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Premiere Drive Upgrade Instructions - with all-in-one jmfs Live CD

800K views 3K replies 480 participants last post by  jmbach 
#1 ·
revision 104 - Nov-06-2010 - with Supersize!

**WARNING**
  1. Software is provided with ABSOLUTELY NO WARRANTY. Please read the licence terms (GPL v3).
  2. Opening your Tivo cover will void manufacturer's warranty.
  3. Although program is not designed to do (and actually attempts to prevent) data loss and distruction, it certainly has a potential to do so. It is ultimately YOUR responsibility to backup, stow away and otherwise protect your data.

If you like my work, buy me a beer... or milk... or a harddrive :D

OVERVIEW
This is a bootable Linux CD based on Slax distribution. It includes all software tools known to make a harddrive larger than the standard work in Tivo Premiere with expanded capacity.
Basic usage, suitable for most users who only want to expand their Tivo disk capacity, is fully guided, based on simple prompt-choice automated script.

Once again, for clarity's sake, if youd don't want to tinker, experiment and/or dig in the code or Tivo, the "USAGE BASIC" and some hardware is enough to set you up with larger Tivo Premiere drive!

It was ONLY TESTED ON PREMIERE DISK. Also, it was not tested and probably will not work on multi-disk configurations.

The full procedure of making a larger Tivo Premiere disk contains the following:
  • Taking the original disk out of the Tivo
  • Copying the original disk onto a new larger one
  • Doing modifications of structures on the new disk to make extra space available for Tivo
  • Installing the new disk back into Tivo.
This CD helps in doing steps #2 and #3 of this procedure.​

DOWNLOAD

Current: Download link (Mirror thanks coold8! :up:)
MD5 checksum:
Code:
a5ef24d6841f75c5c5cfd5fd703f6069 *./jmfs-rev104.iso.zip
Previous: Download link (Mirror courtesy of coold8 as well)
MD5 checksum:
Code:
c6241f5838cf5d1f4b451229b184f031 *./jmfs-rev68.iso.zip

REQUIREMENTS and PREREQUISITES
You will need:
  1. Your original Tivo disk
  2. New disk larger than Tivo's
  3. Computer that you can boot from CD or USB
  4. Jmfs Live CD
It implies that you also need an ability and willingness to:
  1. Open/close your Tivo box
  2. Take harddrive out of the Tivo and put harddrive back into it
  3. Connect/disconnect the original and the new harddrive to a computer using SATA or USB
  4. Burn ISO image on a CD or set up a bootable USB stick
  5. Boot up/shutdown a computer using the prepared bootable media
  6. Follow the guided prompt
  7. Wait for 2-4 hours for process to finish

USAGE BASIC

  • Download CD disk image (ISO). For basic usage you only need the "jmfs-*.iso.zip" file. Sources (jmfs-src*.zip) are also in the folder for those who want to build themselves. (download link above)
  • Unzip the ISO and burn it on CD
  • Connect a Tivo disk and a new large disk to a computer. SATA or USB - does not matter, it will work either way, but SATA is faster.
  • Boot that computer from the CD burned in step #2.
  • The guide will be started automatically, follow the prompts.
    • If you are upgrading from stock drive, you will need to do: Copy, Expand, Supersize - in that order.
    • If you are supersizing an already expanded drive, just do Supersize.
If you ever find yourself in a shell (command prompt) you can:
  • Restart the guide by
    • "/root/guide.sh" command
  • Shutdown the system by any of:
    • pressing Ctrl-D
    • "exit" command,
    • "logout" command
    • "poweroff" command
  • Reboot the system by any of:
    • pressing Ctrl-Alt-Del
    • "reboot" command
During the guided process there is a log file created "/root/log.log". If you experience any problems or errors please check that file for any extended error information. It would like to ask for assistance, please copy the log file somewhere, where you can access it later (e.g. mount an external USB drive or existing partitions and copy it there).

