# 400Gb Samsung Spinpoint T133 Now Only £66 Delivered



## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

Just thought I should point out that the 400Gb Samsung T133 HDLD drives are now available from www.komplett.co.uk for only £66 including VAT and delivery.

Or bag a pair for only £125 including VAT and delivery.

See http://www.komplett.co.uk/k/ki.asp?sku=312836

Strangely there is still no sign of the long promised 1000Gb Hitachi drive appearing on the marketplace and nor has any other manufacturer yet matched the 750Gb 3.5" Seagate drive's capacity.

One would have thought that with HDTV slowing taking off there would be a clamour for ever larger hard drive sizes.

Could it be that the manufacturers have found producing reliable larger hard drive sizes at a price that is also cost effective to not so far be a viable option?


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## Prat77 (Apr 14, 2007)

An OK price but nothing jaw-dropping; I paid just over £70 for the drive in January.

Disk has performed well and is a good choice for Tivo; if only it were as easy to add a drive to our machines as it is for the Americans with their new tivos - plug in the drive, and hold down the pause button whilst tivo boots! Full details on engadget fullstop com


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

Prat77 said:


> An OK price but nothing jaw-dropping; I paid just over £70 for the drive in January.


Prat 77 seems to post only very occasionally but shows a high level of overall knowledge of the Tivo marketplace despite making only 3 posts in the forum.

I wonder who Prat 77 actually is? And I wonder why he picked a name apparently designed to parody or ridicule my forum name?


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## mikerr (Jun 2, 2005)

Pete77 said:


> Strangely there is still no sign of the long promised 1000Gb Hitachi drive appearing on the marketplace


It's available at £249 at microdirect



Pete77 said:


> and nor has any other manufacturer yet matched the 750Gb 3.5" Seagate drive's capacity.
> 
> One would have thought that with HDTV slowing taking off there would be a clamour for ever larger hard drive sizes.
> 
> Could it be that the manufacturers have found producing reliable larger hard drive sizes at a price that is also cost effective to not so far be a viable option?


That's down to the number and capacity of platters.

The hitachi 1000Gb drive is a 5 platter drive (5x200Gb platters),
and apparently runs quite a bit hotter than other drives.

Hitachi are the only manufacturer currently making 5 platter (10 head) drives.
More platters = more noise, heat and power.

The seagate will use 4x 250GB platters (hitachi "played safe" with tried and trusted 200GB platters).


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

mikerr said:


> Hitachi are the only manufacturer currently making 5 platter (10 head) drives. More platters = more noise, heat and power.


So that wouldn't worry Hitachi at all what with heat, vibration and short hard drive life being one of the trademarks of the Hitachi (nee IBM) Deathstar range.  

Hitachi's only normal criteria seems to be making sure it is the first manufacturer to come out with any given hard drive capacity and to secure sales by this method no matter how crappy, overpriced and overheating their product may be.

On the other hand perhaps a Tivo could take two of them (unlike a 750Gb Seagate). I calculate around 500 hours of capacity at Mode 0 without VBR enabled or over 700 hours at Mode 0 with VBR and around 700 hours in normal Best (Mode 4) recording mode. Or around 2450 hours in Basic recording mode. 

This will still work but you will find all Now Playing and other Tivo menu operations rather tediously slow.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

I now see its only an SATA II drive. although someone did say you could buy an SATA to PATA converter fairly cheaply somewhere on the web?


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## mikerr (Jun 2, 2005)

One of these should work for £12.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

mikerr said:


> One of these should work for £12.


If you had a two drive setup would you need one or two of these converters and would there be room to cram one or two of these inside a Tivo and get the lid back on? Also do they require their own power source or not?

I suspect you might not get away with using the standard Tivo IDE leads though?


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## PaulWilkinsUK (Mar 20, 2006)

Pete77 said:


> Strangely there is still no sign of the long promised 1000Gb Hitachi drive appearing on the marketplace....


They're in PC World now @ £249.00


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

Message to blindlemon that his PM message store is currently full so I can't reply to the one that he sent me.


