Tutorial - Recording on a Viewsat Pro PVR using a USB Stick

[nprosper]

Tutorial
Recording on a PVR using a USB Stick

Tutorial By: NProsper

Things you will need:

• Paragon Partition Manager 9.0
• USB Stick (1GB+)
• Viewsat Pro PVR/USB

You can download the trial software of Paragon Partition Manager HERE

Open the program Paragon Partition Manager 9.0 after you have it downloaded and installed on your pc. You should get a screen like the one below:



Once you have the software open, you should then connect the US stick to your computer. After your computer recognizes that the USB stick is connected, click the middle option called "Format Partition".

The Format Wizard now opens up, and will guide you through the steps on formatting any drive on your computer.



CLICK NEXT

You now have to select the drive partition you wish to format. Remember, formatting will cause ALL data on that drive to be erased as the new file system (Table Of Contents) gets re-installed.

We are going to be recording on a PVR so you may notice your drive may display in a FAT file system. This is no good for us. Any FAT File System strictly only allows your Viewsat to view images or mp3 files on the device. In order to make your Viewsat into a true PVR the drive that will be recording has to be in the file system of E2FS which is smaller terms is basically Ext2, a Linux file system.

Go ahead and select the drive which represents your USB device.

Your image result should be similar to the one below:



CLICK NEXT

This next step allows you to select the new file system you want to have on your device.
We will now click Partition Type, and select Linux Ext2



IMPORTANT: Take a look at the section where it says "Assign the following drive letter", make sure you select none. I have had several issues selecting a drive letter for the device. If you do select a drive letter and experience issues, do all the steps over and select NONE for drive letter.



CLICK NEXT

This next step is a chance for you to backup and make changes if you selected the wrong drive to be formatted. If you are 100% sure you have the correct drive selected, click Yes Apply The Changes Physically and CLICK NEXT



The next step shows your drive being formatted:



After you have this done you may get the message that your computer needs to restart. The first time I did this, I was required to restart, every time after I never had to restart the computer. Say yes to restart and leave the USB Stick in the USB Port on your computer. A boot program will start and the USB drive will be formatted from FAT/NTFS to ext2.

Once everything is done and you are back to your desktop (if you required a reboot), open up your Paragon Partition Manager 9.0 once again.

Click Format Partition and If your USB drive shows ext2 you are ready to record!!



Place your USB stick in the front/back of the Viewsat 2000 Pro, wait for your viewsat to recgonize the new hardware and press OK when prompted, you can fine tune settings by selecting menu on your remote and viewing PVR Configuration options. Once the drive is detected you can record shows.

NOTE: YOU CANNOT PUT MP3 FILES ON THIS DRIVE AFTER ITS FORMATTED, MP3 FILES REQUIRE THE FAT FILE SYSTEM!!! IF YOU WANT TO LISTEN TO MP3 FILES, GET ANOTHER USB STICK OR FORMAT IT BACK TO FAT32

I tested on a 2GB device and it was able to record just over 1 hour of showtime.

Enjoy!

NProsper