hard drive change out

[subscats]

should I buy a new hard drive for weakness already formatted or buy a hard drive from a store and can I format it for a series 2 tivo (TCD 540080).

[Ed Siegler]

If you have never done this before, it is much easier to just buy one pre-formatted.

[jjberger2134]

should I buy a new hard drive for weakness already formatted or buy a hard drive from a store and can I format it for a series 2 tivo (TCD 540080).

That really depends on you, and your comfort level with opening your PC.

The easiest way, but most expensive way, to upgrade/replace the drive is to buy a pre-formatted drive from weaknees or dvrupgrade. However, you will pay them a premium to put the TiVo image on the drive, thus making it the most expensive choice. For example, a 500GB replacement drive is about $170 at weaknees. You could buy a 500GB drive at amazon or retail location for probably about $75.

If you are at all technically capable, you should buy a PATA drive (a drive designed for DVR's) and install the TiVo software image yourself. To do this you have 2 choices and the cost is well below a pre-formatted drive.

Choice #1 is to use Instant Cake Software (Cost $20). You download IC as an .iso image and copy the image from a CD to your new hard drive. Thus, you have a new 500GB hard drive in your TiVo for a total cost of under $100.

Choice #2 is to use free software (MFSTools) to copy the image (and possibly your recordings) from your old TiVo drive to your new drive. Go over to the TiVo Upgrade Center on this site for more info on MFSTools. That software is free, so the total cost would be the cost of your new hard drive. You must have a clean image (not corrupted) on your current TiVo to use this option, since you are copying the file.

There are additional pros and cons to all of the above methods beyond the cost factor. So respond with a bit more info than you originally posted and the good people here will be sure to help you.

[subscats]

should I buy a new hard drive for weakness already formatted or buy a hard drive from a store and can I format it for a series 2 tivo (TCD 540080). you sared me with the clean image(not corrupted)

[subscats]

I order one from weakness already formatted. Now I have a clean image (not corrupted). I would like to go to Fry's and buy another hard drive for my second TIVO.I have the hard drive out of my unit one. I'm a little lost with this formatting. NEED HELP. The hard drive order from Weakness is for Model#TCD 540080 The other unit is Model # TCD 240080 can I do this????

[mattack]

You could buy a 500GB drive at amazon or retail location for probably about $75.

Actually, 1 TB drives are how about that price.. ($89 in the recent Fry's ads, to be specific.)

[jjberger2134]

I order one from weakness already formatted. Now I have a clean image (not corrupted). I would like to go to Fry's and buy another hard drive for my second TIVO.I have the hard drive out of my unit one. I'm a little lost with this formatting. NEED HELP. The hard drive order from Weakness is for Model#TCD 540080 The other unit is Model # TCD 240080 can I do this????

Unfortunately, no you cannot do this. A TiVo image is specific to each TiVo model. Based on your description, it appears that you have one "240" TiVo and one "540" TiVo. The images are NOT compatible with one another.

[Adam1115]

Buy the drive and spend $20 on instantcake which does it all for you.

But DON'T BUY IT FROM A STORE. Get a hard drive designed for DVR's. They are much quieter and last much longer.

[subscats]

Unfortunately, no you cannot do this. A TiVo image is specific to each TiVo model. Based on your description, it appears that you have one "240" TiVo and one "540" TiVo. The images are NOT compatible with one another. Thank you, Thank you ED

[subscats]

Buy the drive and spend $20 on instantcake which does it all for you.

But DON'T BUY IT FROM A STORE. Get a hard drive designed for DVR's. They are much quieter and last much longer.

Were do I buy the hard drive?????? I thought A Western Digital 500gb Caviar blue PATA 7200 RPM 16MB Desttop hard drive MOD#WD 5000AAKB from Amazon or a store is the same hard drive write????//// A ford 1966 mustang 289 a the dealer is the same car at:confused::confused: used car lot , right//// I will buy one for a DVD I'am NEW AT IS BUT THiNK ,I KNOW YOU PLEOPLE OUR HEAR TO HELP ME. THANK YOU

[ggieseke]

I put that exact drive in one of my Series 2 DTs. It works perfectly and it's quiet as a grave. I bought mine from http://www.directron.com/wd5000aakb.html but you can get them almost anywhere.