USAGE ADVANCED
You are in the root shell, no need to "sudo" anything.
You need to know your disk names. The source Tivo disk and the targer where you want to copy or the one you want to expand. To find harddrive names in the system:
  • run "fdisk -l" and make note of the device names and capacities (for ex. "Disk /dev/sda: 2000.3 GB").
  • run "hdparm -i <device>" (for ex. "hdparm -i /dev/sda") which will output the disk model (e.g. "/dev/sda: Model=WDC WD20EVDS-63T3B0")
All disks are made read-only on boot, so if you are planning to copy and/or expand, make your target drive writable by "chmod u+w <target drive path>" (e.g. "chmod u+w /dev/sda").

There are scripts included to run tools separately, outside of the guided prompt:

  • mfsadd.sh
    Expects 1 parameter - target drive for expansion (e.g. "/dev/sda").
    Drive must already contain copy of the original Tivo disk.
  • diskCopy.sh
    A "shortcut" for "ddrescue", expects two parameters: source disk and target disk or file name
    (e.g. "/dev/sda /dev/sdb" or "/dev/sda /mnt/sdb1/tivo.img").
  • mfslayout.sh
    Prints the layout of a Tivo disk. Usefull for testing/making sure the disk is OK.
    Expects 1 parameter - Tivo drive name (e.g. "/dev/sda").
  • jmfs.sh
    Base script to run a class from jmfs package. All arguments are passed to executed class.

BUILDING
You need Apache ANT 1.7.1 or above and JDK 1.6 or above.
The ANT build script is included with sources. The targets are:
  1. build (default)
    only compiles the sources.
  2. clean
    deletes all built files, so all sources will be recompiled
  3. package
    compiles and creates packages - jar, bin.zip and src.zip for distribution.
 
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1
#1,652 ·
Thanks for clarifying that point.

BTW, my S3 --> 2TB via your method has now successfully filled its entire capacity AND the oldest recordings do not appear to be corrupted by the newest ones. That suggests the file system is happy.

I don't understand why we are not hearing reports of problems after more than 1TB is written on the non-XL Premieres. Those who went direct from 320GB to 2TB ended up with a 1.7 TB partition via JMFS.

It just takes a long time to actually fill a 2TB drive with recordings and then go back and verify the oldest ones are actually intact.
 
#1,653 ·
Ok well when I get time after all these shows transfer (will take days) then I will do the process.

This partition map was from the straight copy from a 320GB>>2TB and since it only has 14 partitions would it be ok?

If I have to do the process you outlined above with all 3 TiVo's then I will have to use the same 1TB HDD as the intermediary drive in the sequence which isn't a drama.

Thanks

Partition Maps
#: type name length base ( size )
1 Apple_partition_map Apple 63@1 ( 31.5K)
2 Image Bootstrap 1 1@171920054 ( 512.0 )
3 Image Kernel 1 8192@171920055 ( 4.0M)
4 Ext2 Root 1 524288@171928247 ( 256.0M)
5 Image Bootstrap 2 1@172452535 ( 512.0 )
6 Image Kernel 2 8192@172452536 ( 4.0M)
7 Ext2 Root 2 524288@172460728 ( 256.0M)
8 Swap Linux swap 262144@172985016 ( 128.0M)
9 Ext2 /var 524288@173247160 ( 256.0M)
10 MFS MFS application region 589824@173771448 ( 288.0M)
11 MFS MFS media region 137630712@174951096 ( 65.6G)
12 MFS MFS application region 2 589824@174361272 ( 288.0M)
13 MFS MFS media region 2 171919990@64 ( 82.0G)
14 MFS MFS media region 3 3594447360@312581808 ( 1.7T)
 
#1,654 ·
Ok well when I get time after all these shows transfer (will take days) then I will do the process.

This partition map was from the straight copy from a 320GB>>2TB and since it only has 14 partitions would it be ok?

