Working hard drives for SV-360 Elite

[s2byus]

Originally Posted by s2byus

It appears – most likely – that your Seagate Freeagent is entering a sleep mode after a certain time of inactivity - for energy saving purpose. I am not sure, but may be there is a utility that can disable this feature. If so, this should be done with a PC as the STB does not have such capabilities.

This is assumed to disable sleep mode:
For Windows:
http://www.seagate.com/support/freeagent/1_5/FreeAgent-DT-WW.exe
For Mac:
http://www.seagate.com/support/freeagent/1_5/FreeAgent-DT-WW.zip

Install it on your PC, then go to Adjusting the Power Settings

[andrej33]

Originally Posted by s2byus

This is assumed to disable sleep mode:
For Windows:
http://www.seagate.com/support/freeagent/1_5/FreeAgent-DT-WW.exe
For Mac:
http://www.seagate.com/support/freeagent/1_5/FreeAgent-DT-WW.zip

Install it on your PC, then go to Adjusting the Power Settings

Thanks!
That partially worked. I downloaded and installed the software, then changed the settings to "never" .Now it continues to stay connected unless I shut the 360 off from the back. When I turn it back on, i still have to un-plug the hard drive and plug it back in for it to be seen. This is the same weather I push the blue button and release the HD first or not. Are you guys able to do a hard restart and have the HD show up without re-plugging it in?
Thanks everyone. This is such a great website!
Andre

[s2byus]

Originally Posted by andrej33

Thanks!
That partially worked. I downloaded and installed the software, then changed the settings to "never" .Now it continues to stay connected unless I shut the 360 off from the back. When I turn it back on, i still have to un-plug the hard drive and plug it back in for it to be seen. This is the same weather I push the blue button and release the HD first or not. Are you guys able to do a hard restart and have the HD show up without re-plugging it in?
Thanks everyone. This is such a great website!
Andre

Shutting down from the back is not very common or recommended. The back power switch is mostly used for problem solving as it reboots the box, or for power shut down when dealing with the LNBs and switches. The back power switch is also left on to keep the EPG updated and to enable preset recording events. Most likely a reason it was placed in the back so it would be not very convenient or frequent to be accessed.

After this being said, it may help to reformat your hdd with the Elite box – FAT32.
I see my WD 500GB is recognized shortly after a back power switch off – on cycling.

[apophus]

Simpletech FS-U25 250gb working great, USB powered and comes in a variety of colors only was $79 at Frys electronics

[readyakira]

got a Freeagent 500gb and after formating with swissknife and plugging the drive in my stb see a c,d,e,f,g,h drive. I have tried reformating it several times but no luck.

[SystemDude]

Originally Posted by readyakira

got a Freeagent 500gb and after formating with swissknife and plugging the drive in my stb see a c,d,e,f,g,h drive. I have tried reformating it several times but no luck.

Don't know if this applies to you, but one of the things that some users have discovered is that formatting on a Macintosh does not seem to work, even though it appears to be successful -- needs to be a Windows machine.

After you format it, does it appear as just one drive letter containing the whole 500 Gb? If not, it may need to be re-partitioned as the stb seems to want to see just one partition.

I personally used a utility called Fat32Format.exe, but others have used SwissKnife successfully.

[readyakira]

Originally Posted by SystemDude

Don't know if this applies to you, but one of the things that some users have discovered is that formatting on a Macintosh does not seem to work, even though it appears to be successful -- needs to be a Windows machine.

After you format it, does it appear as just one drive letter containing the whole 500 Gb? If not, it may need to be re-partitioned as the stb seems to want to see just one partition.

I personally used a utility called Fat32Format.exe, but others have used SwissKnife successfully.

Well, I am doing it on my winxp machine. I used swissknife, maxblast and a few other programs. when I used the max blast it worked once then went back to listing 6 folders c thru h. each one of those comes up with a dos system error. I noticed it also does not read the name of the drive correctly. It came up one time last night and showed only one folder but said it wasn't dos and I tried to format. I went to sleep with it formatting and this morning it was still trying to format. I had to do a hard reset, after which the drive again comes up as 6 folders with some weird letters as the drive name. I even tried a different cable as it looks kind of like it is a communication error. I am so lost on what to try. I did a factory reset, and that did not work either. I haven't tried re-flashing it yet but I guess I am going to have try that when I get home.

[SystemDude]

This is especially annoying because as you have seen above, other members have installed the FreeAgent and have been using it successfully. The six folders would seem to be the clue -- it does seem as though somehow the drive has been subdivided or 'partitioned' into six smaller logical drives. If one of your software programs has the option for re-partitioning the drive (I use Partition Magic for this kind of stuff, but there are others), I would try that. You want one continuous partition that encompasses the entire drive before you try formatting.

And of course we cannot forget that just maybe the drive or its USB interface module could actually be bad. Do you have the ability to try it on another computer?

[readyakira]

I tried it on a desktop, and tried it on a laptop both of which it seems to work fine. Last I used partition magic 8 to make it one ext2 drive which the box sees now as one folder, but says it has to be a dos file system. format won't do anything just acts as if you never pressed a button. I gave up for a few days as I know not what to try next. I'll try a fat32 again I guess. but it almost seems as if there is something not right about the communication between the 2 because sometimes the drive name comes up as something weird.

[readyakira]

so, I tried the factory file no better this way. I am not sure what is left to try at this point. It seems like a communication error, but it works on the computers fine using the same cords and wires.

[SystemDude]

Originally Posted by readyakira

Last I used partition magic 8 to make it one ext2 drive which the box sees now as one folder, but says it has to be a dos file system.

Originally Posted by readyakira

so, I tried the factory file no better this way. I am not sure what is left to try at this point. It seems like a communication error, but it works on the computers fine using the same cords and wires.

None of this agrees with my experience at all. For one thing, the EXT2 partition should work OK with the box (even though it makes it a little more tricky to copy video files off to a Windows machine for dubbing). And even though I would not have expected the factory file reload to help, at least you know it was not a problem with loading of the custom bin file.

I have used a total of two different USB hard drives and two USB flash sticks with my Elite and after formatting each to FAT32 where required, have had no drive-related problems. I am currently using a 500 Gb "no-name" drive and it works well. It got corrupted once and had to be reformatted, but bounced right back.

Only thing I can think to try now, is if you have (or can borrow) a decent-sized USB stick and try that, just to verify the STB's USB's are working right. You're right -- we are running out of ideas....