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Replacing and upgrading the DVR530 Hard Drive (will Void your warranty!)

100K views 231 replies 82 participants last post by  kcowan 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
About the Author and this thread - ARR is a former Shaw employee who worked for several years assisting the Star Choice team that developed and tested the Star Choice DVR530. He previously posted on the Digital Forum as digitaldude.

This is a revisit of a topic discussed in previous posts and hopes to shed some clarity for those interested.

DISCLAIMER: If your unit is under WARRANTY, then this procedure is NOT recommended.

A little history:

The very initial hard drive in DSR530's were Maxtor, but never went into production with that model as it proved unreliable and not up to the task.

The CE version was chosen for it reliability and performance.
Read the specs here: http://www.seagate.com/docs/pdf/datasheet/disc/ds_ce.pdf

A little known fact is that ~ 30K 'special' dsr530's were shipped with the Seagate 250GB hard drives for in house use at a major N.A. auto manufacture that operates their own DCII transponder and had been using Moto DSR4XX units, but needed a DVR and the 530 was the ONLY DCII DVR around.

While its easy to criticize Moto/*C for selecting the 160GB, initial plans which I took over spec'ing originally had the 80GB and the 120GB was only a consideration as they were being used by the cable HD PVR's and only recently in the DCT6416 went to 160GB. I examined the cost and made a case for our current 160GB, so be thankful we got that.


continued....
 
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#144 ·
I finally got around to installing the new 750 gig drive, I didn't have the proper tool to remove the screws so I just used a end nipper:rolleyes: to unscrew them, start to finish about 10 min..very easy! I will reformat it tomorrow and call for a re hit.

Thanks to all for doing the work to get us more PVR time!

Cary
 
#145 ·
Newer than the newest newbie...I have read most of this thread and hopefully someone can give me some advice concerning a DVR530. I purchased a used box at an auction last week. I was able to inspect the unit prior to bidding on it; display was lit and working, all blue lites were on but unit was not hooked up to satelite. Checked unit serial number with Starchoice, no money owing , no issues with this unit, although it still showed as activated in someone's account. The fact that it was still on somebodys account encouraged me to believe that the unit was likely functional. So... I took a chance and bought the unit reasonably cheaply. I hooked the box up yesterday and it was DOA ..called Starchoice Cs and after reaching a 2nd level Tech managed to get blue lites to cycle but no display on the box and nothing on the TV. This tech said this unit was an earlier model and had a history of problems specifically the same as I was now experiencing and that the still registered owner had been advised to return the unit for a replacement. Odd. On the bright side, if I could get the box to work long enough to aquire a signal and become registered on my account they were willing to warrantee the box. Nice. I left the unit hooked up and powered up and after 24 hrs I have solid blue lites and no display and no TV image. Okay, so the situation is this, I am not likely able to return this unit [sold as is] and I have not really spent that much. Is the problem most likely to be the harddrive? If I purchase a Seagate HD and install it, is it possible/likely that the unit will work or is that just good money following bad? However, It did cost me more than a doorstop but less than an anchor. What's your opinion?
I do not have another 530 just two 505 boxes.

Thanks

Doug [biff]
 
#146 ·
Not likely the hard drive

Biff1

From my experience with three DVR530's so far I doubt that the hard drive failed. The problem usually has to do with the memory chips getting confused and not allowing the unit to fully start up. As I understand the fix, the techies use some srtt of probe the reflash them..

I bought a used second unit like you and it just started enough for me to call Starchoice and get it replaced. However, it was necessary to try restarting it many times before it would get a channel. I can only suggest retrying and hold the power button while turning on the power and wait to see if it will start. It can take quite a while for it to go through the startup so be patient. It worked for me but I would guess that it took 20 tries at one point. It failed to restart when I was on the phone with Starchoice and they agreed to replace it and i paid the shipping.

Hope this helps.

Rick
 
#147 ·
Biff1

My experience is consistent with RickBH's comments. I have had only one failed DSR 530 so far, but I can confirm replacing the hard drive in that unit did not make the unit more stable and did not resurrect it when it finally "died". However, your unit may be different.

With respect to rebooting a "dead" unit (i.e., bringing it back to life), it helps if the unit is warm. Either leave it plugged in for a while or lightly waive a hair dryer over the top of it for a minute (there are posts on this website about the hair dryer trick).

After the unit is warm, unplug its power cord and plug it back in. Wait a moment. If the front blue bar lights do not start to flash / cycle, repeat unplugging and plugging in the unit and waiting for the lights to flash until successful.

Once the front blue lights start to flash, let the unit try to start up. If it fails (i.e., the blue bar lights are on but not flashing / cycling), let the unit sit for awhile. For some reason, my unit would successfully reboot after it sat for about 15 minutes in this state.

If that fails, try holding down the power bar to induce a soft reboot. This may cause the unit to successfully reboot. Repeat the soft boot if not initially successful.

