# How reliable are the My Book DVR expanders?



## kisby (Mar 31, 2002)

I'm trying to decide if I should add one. If I do, then if either hard drive fails, I lose everything! So, how reliable are these 1TB add on hard drives. If they are pretty reliable, then I will go ahead.

I appreciate hearing any pros and cons. 

Thanks!


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## dianebrat (Jul 6, 2002)

They're less reliable than not using them since you now have 2 points of failure.
General concensus is upgrade your internal drive to its max and stay away from the Expander.

I promise there will be a ton of folks saying theirs has already lasted for X years and they're fine, but why double the failure points?


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## jakerock (Dec 9, 2002)

And for every person that says theirs has been working for years there will be another person (like me) who had one die after a year or so and lost everything.

So pay more to double your risk of failure (it actually more than doubles it since you are adding lots more opportunities for failure) or pay less to upgrade the internal drive which gives you a free back up since you're old drive can be saved away. The choice is yours...


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## sangs (Jan 1, 2003)

Many things to consider, including when you crack open the case, you technically void your warranty. Attach a cable and get the same space result, warranty still in tact. Choice was easy for me. And (knock wood), I've never had a WD DVR Expander fail yet, including two I used with FiOS DVRs from 2011-2014. My experience has been very positive with them.


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## jrtroo (Feb 4, 2008)

jakerock said:


> So pay more to double your risk of failure (it actually more than doubles it since you are adding lots more opportunities for failure) or pay less to upgrade the internal drive which gives you a free back up since you're old drive can be saved away.


Statistically, it less than doubles the risk for failure. But it does more than double the potential points for failure.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

sangs said:


> Many things to consider, including when you crack open the case, you technically void your warranty. Attach a cable and get the same space result, warranty still in tact. Choice was easy for me. And (knock wood), I've never had a WD DVR Expander fail yet, including two I used with FiOS DVRs from 2011-2014. My experience has been very positive with them.


This could be much more important now with the "continual warranty". TiVo could start denying warranty claims if you swap the internal drive. They haven't in the past, but before if a TiVo broke after 90 days then you essentially had to pay full price for a refurb. Now with the "continual warranty" you only have to pay $50, no matter which TiVo you have, for a replacement. They may take a more strict stance on people opening the case and messing with the internal drive because of that. (the Bolt isn't old enough for anyone to have tested this yet, so it's still unknown)

Another advantage to using an external drive... you can add space at any time without losing the recordings you already have or having to go through the hassle of cloning you existing drive. Internal drive upgrades are easy if you're willing to swap in a new drive and start over from scratch. But if you just want to expand the space you already have the process can get a bit overwhelming for the non-technical. With an external drive you just attach and your space grows.

Personally I don't think there is anything important enough on a TiVo to really worry about reliability. There is nothing you can't get back either from streaming services or BitTorrent.


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## hunter69 (Feb 9, 2002)

I had one on the Tivo HD, and I lasted about 6 months before I gave up. No problems before I added the extender and then random reboots until I finally removed it and did a drive swap.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

I had one connected to my S3 TiVo for nearly 5 years and it still worked when I sold the TiVo. My wife had one die after about 3 years. Luckily it died slowly so we were able to offload all her stuff to my TiVo, then we replaced it and transferred everything back. The new one lasted until that TiVo was sold as well.


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## Chris Gerhard (Apr 27, 2002)

I have used 3 with TiVoHDs, all 2008/2009 vintage. One enclosure failed after about 4 years, that drive was still fine and the other 2 are still in service without issues. If there are no concerns with voiding the warranty, definitely go with a single 2TB+ internal drive.


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## donnoh (Mar 7, 2008)

I had one of the 500 gig models with a Tivo HD that died after a year and a half or so. I wouldn't waste my money on another, that was the only Tivo hard drive I ever had fail.


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## trip1eX (Apr 2, 2005)

Remember if you buy 2 lottery tickets you double your chances of winning.


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## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

I went from the original 500GB drive to a 4TB in the Roamio. The most space you can add in the DVR Expander is 1TB.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

I still think the biggest factor will be whether TiVo honors the "continual warranty" with TiVos that have had their internal drives replaced. If they don't then I think we'll see a shift in thinking with regard to internal vs external drive upgrades.