If I have to do the process you outlined above with all 3 TiVo's then I will have to use the same 1TB HDD as the intermediary drive in the sequence which isn't a drama.

Thanks
There's a thread in the S3 forum on using jmfs on the S3 HD (and S3 HD XL), and since you've got Series 3 platform machines and not Series 4, you should probably be over there seeing if anyone has reported long term success with a partition larger than 1TB (or 1.2TB, depending on how you measure).
 
#1,655 ·
I started the thread for Tivo HD's and haven't had any issues with a 1.7TB partition:

Code:
Partition Maps
 #:                  type name                            length base      ( size  )
  1   Apple_partition_map Apple                               63@1         (  31.5K)
  2                 Image Bootstrap 1                          1@171920054 ( 512.0 )
  3                 Image Kernel 1                          8192@171920055 (   4.0M)
  4                  Ext2 Root 1                          524288@171928247 ( 256.0M)
  5                 Image Bootstrap 2                          1@172452535 ( 512.0 )
  6                 Image Kernel 2                          8192@172452536 (   4.0M)
  7                  Ext2 Root 2                          524288@172460728 ( 256.0M)
  8                  Swap Linux swap                      262144@172985016 ( 128.0M)
  9                  Ext2 /var                            524288@173247160 ( 256.0M)
 10                   MFS MFS application region          589824@173771448 ( 288.0M)
 11                   MFS MFS media region             137630712@174951096 (  65.6G)
 12                   MFS MFS application region 2        589824@174361272 ( 288.0M)
 13                   MFS MFS media region 2           171919990@64        (  82.0G)
 14                   MFS MFS media region 3          3594447360@312581808 (   1.7T)
I made sure to fill up the drive during my first week, taping shows all day long, until I was convinced that there was no issue with any of my existing shows and that the deletes fell off properly. I've been running with 2TB drives in my Tivo HD's since 12/2010.
 
#1,659 ·
Unitron,

Ok I did the TiVo your way yesterday so I will see how it goes.
The first TiVo I did was straight from 320GB>>2TB and I have filled it up with recordings and it's going great also.

If I have any issues with either way I will report them here for you guys.
Thanks for the data points.
 
#1,660 ·
Any SATA hard drive will work. Western Digital seems to be the preferred brand though, especially those in the A/V DVR line.
Though a fairly old post, I think this maybe needs to be reiterated from time to time. For TIVO drive upgrades your best drive will be one rated for AV (video) usage. True that any drive will work, but the advantage of one designed for A/V is it will continue writing in spite of any errors encountered. I'd much rather have a momentary blip than a huge 30~45 second gap while a non-AV drive tries to perform error recovery.

Just my 2¢ worth.
 
#1,661 ·
Though a fairly old post, I think this maybe needs to be reiterated from time to time. For TIVO drive upgrades your best drive will be one rated for AV (video) usage. True that any drive will work, but the advantage of one designed for A/V is it will continue writing in spite of any errors encountered. I'd much rather have a momentary blip than a huge 30~45 second gap while a non-AV drive tries to perform error recovery.

Just my 2¢ worth.
Then why doesn't Tivo use such a drive in their DVR?

You aren't going to have such a blip very often. If you're having one more than once every three months, your hard drive is circling the drain. Honestly though, you should never see such a blip in a healthy hard drive.

Besides, what if that sector was where the OS was? Wouldn't you want the hard drive to try really hard to boot so you can watch or transfer the shows?

The other tweaks in the A/V hard drive firmware are very minor in nature, and don't yield any benefits except looking good on a datasheet. All hard drives are rated for 24/7 use. You're just paying for the longer warranty for the A/V drive.
 
#1,662 ·
New to upgrade

I was able to boot up jmfs and did the whole copy thing but at about 39 gb the program stops and tells me that it did not copy.

I tried to get the log.log but I did not have permission. :mad:

I am going from original HD to 2 Tb wd ears

I did try on another computer with the same results.

Any ideas.

