 is the best bet. :up:


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## kitschcamp (May 18, 2001)

2.5.5 is a bad idea if it was a 2.5.5a machine - if you're having to use the LBA kernel, then the "upgrade" to 2.5.5a from the mothership will kill your tivo.


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## AMc (Mar 22, 2002)

I detailed installing endpad with the drive connected to a PC here.
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=4733241#post4733241

However if your Tivo has a network card I would consider preparing both drives by doing the basic upgrade on the PC then putting the disks (one at a time) into your networked Tivo to configure Mode 0 and endpad etc. That allows you to set everything up and test it in situ which is better than - configure on the PC, swap the drive to Tivo, work out you've failed to set a permission, pull the drive and reconnect to the PC route which is slow. As I understand it a drive with Network drivers on it will fail over to the modem if the network card isn't present and your Dad could always add a network card at a later date without having to reconfigure the drive in a PC.

Enabling Mode 0 with a network card is no biggie and worth it even on a Standard Definition TV - I have a 32" CRT TV and noticed an improvement, coupled with enabling Variable Bit Rate it doesn't use more space either.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

OK, I got my adapters, I've got the kids to bed, and I've sat down to finally have a go at this.

I'm concerned already that there are different types of IDE to SATA adapters, and that mine might not have 'LBA48 support' (whatever that is).

How can I tell? I've plugged in the drive, and booted from the 'mfslive-1.3b' disc.

I can't see any drives identified as hda or hdb - my cd/dvd drives are in the other IDE socket, and I can see them identified as hdc and hdd

Would this suggest that my adapter is wrong? It's this one if that is of any help:
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&ssPageName=STRK:MEWNX:IT&item=260287504714

Thanks in advance.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

I don't even know which option I want when I boot from MFSLive (and even after reading the help)!

God, I feel like such a N00b!


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

If you press shift+pageup a few times after booting to the # prompt on the MFSLive CD you should see your WD drive listed as /dev/hda (my guess).

If not, then the IDE/SATA converter may not be compatible with your PC. The ones I use are only compatible with one of my 'tivo upgrade' PCs but they are compatible with the TiVo. I have no idea why this might be. But if it seems to be the case for you then you could try another PC (if you have one).

BTW, why are you using the MFSLive CD? The 'ordinary' LBA48 Boot CD works just fine and has copykern too, which you will need to initialise the swap even if your image has the LBA48 kernel.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

blindlemon said:


> If you press shift+pageup a few times after booting to the # prompt on the MFSLive CD you should see your WD drive listed as /dev/hda (my guess).
> 
> If not, then the IDE/SATA converter may not be compatible with your PC. The ones I use are only compatible with one of my 'tivo upgrade' PCs but they are compatible with the TiVo. I have no idea why this might be. But if it seems to be the case for you then you could try another PC (if you have one).


Thanks for the reply. Upon further investigation, I think they've sent me the wrong converter... by the IDE connector it says 'to HD' on the motherboard, and likewise, by the SATA connnector it says 'SATA1 to MB'. 

I've emailed them to see if we can resolve this, but I'm pretty sure that's the issue, so far.



blindlemon said:


> BTW, why are you using the MFSLive CD? The 'ordinary' LBA48 Boot CD works just fine and has copykern (which you will need) as well.


Why am I using it? I have no idea.  It's all a bit of gobbledygook to me to be honest. But it was linked to in this thread: http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?p=6705954#post6705954

Where do I get an 'ordinary' LBA48 Boot CD image from? And can you recommend somewhere to get a cheap SATA drive to IDE MB adapter?


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

warrenrb said:


> Thanks for the reply. Upon further investigation, I think they've sent me the wrong converter... by the IDE connector it says 'to HD' on the motherboard, and likewise, by the SATA connnector it says 'SATA1 to MB'.
> 
> I've emailed them to see if we can resolve this, but I'm pretty sure that's the issue, so far.
> 
> ...


Yeah, that looks like the sort of adapter you use to make an IDE drive work with a SATA motherboard. You need one that looks like this :-

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/ws/eBayISAPI....PageName=ADME:B:EOIBSA:UK:11#ebayphotohosting

The 'ordinary' LBA48 boot CD was linked in my post above


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

Sorry to be a dufus, but I need more help!

I ordered the RXD-629 as in the ebay link above, from Hong Kong as before. Two weeks later and they are here at last.

So I plugged it into my PC (straight on the motherboard, taking out my existing HD cable). The primary IDE port? (Bear with me, I'm a long time Mac user). In the secondary port I have two DVD drives.

However, now when I try to boot the PC, it gets to 'Detecting IDE drives...' and sits there doing nothing. When I reboot and quickly hit 'F1' it says 'entering setup', but again, sits there and never does.