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## ej42137 (Feb 16, 2014)

Saying that the chances of failure are doubled by adding an expander assumes that drives in the TiVo and in the expander are equally likely to fail. The experience of others on TCF forums and my own personal experience with expansion drives is that they are much more likely to fail than drives safely tucked away inside a computer.

The warranty issue is a valid consideration, but I think more from the point of view that you're more likely to break your TiVo taking it apart than you are to need to use your warranty; I've never had a TiVo break while it was still within the warranty period (or even would have been under extended warranty if I were to have been silly enough to purchase one.)


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## ThAbtO (Apr 6, 2000)

With the way Tivo stores the recorded shows, spread across both drives, if either drive fails, then you lose those recordings.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

ej42137 said:


> The warranty issue is a valid consideration, but I think more from the point of view that you're more likely to break your TiVo taking it apart than you are to need to use your warranty; I've never had a TiVo break while it was still within the warranty period (or even would have been under extended warranty if I were to have been silly enough to purchase one.)


The new "continual warranty" means that as long as you're paying monthly/yearly for service it's always within the warranty period.

That being said the two most common parts to fail on a TiVo are the drive and the power supply, both of which are pretty easily fixed on the Bolt. Although the Roamio basic did seem to have some sort of trend with failing HDMI ports, so there could be some other issue people aren't aware of yet.


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## jcthorne (Jan 28, 2002)

Dan203 said:


> I still think the biggest factor will be whether TiVo honors the "continual warranty" with TiVos that have had their internal drives replaced. If they don't then I think we'll see a shift in thinking with regard to internal vs external drive upgrades.


Why be a pessimist? Tivo has 15 years of essentially don't ask don't tell support for units with upgraded drives. No the continual care does not cover the drive itself but they have given no indication they intend to change the working policy. They would have actually had MORE reason to not honor the warranty or repair program on lifetime units. They want to keep a subscriber, why would the not repair the unit for the fee? THey have nothing to gain by this and every thing to loose.


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## zerdian1 (Apr 19, 2015)

BitTorrent
I just downloaded it on my Mac.
how do I use it
where can I get TV shows and Movies to download using BitTorrent?
I am a member of Hulu Plus, Hulu, Amazon Prime.



Dan203 said:


> This could be much more important now with the "continual warranty". TiVo could start denying warranty claims if you swap the internal drive. They haven't in the past, but before if a TiVo broke after 90 days then you essentially had to pay full price for a refurb. Now with the "continual warranty" you only have to pay $50, no matter which TiVo you have, for a replacement. They may take a more strict stance on people opening the case and messing with the internal drive because of that. (the Bolt isn't old enough for anyone to have tested this yet, so it's still unknown)
> 
> Another advantage to using an external drive... you can add space at any time without losing the recordings you already have or having to go through the hassle of cloning you existing drive. Internal drive upgrades are easy if you're willing to swap in a new drive and start over from scratch. But if you just want to expand the space you already have the process can get a bit overwhelming for the non-technical. With an external drive you just attach and your space grows.
> 
> Personally I don't think there is anything important enough on a TiVo to really worry about reliability. There is nothing you can't get back either from streaming services or BitTorrent.


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## Dan203 (Apr 17, 2000)

BitTorrent is a protocol. uTorrent is client of choice for most people. (although I think they added ads recently so that may have changed) Eztv is a good place to find TV torrents. They change their actual domain every now and then so it's usually best to just google it. (presumably to move to countries without copyright laws)


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## HarperVision (May 14, 2007)

I thought we weren't allowed to talk about this stuff here? I'm going to report you to the moderators. That seems to be the thing to do around here, right.


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## gigaguy (Aug 30, 2013)

I like BoltTorrent...


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## dianebrat (Jul 6, 2002)

HarperVision said:


> I thought we weren't allowed to talk about this stuff here? I'm going to report you to the moderators. That seems to be the thing to do around here, right.


I was pretty much going to say the same including the 
It's "don't ask, don't tell" as far as TV torrents here, always has been.


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