DSR704 Green Screen of Death

[Olsario]

So I've had my DSR704 for a few years... I installed a second drive in it a couple of days after buying it and haven't had any problems until last night. Around 2300 the unit restarted itself, shows the Screen of Death for about a minutes, then reboots again. This has lasted for the last 10 hours.

I've since opening the unit to see if any connections popped loose or if anything seemed amiss, however everything looks fine on the inside. The temperature has always been good. I assume it means one of the hard drives are failing or have failed.

My questions: 1. How do I know a hard drive failed? 2. How do I know WHICH hard drive failed? 3. Assuming it is a hard drive failure, can anyone point me in a direction of how I can replace the hard drive and be back up and running?

As an aside, I had made an image of the original before adding the second drive however I have moved a couple of times since then and have been unable to locate it. If I need an image of the original is there a way to secure it?

Thanks in advance.

[Dkerr24]

That's the mistake of dual hard drives... you're gonna have to test both of them to determine which one has failed.

As cheap as hard drives are, just toss the dual drives and buy a single IDE hard drive and image it with the Tivo O/S and get your unit working again.

Images are $20 from dvrupgrade... one of this site's sponsors.

[Olsario]

How do I test the drives?

[Dkerr24]

How do I test the drives?

Spinrite ... But it costs as much as a new 250gb IDE drive...

If you decide to just replace the drive, you'll want to get instantcake from dvrupgrade ($20) to get the image on the new drive.

[Olsario]

I'm going to keep looking for my backup image before I look to buy a replacement.

I'll also see if I can't run some HD diagnostics via Linux... as I'm not buying Spinrite. Having seen dozens if not hundreds of HDs fail in computers, I would have thought there would have been some form of warning(sounds, performance, etc...) in the D*, but it just quit.

So there's no way to restore my recordings?

Additionally, isn't there a GB limit on D* Series 2 units? Wouldn't 120GB be the largest I could get?

[Dkerr24]

I'm going to keep looking for my backup image before I look to buy a replacement.

I'll also see if I can't run some HD diagnostics via Linux... as I'm not buying Spinrite. Having seen dozens if not hundreds of HDs fail in computers, I would have thought there would have been some form of warning(sounds, performance, etc...) in the D*, but it just quit.

So there's no way to restore my recordings?

You could try copying your original image w/recordings, but most likely you'll just copy over the damaged files along with the good ones, which won't really solve anything. Worth a shot if you really want those programs.

[Olsario]

It's not essential I get the recordings, just had a few I would have liked.

Can I simply purchase any size HD or is there a size limit? I recall when I used the two drives years ago reading about size limits of 135GB... which is why I have two drives now.

[rbtravis]

It's not essential I get the recordings, just had a few I would have liked.

Can I simply purchase any size HD or is there a size limit? I recall when I used the two drives years ago reading about size limits of 135GB... which is why I have two drives now.
If you use Instantcake from www.DVRupgrade.com to place the initial image on the drive you can use any size drive due to use of LBA48 boot. However I do recommend for dual drive set ups you use Smartstart from DVRupgrade to slightly lengthen spin-up and lower current drain.
http://www.dvrupgrade.com/dvr/stores/1/accessory_nomodel.cfm?SID=1&Product_ID=375
:)

[Dkerr24]

If you use Instantcake from www.DVRupgrade.com to place the initial image on the drive you can use any size drive due to use of LBA48 boot. However I do recommend for dual drive set ups you use Smartstart from DVRupgrade to slightly lengthen spin-up and lower current drain.
http://www.dvrupgrade.com/dvr/stores/1/accessory_nomodel.cfm?SID=1&Product_ID=375
:)

Great idea, but in the days of sub $100 500gb drives, is a dual drive setup even recommended?

[rbtravis]

Great idea, but in the days of sub $100 500gb drives, is a dual drive setup even recommended? Only if you want 900 hours of recording time and have your season passes set up to record most of the season. Some of us are crazy.:D

[Olsario]

Well, I only went with 2 drives vice 1 because at the time I was reading it wouldn't support anything over 135 on one drive so I bought a 120 and just linked it with the 40 already in there. Since it seems I can use one drive and have it larger than 135, I will do that.

I ran manufacturers diagnostics and it says that my WD 120GB is bad but the original 40GB Maxtor that came with the DSR704 is good.

I have another drive I will end up using... just hoped I wouldn't need to use it on my D*.

Thanks for the help folks.

[Olsario]

So I replaced the drives with one drive, restored the image and back up and running. However, the drive makes a fair amount of noise all the time. I assume it's seek noises. Is there any way to limit the noise it makes? It really is putting a crimp in TV watching.

[ttodd1]

It may just be indexing right now. Give it about 24-48 hours and see if it quiets down then.

[Olsario]

It's been up and running since around 2200 last night, so I'll give it until Friday morning to see if it quiets down.

After that I might try AAM but I don't know how much that would even reduce the noise... anyone know?

[rbtravis]

It's been up and running since around 2200 last night, so I'll give it until Friday morning to see if it quiets down.

After that I might try AAM but I don't know how much that would even reduce the noise... anyone know?
AAM makes a good deal of difference depending on the drive type which you omitted to mention. It is like me saying my car does not work how do I fix it and not giving the make, model, and not saying what it sounds like and if the windows open. Without the make,model,age you are asking for guesses and not help.:confused:

[Olsario]

Well, I was looking for a generalization more than a specific degree.

However, it's a Western Digital WD3200JB(320 GB, 7200 RPM, 8 MB cache). Never been used before plunking it in the DTivo.

[rbtravis]

I am using that drive in two of my tivos and AAM will quiet it down just set aam to 128 and it will be almost silent. Good Luck :)

[Olsario]

Well, it finished indexing around 1100 this morning and it is MUCH quieter. I might still pull out and do AAM but I can tolerate it for now.

Thank you guys for taking the time... much appreciated!

[Olsario]

I know it's been a few months but I finally got frustrated enough with the loudness of the new hard drive and popped it out to enable AAM... it's now whisper quiet. Wish I wouldn't have been so lazy for so long. That "tick tick" can keep a man up at night. Thanks again for the help, folks.

This does bring me to another question though: As mentioned previously in this thread, I had a two drive setup but the 120GB hard drive. The 40GB drive is functional and I would like to be able to access the drive and determine what recordings are on there. Is there any way to do this in Linux or Windows?