# 921 Hard Drive Died, what should I do?



## DashingDaryl (May 9, 2006)

I LOVE the 921, no matter how many quirks it has.

But alas, my 921's hard drive died yesterday. (Clicking Drive, Blue Screen announcement and everything) As a long term Dish Subscriber, normally I'd call them and ask them for a repair/replacement, but I recently moved and discontinued my DISH Subscription.

I have been using the 921 as a OTA HD Reciever and a DVR.

Does anyone have any suggestions on what I should do? I REALLY want to replace the HD myself, but I can't find any information on how to get the machine to recognize the drive. (Can anyone PM me with it?)

Though I'd really rather not, I'm willing to send it in to have it repaired. Where would I do that since DISH is out of the question?

Any help you could offer would be much Appreciated!


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## brettbolt (Feb 22, 2006)

If I were you, I'd call Dish Network and tell them what happened. Even if you end up subscribing to AT60 for a few months, its cheaper than a new 921.

My 921 hard drive failed 3 weeks ago. Dish replaced it at no cost. 3 business days after I called, I had a replacement 921. They probably have a vast warehouse full of 921's from customers who traded theirs in for a 622.

On 921's, the hard drive contains the operating system. So you can't just pop a new drive in and expect it to work.


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## DashingDaryl (May 9, 2006)

Thanks for the response. Reading various boards I see that if I had cloned my Hard Drive before hand, I would be ok. Does anyone know if I can clone a different 921 harddrive for the OS? I know I won't be able to play the recorded shows, but could I reset the PVR to factory defaults and have it still work?


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## harsh (Jun 15, 2003)

DashingDaryl said:


> Thanks for the response. Reading various boards I see that if I had cloned my Hard Drive before hand, I would be ok. Does anyone know if I can clone a different 921 harddrive for the OS? I know I won't be able to play the recorded shows, but could I reset the PVR to factory defaults and have it still work?


I believe that there were two different releases of the 921. You would almost certainly have to get an image from the same release.


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## brettbolt (Feb 22, 2006)

You would need a Maxtor "QuickView" drive, which is designed for PVRs that are running 24/7.


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## Michael P (Oct 27, 2004)

> If I were you, I'd call Dish Network and tell them what happened. Even if you end up subscribing to AT60 for a few months, its cheaper than a new 921.


 AT-60, heck, subscribe to Dish Family w.o. locals for $19.95!

As far as "cloning" the HD, there may be lost bits of the OS on your present drive. Have you tried to get it into "rescue" mode (I'm not sure what the correct term is, however I had several 921's go into this mode by doing a hard reboot after a crash). The 921 tries to repair the OS by finding good sectors on the HD (anyway I presume this is what is happening). When you are in the mode be sure you have a dish connected and aimed correctly, for it looks for data off the satellite. The red, blue and amber LED's light up one at a time, top to bottom, like the light tree at a drag racing track. It takes up to 5 minutes of this light show. If you are lucky you end up with a 921 set tothe factiry defaults (you have to do a check switch and rescan your locals).


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## DonLandis (Dec 17, 2003)

DashingDaryl said:
 

> Thanks for the response. Reading various boards I see that if I had cloned my Hard Drive before hand, I would be ok. Does anyone know if I can clone a different 921 harddrive for the OS? I know I won't be able to play the recorded shows, but could I reset the PVR to factory defaults and have it still work?


YOU are SOL! It is not possible to use another 921 drive image set. The files are matched to the 921 firmware. The process for backing up your hard drive *is not* a simple procedure but is possible. In addition the restore process will require a connection to the satellites before powering up the 921 with the restored drive so it can be matched to the 921 and updated by the signal from the birds. That is the final step in the restore process before running checkswitch. It's the same part that MichaelP describbed in his "rescue" procedure. Bottom line I know of no way you could complete a restore process without your original drive image set and a two line sat connection. Then there is that problem of your card being flagged as no subscription so as I said, I think you are SOL. I agree with previous advice- Subscribe and then get a replacement 921 from DishNetwork.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

Too much speculation here. The 921 need to have at least one good boot partition or have any version of SW in TAR format in root partition. Practically speaking, there is no magic to make it work - for start you need to install on your PC a Linux with XFS support; then check your 921 disk for integrity. BTW, any disk with size 250 GB will works; best is quiet 7200 RPM, 16 MB cache, lowest power spec ( WD is pretty good for that ).


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## brettbolt (Feb 22, 2006)

I agree with Don -- call DN and get them to replace it. Might cost $49 and a brief subscription, but probably cheaper than a new drive.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

I would run some program on PC like MHDD.EXE against the disk to see if any bad sectors; if not or all of them remapped after couple passes, then you don't need to buy new one.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

brettbolt said:


> I agree with Don -- call DN and get them to replace it. Might cost $49 and a brief subscription, but probably cheaper than a new drive.


That was quick turn back  - why you proposed first the maxtor disk ?

"You would need a Maxtor "QuickView" drive, which is designed for PVRs that are running 24/7." - what was in your mind that time ?


