Is WinMFS locked up or does it just take a while?

[Brent94Z]

Hello!

I think my hard drive is failing on my in my Toshiba RS-TX20 so before it fails completely I thought I'd try to upgrade it to a 250gig hard drive. I'm using WinMFS and it has been running for 3 hours so far. At first the status bar progressed one "block" every minute or so but then after a few minutes it quit going up. It has been "stuck" on partition 10 with 4 blocks for 3 hours now.

Doing some reading, it doesn't seem like Partition 10 is where the files are stored and I'm concerned my failing hard drive might have just failed! :( Should I expect the status bar to not move for several hours while on Partition 10 or do I need to reboot and try again (hopefully with better luck!)

Thanks!!!

[dwit]

What are you trying to do. Just a backup of the Tivo image, or are you trying to copy the recorded shows to the new drive?

I have read that sometimes it is hard to tell if mfscopy is running or not. I think it turns out that many times it appears to be locked up but is actually running.

I guess, depending on the amount of recordings on the drive, give it as much time as you can(like over night maybe). Then check the mfsinfo to see if it took.

If it didn't take, you might run the drive's manufacturer's diagnostic utility to see if there are problems with the drive. If it doesn't check out as problem free, I guess we can conclude the drive is bad.

Even so, you might try just doing the winmfs truncated backup to attempt to restore just the Tivo image to a new drive. If that fails, and you did the procedure correctly, then I guess that would truly indicate a failed drive. That same utility can sometimes repair the drive.

If the drive is beyond repair, you would have to get an Instant Cake cd/download(from dvrupgrade.com) for your model Tivo to make a new Tivo drive.

[ciper]

Open task manager and enable the columns I/O read bytes and I/O write bytes. As long as those numbers are increasing its still working. The GUI is a POS and does get stuck between partitions.

[Brent94Z]

What are you trying to do. Just a backup of the Tivo image, or are you trying to copy the recorded shows to the new drive?

I have read that sometimes it is hard to tell if mfscopy is running or not. I think it turns out that many times it appears to be locked up but is actually running.

I guess, depending on the amount of recordings on the drive, give it as much time as you can(like over night maybe). Then check the mfsinfo to see if it took.

If it didn't take, you might run the drive's manufacturer's diagnostic utility to see if there are problems with the drive. If it doesn't check out as problem free, I guess we can conclude the drive is bad.

Even so, you might try just doing the winmfs truncated backup to attempt to restore just the Tivo image to a new drive. If that fails, and you did the procedure correctly, then I guess that would truly indicate a failed drive. That same utility can sometimes repair the drive.

If the drive is beyond repair, you would have to get an Instant Cake cd/download(from dvrupgrade.com) for your model Tivo to make a new Tivo drive.

Thanks for the suggestions, dwit!

I have two drives hooked up (my Tivo drive and a blank hard drive) and am trying to do a copy of the Tivo drive to the new one.

It does appear locked up but it won't kill me I suppose to let it go overnight. If all else fails, I'll look to the Instant Cake solution. Thanks!

Open task manager and enable the columns I/O read bytes and I/O write bytes. As long as those numbers are increasing its still working. The GUI is a POS and does get stuck between partitions.

I am using Windows XP and don't see those option in Task Manager? I am not a complete geek but am somewhat computer savvy. LOL! The program does indicate "Not Responding" in task manager. Maybe you are talking about the Task Manager in Vista? If so, do you know where I should look in XP? I read here that I don't want to open any disk management utilities or anything like that so don't want to go clicking around too much :)

Thanks guys!

[dwit]

I have read that even when task manager says not responding, mfscopy may still be running(or can/may resume running).

Give it a lttle time and then if it doesn't copy, run diagnostic on the drive.

[Brent94Z]

I have read that even when task manager says not responding, mfscopy may still be running(or can/may resume running).

Give it a lttle time and then if it doesn't copy, run diagnostic on the drive.

Gotcha! And in the morning if it isn't finished you mean to try and get Windows to recognize the drive to run some type of utility on it (like Norton). Which then I *think*, if I'm reading here correctly, that I'll then have to use WinMFS to reload the correct Tivo boot sector area stuff. (I'm on a steep learning curve here but trying. LOL)

Thanks!

[ciper]

I am using Windows XP and don't see those option in Task Manager? I am not a complete geek but am somewhat computer savvy. LOL! The program does indicate "Not Responding" in task manager.

