Computer & Laptop Accessories

[Question162182]

I want to buy an external hard drive that will work with my bell hd receiver to make it a pvr. Can you suggest one for me

[ibidds]

any hard drive with USB2 or 3 will work on any PVR. When  you plug it in it will prompt you to format the drive. Once you do that it is good to go. Choose at least 1TB so you have lots of room.

One thought though, use a desktop drive to ensure that power is never an issue. Unlike a portable drive the desk (3.5") drive will have its own power supply and not rely on the USB bus for power.

I have used both desk and portable drives in the past with Bell recievers.

[Big_T]

Will a Maxtor one touch 4 work with a Bell tv pvr recdiver  model 6400 and up??

[JouMoer]

Getting an external HD is not that simple and you can have unnecessary headaches so make sure to get the right thing.  I have a Bell 6400 and the Bell website lists the requirements which do mean something.

1. The HD must be between 50 gig and 2 TB. A 3 TB will not work even though the price difference may be tempting.

2. The HD must have it's own power source.  People talk of inserting a flash drive in the 6400 USB port and getting it to work. It does - with SD, not HD  and is flaky and inconsistent

3. The HD must not "go to sleep" or if it does, you need to be able to over-ride this. The Seagate I had did this and I could not over-ride thru the receiver. This caused problems as it would not wake up to record and I had to replace.

4. Some newer HD's only have a 3.0 USB connection. These will not work. You must have a 2.0 USB connection.

5. The HD must have a 7200 RPM rotation speed.

I am not sure how important rotation speed is but I have a 500 gig WD My Book Essential Edition that hooked up flawlessly. It meets all the requirements and has a 7200 RPM. I am looking at upgrading to a 2 TB but the 2TB WD My Book has 5400 RPM and I am reuctant to buy this and then have to return it if it does not perform.

As an aside, the Bell 6400 comes with 2 USB ports but you can only hook up one HD.

[Big_T]

Will my max toe one touch work with my 6400 bell hd tuner??????

[Big_T]

Please wil someone let me know if the maxtor one touch will work with my 6400 bell hd receiver??

[JouMoer]

I am not sure what size Maxtor One Touch you have. Does it meet the parameters I have shown as laid out by Bell? Most important, is it 2 Gig or less? If so, then there is no harm in hooking up with your 6400.

If it is USB 2.0 it will communicate. If not, then it is probably 3.0 and so will not work.

If it does communicate you will get a message that the PVR will re-format the drive and you will lose everything on it. Make sure you backup everything you do not want to lose. After the format it will say you done at which point you can test by recording and reviewing.

You can also rewind while watching live and if this works then your PVR is working.

Finally, since Maxtor is Seagate and they have a problem with going to sleep, set to tape overnight and see if this works. If not, the HD probably went to sleep.

[JouMoer]

In my post #4 of 7 I indicated that I could not get a Seagate to properly work for me with the 6400. You may have this issue with the Maxtor in that it may seem to work but when you get to tape overnight, you find that nothing is recorded probably because the HD went to sleep. This is the issue:-

You can change the sleep setting thru a computer but when you hook the HD up to the 6400, it re-formats the drive and reverts everything back to factory settings and if the factory setting default is to go to sleep then you screwed unless you can figure out how to program this thru the TV.