Limit to how many times original drive can be expanded?

dbong1021 · 02-28-2007, 05:51 PM

Random question as I was thinking in the car today ..

Is there a max amount of times an original Tivo drive can be upgraded? I've used my original HD twice for an upgrade already ( first 250gb drive died, used original to make another 250gb drive ). Is there a maximum amount of times an original drive can be cloned and upgraded?

Please say there isn't!

puffdaddy · 02-28-2007, 10:09 PM

IIRC, the number of times depends upon:

1) whether it's a S1 or S2 drive (though I could be wrong about this)
2) your starting image (if you roll your own starting image fresh from slices that helps).
3) the number of drives in your configuration
4) whether or not you use Jamie's partition coalesce or Spike2k5's new version of mfstools (MFSlive.org). The latter has an experimental flag to allow expanding a drive that already has 15 partitions in use.

classicsat · 03-01-2007, 01:10 PM

Ordinarily, you can make two expansions to a Series 1 standalone A drive, and one to Series 2 and DirecTV DVRs A drive. I believe B drives can be expanded two or 3 times, on any system.

I think though that recent develipments with mfslive and all, let you coalesce partitions so you can expand an already expaned drive further.

dbong1021 · 03-01-2007, 01:48 PM

Hmm, its a S2 drive.

I've already expanded it twice. I used the WeaKnees Interactive guide method. I'm not sure which tech method that is though ? Now I'm confused =(

IminMs · 03-01-2007, 05:58 PM

Are you asking how many times can the original "image" be used to be copied to another drive or if you can take a 80gig drive to a 250gig and then to a 320gig?

Sorry but the orig question has me confused.

dbong1021 · 03-01-2007, 06:16 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by IminMs

Are you asking how many times can the original "image" be used to be copied to another drive or if you can take a 80gig drive to a 250gig and then to a 320gig?

Sorry but the orig question has me confused.

Apologies for the confusion. I was asking how many times I can copy my original 40gb S2 drive to another drive of XXXgb's.

I wasn't asking about expanding my original --> 250gb --> 320gb --> 500gb --> etc.

I've kept my original drive around to keep as an image to go back to incase my newer/bigger drives went bad. I just want to keep using my original over and over ( knowing that I'll lose the newer recordings and Tivo system updates on the newer drives ).

spike2k5 · 03-01-2007, 06:57 PM

If you don't care about saving recordings, there is no limit.
(using mfsbackup with -s option)

Here is an excerpt from my faq page:

To save recordings and expand Single drive setup:

Series 1 Standalone (2x)
Series 1 Standalone UK (2x)
Series 1 DTV (1x)
Series 2 & Series 3 standalone & Dtv (1x)

Using mfslive beta w/ restore -f option
more than 10x depending on how big your drive is and what r value you use.

Ref

IminMs · 03-01-2007, 10:43 PM

I thought that's what you meant. I guess the other replies had me thinking i misread your question.
Anyway, follow Spikes advice.