Thanks
 
#1,663 ·
New to upgrade

I was able to boot up jmfs and did the whole copy thing but at about 39 gb the program stops and tells me that it did not copy.

I tried to get the log.log but I did not have permission. :mad:

I am going from original HD to 2 Tb wd ears

I did try on another computer with the same results.

Any ideas.

Thanks
I had a similar problem once, solves it by a program that did what was called a full low level format on the drive (I think the program is Max Blast ISO)
 
#1,664 ·
I had a similar problem once, solves it by a program that did what was called a full low level format on the drive (I think the program is Max Blast ISO)
Just be sure to do that to the target drive, and not to the source drive, since it writes zeros to the entire drive and you don't want to erase your source.

Also, since the stock drive in a Premiere is, if I'm not mistaken, a Western Digital, and the EARS is also WD, Maxtor software is probably not the thing to use on either.

You can download an image for a bootable cd from the WD site that has their diagnostic software on it, and run the long test on both drives, and run the "write zeros to the drive" utility only on the EARS.

Check the documentation on the jumper settings for the EARS, and see if there's one for turning on or off advanced format and if there's one to set whether the drive is 1.5Gb/s or 3 or 6 and see what the original drive is and match it.

Remember, do not boot into Windows with the original Premiere drive attached to the computer!!!
 
#1,665 ·
Then why doesn't Tivo use such a drive in their DVR?
Every Premiere I have seen DOES have a WD AV/GP HDD installed as stock equipment.
TCD746320 Premiere - WD3200AVVS

TCD746500 Premiere - WD5000AVDS

TCD748000 Premiere XL - WD10EVDS or WD10EURS

TCD758250 Premiere Elite/XL4 - WD20EURS
 
#1,666 ·
Just be sure to do that to the target drive, and not to the source drive, since it writes zeros to the entire drive and you don't want to erase your source.

Also, since the stock drive in a Premiere is, if I'm not mistaken, a Western Digital, and the EARS is also WD, Maxtor software is probably not the thing to use on either.

You can download an image for a bootable cd from the WD site that has their diagnostic software on it, and run the long test on both drives, and run the "write zeros to the drive" utility only on the EARS.

Check the documentation on the jumper settings for the EARS, and see if there's one for turning on or off advanced format and if there's one to set whether the drive is 1.5Gb/s or 3 or 6 and see what the original drive is and match it.

Remember, do not boot into Windows with the original Premiere drive attached to the computer!!!
The Max Blast works on any drive, but you sure don't want to zero out the original drive.
You can boot any TiVo drive into Windows XP or newer as long as you don't use the windows drive service, Windows just will not see the drive. WinMFT requires you to boot into Windows to run the software.
 
#1,667 ·
The Max Blast works on any drive, but you sure don't want to zero out the original drive.
You can boot any TiVo drive into Windows XP or newer as long as you don't use the windows drive service, Windows just will not see the drive. WinMFT requires you to boot into Windows to run the software.
People have reported here that they booted into Windows to take a look at their Premiere drive with WinMFS, and when they put the drive back in the TiVo, it wouldn't TiVo no mo'.

Better safe than sorry.
 
#1,668 ·
I've heard of situations where you must use a CD and not a DVD. I can't remember whether that was only when burning firmware to be read by a DVD player (or whatever), or whether it could also apply to an .ISO image that is to be booted by a computer. If you can get your hands on a CD-R, try that.
I've tried using the CD-R & get the same results as with the DVD-R. Was wondering if someone could help with I'm having with trying to upgrade my Premiere to a 2TB drive. Using a JMFS Live DVD, I'm getting a "loading/boot/vmilinuz"...then a "loading/boot/initrd.gz" message...before the computer reboots. This happens over & over again. Any ideas on what I can do? Thanks.
 
#1,669 ·
People have reported here that they booted into Windows to take a look at their Premiere drive with WinMFS, and when they put the drive back in the TiVo, it wouldn't TiVo no mo'.

