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External Hard Drive Discussions - See Facts Link in Post 1.

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#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
I'm new to this so please bear with me. I've tried searching with no success.

I just upgraded to a 9241 because my kids gave me an external hard drive for my BD.

Anyway, it formated just fine so here is my question.

As I keep recording movies etc, does the external drive become an overflow when the 9241 is full?? If this isn't the case, do I have to archieve shows to the external drive manually??

Once movies etc are in the hard drive do I just access them for watching the same as if they're on the 9241 drive.

I hope I explained properly but I'm sure somebody will let me know if not. :p

Here's the link to the eHDD facts thread. Read it to find the appropriate eHDD, etc.

Bell External Hard Drive Facts - Canadian TV, Computing and Home Theatre Forums

Do not ask questions in the Facts thread. Use this thread for questions.
 
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#29 ·
The extended hard drive is what makes the receiver a PVR. You can do all the things with the 6131 as others with 9241s and 9242s can with an EHD. Post #2 explains this very clearly. Be sure that the hard drive you get does not have a sleep mode because it must be on when the TV is on in order for the receiver to act as a PVR.
 
#30 ·
Originally Posted by Waterug;

You can do all the things with the 6131 as others with 9241s and 9242s can with an EHD.
Well not quite. The 6131 is a single tuner so you cannot record a show, whilst watching another, that magic is reserved for the Dual Tuner models.
 
#32 · (Edited)
External 1TB HD in hours ?

Hey, just hooked up a 1TB external hard drive to my 9242. It is showing 133 hours of storage for HD programs and 1000 for SD.

I realise I forgot to check if it is partitioned on the unit (the External Hard drive) . To take the unit out from the enterainment centre and all the wiring through conduits and move it to a computer will have to wait as it's a chore. But hopefully I can get answers here.. does that sound like the full glory on what a 1Tb can provide ?

I can't believe I forgot to check :-(
 
#35 ·
Wow , Fast responses !

Thanks !

Good to know. I had heard of some of these drives being partioned or actually having 2 physical drives inside so this alleviates things.

I had wanted to add this drive a long time.. took a great boxing day deal to make it happen.
 
#36 ·
External HD question

Hi all. I am a new member. I've had my 9241 PVR for about 6 months now and am really enjoying it.

I've just spent the last hour doing a search but can't find the answer to what I thought would be a simple question. Everyone seems to want to add an External Hard Drive so they can supplement the size of their internal HD. Lots of info on that.

I want to do something different. Can I record movies off the internet onto an External HD and then play them on/thru the PVR via the USB port on the back? Is this possible? If so, what kind of problems might I have? Is there a special sequence to hooking it up or finding it in the menus?

Thanx for your help and this sure looks like a great site full of information and helpful members.

shmoky
 
#38 ·
Another option, if you are in the market for a Blu Ray player, is to get one with wireless internet streaming capabilities and 2 usb ports.

You could stream your movies from your computer onto your TV using wireless internet, or you could connect your external hard drive to it, and watch the movies that way.

I picked up a Samsung 3600 on boxing day, and it works great. I also have a 9242 with an external hard drive, so I get the best of both worlds (TV and Internet movies).
 
#39 ·
I have a 1tb Comstar HD hooked up to my 9242 receiver that gave me 133hrs HD or 1000hrs SD. It has worked perfectly for 10 months until I loaded it up to maximum capacity. After learning the hard way that it was not a good idea, I finally succeded in having some files deleted by a computer repair and everything is back to normal. Then I bought a 2tb WD My Book Essential, hoping to double the recording capacity. I got only 143hrs HD or 1080hrs SD. What an upgrade for 1tb more! Makes me wonder if its a matter of capacity ceiling or usable space on the HD. Before plugging the HD to my receiver, I plugged it to my computer and it said that there was 1.8tb available. Quite weird...
 
