Should I upgrade to a single or dual drives??

[JayM]

I have a new refurbed TCD540040 on the way to me from Tivo direct. Great deal. Probably won't be able to add hacks because it will most likely be a 2.5 series but I am upgrading the stock 40 GB HDD.

I already bought a Hitachi 250 GB HDD today to replace the 40 GB. I'll just put the 40 GB to the side and save. I was reading up and debating if I should throw in another 250.

My concerns are failure because of heat. Noise is also a considerable concern. I don't want this thing to get loud. I would plan on buying the Twinbreeze kit from Weeknees to help the heat issue but I don't want the PVR to run loud between the HDD's and the fan.

I am also going to run amset to the Hitachi drives to lower the noise emission on the drives since they support it so that would help.

What are peeps experience with dual drive units? Are they annoyingly loud? What about Weeknees' fan and how much does that contribute to the units noise output? I know what one person may feel is not loud another person may.

Maybe for guidance I should define that I don't want to hear the unit past 5 feet of distance from it.

I am on the fence for what I should do on the second 250 GB drive.

I would appreciate any helpful feedback.

[bjp999]

AMSET only works on Maxtor drives.

I just bought a used DSR704 (DTivo) and planning to up to a single 250G drive. That's 200+ hours which is enough for me. I too am concerned with heat and noise. OOTB the unit runs at about 40 C.

I have an HR10-250 also, with 2 250G drives (Maxtor w/ AMSET). It is not overly noisy, and I use it to record HD almost exclusively. It runs pretty cool (about 35 C) with the Weaknees bracket (which includes a special fan for the HR10-250).

Good luck!

[JayM]

AMSET only works on Maxtor drives.
Let me rephrase that. AMSET is in fact the Maxtor software to adjust their own disks but Hitachi has the same feature for their own drives here (http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm#FeatureTool)

Either way I heard this software is interchangeable for any drive that supports it.

Thanks for your input bjp. I may be going the with the dual drive upgrade. Also, I always use the best quality recording mode on my PVR's so with 500 GB (2 x 250's) I'm still under 200 hrs of recording time. :)

[bjp999]

Let me rephrase that. AMSET is in fact the Maxtor software to adjust their own disks but Hitachi has the same feature for their own drives here (http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm#FeatureTool)

Either way I heard this software is interchangeable for any drive that supports it.

Thanks for your input bjp. I may be going the with the dual drive upgrade. Also, I always use the best quality recording mode on my PVR's so with 500 GB (2 x 250's) I'm still under 200 hrs of recording time. :)
Thanks for the tip! I didn't realize that the Hitachi's had acoustic management as well. I am about to put the drive in the Tivo, so I'll make sure to run this first.

I guess I had forgotten just how much more space is required for SA Tivos in best quality vs DTivo. 200 hours sounds pretty good, < 100 hours seems light.

Good luck with your setup, and thanks again!

[ronrico51]

I am using 2 Seagate 120 gb drives in my tcd240xx, very quiet and cool. Love those Seagates!

Rick

[beanpoppa]

I have a new refurbed TCD540040 on the way to me from Tivo direct. Great deal. Probably won't be able to add hacks because it will most likely be a 2.5 series but I am upgrading the stock 40 GB HDD.

I already bought a Hitachi 250 GB HDD today to replace the 40 GB. I'll just put the 40 GB to the side and save. I was reading up and debating if I should throw in another 250.
.

I would vote against the second drive, unless you REALLY have a need for so much space. The reason being that once you marry two drives, you can't separate them. So, you are doubling your chances of having a failure wipe out all your recordings (not taking into consideration the implications of what the additional heat brings up)