I've tried both adapters and both hard drives. The hard drives don't feel like they are spinning, but then they are meant to be so quiet I don't know if that's what it is.

I've plugged the power cable into a spare power lead on the PC, and the other end to the white port on the adapter. I've connected the SATA lead to the logical ports at both ends. There is another, longer connector on the drive - I assume that is not used in this case, and the drive gets power from the small lead?

Do I need to update my BIOS or something like that? I'm using an old HP machine from around 2002/2003 I think. Can anyone suggest anything? I'm completely stumped and having waited around a month now for both adapters, I'm getting kinda frustrated.

Heeeeelp!


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## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Have you connected any power to the SATA drives?

The small connector is the data connector; the long one is the power.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

See, I was wondering about that, but I don't have a lead that fits it. I just have a power cable that goes to the adapter, so I assumed SATA could draw power from that via the small lead. I assumed (seemingly wrongly) that the adapter would provide everything I needed, cable-wise. This picture shows the cables I got with it.










Because I don't have an SATA motherboard, what kind of cable do I need to connect to the drive? One of these?
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/NEW-4-Pin-Mol...39:1|66:2|65:12|240:1308&_trksid=p3286.c0.m14


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

Would this do?
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=98947

Or do I need this (which is dearer, but seems 'less' if you know what I mean):
http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=36039


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## Tim L (Jan 5, 2002)

warrenrb said:


> Would this do?
> http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=98947
> 
> Or do I need this (which is dearer, but seems 'less' if you know what I mean):
> http://www.maplin.co.uk/Module.aspx?ModuleNo=36039


Either will do. Go with the cheapest.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

warrenrb said:


> See, I was wondering about that, but I don't have a lead that fits it. I just have a power cable that goes to the adapter, so I assumed SATA could draw power from that via the small lead. I assumed (seemingly wrongly) that the adapter would provide everything I needed, cable-wise. This picture shows the cables I got with it.


I still don't understand why vendors of IDE/SATA converters don't supply the power leads with their kits. Maybe because they don't actually plug into the converter I guess, but as you say, the kits are useless without one.


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## TCM2007 (Dec 25, 2006)

Some SATA drives have "old fashioned" power connectors too - but not many these days.


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## DX30 (May 22, 2005)

Also many PC power supplies now have sata power connectors and don't need a convertor power lead.

It does become a bit of a guessing game whether a convertor lead is required, depending as it does on the PSU and drive choice, so I can see why saving a few cents by ommitting something that may not be needed is attractive.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

OK, got all my leads, including a power cable for the SATA (blush). The drive shows up at hda correctly, and the source drive is at hdc.

I've been following the instructions here:
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=407652&highlight=500gb

and I've got to the point where I've qunlock'ed my Dad's original 40Gb drive and started the copy with:
mfsbackup - Tao - /dev/hdc | mfsrestore -r 4 -s 300 -xzpi - /dev/hda

Which has generated the following output:
Scanning source drive. Please wait a moment.
Source drive size is 39 hours
Uncompressed backup size: 26784 megabytes
Starting restore26784 megabytes (0.00%)
Uncompressed backup size: 26784 megabytes
Backing up 78 of 26784 megabytes (0.29%)

... and it's stopped there. About 30 mins so far.

Shouldn't it be 'ticking' up as it goes? Am I being impatient?

And not to question Blind Lemon's knowledge in this area, but is the SATA with an IDE adapter definitely OK with the MFS tools option, rather than MFSLive which is recommended in this thread?
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=380949&highlight=green+power+1tb

Thanks!


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

I have not had problems using the LBA48 Boot CD with SATA converters providing both the converter and the drive are functioning correctly. 

Did you test the new drive thoroughly? Are you sure the 40gb source drive is not corrupted?

You could use the MFSLive CD instead and it might be better as the error handing is more robust, but I doubt whether the LBA48 Boot CD is the cause of your current problem.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

Thanks for the reply. I've not tested the new drive - what is the best way to do this? Will formatting it in Windows be enough?

I hope the 40gb source is not corrupted - it's straight from the Tivo which was working fine to this point. All I've done to it is qunlock it.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

I just put the 40Gb back into the Tivo and it seems fine. I don't imagine there's any other tests I could do on it?


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## mikerr (Jun 2, 2005)

Did you really need to keep all your recordings from the 40Gb?

If not, try:

mfsbackup -so - /dev/hdc | mfsrestore -r 4 -s 300 -xzpi - /dev/hda

which will run *much* quicker, and will copy absolutely everything except the recordings.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

I tried the non-recording copy as above, but it gets to 11.68&#37; and stalls like before. Anyone seen this before? Is it likely to be source, target or the PC itself?