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## Prat77 (Apr 14, 2007)

Pete77 said:


> The only forum member who I know obtained the drives in January for around £70 was blindlemon.
> 
> Is this Prat77 person merely blindlemon by another name then?
> 
> If you wanted to be taken seriously as a forum member then why did you pick a forum name which appears directly designed to take the Michael out of another forum member (i.e. myself).


Oh I am sorry - I didn't realise I had to run all my purchases past you. Post your address below and I'll forward my credit card statements to you.

I have no desire to be taken seriously by paranoid internerds, merely to share any advice I may have. My forum name is merely made up of my name and year of birth - why would you think people are trying to "take the Michael" out of you? 

I'd be interested to know people's experiences with IDE and SATA converters; I purchased the (IDE) Spinpoint drive for my XBox after reading tales of people finding out the converters simply didn't work with the xbox and sata drives.


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## Prat77 (Apr 14, 2007)

Pete77 said:


> Prat 77 seems to post only very occasionally


5 posts in under than a month isn't too bad?

(quick filler post so I can post a URL below...)


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## Prat77 (Apr 14, 2007)

Here's the reference I found to a board only supporting PCs, not xboxes. Where the Tivo sits on the scale between the two, I do not know!

http://www.amazon.com/ADDONICS-SATA-IDE-CONVERTER-ADSAIDE/dp/B0002FGEAS

And here's the reference guide to adding a hard disk to american machines using just your remote!
http://www.engadget.com/2007/05/04/how-to-use-your-tivo-series3-esata-port-to-add-an-external-driv/


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## ndunlavey (Jun 4, 2002)

Prat77 said:


> 5 posts in under than a month isn't too bad?


I wouldn't worry about it - he has in the past questioned why I post so much.


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## RichardJH (Oct 7, 2002)

I


> 'd be interested to know people's experiences with IDE and SATA converters;


 original post Pratt77.

I bought 2 adaptors for use in my new Dell PC which is sata only and no problems using a LG DVD writer and Seagate 250 IDE drive. I found that you must set drives to cable select to get them recognised. Each adaptor needs a power supply extra to the normal disk drive supply.


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## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

Don't worry about Pete - he's having one of his bad times where he gets all paranoid. The rest of us are friendly.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

Prat77 said:


> I have no desire to be taken seriously by paranoid internerds, merely to share any advice I may have. My forum name is merely made up of my name and year of birth - why would you think people are trying to "take the Michael" out of you?


Well at the time you first posted everyone else took the context of your appearance as Prat77 and its similarity to my name (both the number 77 and the apparent parody via using the word Prat) to have been a deliberate attempt to be provocative.

I only ever knew one person with the surname Prat (back at my old university in the 1980s) and he spelt it with a double t. I have to say that if I was unfortunate enough to have the surname Prat I would probably change it by deed poll to something else and I certainly wouldn't use it as my forum handle. However on the basis that you came to the forum for the first time and were stuck for a forum name I imagine that seeing my posts and your apparent subsequent assumption that it was normal to include year of birth in your forum name must have influenced your choice.

I do however find it odd that you were so easily able to resurrect comments in a post I made in the forum over 40 minutes after I had deleted them as even things like Way Back Machine do not archive web pages that often. That suggests to me a rather sophisticated internet user as also do your comments about me being an "internerd". However in language terms this does closely resembles the posting style of a very long term member of this forum who has already once changed his forum name.

Whether your surname is really Prat or not your choice of forum name does seem unfortunate when there is another very regularly posting forum member with 77 in their name and the word Prat is bound to be taken by many as a deliberate attempt to take the pi**.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

ColinYounger said:


> Don't worry about Pete - he's having one of his bad times where he gets all paranoid. The rest of us are friendly.


I wouldn't take any notice of Colin.

He's a fairly mean Tivoweb coder who has produced some rather useful stuff but its hard to take anyone seriously who chooses to post a forum avatar that shows a paper bag on his head. Especially when its not compulsory to post any forum member avatar at all so the logical and sane thing to do would be to leave it blank if you don't wish to post your own real pic.


