YATT: Yet another Tivo Thread....

[aphex]

Im leaning towards the 40 hour and upping the drive at a later date..... Has anyone done it? Was it bad?

 

[iamwiz82]

I have never run out of room on my 30 hour UltimateTV.

 

[bunker]

I'm just waiting for the warranty to run out on my 40hr. before I pop it open and add a harddrive.

 

[Double Trouble]

I've upgraded several series 2 40 hour tivos as well as directivos. You can find some pretty good step-by-step instructions on the web that will make the process pretty much pain-free.... Note that the controllers don't recognize drives larger than 137 GB.

Also, a word of warning: Make SURE you make a functional backup of your tivo image before you use the old 40 GB drive for something else (if you plan to do that). If something happens to your new tivo drive (for example, the drive fails), you will have no way to 'recover', short of purchasing another tivo.

 

[aphex]

Originally posted by: tagej
I've upgraded several series 2 40 hour tivos as well as directivos. You can find some pretty good step-by-step instructions on the web that will make the process pretty much pain-free.... Note that the controllers don't recognize drives larger than 137 GB.

Also, a word of warning: Make SURE you make a functional backup of your tivo image before you use the old 40 GB drive for something else (if you plan to do that). If something happens to your new tivo drive (for example, the drive fails), you will have no way to 'recover', short of purchasing another tivo.

Actually from what i see, the newer tivo's (silver models) are using a new kernel and have native support for > 137gb drives.

 

[Double Trouble]

I don't believe it's the kernel that determines whether it can handle drives larger than 137GB, it's the IDE controller used. The older systems all have older IDE controllers that can't handle LBA addressing. Newer ones probably handle the larger drives OK. I know the HD tivos work just fine with the larger drives.......

 

[nageov3t]

I have an 80 hour Tivo, and I've never come close to running out of room.

but I've heard that the drives aren't that hard to upgrade.

 

[imported_Strang]

I've been considering upgrading my DirecTivo. I've filled ours up a few times b/c there's a few older shows that I missed out on the first time around (CSI and The West Wing, for example) that now have marathons and such that I wouldn't mind recording (especially TWW, since I have the first two seasons on dvd and am waiting for the 3rd). If you only plan on having it record new shows for the week that they're fresh, smaller would probably be fine, but if you tape movies from HBO or football games or whatever, you might want more space.

 

[rahvin]

Originally posted by: tagej
I don't believe it's the kernel that determines whether it can handle drives larger than 137GB, it's the IDE controller used. The older systems all have older IDE controllers that can't handle LBA addressing. Newer ones probably handle the larger drives OK. I know the HD tivos work just fine with the larger drives.......

If that were true you wouldn't be able to hack the Tivo to add the support. Yea it requires adding a new kernel but it can be done. When the newest software version is pushed out to the older Tivo's (if it is) they will have the support as well.

 

[Wingznut]

Originally posted by: loki8481
I have an 80 hour Tivo, and I've never come close to running out of room.

I have over 100 hours of space, and I'm constantly filling that up. It doesn't take long with Season Passes of various NHL and NFL games.

And DEFINITELY make a backup of your original image before doing anything.


Is DirecTiVo an option? Dual tuners rock!

 

[aphex]

Originally posted by: Wingznut

Originally posted by: loki8481
I have an 80 hour Tivo, and I've never come close to running out of room.

I have over 100 hours of space, and I'm constantly filling that up. It doesn't take long with Season Passes of various NHL and NFL games.

And DEFINITELY make a backup of your original image before doing anything.


Is DirecTiVo an option? Dual tuners rock!

Not for me, my townhouse's patio faces northeast....

Brighthouse networks do offer their own dual-tuner DVR, but its a scientific atlanta.....

 

[torpid]

Are they both series 2?

Regardless I'd probably buy the 140g. You're going to pay close to $100 for a drive, shipping, the mounting rails, etc. Then there's all the time you'll have to spend, and the fact that it voids the warranty.

 

[MikeyIs4Dcats]

only filled it up oncw, when I was hording Band of Brothers at best quality for a while

 

[allisolm]

You can get good instructions for upgrading the drive at 9thtee.com.