Choosing the Right TiVo hard drive

TiVo uses an internal hard drive to save recorded shows, Season Passes and settings. Not only that, all of it's file system (MFS) and it's operating system (Linux OS) are kept on the hard drive as well. To make matters worse, TiVo runs 24x7.
So the hard drive gets used non-stop and never goes to sleep. For that reason, most TiVo problem is related to hard drive failure.

List of tell-tale signs of hard drive failure include pixelation, frequent reboots and loud noise coming from your TiVo.
If you have experienced any of these symptoms, there is a good chance that your hard drive has some kind of problem and it a good idea to replace or upgrade your TiVo drive.

Of course, that's not the only reason to upgrade your TiVo. Most people upgrade because they need more recording space since factory drive that comes with TiVo is not big enough for most people.

Now, the first thing you need to know is what kind of TiVo you have (TiVo Series 1, 2, 3 or 4 and Directv or Standalone).
TiVo model is printed on the back of the unit so you can look it up there. You can also look at System Information under TiVo Central screen to see what kind of TiVo you have.

Next, gauge your TV viewing habit. Some people like to watch few of their favorite shows and dislikes commercials so they wait until their favorite show is recorded then watch it as they skip commercials. With this type, factory size hard drive or relatively smaller hard drive would work. If you are like me, who would like to record the whole series and watch them during "rerun season", then you would need lots of recording space.

Finally, know where your TiVo is located. We will get in to this more later but it's something to do with how much noise you can tolerate.

Before we get in to different TiVo types, you need to know few things about hard drives.

The Basics of Hard Drive:

Older hard drives came in PATA interface. They are also know as ATA, UATA, Parallel ATA. All TiVo Series 1 and 2 use this type of interface. Newer type of interface is called SATA or Serial ATA and all Series 3 and 4 use them.

Most manufacturers stopped making PATA drives all together so it's harder to find PATA drives now. There are SATA to ATA adapters so you can use newer SATA drives on older Series 2 TiVo. But not all adapters work and there are many brands so you need to get the right one.

Another thing you need to know is the hard drive cache size. Generally, more cache it has, it give you better performance. But more cache it has more expensive it gets.

Also there is RPM. Higher RPM will give you faster performance but will run at slightly higher temperature.

Now on to TiVo series...

Series 1 TiVo:

Currently, all Series 1 TiVos can only utilize 137GB of the hard drive space due to the software limitation.
Most Series 1 TiVos have 2nd drive bay inside available for adding a 2nd drive.

If you have dual hard drives you can have 274GB max. You can expand beyond that limit but you need to hack your TiVo and put a special Linux Kernel that supports hard drives greater than 137GB.
However, you have to be aware that once the TiVo software gets updated, you will lose the extra capacity greater than 137GB. In order to gain it back, you have to rehack your TiVo. This must be done immediately after the software gets updated, otherwise new software will try to fix the TiVo file system called MFS and will corrupt the file system. At that point, your TiVo will go into reboot cycle. Only way to fix that problem will be to put a fresh software image on your hard drive. 

It's hard to find new smaller hard drives, and 160GB is cheaper to buy now days, so most people buy 160GB drive and use 137GB of it.

Series 2 TiVo:

Most older standalone Series 2 TiVos require software 7.1 or newer to be able to use hard drives greater than 137GB.
On newer standalone Series 2 TiVos, software 5.1 or greater support hard drives greater than 137GB.
All Directv Series 2 TiVos with software 6.1 or higher supports hard drives greater than 137GB. 
Directv HD TiVo (HR10-250) has built in support for hard drives greater than 137GB with the software version 3.1 or higher.
Some TiVos with DVD player or burners have capacity lock put on the software. You can use sd-h400_unlock utility to fix that problem.

Most Series 2 TiVos do not have 2nd drive bay inside so you would have to buy a dual mounting bracket. You will also need to buy a dual IDE cable, power splitter, fan if possible. If you have TiVo with DVD burner or player built in, you cannot have dual drive setup since there is no space in the unit to add a 2nd drive.

With the most current TiVo software, you can have up to 2.2TB of total recording space.

We are the first company to provide 2TB internal drive upgrade to most standalone Series 2. Directv TiVo cannot handle 2TB internal drive at this time due to it's older OS being used.

Series 3 TiVo: TCD648250B (aka TiVo Series 3), TCD652160 (aka TiVo HD), TCD658000 (aka TiVo HD XL)

TCD648250B is the first standalone TiVo with dual high def. recording capability. This model uses SATA drive unlike Series 2 Tivo.

