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dreambox 800 : a guide to setting up an external hard drive?

Discussion in 'Digital TV - UK & Europe' started by atghawkin, Aug 29, 2011.

  1. atghawkin

    atghawkin Regular member

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    Hi all,
    I would like to set up an external hdd on my dreambox 800, i have a sata 2.5" 120gb and when connected to my pc i get a steady on led light but when i connect to the dreambox the led just flashes and the hdd doesn't come up on the dreambox, do i need a hdd with its own power source ? any input welcome !
    cheers
     
  2. fintannl

    fintannl Regular member

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    you need to format it first, button menu, setup , system hardisk and initialize, crap harddrive. why not 1tb so at least you can tape many films
     
  3. atghawkin

    atghawkin Regular member

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    hi fintan,
    Forgive me on my taste in hard drives :) ,this is one i had lying about so it's just handy!.After "system" their is no "hardisk" option so can't initialize also blue panel/device manager doesn't see it,i have a 8gb pen which shows up.
    I have wiped the drive with easus (no joy) and formatted to ntfs with easus (no joy) is it just that the dreambox won't see it or do i have any other options?
    cheers
     
  4. lukeian5

    lukeian5 Member

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    you could just put the hdd in the 800, format and mount it then

    I'm assuming it's in an external caddy.
     
    Last edited: Aug 30, 2011
  5. atghawkin

    atghawkin Regular member

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    hi lukeian,
    yep its an external caddy,the thing is the dream box isnt connected to my main t.v. i got it to watch sports mostly and i was hoping that if i did record something off it then i could bring the external hdd down to my main t.v. (which has a usb connection )and watch it then.I do have an iomega 1tb media player (are ya readin this fintan!! :))thats already full o stuff and don't want to start messing with it,something around the 120gig would do fine ,does anyone out there even recomend an external that would work?
    cheers
     
  6. fintannl

    fintannl Regular member

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    firstly you won't be able to to connect the hdd of your dreambox directly into any tv as the dreambox stores all files in linux format on the hdd and i'm unaware of any tv that currently reads linux partitions. i know the iomega and it works fine with the dreambox.
     
  7. atghawkin

    atghawkin Regular member

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    Shame about the linux format!,will have to look further into this ,thanks fintan
     
  8. fintannl

    fintannl Regular member

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    not really shame about linux. tv's as a rule supply a usb port for software upgrade. the basic software within a tv is basic and from one tv to the next it differs. tv software is focused on supplying clarity of picture and tv associated features. the software is neither windows nor linux. maybe in time it will be but it has not got there yet. so as said the usb port is supplied to read a file of a specific format and that format is tied to the brand of the tv unit.
     
  9. atghawkin

    atghawkin Regular member

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    hi all
    back again to seek advice! i have an 8gb pen that my dm800 can see ,i'm trying to use this to record so i pressed the pvr button twice i get to : select location and select the movie path, so then i go to parent directory and press ok, this leads me to: list of storage devices i press ok and i get upper usb slot now i press green button for ok when i do this i get an error msg saying : directory/autofs/sda1/nonexistant .
    is there a way of making this path exist!!.by the way it is initialized (ext3)
    cheers
     
  10. atghawkin

    atghawkin Regular member

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    ok panic over!!
    i got sorted ,after some messing around i found the right path and believe it or not fintan i recorded a few minutes of rte2 and filmfour+1 around 5 minutes of each then i popped the usb pen into my tv and it worked,so i can record from dreambox and playback on my tv ! nice bonus

    cheers!
     
  11. fintannl

    fintannl Regular member

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    stunned. could you post model of tv as would like to investigate tv software
     
  12. atghawkin

    atghawkin Regular member

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    its a samsung series 5 lcd ,i can also play vob avi and mkv files on it too ,lg also have a tv that plays media from a usb stick so i'm presuming their are other makes that will .cheers!
     
  13. fintannl

    fintannl Regular member

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    I think what you are trying to say is that the tuners are better in the current dm800hd. This may be true but they are still incredibly poor compared to the blade7000.
     

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