[kad7777]

Anticipating a hard drive replacement in the future of my Roamio Plus.
Replacement is a 3T Red WD30EFRX.
I know the Roamio will setup on its own.
My major question is:
Do I need to pair the new hard drive with the cable card?

If yes, can I avoid that step by cloning the older drive?
If so, any link or info on doing cloning correctly?

 

[ThAbtO]

Do I need to pair the new hard drive with the cable card?

Yes. Time to get it operational is only about 15 min. Add about 10 min if you were to use a larger drive, up to 8 TB and the Windows program MSFR.

If yes, can I avoid that step by cloning the older drive?

If you use MFSTools 3.x, but its also possible you need to pair it again. The time can take overnight to do.

You should download shows currently on the Tivo, as well as the passes with KMTTG, restore them also. But for shows, you need to have PyTivo, but you cannot put shows back if the Roamio is running v21 (Hydra, TE4), only if its on v20 (TE3).

 

[Scott9mm]

If you clone the old drive the cable card will work OK but you won't see the additional capacity of the 3T drive. If you expand to the 3T capacity after cloning you will need to re-pair the cable card (at least that's what happened with my Roamio+). But if you use MFSTools to move everything from the old drive to the new one and then expand (to 3T or greater) the cable card pairing should be OK, at least that's how it worked with my Roamio+ and Premiere. Moving data from the old to new drive with MFSTools will take hours (about like cloning) but that's what I would recommend. If you don't already have the 3T drive consider going bigger (4-12T). The fastest way is to connect the drives directly a computer disk controller but a docking station works fine too (preferably with USB3), just slower.

 

[kpeters59]

You can back up and restore your Channels List and OnePasses with KMTTG.

-KP

 

[kad7777]

I assume to re-pair a card, it's a matter of just calling cable co.
Any protocol when doing so?

 

[Scott9mm]

I assume to re-pair a card, it's a matter of just calling cable co.
Any protocol when doing so?

Just a lot of patience. First to finally get connected to someone that really knows cable cards. Second to work with the tech to read back data from various cable card diagnostic screens. I hear that knowledgeable CC techs are scarce. You could get lucky or it could take an hour or more over several calls.

 

[morac]

I assume to re-pair a card, it's a matter of just calling cable co.
Any protocol when doing so?

For some cable companies you can pair the cards yourself. For example Comcast and Verizon let you do that.

XFINITY CableCARDTM activation & pairing

CableCARDs | Verizon TV Support

 

[kad7777]

For some cable companies you can pair the cards yourself. For example Comcast and Verizon let you do that.

XFINITY CableCARDTM activation & pairing

CableCARDs | Verizon TV Support

Unfortunately - Spectrum

 

[kdmorse]

I assume to re-pair a card, it's a matter of just calling cable co.
Any protocol when doing so?

One mans advice:

Never use the word re-pair. They'll hear 'repair', and instantly transfer you to lord knows which department to inflict lord knows what service actions upon you.

I always use "Update the pairing information my cable card", having gone down that "repair" rabbit hole once.

Any other advice is entirely cable company specific.

 

[gkottner]

I have no idea if this page is up to date since there is no post date on it, but it does tell you what to do to pair a Spectrum Cable Card and has a phone number to call. Good Luck!

Spectrum.net

 

[deputylynch]

For some cable companies you can pair the cards yourself. For example Comcast and Verizon let you do that.

XFINITY CableCARDTM activation & pairing

CableCARDs | Verizon TV Support

You can't pair a Comcast card without calling them at least in my market area of Pittsburgh