TCD652160 is the newer HD capable TiVo. This TiVo uses SATA drive as well but uses 64bit Tivo File System called MFS64. With changes to MFS64, TiVo file system can handle more than 2.2TB of disk space but the linux kernel used cannot handle more than 2.2 TB so it's still limited to 2.2TB of total disk space.

Next came, TCD658000. It's hardware is almost identical as TiVo HD other than the 1TB SATA internal hard drive and THX certification. Disk space is still limited to 2.2TB of total recording space.

All Series 3 TiVos have an eSATA or external drive port.
For Series 3 (TCD648250B), you can add any eSATA drive by using TiVo menu.
For TiVo HD and HD XL (TCD652160 and TCD658000), you can only use TiVo certified drive called My DVR Expander using TiVo menu.
Also, you cannot use TiVo menu to add an eSATA drive if you have upgraded your internal drive capacity.
For all three models, you can add any eSATA drive using TiVo upgrade tools and a computer.

We are the first company to provide 2TB internal upgrade kit to all three Series 3 TiVo.
There are some eBay vendors who claim that they can do it but they are simply doing bit by bit copy of our drives that they bought from us. All I can say is good luck copying 2TB drives bit by bit.

Series 4 TiVo: TCD746320 (aka TiVo Premiere), TCD748000 (aka TiVo Premiere XL)

TiVo Premiere come with a 320GB SATA internal hard drive, faster dual processor and HD user interface. TiVo Premiere XL is like TiVo Premiere but come with a 1TB SATA internal hard drive and THX certification.

Currently, us and Weaknees.com are the only companies that can provide upgrade drives to TiVo Series 4.
The reason is that TiVo Inc. made some changes to it's file system and existing tools used to perform upgrade no longer work. We have developed a special tool to perform the upgrades. We can't speak for Weakees.com but I suspect they did the same.

Like Series 3, Series 4 TiVos have an eSATA or external port. However, you can only use TiVo certified My DVR Expander using Tivo menu. However, you can add up to 2TB of external drive using our upgrade kit.

Now with Series 4, you can have up to 4TB of recording space. (2TB internal and 2TB external)

Non-Tivo Directv R15, HR20, HR21, HR22, HR23:

Directv R15 is non-TiVo and comes with fixed size 160GB Seagate hard drive. You cannot expand the capacity on this model as of now. If you need your hard drive replaced on this model, contact us for more details. Ignore the rest of the guide as they don't apply to non-Tivo DVRs.
Directv HD DVR HR20, HR21, HR22, HR23 are non-TiVo HD DVR and come with various sized SATA hard drives.
You can expand capacity on these models. Contact us for more details on how to expand, transfer settings and recordings. Ignore the rest of the guide as they don't apply to non-Tivo DVRs .

Choosing the Right Size:

Choose the hard drive size according to your viewing habit. If you use TiVo as a VCR (recording few shows and watch them at later time), then small sizes like 80GB, 120GB or 160GB will work fine. If you like to save entire season of shows and watch them during off season, then you would want to get the biggest size you can afford. The biggest consumer hard drive available currently is 2TB.

Any hard drive greater 1TB needs special attention in order to work properly on TiVo so if you are buying an already prepared drive, buy it from a seller who knows what they are doing. Make sure the drive is the same size or bigger than your current TiVo hard drive.

Choosing the Right Brand:

It used to be simple to choose the right brand because most brands worked well. But now, that's not the case.
Not all hard drives work well in a TiVo. It depends on brand, model, even firmware rev.

Here is where our expertise come in handy. We buy bunch of drives and do extensive testing before sell a particular batch. So we know which currently available drives work the best for your TiVo.
For example, Western Digital is switching all their drives to Advanced Formatting or 4k sector size. We know how to make these drives work the best by aligning partitions for a TiVo and tune it properly. Without proper adjustments, your TiVo will be sluggish. Beware of vendors selling these newer WD Green drives as they do not know how to adjust these drives correctly for TiVo.

For various reasons, some drives don't work well with certain TiVo model so you need to get a drive from a qualified professional and vendor.

Finally, the noise factor:

So where is your TiVo located? In your Bedroom?
If that's the case, you would want to go with WD Green Drives, Hitachi or Samsung with AAM set to the quietest setting.
Seagate drives are "no" "no" since they tend to be loud and will keep you awake at night if you sensitive to sounds. Only exception to that is their DB35 or Pipleline HD series drives which are made for DVR and they are quiet.

Warranty Info:

Most retail hard drives come with 3 year warranty from the purchased date. If you can't produce proof of the purchased date, factory date is used. Most OEM drives carry 3 years as well.  Most brands have date stamp on the hard drive. 

Final words:

Once you are used to TiVo, there is no going back. It's just not the same watching TV without it.
So take take of your TiVo before it goes down so you will have many years of fulfilling TV viewing experience.

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