R15 to DVR40 hard drive change?

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I did a stupid. After 4 years my Tivo DVR40 remote started getting flakey. Deciding it was time to upgrade to more disk space and all the latest and greatest, I upgraded to a Directv R15. (Not knowing that I would loose TIVO)

Installed the R15 and spent the next week pressing reset at least once a day, and calling DTV support at least once a day (never had to hit reset on my DVR40). I offered to send DTV a list of at least 50 bugs in the box, but they weren't interested in improving their product.

Tried to return R15 to DTV, but they said, sorry - you bought it ($99) you got it - we wont take it on return, and we wont send you a new R15.

So I went back to my DVR40. Looks like I am stuck with a $99 R15 boat anchor! But wait, maybe I can move the 120 gig hard drive over to the DVR40!

My question is, is it possible to move the 120 gig hard drive from the "piece-o-s___" R15 to the DVR40, keep the Tivo programming/firmware, and gain recording time?

I am an electronics geek, and have built many PC's, so I can deal with putting the DVR drive into a PC if need be. Also, I'm a little smarter about DTV/Tivo than two weeks ago, but need even more education regarding my options at this point.

Thanks for whatever you can provide in the way of assistance or direction.

Tivo Fan
Hood River, OR

 

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Thanks for the feedback. I appreciate it.

It turns out one can call DTV 5 times and get 5 different answers. When I re-registered my old unit last night, the rep said they would send me a "return kit" to return the R15. He said I am just "leasing" the box (for $99?). I wonder if I will get a refund or not. In any case, this will henceforth be known to me as the "$100 DTV Gotcha".

I will probably upgrade the DVR40 with a bigger drive using the instructions in the link above.

Thanks again for the quick responses.

)

p.s. Please see new post from me regarding getting a tivo box that will drive a 480i hi-res wide-screen tv