Thanks for the great info!! My 8300hd was working, but would not pause or record live TV. I replaced the hard drive with what u recommended. Works great now , alot less noisy too! I did have to reboot twice.

Thanks again!

Tom.

Hi, I need some help.

I got a gently used WD5000AAKB off ebay and finally performed the upgrade on Sunday and it went perfectly - easy to remove the old drive, put in the new one, plugged it in and all was working.

I've been recording and watching just fine for the last few days.

tonight, I went to watch a program that had just recorded and it basically paused a few moments into the recording. Additionally, the whole PVR became unresponsive, not opening the list or changing the channel until 20 - 30 seconds after a button press. even the power switch on the front does not get an immediate reaction

I've rebooted, unplugged and nothing has helped.

now this all made me feel like my replacement drive was a rip off, but then comes the really interesting part. recordings from before today still play back just fine (as does live tv).

I checked my signal and the three numbers are -4 (tuner 1) -13 (2nd number) and 39 (3rd row).

anyone have any ideas? a tech is coming out tomorrow, but I'm sure if I say I changed the drive, he'll just blame that.

thanks,

Aron

Last week - after a final hair-pulling eHDD glitch (the classic loss of the synchronicity between the programs and the index) I swapped my iHDD for a 500GB WD Caviar Blue in the new WDBAAV5000ENC-NRSN version. The instructions here were awesome - but pretty much it was self explanatory once you have torx bits.

Two notes - take note of where everything is plugged in an what the jumper cables are on the drive before you disassemble anything. Make sure your new drive mirrors this.

In my case - when the drive booted up I got a countdown that led to a message that my "video recorder was not ready" and followed the reformat instructions given in the first message to this post.

The iHDD works perfectly - and I can now rest comfortably knowing I will not again lose the finals of the Rugby World Cup.

So, an update on my previous post.

The tech came out and replaced practically every wire in and around my house to clean up the installation and the signal.

this includes the coax into the house, the coax to the box, the HDMI cord to component cables, etc.

Right after he left, the problem reoccured.

It Looks like it was a bad drive off ebay - I pulled it out and installed it in a PC so I could run some test on it and it failed a bunch of SMART tests.

I've swapped back the old drive, and the ebay seller is supposedly going to refund me, but I'm basically out the shipping each way (~40) for the honour of having a 500gb drive for 4 days. It was fun while it lasted!

aron

Hi All,
I have looked high and low for the WD5000AAKB and i can't find this hard drive anywhere...

Is there another one that is sold that would be around 500 - 1T in size that would do the trick and people have them in stock?

Thanks for your help

Can someone post a list of working hard drives you can use ( model numbers) for upgrading? Please... I don't know much about hard drives so i just want to find one that works and then do the install...

Thanks guys

I've been having trouble finding the WD5000AAKB in stock anywhere these days as well. For the last few upgrades I've done for clients we've used the smaller WD3200AAJB drive in its place. You don't get as much storage space but that this point (IDE drives obviously on the way out) you get what you can find.

Hey,
i just found 2 places in Canada that sell them still... 95 bucks new so i'm going to order 2 LOL...

Please post the place/web names here - no links please.

For those of you looking for a model that works see my post above - Oct 27. That drive works just fine.

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?p=1343101#post1343101

Be careful about places still offering the WD5000AAKB drive at a reasonable price. All the ones I found recently eventually turned out to be out of stock. One even charged my CC and then had it on back-order for a month.

Thank you all for the help these forums provide, but i have a question.

I have replaced the internal drive on the HD8300 (Rogers) that we purchased a few years ago (iHDD died). The unit has formatted the drive but I am getting "recording not available". I have gone through the pause / - / listx3 function to no avail. I have tried several drives, to no avail and I seem to be in a bind and could use some help/direction if anyone has a few seconds to lend a hand.

Thank you

bdg55,

I had the same problem as you back in the summer when I upgraded an old 8300HD. Basically, you got to format it again. From my experience, we updated the first page of this thread which now reads...

Note: If you get a Video Recorder Not Ready message after installing a new internal drive, you may need to do the "last resort" format as outlined at the bottom of post 1 of the SA FAQ below. This came about after a recent firmware update.

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=17719

There are two ways of going about a format...

Option 1

Last Resort

If for some reason you can't get the STB to do what you want and you've rebooted it by unplugging it, etc. This is a "last resort" item. You can reformat the iHDD (courtesy of websurferdude).

The Explorer 8X00 has a fairly simple procedure to erase the drive (start clean). Note that this process will erase all scheduled programming and will cause the unit to reload all programming data from your cable provider. On the plus side, it will repair any fragmenting problems.

"Press and hold PAUSE until Mail led is lit. Press PAGE down or (-),
and then press LIST three times. Turn box off. When turned-on,
formatting will begin."

or Option 2, which is what I had to do as Option 1 wasn't working for me...
Try this alternative to the "Lazy-man's diagnostic mode":

Press and hold the pause button for 10 seconds +/- until the mail light appears on the 8300's display.

Press "PAGE -" on the remote (instead of PAGE +).

"E-00" appears on the 8300's display.

"d-2." appears on the display if you press "3" on the remote.

if you press "LIST" 3 times, the hard drive will erase all the programs on it.That should solve your problem... If not, after trying multiple drives and having the same problem, I would say the unit is caput?

thank you, will try again it and get back to you, appreciate the response

E50 on start up, then the formatting process, then no recording

might try and find a 500GB IDE drive in the city and see if it will work, after that I am at a loss.

I upgraded my SA8300HD with a Hitachi 500GB drive about a year ago. It's been working fine other than the occasional dropout glitches. The only problem is the NOISE - I can hear it humming half-way across the house!

After a few months of constant spin up/down (sounds like a helo winding up) when not in use, the drive is constantly on now. I also had a new receiver connected to the box so I thought it was some HDMI weirdness and ignored it.

Was there a firmware change in the SA8300HD that keeps the drive always spinning now?

Was there a firmware change in the SA8300HD that keeps the drive always spinning now?
Yes, goes back at least a few months.

Reported in the following sticky (summary in post 1):

http://www.digitalhome.ca/forum/showthread.php?t=140406

Registered just to post a THANKS for this guide, it worked perfectly for me with a WD5000AVJB I got off eBay. I would have never tried to attempt such an upgrade until finding this excellent walkthrough. Now I'm all set and can record as much HD as I want and just in time for all the holiday programming, fantastic.

What's the quietest [PATA] drive I can put in my 8300 (SD, not HD)?

Is there a Solid State Drive that is compatible?

My drive died so I have to replace it anyway. I already temporarily stuck a old 60GB PATA drive I had lying around from many years ago, so I now know it's incredibly easy to do.