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## mikerr (Jun 2, 2005)

pete77 said:


> I wouldn't take any notice of Colin.
> 
> He's a fairly mean Tivoweb coder who has produced some rather useful stuff but its hard to take anyone seriously who chooses to post a forum avatar that shows a paper bag on his head. Especially when its not compulsory to post any forum member avatar at all so the logical and sane thing to do would be to leave it blank if you don't wish to post your own real pic


Is it a "logical and sane" thing to do to obsess over other people's avatars ?


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

mikerr said:


> Is it a "logical and sane" thing to do to obsess over other people's avatars ?


Its only the one with the paper bag on the head that has ever obsessed me.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

Don't forget the 'vest' guy


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

blindlemon said:


> Don't forget the 'vest' guy


Ah yes I overlooked that but no long term mystery to solve in that case.


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## PaulWilkinsUK (Mar 20, 2006)

Pete77 said:


> Ah yes I overlooked that but no long term mystery to solve in that case.


Yeah, come on Pete, you love my vests !


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## timboreeves (Oct 29, 2006)

Shame it isn't easier to add these cheap drives to a tivo.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

timboreeves said:


> Shame it isn't easier to add these cheap drives to a tivo.


Just follow the instructions at www.steveconrad.co.uk/tivo and large disk upgrade.

Alternatively buy a pre-prepared drive to simply drop in from www.tivoheaven.co.uk or www.tivoland.com Admittedly this latter option is significantly more expensive though, especially with hard drive prices having fallen so much but the cost of labour being ever increasing.


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## timboreeves (Oct 29, 2006)

Pete77 said:


> Just follow the instructions at www.steveconrad.co.uk/tivo and large disk upgrade.
> 
> Alternatively buy a pre-prepared drive to simply drop in from www.tivoheaven.co.uk or www.tivoland.com Admittedly this latter option is significantly more expensive though, especially with hard drive prices having fallen so much but the cost of labour being ever increasing.


Those are superb instructions from Steve C. Hmmm tempted! :up:


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## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

Yikes Pete! That's a pretty poisonous message in post #18. I give up - I've changed my avatar for you.










and here's a picture of me just before I strip some revolting wallpaper.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

ColinYounger said:


> Yikes Pete! That's a pretty poisonous message in post #18. I give up - I've changed my avatar for you.
> 
> 
> 
> ...


And what about your message in Post 16 then?  

I see we still haven't managed to wean you off the paper bags though.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

Pete77 said:


> Alternatively buy a pre-prepared drive to simply drop in from www.tivoheaven.co.uk or www.tivoland.com Admittedly this latter option is significantly more expensive though, especially with hard drive prices having fallen so much


If you look at my RSS feed you will see that prices of 400gb drives have been cut 3 times since December 2006, so I do my best


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

blindlemon said:


> If you look at my RSS feed you will see that prices of 400gb drives have been cut 3 times since December 2006, so I do my best


OK fair point, although I see that the preparation fee for a 400Gb drive still commands a premium over the same work on a 160Gb and 250Gb hard drive.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

timboreeves said:


> Those are superb instructions from Steve C. Hmmm tempted! :up:


Do you own a desktop PC and have any experience with changing hard drives or inserting memory etc.

If so then go for it. If you get stuck people on here are only too willing to help you out.

As a worst case if it doesn't work out you can send the drive you have purchased to Tivoheaven and pay their bare drive preparation fee for formatting the new drive for you.

As an alternative to the steveconrad method you can also use the download at and follow the instructions at www.mfslive.org


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

Pete77 said:


> As an alternative to the steveconrad method you can also use the download at and follow the instructions at www.mfslive.org


If you do that then you will need to reboot from the LBA48 CD afterwards and run copykern as the MFSLive CD doesn't apply the LBA48 kernel (although it does correctly initialise the swapfile).

IMHO there's no advantage to using the MFSLive CD unless you need the -f option.


