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How to Expand the Hard Drive Capacity of Your Direct TV Satellite Receiver or Cable Box Create a super-high-capacity television programming and movie server |
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Expand your DVR Hard Drive for virtually endless recording possibilities In a previous article, we wrote a story about using your existing cable box or satellite DVR to create a flexible and cost-effective high-definition movie server. We received a tremendous amount of feedback on that article and many of our readers indicated that method of viewing would work best for them, particularly as compared to paid third party solutions such as Apple TV or Vudu (read previous article for full details).
In this article, we’d like to expand on the concept and show you how to give your Direct TV satellite box (or any compatible satellite or cable box) a huge storage capacity boost by pairing it with a specialized external hard drive. By choosing just the right add-on storage solution you will be able to create a super high-capacity television and movie server that can triple or even quadruple the storage capacity of your original cable or satellite box. Before we get started, let's clarify a few technology issues. All cable and satellite boxes use internal hard drives to store things you record. The storage capacity (or in plain terms, how much space there is to record) of a given box is determined entirely by its manufacturer. Usually, the default (or “built-in”) storage capacity of satellite and cable boxes hovers in the 160 to 250 gigabyte range. This amount of space may seem large, but since high-definition broadcasts require a significant amount of storage, drives in this capacity range fill up quickly, especially if you use the box as a movie server or use it to record entire series of television programs. A few high-definition movies or full seasons of popular programs such as American Idol, Survivor, CSI, or Lost could surely put a big dent in your hard drive’s storage space!
When your drive is full, you have two options: don’t record or delete some of your recorded programs. In fact, most boxes will automatically start deleting your "oldest" content as the drive becomes full. You can imagine the frustration you or your family might feel if you lost the season finale of Grays Anatomy, Desperate Housewives, or your favorite edge-of-your-seat drama. Even worse, what if your favorite high-definition baseball game or play-off game was missing? Or what if you simply want some storage space for your programs because your spouse and kids have filled up 90% of your hard drive? At some point you will be faced with a compromise of what to keep and what to delete.
Here is the process we followed to upgrade the Direct TV HR20 (or HR21):
Now that we had a properly installed massive hard drive we wanted to see just how much real world recording we could do. We immediately went into the guide, filtered out the high-definition channels, and started recording. Since we are planning to illustrate what a great high movie server this box can be we focused on recording HD movies off of HBO, Showtime, Cinemax, etc. We also recorded several 'normal' programs such as sporting events, cooking shows, and some popular TV series such as Lost.
TV Recording Tip: The new high-capacity hard drive is also perfect for recording weekly TV programming. In fact, you could set-up the DVR to record the entire season of either your favorite program or a new series. Once the entire season had been captured you could watch the individual episodes at your leisure. One of the major advantages of recording in this fashion is if you get really into a program you could watch multiple episodes in one sitting (or within few days) without having to wait an entire week for a new episode. And of course you will always be able to skip through the commercials. After about a week and a half of recording we had amassed a collection over 65 high-definition movies and shows totaling over 120 hours of HD footage – and the hard drive was only 68 percent full! Our new high-definition movie library included some major blockbuster titles such as Shrek The Third, Night At The Museum, Evan Almighty, Pirates Of The Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, Ratatouille, Spider Man 3, and Transformers. We even had classic and all time favorite movies such as Titanic, Hairspray, Truman Show, 300, Austin Powers, Mission Impossible 3, Bridge To Terabithia, The Patriot, Gladiator, and The Mummy. The downloadable PDF version of this article includes a complete list of the movies and programs we recorded.
In addition to our enormous recording capacity, we noticed that the hard drive worked exactly like the standard internal hard drive. We experienced no speed or latency issues. In conclusion, we found that expanding our DVR’s recording capacity to create a massive movie and TV server is an easy process. However, to do so, it is absolutely critical the right hard drive is chosen for the job. We found out firsthand that the expansion is not as easy as just picking a random external hard drive. As with most things in life choosing the right tool is critical for the job.
What hard drives work for this expansion? What are their specifications?
As mentioned in the article we did not have success in our testing with either the Western Digital or Seagate hard drives. We successfully used (and fell in love with) the Apricorn 1TB external eSata hard drive. Given the ease of use and low cost of the Apricorn hard drive it was the best (and only) solution. Full drive specifications can be found in the PDF version of this article (you can download by clicking here). I'm sold, how do I purchase one?
You can order the hard drive expansion through our on-line store or by calling us toll-free at 800-616-5354.
The upgrade kit is valued at $399. We are currently offering the entire kit for $269. This is an extremely cost effective way to really boost up your HDTV experience! If you have questions please call Steve or Dave at 800-616-5354. |
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The best way to resolve this storage issue is to give your cable or satellite box a major boost in storage capacity. By pairing your DVR with just the right high-performance external hard drive you'll enjoy a dramatically increased recording ability. The upgrade process documented here was completed on the Direct TV HR20 satellite receiver but is compatible with other models. It has also successfully been completed on the Direct TV HR21 as well as the Scientific Atlanta 8300 series cable box. The exact process of upgrading the drive may vary slightly from box to box, but the concept is universal. 
The goal for our upgrade is to provide an easy plug and play solution. We started out by testing three large one terabyte hard drives (1terabyte is about 3-4 times larger than the standard hard drives) from Western Digital, Seagate, and Apricorn. These hard drives all connected to our Direct TV HR20 through the eSATA connection on the rear of the Direct TV box. Unfortunately, we did not have much luck with the Western Digital and Seagate drives; both of them were not successfully recognized by the Direct TV boxes. After determining two of the three drives were not compatible with our upgrade, we realized choosing the right drive was critical to the expansion. As the saying goes the third time is the charm, and our third hard drive attempt, the DVR Xpander from Apricorn, connected flawlessly and allowed our upgrade to go smoothly.
IMPORTANT NOTE: Once the external hard drive is properly connected all of the previously existing recordings and To Do List items are reset. You will need to re-establish all of your recordings. (It should be pointed out that if this process is followed in reverse and the external hard drive is removed from the setup the old recordings and old To Do List items will still be on the internal hard drive).
TIP: To take full advantage of your high-definition TV and DVR you should record as much high-definition programming as possible (as opposed to analog or standard definition programs). Direct TV provides an easy way for you to filter out and show only the high-definition programs in the guide. If you press the guide button once you will see your standard channel guide, if you press the guide button again you will see a menu called "Filter The Guide". The last selection in the Filter Guide is "HDTV Channels". Select this and your guide will now only display high-definition channels. 
TIP: Families with children know how often kids get a movie stuck in their head and they will watch it over and over again, day after day. This high-capacity movie server is a perfect solution as you will have plenty of space to record your kids favorite programs. 
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