I just bought a 1TB Seagate hd for my 622 receiver. It's not that one Dish is promoting but it was recognized by my receiver and worked. The problem is that it regularly needs unplugged because none of my recordings are showing up, there's an error trying to send recordings to it, it just isn't even recognized, etc. This always fixes itself after I re-power the hard drive. Is this at all typical of most others experiences with externals? Even though some hard drives are recognized by your dish receiver are they still not fully compatible? I was wondering if maybe each night when my receiver shuts down to check for updates, the hard drive is going into sleep mode and not coming out the next day as I always need to restart the hard drive first thing in the morning as it is no longer recognized as being hooked up.
Is it normal for external hd's to be very glitchy?
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Not normal at all. I have 3 different EHDDs that are all plugged into a USB hub. I've NEVER had to unplug any of them...
I will however note, that sometimes I have to turn my EHD's off and on, a few times to get it to recognize them... However, once recognized, never have issues... Haven't had that problem with recognizing them in a while though...
It is a FreeAgent Desk Drive 1TB. I agree with you, I think it must be a sleep mode problem but I don't know what to do. I know of PC programs that can write an empty string every so often to keep the drive from going into sleep mode but I have no idea what to do when it's hooked up to a dish receiver.
FreeAgent Desktop 1.5: Adjust Power Setting - Windows
Have to do it from a PC. Don't think you have to reformat the drive or anything. Just don't let Windows reformat it if you have recordings on it. Or just restore your recordings to the receiver before you hook the drive to your PC.
Also, since since the receiver already formatted the drive, and erased the Seagate Manager, here's where to download it:
FreeAgent | Go, FreeAgent | Desk, FreeAgent | XTreme | Seagate
Have to do it from a PC. Don't think you have to reformat the drive or anything. Just don't let Windows reformat it if you have recordings on it. Or just restore your recordings to the receiver before you hook the drive to your PC.
Also, since since the receiver already formatted the drive, and erased the Seagate Manager, here's where to download it:
FreeAgent | Go, FreeAgent | Desk, FreeAgent | XTreme | Seagate
This is both good or bad depending on your view. You can download the free agent utilities program for windows only and set your drive to either go to sleep at different lenghts of time or never sleep. Maybe someone has a link, seagate has 2 apps for these, you will need the one that will say it has the utilities feature. I found out when dish first activated this feature over 3 years ago that when the free agent EHD's go into this mode you can make duplicate copies very easy. I've been doing it all this time and have never had a problem. Some said they would fix this but they never did and I don't think they can, but that's another story. If you get that error message and you can still see your recordings your in the right mode to duplicate. If it stays in sleep to long your programs won't show up. I set one of my free agent's to go to sleep in 3 minutes and use it as a copy machine. This is very useful if you do not want to lose any movies or shows that you really want in case your box or one your EHD crashes. Here is a step by step way to make copies with just your remote.
1-- transfer programs you want to make a copy of to your EHD
2-- wait till it is in sleep mode , the best way to check if it is ready is to try and send a show to the EHD, if you get the error message then it's ready for copying.
3-- select which show or shows to copy from your EHD, I've done as many as 20-30 at one time , it takes the same amount of time as a normal restore
4-- hit the restore button, when it's done it will ask if you want to play them but you can say no and exit out
5-- your done, you can access the EHD and you will still see all the shows still there and look at your box and they will be there too.
When I first found this trick it was by accident but it did freak me out to go to the EHD and see all the show's and movies not there. after I unplugged and replugged it back in I saw they were back so after I waited awhile I decided to send them back to my 622 at the time, just to be safe. I think the free agent's were set to go to sleep at either the 3 or 5 minute time out of the box. after I restored all the shows back to the 622 I looked at the free agent and they were still there. I did a lot of testing and checking to make sure the copies were of the same quality with no problems and found them to be identical in every way. This all still works with the latest updates and the silver free agents up to 1.5 TB, I bought some on black friday for $70 at wal mart. Some members have asked why anybody would want to do this, here is a few reasons . I still have a pocket dish and need to make copies of shows from HBO or Showtime "DRM" so that I can transfer a copy and still have it on my 722 or EHD.
These boxes and EHD's fail and you will lose eveyrthing if you don't have a copy backup on one or more EHD's.
Since you can now move content between boxes if you get a another box you can move content to it without worrying about DRM same as with a pocket dish. Some see these free agents as trouble ,I see this as a added benefit plus they have a 5 year warranty. I have some set to not go to sleep and some to go to sleep in case I need to make copies. Now with the 1.5 TB's I can have a lot of content on one drive and have the secure feeling that I have copies of everything on other drives , just in case it goes bad.
1-- transfer programs you want to make a copy of to your EHD
2-- wait till it is in sleep mode , the best way to check if it is ready is to try and send a show to the EHD, if you get the error message then it's ready for copying.
3-- select which show or shows to copy from your EHD, I've done as many as 20-30 at one time , it takes the same amount of time as a normal restore
4-- hit the restore button, when it's done it will ask if you want to play them but you can say no and exit out
5-- your done, you can access the EHD and you will still see all the shows still there and look at your box and they will be there too.
When I first found this trick it was by accident but it did freak me out to go to the EHD and see all the show's and movies not there. after I unplugged and replugged it back in I saw they were back so after I waited awhile I decided to send them back to my 622 at the time, just to be safe. I think the free agent's were set to go to sleep at either the 3 or 5 minute time out of the box. after I restored all the shows back to the 622 I looked at the free agent and they were still there. I did a lot of testing and checking to make sure the copies were of the same quality with no problems and found them to be identical in every way. This all still works with the latest updates and the silver free agents up to 1.5 TB, I bought some on black friday for $70 at wal mart. Some members have asked why anybody would want to do this, here is a few reasons . I still have a pocket dish and need to make copies of shows from HBO or Showtime "DRM" so that I can transfer a copy and still have it on my 722 or EHD.
These boxes and EHD's fail and you will lose eveyrthing if you don't have a copy backup on one or more EHD's.
Since you can now move content between boxes if you get a another box you can move content to it without worrying about DRM same as with a pocket dish. Some see these free agents as trouble ,I see this as a added benefit plus they have a 5 year warranty. I have some set to not go to sleep and some to go to sleep in case I need to make copies. Now with the 1.5 TB's I can have a lot of content on one drive and have the secure feeling that I have copies of everything on other drives , just in case it goes bad.
My trick works with the free agent desk models 320-1.5 TB and with both the 722 and 622, not sure about the 722k , I think I also did it with my 612 too. One other reason this is good is when you record a pay for view and it has a limited time to watch, I'll either record an all day a few times but if it is a one time I can make a bunch of copies and watch them for up to the 2-3 months until they expire.
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I highly recommend a Western Digital over Seagate. I have yet to have a problem with any of the three I have, never have to unplug them or do anything.
Tampa,
As you know I bought one of these as per your recommendation.When you say you never unplug them are you talking about the power source or usb? Or both?
Thanks
I agree 100%. WD Caviar green (or black) are the best.
Hitachis are the worst, they just go to sleep and there's no utility to change that. Don't even think about using them on a Magnavox recorder or a Wii.
Ya, I should explain. While I do move from one receiver to another, when I don't, it sometimes stays with one receiver for a couple of weeks or more. In that time, it never has a glitch - it is accessible 100% of the time with none of the problems of a Seagate. I also think you find the fail rate for Seagate is higher than WD.
So if I understand you leave it plugged into the usb and keep it powered unless your moving it to another receiver.?
Thanks
