Dish Network External Hard Drive

[Sundog]

I have a Seagate Free Agent Desk 500GB external hard drive attached to my Dish Network receiver, to allow extra storage of TV-recorded events. When attached the first time, it was reformatted automatically by the Dish Network system. It it used by first recording an event to the Dish internal hard drive, then moving the event to the Seagate, from where it could be played back on demand. It has worked fine for a couple of years.

Recently, intermittently, it could no longer be accessed by the Dish system. A trouble call to Dish indicated, via their remote diagnostics, that their receiver was OK and the problem appears to be "the cable to the external hard drive." I unplugged, replugged, powered off, powered on, to a fare thee well. The system worked fine until I was out of town, then it once again no longer could be accessed. (Aliens?)

I tried attaching an Iomega hard drive to the Dish receiver. It got reformatted and seems to work OK; recorded an event and played it back. Now I want to move recorded programs from the Seagate to the Iomega. When I hook either drive to my computer, it is not recognized by Windows Explorer. In Folder Options > View, I've selected "Show hidden files, folders, and drives," and unchecked "Hide empty drives in the Computer folder."

However, Control Panel > Device Manager > Disk Drives shows both the Seagate and the Iomega, and "Properties" indicates "This device is working properly."

Any ideas on how I can transfer my wife's precious recorded events so I can remain in good standing? Or a link to a site that might offer help?

[Sundog]

Some Googling indicates that the problem may be related to the default setting on the Seagate Free Agent drive that turns it off after 5 minutes of inactivity. Downloading and running Free Agent Pro Tools Utility to my computer allows setting this feature to "Never." I was successful in doing that with the Seagate drive attached to my computer even though it wasn't recognized by Windows Explorer. The Seagate utility knew about it and I set it to Never, reattached to the Dish DVR box, and it now is recognized by the Dish system, with all my wife's cooking shows still there.

Now to quietly sneak out of town so the aliens don't notice I'm gone and automagically undo all my good work.

Why did this happen after years of quiet running? Who knows.

[Bigaldoc]

I wish you continued good luck! I don't have a dish but my experience with TWO Seagate 500 gig Free Agent drives was not good. One at a time they both failed completely. I don't remember how long, but it wasn't more than 18 months or two years, somewhere like that.

I used mine for alternating backup imaging on my computer and I got ZERO help from Seagate. That "sleeping" thing caused me all manner of troubles with my backups - making them fail periodically.

As I said, good luck...

[BobArch2]

Some Googling indicates that the problem may be related to the default setting on the Seagate Free Agent drive that turns it off after 5 minutes of inactivity. Downloading and running Free Agent Pro Tools Utility to my computer allows setting this feature to "Never." I was successful in doing that with the Seagate drive attached to my computer even though it wasn't recognized by Windows Explorer. The Seagate utility knew about it and I set it to Never, reattached to the Dish DVR box, and it now is recognized by the Dish system, with all my wife's cooking shows still there.

Now to quietly sneak out of town so the aliens don't notice I'm gone and automagically undo all my good work.

Why did this happen after years of quiet running? Who knows.

Hi Sundog,

I have Bell TV services (satellite) and an HD PVR along with an external HD, similar to your set-up. It has been reported that Bell's PVRs are very similar to the Dish Network product. As such, I would expect that specifications and features are aligned. Here's a link that explains the use of EHDs in the Bell environment, which I suspect matches those with Dish Network. Specifically, it mentions the "power-down" feature which is not desired, and one that you have already discovered. My EHD is a 1TB LaCie which houses an Hitachi HD. The LaCie does not have the power down feature and has worked flawlessly for over 2 years.

Formatting of the EHD is unique to the environment and is performed by a subset of Linux. The article linked above will explain a lot about the use of the EHD in the Bell environment. And as previously noted, Bell and the Dish Network hardware are close enough to be sisters.

[Sundog]

Bob,

Thanks for the link; it answered a couple of other questions for me!