HDD Initialization woes

[JeTTBLaCK]

Hi.

I've just bought a Samsung 1.5 Tb Ecogreen HDD to enhance my Vu+ Duo.

The disk is detected ok but attempts to initialize result in an stb crash. I'm not sure if it's a size issue as I've only seen 1Tb disks mentioned previously but for the extra 500Gb it seemed worth the price.

Any suggestions on what the filesystem should be (ext2/ext3 maybe?) and if the tools exist on the Vu+ Duo to manually create a filesystem on the disk?

I'm currently running latest VTI image 1.0

Many thanks

[JeTTBLaCK]

Answering my own post - it seems as if there are issues with HDD above 1Tb but there are two potential solutions to try. First restore the original Vu+ image as per factory delivery then attempt an initialization. If that fails, then install the disk in a pc and boot with a linux distribution (live disk may be easiest such as Knoppix or mepis) then format the disk as an ext3 filesystem. Once that's done, mount the disk and create a folder on it (such as /movies for example). Then shutdown the pc and install the disk back in your Vu+ Duo and see if it is then correctly recognised and accessible.

HTH - credit to RealMagic911 on the German vuplus forum btw.

Cheers

[BadKarma]

Hi JeTTBLaCK,

I installed the Samsung F2 1.5 TB 5400rpm HDD just a few minutes ago. Can confirm I had no problems initialising this disk using "VuPlus-Support.co.uk Fully Lopaded OpenPLi powered backup image" by Sicilian. I have read somewhere people having HDD initialising problems with the Dream Elite image also.

Regards
BK

[JeTTBLaCK]

Hi BK.

Many thanks for the quick response. I've just flashed back to original 4.6 and the disk is busy initializing now. I may try the OpenPLi that you mention - still early days yet as I'm in my first week still :)

Cheers

[steve1978]

I had the same issues on dream elite, box would crash or it would just fail I installed pli it worked first time, went back to dream elite and everything works fine now

[canthackit]

did have problems with Dream Elite and a Samsung 1Tb HDD would just not recognise it although it was listed.

so i copied all my stuff to the the PC hdd, then i could intialise the Samsung in the DUO, it formated and mounted the drive, copied everything back over, works fine now.

just one other thing whilst on the subject, back in the good old bad old day's of DB's there was the facility to mount/unmount and format the HDD in the box and selectable format's, reiserfs, ext2, ext3, why oh why did they all dispense with this idea and just make the job more difficult than need be.

regards: canthackit

[RubbeRNL]

Hi JeTTBLaCK,

I installed the Samsung F2 1.5 TB 5400rpm HDD just a few minutes ago. Can confirm I had no problems initialising this disk using "VuPlus-Support.co.uk Fully Lopaded OpenPLi powered backup image" by Sicilian. I have read somewhere people having HDD initialising problems with the Dream Elite image also.

Regards
BK

Hi, what date was that "VuPlus-Support.co.uk Fully Lopaded OpenPLi powered backup image" image ?
I also cant initialise the same harddisk I bought yesterday , and I am using Pli from june.

thanks.

[Sicilian]

Hi, what date was that "VuPlus-Support.co.uk Fully Lopaded OpenPLi powered backup image" image ?
I also cant initialise the same harddisk I bought yesterday , and I am using Pli from june.

thanks.

What date does the fully loaded image have here? http://www.vuplus-support.co.uk/forumdisplay.php?19-VU-Support.co.uk-OpenPLi-Powered-images

[RubbeRNL]

very strange but initialisation worked with a usb stick in the front usb connetcion.
I wanted to flash but forgot to take the power off, so still the same pli image as before.
Did however manually make the movie dir to record, but now it works.
thanks.

[daddykins]

Hi , I have just fitted a WD Caviar 1TB...and I thought all was good, because it was listed ok.

But, now I have tried to record and I get the "no HDD found or not initialised" error.

I have initialised it, and the process appeared to go ok (about 5 minutes) but in fact the problem remains.

I don't have the option to format in pc -- is there any other way I can "wake up" mydrive?

Cheers, D

[bob1]

Wd have problems in the duo according to vu official site ,why can't you format in pc?
I had a problem last week (my fault) and zeroed the drive worked fine after that.

[pooface]

Also, what image are you using?! Are you sure the drive is mounting correctly?! In telnet, type the command "df -h", and ensure it gives something like this:


Filesystem Size Used Available Use% Mounted on
/dev/mtdblock0 118.0M 43.8M 74.2M 37% /
udev 2.0M 56.0k 1.9M 3% /dev
/dev/mtdblock2 4.0M 388.0k 3.6M 9% /boot
tmpfs 68.8M 224.0k 68.6M 0% /var
tmpfs 68.8M 16.0k 68.8M 0% /tmp
tmpfs 68.8M 0 68.8M 0% /dev/shm
/dev/sda1 3.7G 1.0G 2.7G 27% /media/usb
/dev/sdb1 1.4T 666.3G 730.5G 48% /media/hdd

ensure that in the last column, on the one where it says /media/hdd, it gives the correct size of the disk... In my example above, the hdd is a 1.5tb e-sata. If /media/hdd does not appear in the right-hand column, then you have not mounted the hdd correctly...

