Toshiba SD-H400 Stuck on Powering Up

[BrianEWilliams]

I have a Toshiba SD-400 that is stuck on the powering up screen. This unit has TiVo Basic service on it, so I'd hate to lose it. It had been acting funny, rebooting once in the middle of my boys watching something. It would come back up with a "Installing Service Update" screen. Today it is just stuck on the initial Powering Up screen, with the hard drive showing little activity.

It's got a Maxtor DiamondMax 80 GB hard drive with a manufacture date of July 24, 2003. I am hoping it is just the hard drive, as I've been looking for an excuse to learn how to upgrade. I am heading next to the Maxtor site to see if there are any diagnostics I can run on it, plus to see if it is under warranty. The drive is out of the box, and I have a Linux machine all set to plug it into, but I am not doing anything until I learn a little more.

Love to hear any of your comments or suggestions, and I'll post updates as they happen. Thanks.

CORRECTED: Hard drive manufacture date

[RoyK]

I have a Toshiba SD-400 that is stuck on the powering up screen. This unit has TiVo Basic service on it, so I'd hate to lose it. It had been acting funny, rebooting once in the middle of my boys watching something. It would come back up with a "Installing Service Update" screen. Today it is just stuck on the initial Powering Up screen, with the hard drive showing little activity.

It's got a Maxtor DiamondMax 80 GB hard drive with a manufacture date of July 24, 2006. I am hoping it is just the hard drive, as I've been looking for an excuse to learn how to upgrade. I am heading next to the Maxtor site to see if there are any diagnostics I can run on it, plus to see if it is under warranty. The drive is out of the box, and I have a Linux machine all set to plug it into, but I am not doing anything until I learn a little more.

Love to hear any of your comments or suggestions, and I'll post updates as they happen. Thanks.

Good bet its the hard drive.

[BrianEWilliams]

Just ran the Maxtor diagnostic on the drive, and it said the hard drive is failing with an error code of d795A67f and needs to be replaced. Too bad I didn't grab an image of the drive before now. Any chance a usuable image could be taken now, or is this a stupid question?

This problem is common with these units, which I discovered after a little searching. I'm going to try to replace the hard drive myself, but I just have to track down a Toshiba SD-400 image somewhere. Should be a fun enough project if I get the image, especially since this is my backup TiVo. Maybe I should make a backup image of my main TiVo before it dies as well.

EDIT:

Just did a little research and found InstaCake. Seems like they have a version for the Toshiba SD-H400, but I can't post a link. Google is your friend here.

It costs $20 and they seem to have a SOL policy if it doesn't work, so I'd appreciate hearing any feedback on this product.

[funtoupgrade]

The hard drive should be under warranty, since they have not made it yet (July 24, 2006!). As indicated in some other post I can supply an image but only on a DVD. PM me if interested.

[BrianEWilliams]

Check your PM's. I fixed the manufacture date on the original post. Good catch.

[dz2k]

i need that image.