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## DonLandis (Dec 17, 2003)

P Smith-

There was speculation that the Maxtor Quick View is necessary as a repacement drive on the 921. Not so. You don't even need a 250G drive. I think the speculation that a Quickview drive would be necessary came from some posts in the past that 
1. That is the drive that many (not all) PVR921s came with and
2. a statement by Michael from Weakknees, maker of HDTIVO replacement drives highly recommends them for his best replacement on the HDTIVO. 
The quickview was indeed designed as an optimum drive for DVR use and other video servers. They may be good for the long haul. But, as a drive _"requirement"_ on the 921, not so.

Additionally, you don't need a PC running Linux although maybe someone has figured out a way to do it this way, I don't know about that. I know what works and what will get you hosed if you do it wrong. "magic"? no but procedural, yes.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

Don, one of my point was about 921 HDD file system check (fsck), this step is require Linux+XFS.

It is interesting to see how Dish developers tried almost every type of File System for their PVR-DVR; from MSDOS on 7200 to EXT3/XFS on 921, but returned back to that own proprietary 'Dave FS' first used in 501 when build DP962 aka ViP622.


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## brettbolt (Feb 22, 2006)

P Smith said:


> That was quick turn back  - why you proposed first the maxtor disk ?
> 
> "You would need a Maxtor "QuickView" drive, which is designed for PVRs that are running 24/7." - what was in your mind that time ?


501's need Maxtor QuickView's, and I incorrectly assumed that 921's had the same requirement.

But without a drive image , how can you get the operating system back? Thats why I think you should send it to DN and get a replacement.


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## DonLandis (Dec 17, 2003)

brett- back last year when several people were trying to figure a way to install larger hard drives some were testing the idea of working from scratch using match versions of Linux OS and letting the 921 re-establish the handshake / marriage but I never heard whether these guys had success with that approach. I recall some of the discussion and it got very fast very Linux technical so I didn't feel it was anything I wanted to attempt. Maybe P Smith can bring us all up to speed with that approach. You are correct, however, without the original drive image from the 4 partitions from your own 921's original drive, not the 5th, you couldn't use the method I'm familiar with.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

As I recall, the process was:
- use Linux+XFS
- get new HDD ( 250 GB is optimal because of hardcoded TIME limit for recordings )
- create 5 partitions with same original size ( don't remember, but I could find my records )
- make XFS type file systems on 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 5th; 4th is a SWAP partition
- copy DISHLinux.tar ( any version ) into 1st partition
- install back the HDD and wait for 1/2 hour


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## DonLandis (Dec 17, 2003)

Where does one get "DishLinux.tar" ?

Did a Google search on it and discovered some fascinating reading. Not much on the file but rather some stuff from year 2002.


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

from any working 921  - it's only 30 MB file


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## cpufixer1 (Jun 10, 2003)

Dish also replaced my 921 for free even though it is two years old. I will not go to the 622 because they make me subscibe to HD.


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## DashingDaryl (May 9, 2006)

WHO WOO! I resolved my Dead 921 issue this weekend.

Here is what I ended up doing.

With all the speculation about replacement disks, I opted to get an EXACT replacement Disk. This ended up being a 250Gig Maxtor 5400 RPM Maxline II disk. 
maxtor.com/portal/site/Maxtor/menuitem.ba88f6d7cf664718376049b291346068/?channelpath=%2Fen_us%2FProducts%2FEnterprise+Storage%2FMaXLine+Family%2FMaXLine+II&productview=Specifications

I bought it off of eBay for $115 from a very very helpful guy named TivoMaster1. 
feedback.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewFeedback&userid=tivomaster1&iid=9744863952&frm=284&ssPageName=VIP:feedback:1:us

Then I used a freeware program called Clone MAXX pcinspector.de/clone-maxx/uk/welcome.htm that did a Bit by Bit copy. The reason I chose this program was: it was Free, but more importantly, you could create a boot disk.

After I created a boot disk with Clone MAXX on it, I installed the drive with problems on one ide cable, and the New Drive ton the other IDE cable.

The program determined the disk was bad, and compensated by slowing down the transfer rate. At first it was going to take an Hour, but after it detected the error, it changed rates and took about 13 hours.

Luckily I only had less than 100 bad sectors. I had enough good sectors to get my system up and running. The drive booted up and I did not lose any programming.

I would recommend this to anyone planning on keeping their 921. Not only would you have a backup drive in case your primary goes bad, but you could fill up a second drive with programming (For those of u that record but never watch)

I don't wish this problem on anyone, but if you find yourself in similar circumstances, I hope this helps.

Daryl


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## P Smith (Jul 25, 2002)

Well, good for you - but you missed one important step what I mentioned a few times before - run MHDD.EXE from boot floppy and REMAP bad sectors on source disk BEFORE do cloning.


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## BarryO (Dec 16, 2003)

Daryl,

interesting. So I could do this "pre-emptively" and keep the new HD as a back-up for the circumstance when the 921's HD dies (all HD's die eventually).


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## music_beans (Mar 21, 2003)

cpufixer1 said:


> Dish also replaced my 921 for free even though it is two years old. I will not go to the 622 because they make me subscibe to HD.


Then subscribe to HD.  Plus you will get a newer model reciever too.


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