Finally, if several soft reboots are not successful, unplug the unit and start again.

Bottom line be patient. It may take over an hour to resurrect the "dead" unit. However, given the cost of a new unit ($700), it may be worth it.

Regards,

Sub Zero
 
#148 ·
in response to those asking about transferring data

ARR (and he like vanished off the two boards I periodically read- hope he's OK) indicated in a previous post elsewhere, the filesystem is VxWorks, which is obscure but not impossible to work with. You simply need to find the drivers so your PeeCee can work with it. But it would be a pretty geeky project.

As far as copying the disk, etc., so you don't lose content - likely too much work to even bother. The disk upgrade would use completely different sectors and multiple other disk foo items which would result in totally unpredictable results - if it worked at all. You could copy from one disk to another of identical size but then you would face the issue of encryption....the video content is 3DES encrypted and married to a secure chip on the main board.

Unless you are /really/ good the process to move this married data is pretty daunting. It can be done, but you would need to ask yourself if this is how you wish to spend your time?

FYI - I've been running on a DB35 750GB Seagate for just under one year. Will the drive fail some day? Sure as heck. But in the interim I have a usable machine versus one which is sized for a stupidly limited amount of recording. Others have very similar stories and it's all good.

I plan to record ALL of the CBC Olympics coverage. It is so much better than NBC as to be laughable due to the fact CBC actually covers athletes from other than Canada - as opposed to NBC which is grossly biased and it really should not be for such an event - and not sweat the storage issue.

chmod
 
#149 ·
Reflashing a 530

My eBay 530 finally went south recently and tech support told me how to access a hidden menu for doing a factory reset without losing the HD contents. If you already know this, sorry for the mundane.

If you can manage to get the machine to access the Options menu after the blowdryer, plug and replug gambit, etc, go 6,4,988 and you're supposed to see the factory reset menu and choose to preserve or not the HD stuff.

I don't know if this fixes the problem until the next time the box gets confused, but if your 530 is jumping out of playback or randomly reseting itself, try this before it's too late perhaps.

This isn't supposed to change the E0, F0, etc. status either.

Don't you just cringe when the sparks fly to replug this beast!! LOL Too cheap to put in a power switch - shame on you Motorola!!
 
#150 ·
Has anyone tried cloning the installed hard drive to the new hard drive? Does that work? Also, is it possible to open the thing without using this security bit? If not, can you buy a bit at RONA or somewhere? I'm going away in a week and a half and I don't think the bit will arrive by then.
 
#151 ·
Copying old drive

Check out my post on page 8 (#118). It can be done, but with one big drawback... partition size will also be copied and there is no way to change it to the expanded size of your new drive.
For the bit, I looked everywhere for one before ordering online, including specialized electronics stores. I know some people on this forum have successfully (and patiently) used vice-grips to turn the screws out.

Good luck.

FWW:cool:
 
#152 ·
Anyone know if some sort of SATA to IDE Converter piece will work in this situation? I want to get as big an HDD as possible but the largest i can find without buying online is a 500GB Segate Barracuda. I wanted 750GB IDE or if that sata to IDE converter works i wanted to get like a 1tb drive.
 
#155 ·
I have just purchased a refurnb 530from EBay that will be showing up here (Down south) in a few days. I have all of the parts to upgrade the HD but I was wondering should I do it before I call in to create my account. If so can I still do the dish install with the new drive in the machine,
 
#159 ·
Well,....

I've had the 500Gb Seagate drive in the 530 since about Feb 2008. This past week, my 530 has been showing signs of feeling sick. DVR list wasn't working properly, would shut off spontaneously while watching DVR programs... Timers weren't working correctly

This past weekend, it has died... It only has the rotating lights on the front panel, and doesn't output any picture to the TV. Hard Power resets couldn't revive it, nor would any front panel reboots.. At approximately 9pm EST Nov 23rd, I pronounced it dead.

A relatively quick call to SC lead to a replacement 530 to be Purolated out to me this week. (it is a much shorter call once it is bricked, then when it is kinda working.) He didn't get me to do multiple power resets or Soft Resets.

My original 530 had filled out it's organ donor card, and I went in to retrieve it's 500Gb HDD, and replace it with the puny 160Gb one that I had sitting in a drawer....

I may try to take some screenshots of the reinit process when I do it this week (time permitting).

Man, I hate commercials.... I am already in PVR withdrawal.

P
 
#160 ·
Hello fww,

Which usb adaptor did you use? (Model # or TigerDirect #). From your description I'm not exactly sure of your setup. What drives have you tried with it. I looked for the larger IDE seagate drives but most were out of stock, refurbished or overpriced. I'd much prefer to use an external usb drive so I can use a larger, cheaper Sata drive. It would also put the extra heat outside the box. (My AV equipment is in a rack under my family room. Space, noise and aesthitics are not concerns.) Any details appreciated.:p Thanks.
 
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