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

Everytime I try it (and I've tried it a lot), it stalls - at different points, but always within 30 seconds of starting.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

warrenrb said:


> Everytime I try it (and I've tried it a lot), it stalls - at different points, but always within 30 seconds of starting.


Test the target drive. Use something generic like Hitachi's DFT or Seagate's Seatools for DOS as the WD utilities don't work well with SATA converters.

You may also be experiencing an incompatibility between the SATA converter and the WD 500 GP drive. I bought a number of these drives recently after testing one out extensively a month or so ago and the new drives all refuse to work properly in a TiVo via any of the 4 brands of SATA converters I've tried so far, whereas the original 500 GP drive I used for testing and a 750 GP I have in stock both work just fine with all the converters, as do 500GB Samsung SATA drives.

Bit of a shame really....


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## Fred Smith (Oct 5, 2002)

FYI,

Bought a WD green 500Gb SATA HDD from Scan last week (free shipping if you are member of certain forums) and this arrived yesterday:

http://cgi.ebay.com/PATA-IDE-To-SAT...74941QQcmdZViewItemQQ_trksidZp1713.m153.l1262

(Note the CD was not supplied nor needed).

Both working fine in my TiVo.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

Thank you for this ray of hope - I'd all but conceded defeat on this.

That adapter looks quite different from the two I've tried so far, and altogether better suited (I wasn't even sure if the last one I had would fit in tivo!).

I guess I could try one more adapter - if only there wasn't the two week wait from Hong Kong each time. (The other problem being I've been buying two 'wrong' adapters each time which is frustrating).

@blindlemon - is that one of the adapter types you have tried with these drives?


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## Fred Smith (Oct 5, 2002)

Despite the quoted upto twenty business days, it arrived in about eight days.

The good thing about the adapter (apart from it worked for me and I hope it does for you if you order one) it fits flush with the back of the drive so leaves room between the drive and the PSU.

Be interesting to see if blindlemon has used one of these and if so what result.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

Fred Smith said:


> Be interesting to see if blindlemon has used one of these and if so what result.


No, not so far - all the adapters I've tested have been the type that fits in the IDE socket on the motherboard, and they all work fine with various SATA drives but not the latest 500gb GP I've received. Bit of a mystery really....


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

I've order the above adapters - this is my last attempt with these WD drives, and then I'm gonna cut my losses and get an SATA drive enclosure to use them as externals instead, and just buy an IDE drive for my dad's Tivo.

Thanks for the tip off Fred - I'll let you know how it goes in a week or so...


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

Me again... sorry.

Adapters arrived, and worked! (Thanks Fred!) I was able to make the copy of the original drive tonight with recordings, and then run copykern to finish the process.

I put the drive in Tivo and it booted no problems, and reports LOTS of recording space.

I now want to add various hacks to the drive - specifically Mode 0 and Endpad. I read somewhere that this is best done via Turbonet so I put the drive back in the PC and ran nic_install turbonet, but it says 'No tivo drive found' and when I add --debug to that command, it says (of HDC where the drive is), "Not a Tivo drive".

Any ideas why that would be?

This is my dad's Tivo, which won't ultimately have a network card, so if there is a *EASY* way to add these hacks without it I would do that, otherwise, how do I install the drivers? Where am I going wrong?

Thanks!


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

Nevermind...

A Blind Lemon post on a different thread gave me the answer - I was trying to run the nic_install from the wrong disc! The one on the LBA48 disc doesn't seem to work.

Sorted. Back soon at the next hurdle...


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

OK. Trying to do my Tivo now. a 200Gb drive to the same 500Gb as in my dad's.

When I run the same command as before, I get:
Source drive size is 39 hours
- Upgraded to 127 hours
- Upgraded to 222 hours
Uncompressed backup size: 180975 megabytes
Restore failed: Backup target not large enough for entire backup by itself.

I vaguely remember something way back when I first did my upgrades, that you could only expand a drive so many times (3?) before problems. Is this what that is, or something else?

Thanks.


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## warrenrb (Jul 21, 2002)

No one knows the answer to my 'Backup target not large enough' problem?

Can anyone confirm that there's a limit to how many times you can backup the same disc (or the children of that disc).

I just wanna check if I can save my recordings before I go ahead and make my new drive from a virgin image (as provided on the image thread). I really could do with keeping the recordings, if it's possible.

Thanks!


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## AMc (Mar 22, 2002)

If you have a network card, space on a PC/Mac and the patience you can remove the recordings, upgrade and reinsert them on to a new drive.
I did that using an image from the begging thread, it wasn't quick or simple though my experience is here
http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=391124&highlight=nanvue


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