#41 ·
FYI I am using a Seagate 1tb External Drive. At first had a few problems where it seemed to go to sleep every 15 min (even though the good boys at Future Shop said it had no sleep function). In that case I would always have to reboot as it didnt seem to wake up. So I plugged into my computer and used the Seagate Manager changed the sleep time to never and now its been working absolutely wonderful. So if anyone wants to buy that one it does work just have to change the sleep time and its very quiet!!
 
#42 ·
Accidental disconnection of 6141 from EHD

I almost had a stroke!
While reconfiguring my 6141 and Denon AVR-590 for HDMI pass-through I accidently pulled out the USB cable connection to my EHD.
I immediately reconnected it and I got a message on the screen that my EHD was now connected and did I want to reboot.
My thought immediately was "I lost all my PVR contents and scheduling"!
I did not say "yes" and proceeded to immediately call Bell TV support.
I got a CSR within 1 minute and explained what I had done.
To my relief he said "no problem...you will not lose your contents".
He told me to do a hard shutoff of the receiver on the front panel.
I did so and when it came back on (about 2 minutes) he told me he had sent an activation signal.
Then he said "don't use the PVR function for about 20 minutes".
I followed his instructions for 30 minutes actually and my first indication that the PVR was working without loss of scheduling was it switched to the Daily Show automatically at 12:00 noon.
At this point I checked the PVR and all my recorded programs were there.
Quite a relief.

I usually unplug the receiver and then the EHD whenever I am working anywhere near it but I didn't do that this time.
I'll never make the same mistake again.
My wife was quite happy. (Happy wife...happy life).
 
#43 ·
My external hard drive is an 1TB Western Digital My Book Essential. I didn't know it had a sleep mode when I brought it but it seems to be working with my 6131 :).

This particular hard drive has a light on it that indicates hard drive access. It is flashing every once in a while (3secs - 30secs) even though the receiver is "off." It is not even time for PVR recordings. Why is it doing that? Why does this receiver need to access the hard drive when the receiver is "off?"
 
#44 ·
As the 6131 has no internal HD, when you plug an external HD, it becomes part of the receiver. The receiver itself is constantly powered on even when it's turned off, unless you unplug it or use the power button on the front panel. When you shut it off with the remote, it only goes in a kind of sleeping mode. The receiver is always working, sleeping or receiving updates, so I guess it is normal that your receiver interacts constantly with your EHD.
 
#47 ·
So I watched the tv while the receiver is "off." It seems that the hard drive accesses coincides with PVR related messages (eg. you have _ recording(s) available, you have _ event(s) scheduled for today, etc).

These messages happen with such frequency (<30secs) that the hard drive never goes to sleep. So why doesn't the receiver "officially" support hard drives with a sleep mode?

One concern I have is that frequent drive access means that the drive will wear down faster. Other than unplugging, is there any way to stop these messages and stop the receiver from accessing the hard drive when it is not needed?
 
#45 ·
Tests with a 2TB external hard drive.

I ran some more tests with the 2TB WD My Book Essential. I was surprised to have only 143hrs in HD or 1080hrs in SD (as opposed to 133hrs or 1000hrs with a 1TB) with the 9242. So I checked the partition with my computer. Once formated by the receiver, the disc was separated this way: 1gig, 500gig and 500gig formated and 900gig of free space. I reformated the EHD several times and it always ended up this way.

Then I tried it on a 6131 receiver. It began formating the EHD and a message appeared saying that the receiver could only use a EHD between 50gig and 1TB. There was no way to make the 2TB EHD work with the 6131.

By curiosity, I then tried the 2TB on a 9241. After formating, it gave me 143hrs in HD or 1075hrs in SD.

Bottom line, it seem like the 9242 and 9241 are programmed to use a maximum of 2 x 500gig on a EHD, leaving the rest of the disc untouched. In the case of the 6131, it would not even format it. This is my own experience with this particular WD 2TB hard drive, but I'd like to have details from people who succeded in using more than 1TB with their receiver.

