# Swapping R15 hard drives.



## carl6 (Nov 16, 2005)

More info on swapping hard drives in R15’s. I started discussing this in another thread, and that thread was closed. I did check to see if the following was "okay" to post with a moderator, and got the go ahead.

Cloned a drive from one R15 using Unix dd.

Cloned drive worked perfectly in original R15. All previously recorded content was there and could be watched (as expected).

Put original drive back in original R15. Worked fine (as expected).

Put cloned drive in second R15. 

-	Live tv viewing worked just fine.
-	Trick play (pause, rewind, etc.,) of live tv worked just fine.
-	VOD indicated all shows that were recorded on the other R15.
-	Could NOT play previously recorded content. Gave an access card expired error.
-	Once in VOD, could not “Back” or “Exit” out – still had the access card error.
BUT, could press guide and go back to live tv that way, and live tv worked just fine.
-	Can record new material, and it works just fine. Can play it, and exit from it back to live tv
-	Even after recording new material, still unable to watch previously recorded material.
-	Can delete previously recorded material (double dash).

So, it appears that a cloned R15 hard drive will work in another R15 with no problem EXCEPT you will not be able to watch any previously recorded material. You can record new, you can delete the old stuff, you just can’t watch something that was recorded on the other R15. Therefore, it is obvious that something is encoded within each recording that associates that recording with either an access card and/or a receiver.

Carl


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## qwerty (Feb 19, 2006)

Do you still have it setup like that? Can you try viewing the old recordings with the access card from the old unit?


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## Clint Lamor (Nov 15, 2005)

My suggestion would be not to talk about anything that can be even remotely considered hacking. Encryption is not assuredly considered in that area. So no more or this one gets a nice lock also.


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## qwerty (Feb 19, 2006)

Well, I'd still like to know if you moved both the drive and card to a new unit if you could access your old recordings. Not to hack, but to know if I could recover my recordings if the box died. Is that kind of discussion out of line?


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## Earl Bonovich (Nov 15, 2005)

I guess not...
My guess would be that you would have to have the moved Access Card re-married to the new hardware...

It is the discussions of the VideoGuard and the how the encryption works, is where we start to "stick our toes" out over the line.


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## carl6 (Nov 16, 2005)

I did not try moving the access card for several reasons. First off, I found out what I wanted to know. Second, I assumed that to make the R15 work at all with a different access card I would have to coordinate with DirecTV, and it was not worth the effort of trying to coordinate two access card swaps to find out what might happen. Lastly, I was intentionally staying away from the access card issue because of the locking of the previous thread. I posted the information because I thought it might be of value to someone with a drive problem at some future time.

On a separate note - I have now modified both of my R15's to run the fan continuously. They stay MUCH cooler. I'll keep an eye on them to make sure the fan doesn't burn out or freeze up prematurely, but so far it has been a very worthwhile change. All I did was power the fan off the 12 volt line that runs to the hard drive using a hard drive Y cable and small jumpers between the applicable connectors. Completey reversable if necessary.

Carl


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## qwerty (Feb 19, 2006)

carl6 said:


> I posted the information because I thought it might be of value to someone with a drive problem at some future time.
> Carl


It is helpfull. Thanks Carl.


carl6 said:


> On a separate note - I have now modified both of my R15's to run the fan continuously. They stay MUCH cooler. I'll keep an eye on them to make sure the fan doesn't burn out or freeze up prematurely, but so far it has been a very worthwhile change. All I did was power the fan off the 12 volt line that runs to the hard drive using a hard drive Y cable and small jumpers between the applicable connectors. Completey reversable if necessary.
> 
> Carl


I've also suspect heat was a problem Please follow up in 3 or 4 weeks and let us know how it works.


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## Wolffpack (Jul 29, 2003)

qwerty said:


> Well, I'd still like to know if you moved both the drive and card to a new unit if you could access your old recordings. Not to hack, but to know if I could recover my recordings if the box died. Is that kind of discussion out of line?


I think you'd have a 50/50 chance of that working. Which would be valuable to know. The scenario I'd be looking at is down the road, with DirecTV2Go, you have your portable device, or possibly networking is enabled between DTV DVRs. Your DVR goes bad but not the HD. You have shows on there you want, so could you get to those to download to a DTV2Go device or to transfer to another DVR via the network using your replacement DVR? 95% of the users will accept the loss of their shows, but those with the ability to swap a drive into a replacement unit could possibly salvage their shows and move them to a portable or another DVR. All the while maintaining the content security.

Of course, this all could be remedied by enabling external storage and even adding user control to which shows are recorded to which devices. Add yourself a 500GB external SATA and have all your "important" shows be directed to external storage while all of the DTV VOD/Showcase data is stored internally. You loose your unit, you take your SATA and plug it into your replacement unit. Works for me. 

Granted, this is assuming many more pieces of the eventual pie fall into place, but one can hope, can't they?


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## carl6 (Nov 16, 2005)

Halo said:


> The error message "access card expired" probably is just the default message used with a mismatched hard drive, and has nothing to do with the access card. ...
> 
> So, I may be wrong, but I really think the card has nothing to do with it.


I do not know what causes the results I saw, receiver, card, something else, ???

But I do know that the drive itself worked fine in the second unit - you could still pause and rewind live tv, you could record new programs and watch them, but you could not watch something that was recorded on the other (original) R15 that the drive came from. So some type of data associating the recording and the receiver or access card it was recorded on is embedded with each recording.

Carl


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## Earl Bonovich (Nov 15, 2005)

Okay... After a long thought... I am going to nix this thread as well...
It is just comming to close to the edge of where we want to be on this forum board...

(I going to nix some of the posts in the thread, but keep some of them)

The technique of moving a drive from one unit to another is valuable.... since it does take a while to setup the Series Links and preferences..
But trying to figure out how to access recordings on that second unit, could lead down a path to how to access it via other means as well.

Sorry......


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