PS, Edit working fine for me now, cheers Sic ;)

[daddykins]

Hi, I got things sorted, found the process and it gave me a useful learning curve for a newbie like me, with telnet ….

================
Connected to vu duo box via telnet and used :—

umount /media/hdd
mkfs.ext3 /dev/sda1 (it takes approximately 15-20 minutes)

mount /media/hdd

Then, created a folder say "movie" --

mkdir /media/hdd/movie

You can modify the mkfs line as follows:-

mkfs.ext3 -m 0 /dev/sda1

apparently this should stop it reserving unnecessary disk space for “root system” but I’m not sure if it worked on mine ‘cos I only have 960 meg available !

Hope this helps someone,

D

[gareth41]

I always install Western Digital green edition hdd's in these units, im a NZ retailer by the way, anything 1Tb and over is advanced format, WD10EARS and WD20EARS model numbers are advanced format. These drives must have jumpers 5-6 and 7-8 set prior to hdd initialization, or initialization may fail. Once jumpers are set, initilization will take approx 15 to 20 mins on a 2Tb drive. 5-6 cap the drive to 1.5Gb/s and 7-6 tell the drive to use the old sector format not the advanced format.

[canthackit]

Try this i posted it on another forum.

How To Format/Mount HDD on Dream Elite

Hi
I found this post on the Dream Elite site in the DB 800 section it's a post by dimmie.
And it works on the VU+ DUO tested by me.
If you dont have a text editor i always use Crimson Editor it's free just google it.
Finally just doing a restart didn't work fo me so pull the power.


Workaround / fix for harddisk formatting error in Dream Elite Image

After a lot of testing, I found out that the dream-elite team has deactivated a line in fstab which causes error when you want to format a new harddisk in your dreambox.
If you get an error while formatting the harddisk in your dreambox you can do the following trick to get your harddisk formatted:



1 .Open the file fstab with a linux-compatible editor (i used textpad).
fstab can be found in "/etc"

2. When you have opened it you will see something like this:

rootfs / auto defaults 1 1
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
devpts /dev/pts devpts mode=0620,gid=5 0 0
usbfs /proc/bus/usb usbfs defaults 0 0
/dev/mtdblock2 /boot jffs2 ro 0 0
tmpfs /var tmpfs defaults 0 0
tmpfs /tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0
#/dev/sda1 /media/hdd auto defaults 0 0

3. Now remove the '#' so that it will be:

rootfs / auto defaults 1 1
proc /proc proc defaults 0 0
devpts /dev/pts devpts mode=0620,gid=5 0 0
usbfs /proc/bus/usb usbfs defaults 0 0
/dev/mtdblock2 /boot jffs2 ro 0 0
tmpfs /var tmpfs defaults 0 0
tmpfs /tmp tmpfs defaults 0 0
/dev/sda1 /media/hdd auto defaults 0 0

4. Put the edited fstab file back in /etc, give it rights 644 and restart your box.

5. After the restart, format your harddisk, it will format without errors.

6. Play some channel and do some time-shifting (pause/play etc)

7. I noticed that the mapping option in Dreamelite image doesn't work anymore when you remove the '#" so now change the fstab file back to original, give it rights 644 and put the # in front of that line again.

8. Restart your box again.

9. Map your harddisk.


Tested on a DM800 and a DM8000.


I hope dream-elite team will make a workaround for this in the next image release.

Bye !

Dimmie

Regards: canthackit

[satsatsat]

will this work on pli image do u think

[canthackit]

not tried it myself, but i don't see why not.

regards: canthackit

[specialk]

Hi , I have just fitted a WD Caviar 1TB...and I thought all was good, because it was listed ok.

But, now I have tried to record and I get the "no HDD found or not initialised" error.

I have initialised it, and the process appeared to go ok (about 5 minutes) but in fact the problem remains.

I don't have the option to format in pc -- is there any other way I can "wake up" mydrive?

Cheers, D

On a the german vu plus support site I found the following thread: XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

By using the tool wdidle3.exe you can increase a timeout for parking the head. This solved it for me.

[Kefalonia]

Advanced Format is on certain Western Digital Green Edition HDD's
like the WD10EARS and WD20EARS.
It is not on the 1.5GB WD15EADS which is greater than 1Tb.
On this drive the 5-6 and 7-8 jumpers don't need to be set.


I always install Western Digital green edition hdd's in these units, im a NZ retailer by the way, anything 1Tb and over is advanced format, WD10EARS and WD20EARS model numbers are advanced format. These drives must have jumpers 5-6 and 7-8 set prior to hdd initialization, or initialization may fail. Once jumpers are set, initilization will take approx 15 to 20 mins on a 2Tb drive. 5-6 cap the drive to 1.5Gb/s and 7-6 tell the drive to use the old sector format not the advanced format.