[cr33p]

Ive been upgrading all my family's tivos for well over 5 years now and not once replaced any of them with a "DVR" specific HDD, they are all quiet, run cool, and have never had any issues. By time either drives fail you will be ready for a new tivo or a newer larger drive anyhow. Save your money buy a decent retail drive, I prefer WD drives myself, they are quiet off the bat, and cheap. I just ordered 3 1TB Caviars from Newegg this week for 74.95 each free ship. Cant beat it.

[Leon WIlkinson]

Were do I buy the hard drive?????? I thought A Western Digital 500gb Caviar blue PATA 7200 RPM 16MB Desttop hard drive MOD#WD 5000AAKB from Amazon or a store is the same hard drive write????//// A ford 1966 mustang 289 a the dealer is the same car at:confused::confused: used car lot , right//// I will buy one for a DVD I'am NEW AT IS BUT THiNK ,I KNOW YOU PLEOPLE OUR HEAR TO HELP ME. THANK YOU

I did the Instant Cake Image after I did a pre-formatted Image a year before.

If you can come Here (http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/forumdisplay.php?f=25) when you run into trouble, you will be ok. ;)

This is what a novice needs to know/research, like I was.

Use bios to boot from CD (easy) How to fix a Password issue in the bios. ((very easy with this forum.))

opening a computer to see what the inside of a computer looks like. (easy)

Waitng for Instantcake to finish ( HARD) ((This place is not much)) :)

[Adam1115]

Were do I buy the hard drive?????? I thought A Western Digital 500gb Caviar blue PATA 7200 RPM 16MB Desttop hard drive MOD#WD 5000AAKB from Amazon or a store is the same hard drive write????//// A ford 1966 mustang 289 a the dealer is the same car at:confused::confused: used car lot , right//// I will buy one for a DVD I'am NEW AT IS BUT THiNK ,I KNOW YOU PLEOPLE OUR HEAR TO HELP ME. THANK YOU

That drive is not designed for a DVR, and typically Best Buy type places don't sell the DVR designed drives because they are usually OEM.

There are specific drives MADE for DVR's. The ones sold at Best Buy are designed for computers.

[donnoh]

Ive been upgrading all my family's tivos for well over 5 years now and not once replaced any of them with a "DVR" specific HDD, they are all quiet, run cool, and have never had any issues. By time either drives fail you will be ready for a new tivo or a newer larger drive anyhow. Save your money buy a decent retail drive, I prefer WD drives myself, they are quiet off the bat, and cheap. I just ordered 3 1TB Caviars from Newegg this week for 74.95 each free ship. Cant beat it.

Why would you buy retail drives? If you order from Newegg they are most always never retail drives.
Also Newegg packages their drives like crap, destined to fail, maybe why you buy retail drives?
I'll buy all of my drives forever more from Amazon, they're packaged to survive.

[mchief]

That's crap - I have purchased a number of drives from Newegg without a problem

[hoagie]

That's crap - I have purchased a number of drives from Newegg without a problem


I never purchased a hard drive for my series 2 that was *designed* for a dvr.. I bought a western digital oem hard drive (let's face it, all tivo's are is a specialized computer) and it was fine.

[cr33p]

Why would you buy retail drives? If you order from Newegg they are most always never retail drives.
Also Newegg packages their drives like crap, destined to fail, maybe why you buy retail drives?
I'll buy all of my drives forever more from Amazon, they're packaged to survive.

Not yet have I recieved a failed drive, and all my drives from Newegg are packaged quite nicely, I have also used fry's and zip zoom fly, all seem the same, go for the price, even if they fail they are warrantied :)

[ggieseke]

That drive is not designed for a DVR, and typically Best Buy type places don't sell the DVR designed drives because they are usually OEM.

There are specific drives MADE for DVR's. The ones sold at Best Buy are designed for computers.

All I can say is that it works perfectly, and it runs significantly quieter than the Seagate drives that were specifically made for DVRs in my other two S2DTs.

[schwinn]

I never purchased a hard drive for my series 2 that was *designed* for a dvr.. I bought a western digital oem hard drive (let's face it, all tivo's are is a specialized computer) and it was fine.
+1 - never used a "DVR" drive on my S1s, and they are all running fine. I did have a crappy Maxtor in there at one point, that failed after about 1 year, but since then, I installed a Seagate (7200RPM, since that's what was available at the time) and it's been quiet and reliable for the past 5+ years (I really don't remember how long it's been!)