You didn't look hard enough. I think it has been a task manager option even before Windows 2000.
http://i25.tinypic.com/wks3h3.jpg

This has been addressed on the MFSLive forums. Read the 5th post in this thread http://mfslive.org/forums/viewtopic.php?t=641

[dwit]

Gotcha! And in the morning if it isn't finished you mean to try and get Windows to recognize the drive to run some type of utility on it (like Norton). Which then I *think*, if I'm reading here correctly, that I'll then have to use WinMFS to reload the correct Tivo boot sector area stuff. (I'm on a steep learning curve here but trying. LOL)

Thanks!

All retail hard drives come with the manufacturer's diagnostic utilities cd. Maxtors come with a cd called Maxblast, Seagate(Seatools), Western Digital(Data Lifeguard), etc., etc.,etc.

These are used as boot cd's and have programs that scan the drives for problems and report if there are any. Most manufacturers (may)require you to run this diagnostic before providing warranty support.

All of these diagnostics are also provided free at each manufacturer's support website(download image, burn to cd).

ps: WD and Hitachi also have utilities on these cd's to make their drives much quieter if they are noisy. Make sure to use that if you use the cd.

[Brent94Z]

You didn't look hard enough. I think it has been a task manager option even before Windows 2000.

ciper, you were obviously correct. I had thought I went through all the menu options on all the screens but I evidently did not because after you posted this, I methodically went through each tab and each menu item one at a time and what-do-you-know... there it was :) Thanks!

I ended up being able to easily and quickly determine that it was locking up on Partition 10.

[Brent94Z]

I have read that even when task manager says not responding, mfscopy may still be running(or can/may resume running).

Give it a lttle time and then if it doesn't copy, run diagnostic on the drive.

Thanks, dwit!

I ended up trying MaxBlast4 but with no luck. :(

I ended up spending several hours trying to salvage my Tivo hard drive. I tried about everything and things seemed to work "just enough" to give me hope. LOL When WinMFS locked at partition 10 it copied enough to the new drive that WinMFS recognized the new drive as a Tivo Series 2 or 3 drive. I tried a couple times to do the copy but each time it locked at partition 10. I was able to successfully make a truncated back-up copy (or so I thought) of my Tivo drive to my regular hard drive. I reformatted the new drive since WinMFS was giving me an error 9 everytime I tried to select it. This fixed the error 9 problem but then when I did a restore to the new drive I got an error at the very end. Ugh. I thought maybe enough got copied that I could stick it in my Tivo and get the green screen and it might fix itself. Tried this and sure enough, got the green screen! But, after about the 5th time of this popping up on the screen I read it more closely and since it told me I might want to turn of the TV if I was afraid of "burn in" I assumed that during this 3 hour process that this screen was probably supposed to stay up and not just show up for a minute followed by another Tivo reboot. Decided to just unplug it and proceeded to do a complete format on the drive last night as I slept :)

Got up this morning and decided I had spent enough time on this so just bought InstantCake, created the disk, hooked up my new drive, and that was it... EASY. Piece of cake and I, of course, now wish I had just done this at the beginning of the weekend. LOL!

One thing I did find a bit odd (or at least misleading) about InstantCake is that it wanted a certain configuration of how you hooked up your drives or you'd have to use the advanced mode. Well, I've got a funky motherboard that doesn't like to boot from the CD unless it's the primary. So, I used the advanced mode and this was even easy! What I find odd is that it seems like if you would know how to connect up your CD-ROM drive and Tivo drive as specified you would then HAVE to know what is primary and secondary and master and slave. If you know this much then you can hook it up however is easiest for you! Minor point but just thought it was strange they wanted them hooked up a certain way evidently to make it "easier" but if you can hook it up that way you have enough knowledge to hook up the drives however you want. LOL :)

Anyway, thanks much to all! I learned a lot during this process reading these forums trying to figure out what was wrong with my Tivo and how to fix it. I did learn one valuable thing though... if you value your time as I do sometimes it is better in the long run to just fork out the $20 and save 2 days. LOL!!! Nothing wrong with the free tools but my drive was evidently too far gone... and once it crashes during a copy, it probably ain't gonna work no matter how hard you try! So others know what mine was doing it first started locking up every so often. Then started locking up more. Then at the very end the video started freezing/pausing every few seconds... even the Tivo cartoon thing that comes up after a reboot. The unit didn't lock up any longer but did auto-reboot about every 20 or 30 minutes! If you have those symptoms you might want to learn from me and just get a new hard drive and consider your old drive too far gone. LOL Or, if you have many hours to burn then, yeah, try to copy the drive and maybe you'll have better luck than myself :)

Anyway, thanks much to these forums and to the InstantCake program. Both saved my lifetime subb'd TX20 from the trash bin! :)