Better safe than sorry.
Some of the older Windows installation would come up with a window asking you if you want to ready a new drive, answering yes to that question kill the drive for TiVo. Newer versions of windows (Vista and Win 7) will not have such a window, so you can't bonk the drive by just booting into Windows.
 
#1,670 ·
Some of the older Windows installation would come up with a window asking you if you want to ready a new drive, answering yes to that question kill the drive for TiVo. Newer versions of windows (Vista and Win 7) will not have such a window, so you can't bonk the drive by just booting into Windows.
I'm talking about looking at it with WinMFS, probably mfsinfo specifically.

Why this would cause problems I don't know, as you'd think it would be a read-only operation, but people have reported it happening to them right here on this website.

Spike isn't going to guarantee that WinMFS won't bork a Premiere drive.

TiVo isn't going to guarantee it.

Microsoft isn't going to guarantee it.

Considering that the only way currently known to fix the problem is get hold of another Premiere drive and overwrite it, my advice is better safe than sorry.

Apparently you can boot into Linux with the MFS Live cd, v1.4, and use

pdisk -l

to look at the Premiere's partition map safely, but since

mfsinfo

on that cd is going to return an error message on a Premiere drive, there's no point in risking even that.
 
#1,671 ·
Every Premiere I have seen DOES have a WD AV/GP HDD installed as stock equipment.
TCD746320 Premiere - WD3200AVVS

TCD746500 Premiere - WD5000AVDS

TCD748000 Premiere XL - WD10EVDS or WD10EURS

TCD758250 Premiere Elite/XL4 - WD20EURS
I stand corrected for the Premieres! But their previous models did not utilize A/V drives.

Actually, looking through the data sheets for WD, it looks like all new low RPM drives are now also being marketed as "A/V" drives or have an A/V counterpart. The data sheets for the green drive vs. their A/V brothers look identical but the A/V drives are $5 - $10 more expensive. The warranties are also the same -- 3 years.

Interestingly, there are 3 TB A/V drives even though no DVR can actually use them. So I guess they're trying to sell them to people who edit movies at home.

Since A/V drives aren't as big a rip-off as they were before, I don't consider anyone who buys one a complete idiot. Not like those people who use synthetic motor oil. :D
 
#1,672 ·
I'm talking about looking at it with WinMFS, probably mfsinfo specifically.

Why this would cause problems I don't know, as you'd think it would be a read-only operation, but people have reported it happening to them right here on this website.

Spike isn't going to guarantee that WinMFS won't bork a Premiere drive.

TiVo isn't going to guarantee it.

Microsoft isn't going to guarantee it.

Considering that the only way currently known to fix the problem is get hold of another Premiere drive and overwrite it, my advice is better safe than sorry.

Apparently you can boot into Linux with the MFS Live cd, v1.4, and use

pdisk -l

to look at the Premiere's partition map safely, but since

mfsinfo

on that cd is going to return an error message on a Premiere drive, there's no point in risking even that.
WinMFS is not totally compatible with the TP, but just looking at the drive with WinMFS will not bork the drive, people that have reported WinMFS borking the TP drive may have done something they should not have done, or did not realize they should not have done like super size a standard TP drive, that just a guess on my part.
You are correct that if you not sure what your doing with any TiVo drive not connecting it to any computer is safe from borking the drive, I know that some computer motherboards (at least one that has been reported) can bork a TiVo drive in the boot process.
 
#1,673 ·
WinMFS is not totally compatible with the TP, but just looking at the drive with WinMFS will not bork the drive, people that have reported WinMFS borking the TP drive may have done something they should not have done, or did not realize they should not have done like super size a standard TP drive, that just a guess on my part.
You are correct that if you not sure what your doing with any TiVo drive not connecting it to any computer is safe from borking the drive, I know that some computer motherboards (at least one that has been reported) can bork a TiVo drive in the boot process.
At least one brand of motherboard, GigaByte
 
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