BTW, after all those tests for science I'll try to get a refund for the 2TB that is absolutely useless to me.
 
#46 ·
If I want to move on external HDD between two 6141 units, is there a right and wrong way to do it? Reading a post from earlier up on the page, it seems that simply unplugging the drive and then plugging it back it might get you a prompt for formatting a require a call to a Bell CSR?
 
#49 ·
EHD Problem with 9241

I have the following Seagate 1 TB EHC hooked up to my 9241 receiver.
http://www.seagate.com/www/en-us/products/external/expansion/expansion_desktop/
I originally hooked it up a few weeks ago, it formated correctly and I was able to archive 5 or 6 recordings to it. Probably about 15 hours of HD viewing. Last night I attempted to archive some more recordings and it would not work. I got an error message ( I am sorry, I don't remember exactly what it said ). I wanted to make sure that other functions on the EHD were working so I attempted to watch a program that was stored on it. It played fine, but when I tried to pause or stop, it would just freeze. It would not let me play it again unless I forwarded or rewound. I was not able to get out of the program until I powered off the receiver.
Has anyone else had this problem? Is it the EHD I am using? Anyone with insight please help me out.
Thanks,
Ken
 
#50 ·
New tests with a 1.5TB EHD

After my unsucessful attempts to use a 2TB, I tried with 1.5TB. As some folks here had good results with a 1.5TB, I hoped I would work for me too.

I bought a iPro Drive 1.5TB (IP-HDE1-1.5TB) and hooked it to my 9242 receiver. I was pleased to get 200hrs in HD or 1505hrs in SD. I then checked the partition on my computer: The 1397GB on the drive where partitioned like this: 1GB, 500GB, 500GB and 396GB.

It looks like the receiver can handle all the available space on 1.5TB but not on a 2TB on which it uses only 1TB.

Besides, the 1,5TB iProDrive is very quite (I can barely hear it compared to my other Comstar 1TB that was pretty noisy) and it gets barely warm. On the long run, I'll see if it's all that good.
 
#52 ·
Don't disagree with you. That is why I turn mine off when not in use as I only use it every few weeks to archieve movies.

My point was that hard drives can handle the 24/7 service duty. If you are switching it on and off several times a day, that is probably harder on it than leaving it on.
 
#53 ·
Hi all, looking for a little guidance with respect to purchasing an EHD for a 9242. I've seen alot of good reviews for the Western Digital WD10EADS Caviar Green 1TB, so I've placed one in my shopping cart on newegg.ca, but when I did a search for "Vantec CX" a recommended enclosure I get nothing. Can anyone recommend a good enclosure for EHD use. Thanks in advance for the help.

dave
 
#54 ·
I use a Vantec Nexstar 3 enclosure with a 1 TB WD Caviar Black - no problems with it on my 9242 after about 3 months, for archiving or playback. I've also tested using a Vantec Nextstar NST-D100 HD 'toaster' for rapid drive swapping on the 9242 with a couple of the same drives - that worked fine, but as I only had it set up for a few days I can't comment on it's long term performance.
 
#55 ·
when I did a search for "Vantec CX" a recommended enclosure I get nothing.
Try "Vantec Nexstar CX" it's quite a bit cheaper that the Nextar 3 and the USB only CX works better (unless you need eSATA.)

hard drives can handle the 24/7 service duty.
I've seen a number of consumer drives that have specified duty cycles of less that 24 hours/day, including some current 2.5" drives. You usually need to go to the manufacturer's site to find that out. It is true that most modern 3.5" drives will operate 24/7 with no problem (within spec) but it may shorten their life.
 
#56 ·
is this the Vantec drive you're talking about...
That's the one. It can be picked up cheaper than that at quite a few other stores though.

Not familiar with the Rosewill stuff. I have a feeling it's a house brand and I've had bad luck with that type of product.
 
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