Samsung Sky HD Hard Disk Upgrade

[nealbran]

I have recently been trying to upgrade to a 1TB disk in my samsung Sky+ HD box and using a WD10EVCS after every 5 minutes my Samsung box just turns off. It would also stutter on the playback of recordings etc... I used copy+ to copying the programs over without any problems and prepare the new disk.

I fitted the original drive back in the box and it works fine.

I would like to hear other people's experiences and if anyone has long term success with the Samsung HD103UJ Spinpoint F1 1TB or any other 1TB disk. It would be particularly interesting to hear if someone had the same problem as me and then used the Samsung hard disk without issue.

I believe as per another poster on box resets its all power related as my WD10EVCS is the same as below and the box can't handle it I believe.

"If you look at the specs. on the top of the drive fitted by Sky:
300GB Seagate DB35.3: +5v 0.72A, +12v 0.52A
Whereas the replacement drives that didn't work are:
1TB Western Digital WD10EACS: +5v 0.70A, +12v 0.55A
400GB Hitachi HDS724040KLSA80: +5v 0.78A, +12v 0.98A
and the one that does work is:
1TB Samsung HD103UJ: +5v 0.70A, +12v 0.50A
So maybe the issue is the 12v power consumption?
My hunch is that any drive which consumes more than 0.52A current at +12v is likely to fail"

Cheers

Neal

[Martin J.]

There is an ongoing thread on this subject just a few posts below your own: Box keeps turning off after 1 TB upgrade?

[nealbran]

This seemed to relate to box upgrades in general rather than just the Samsung box

[Martin J.]

If you read through to the end, it is primarily Samsung related.

[mudstuff]

Is the 1TB Samsung HD103UJ still working ok? Looking to upgrde my samsung hd box and would rather have 1TB if possible as opposed to the 750GB Seagate everyone seems to be using. If you're gonna upgrade, make it a good one I say!

[Stoofa]

The 750GB Seagate mentioned in the other thread is by far the best drive to use in the Samsung boxes - 100% success rate with them at the moment.

Quite why the Samsung box is having these problems is unclear.
The voltage issues appear to have been a red herring.
A friend of mine who works in Sky R&D also couldn't work out why - a recent software upgrade (released for other reasons) may have had the result that the Samsung boxes would be less picky on upgrade discs.
Alas that didn't happen.

[mudstuff]

Thanks mate, I'll stick with the seagate for now then.

[simon194]

Originally Posted by Stoofa

The 750GB Seagate mentioned in the other thread is by far the best drive to use in the Samsung boxes - 100% success rate with them at the moment.

Quite why the Samsung box is having these problems is unclear.
The voltage issues appear to have been a red herring.
A friend of mine who works in Sky R&D also couldn't work out why - a recent software upgrade (released for other reasons) may have had the result that the Samsung boxes would be less picky on upgrade discs.
Alas that didn't happen.

I thought it was the IntelliPower feature of some WD drives that caused the problem with Samsung boxes or have I got that wrong.

[buffalobill]

I upgraded to the 1TB Samsung HD103UJ drive before I went on holiday last week and all was working fine. I came back yesterday and my planner was bare A planner rebuild didn't bring anything back either.

An average HD movie now takes around 3% whereas straight after the upgrade it took up around 2%. Am I to presume that the drive has been reformatted and treated as 750Gb?

[Stoofa]

Originally Posted by simon194

I thought it was the IntelliPower feature of some WD drives that caused the problem with Samsung boxes or have I got that wrong.

I don't think there has been any definitive answers - only speculation and theory.
A friend of mine works in Sky R&D and I explained the problem to him.
He spoke with the "Expert on Samsung boxes" and he too was a little ost as to why it was happening.

My friend then said "Wait for the next software update" (this was the one prior to the one we've just had).
The software update was being released to fix various things, however he thought it might also fix this disc incompatibility issue on the box (unofficial fix of course as Sky cannot acknowledge HD upgrades etc).
The software update came through however I wasn't in the modd to take my box apart yet again and replace the 750GB drive with a 1TB.

I'd be interested to hear if somebody with a Samsung box that is definitely running the very latest software update has tried a 1TB disc and what their results were.

[buffalobill]

My box is a Thomson one, and I've read success stories with the HD103UJ drive.

Do I run it through Copy+ again or is it doomed to failure?

[-Hitman-]

I upgraded my Samsung HD box last October time to a Samsung 1TB F1 spinpoint and it's been perfectly fine before/after the latest updates!

It is confusing to read reports of some being successful and some not, could well be down to a faulty hard drive, for me no problems with mine.

Just bought a couple of WD WD10EADS 1TB drives cheap as i store tons of HD material, already full on the F1 and also a quick release caddy, with this being powered on it's own i won't be using the HD box's power and so shouldn't cause any power problems with the new drives.

[holcroft]

Originally Posted by nealbran

I believe as per another poster on box resets its all power related as my WD10EVCS is the same as below and the box can't handle it I believe.

"If you look at the specs. on the top of the drive fitted by Sky:
300GB Seagate DB35.3: +5v 0.72A, +12v 0.52A
Whereas the replacement drives that didn't work are:
1TB Western Digital WD10EACS: +5v 0.70A, +12v 0.55A
400GB Hitachi HDS724040KLSA80: +5v 0.78A, +12v 0.98A
and the one that does work is:
1TB Samsung HD103UJ: +5v 0.70A, +12v 0.50A
So maybe the issue is the 12v power consumption?
My hunch is that any drive which consumes more than 0.52A current at +12v is likely to fail"

Cheers

Neal

I have just opened my brand new samsung Sky HD box to upgrade. I had a spare WD10 EVCS which works great in the thomson I have, and have read that these don't work well in the samsung which previous posters have said have a Seagate drive in.

Anyhow the drive in my Samsung is a WD 3200 AVJS which has settings as :
5VDC - 0.65A
12VDC - 0.50A

The WD 10 EVCS settings are :
5VDC - 0.70A
12VDC - 0.55A

I will report if it works, but has anyone upgraded a Samsung that had a WD disk as the original rather than a Seagate and if so what have they used?

[stmary]

Neilbran,
Any luck with the Samsung WD10EVCS upgrade. I am about to try the same thing but wondered if you or any one else has had any luck yet or if I need to but another 1TB drive.

[holcroft]

Originally Posted by stmary

Neilbran,
Any luck with the Samsung WD10EVCS upgrade. I am about to try the same thing but wondered if you or any one else has had any luck yet or if I need to but another 1TB drive.

I have now upgraded two Samsung Sky HD boxes with WD10EVCS 1 TB drives and so far after over 4 weeks I have had no problems whatsoever - both machines working fine. The new EPG not been downloaded to the Samsungs yet but others have reported no problems with the new EPG and larger drives