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## blindlemon (May 12, 2002)

Pete77 said:


> OK fair point, although I see that the preparation fee for a 400Gb drive still commands a premium over the same work on a 160Gb and 250Gb hard drive.


Prices are based on what I paid for the drives which may have been (and often is, given that prices fall all the time) more than the cheapest price online today - but in any case, it's still the cheapest pre-configured 400gb drive available


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## Prat77 (Apr 14, 2007)

Pete77 said:


> I only ever knew one person with the surname Prat (back at my old university in the 1980s) and he spelt it with a double t. I have to say that if I was unfortunate enough to have the surname Prat I would probably change it by deed poll to something else and I certainly wouldn't use it as my forum handle.


If I was unfortunate enough to be shown the same level of dislike in a community as is shown to you, I'd certainly be embarrassed enough to change my name!



Pete77 said:


> I do however find it odd that you were so easily able to resurrect comments in a post I made in the forum over 40 minutes after I had deleted them as even things like Way Back Machine do not archive web pages that often. That suggests to me a rather sophisticated internet user


I recall just pressing the "Quote" button and typing my reply there. I'm not quite sure if that shows if I'm a sophisticated person, but I can assure you that I don't even own a vest  Looking back now I see you had to go back and remove a flight of fancy from your post - why not have the courage of your convictions and stand by your outlandish claims? Just because you're paranoid it doesn't mean they're not out to get you 

Has anyone here successfully used the SATA/IDE convertors in a Tivo or Xbox?


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

Prat77 said:


> If I was unfortunate enough to be shown the same level of dislike in a community as is shown to you, I'd certainly be embarrassed enough to change my name!


I still say you are a well known existing forum member who uses this ID when I particularly annoy you, as seems to have happened today. Oterwise why did you take so long to suddenly come back as Prat77.

As to the SATA to IDE drive converter one of the snags is they need a powered mauns adapter so this would mean running more cabling in to the Tivo. Also drives nearly as large with an IDE interface are available so why bother?


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## mikerr (Jun 2, 2005)

Pete77 said:


> As to the SATA to IDE drive converter one of the snags is they need a powered mains adapter


Of course they don't need a mains adaptor- they'd be pretty useless if they did !

I plan on trying a SATA drive with a convertor in a tivo next time I have one open - don't see a reason for it not to work.


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## Prat77 (Apr 14, 2007)

Pete77 said:


> I still say you are a well known existing forum member who uses this ID when I particularly annoy you, as seems to have happened today. Oterwise why did you take so long to suddenly come back as Prat77.
> 
> As to the SATA to IDE drive converter one of the snags is they need a powered mauns adapter so this would mean running more cabling in to the Tivo. Also drives nearly as large with an IDE interface are available so why bother?


Sorry, could elaborate on what you meant by "take so long to come back"?

As for the power, you need electricity to run the hard drive so it's not exactly much of an issue. The reason for my question is that no-one here seems to have used one with a Tivo or Xbox - I nearly bought an adaptor in January and only just escaped a close shave after spotting an Amazon review saying that they only work with PCs. A Tivo is similar to a PC - is it close enough for these adaptors? It would be useful to be able to use them as large drives only come with SATA adaptors nowadays.


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## ColinYounger (Aug 9, 2006)

I'd like to jump in from lurk mode and say I'm interested in knowing about fitting SATA drives in an IDE based machine. If anyone on this thread decides to experiment, please do a Steve Conrad style guide.


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## Pete77 (Aug 1, 2006)

ColinYounger said:


> I'd like to jump in from lurk mode and say I'm interested in knowing about fitting SATA drives in an IDE based machine. If anyone on this thread decides to experiment, please do a Steve Conrad style guide.


Surely its not as hard as formatting and setting up a whole Tivo hard drive.

Its just a question of which adapters turn out to work with which hard drives (especially bearing in mind Tivo power supply limitations) and which don't.

Why did you go into lurk mode by the way. Did you get busy at work or at home?


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