help - strange behaviour!

[nematode]

I just got an ME1 with a 1Tb harddrive last week. It has the latest
firmware. Quite often it does not register the HDD (both partitions)
on boot up. But if I attach it to a computer and then detach it it
suddenly sees the HDDs? Also, I set it up to schedule record a 1hr
program. I checked it after 1hr 30min to discover the unit
unresponsive to remote or power button. I had to pull the power and
reboot. I then discovered it had only recorded 5 minutes.

What's going on?

[shadow]

Have you set hard disk jumper as master mode ?

[stephen sames]

It's a SATA hd - no jumpers I think?  Can't see any?

[Danny Wood]

How have you got a SATA drive in the ME1?
It is puerly PATA, if you are using a converter this could be the problem.

[stephen sames]

Yes, I have.  It is a 1TB SATA drive.  It came preinstalled.  Maybe the fact that it is SATA is the problem. 

[Danny Wood]

Well the ME1 hardware only supports PATA, and the emprex site says max 500GB.
I would email where you got it from for support.

It might be an idea to update/downgrade the firmware and see if that helps.

[PG]

I have the exact same problem.

Recently got the 1TB ME1 (probably from the same eBay source as the
author). I immediately did the Firmware upgrade which in turn
partioned the HD (800GB FAT32 and 200GB NTFS).

After it did all this I connected it to my PC to copy over some
movies. One thing I did not do at this stage was properly eject the HD
through Windows. This may or may not be causing me the current
problems. I am guessing it is not but the instructions do say to eject
properly so maybe.

Now when I power up the ME1 I cannot see either the HDD1 or HDD2. I
cant even go into setup and attempt a HDD format because it cant see
the HD. A system reset does not help.

My only way of seeing the HD and its partitions again is to redo the
firmware upgrade via the USB stick. It goes though its upgrade but
does not need to format the HD. Once it does the upgrade, the system
reboots and I am now able to see the HD and its partitions along with
all the original files. I need to redo this every time I hard power
the ME1 down.

It both scenarios I am at the correct FW version (press Display
twice)

System revision: MEC_P0.31.K1.b6
Kernel Revision: #7
Bootup: #7 Bootcode:02.08.41
Audio:133137 Video:131918
RootApp: 133705 rootfs:133876
MAC Address: xx:xx:xx:xx:xx:xx

I did confirm before purchasing with the eBay seller that they
confirmed with Emprex that it did in fact support a 1TB HD. It is
SATA. The newer ME1 supports this.

Not sure what my next steps are. I will try and reformat the HD (when
I do have visibility) and start from scratch.

Any other ideas welcome.

On Mar 3, 12:58 pm, Danny Wood <danwoo...@gmail.com> wrote:
> Well the ME1 hardware only supports PATA, and the emprex site says max
> 500GB.
> I would email where you got it from for support.
>
> It might be an idea to update/downgrade the firmware and see if that helps.
>
>
>
> stephen sames wrote:
> > Yes, I have. It is a 1TB SATA drive. It came preinstalled. Maybe the
> > fact that it is SATA is the problem.
>

> > On Tue, Mar 3, 2009 at 12:32 PM, Danny Wood <danwoo...@gmail.com
> > <mailto:danwoo...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> > How have you got a SATA drive in the ME1?
> > It is puerly PATA, if you are using a converter this could be the
> > problem.
>
> > stephen sames wrote:
> >> It's a SATA hd - no jumpers I think? Can't see any?
>
> >> On Tue, Mar 3, 2009 at 9:27 AM, shadow <ibe...@gmail.com
> >> <mailto:ibe...@gmail.com>> wrote:
>
> >> Have you set hard disk jumper as master mode ?
>
> >> On 3月2日, 上午6時31分, nematode <ssa...@gmail.com

> >> <mailto:ssa...@gmail.com>> wrote:
> >> > I just got an ME1 with a 1Tb harddrive last week. It has
> >> the latest
> >> > firmware. Quite often it does not register the HDD (both
> >> partitions)
> >> > on boot up. But if I attach it to a computer and then
> >> detach it it
> >> > suddenly sees the HDDs? Also, I set it up to schedule
> >> record a 1hr
> >> > program. I checked it after 1hr 30min to discover the unit
> >> > unresponsive to remote or power button. I had to pull the
> >> power and
> >> > reboot. I then discovered it had only recorded 5 minutes.
>

> >> > What's going on?- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -

[Overide]

I guess PG, you should conect the me1 to your laptop or desktop and
get the windows to recognize it and format the hard disk to first try
with NTFS (full 1tb as 1 partition) and then try reloading the
firmwware upgrade on it and see if it works..if the me1 does not
detect the harddisk , then format the 1tb to fat 32 and then upgrade
and see . Hope this might help.

:)

[Danny Wood]

Your issue will be with not safely removing.

The linux drivers (ntfs-3g) for the ntfs filesystem will not mount an open filesystem as it doesnt deal with the journal in the same way as windows.
It can be forced, as I have done on my desktop with no issue of loosing data but obviously its better to safely remove the drive and have it open correctly than the former.
If you are comfortable with the linux command line then you could write a little script that runs before the main ME1 stuff loads to force open the filesystem but this could cause issues with data loss (the ME1 doesn't write to the filesystem so I doubt this would be an issue)

To remedy this problem after an unsafe remove or power loss all you have to do is plug it back into windows and safely remove, this should close the NTFS filesystem correctly and should then work.
Try it when it next does it.

If you get the issue then obviously NTFS is a poor choice for filesystem on this box, choose to have solely FAT32 if possible and you arent using > 4GB files.

[PG]

Thanks for the feedback. I will try this later. I was actually
confused as to which partitions to set up.
Failing to understand why I needed an NTFS partition I took the safe
option and just created a 20% one.

If both media storage and recording happens on the FAT32 why would I
need an NTFS partition? I dont think I have many examples of a 4GB
file I would need to play.

I will try the proper un-mounting from Windows later and will let you
all know how it goes. If it does not work then it sounds like I should
start from scratch and create a 100% FAT32 partition.

> >> - Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

[nematode]

The supplier has requested the unit be sent back so they can have a
look at it. The full symptoms are:

With latest firmware. ME1 does not see HDD partitions on boot up
(both FAT32 and NTFS). Once connected to a PC then disconnected it
does see the HDD partitions. When put into and out of standby, it
still see the HDD. However, once in standby and switched off for a
time, it will not see HDD after being started up again.

I wiped the partitions and formatting and started a firmware upgrade
and format HDD. After this the symptoms are still the same as above.

Maybe it is the SATA interface?

I will let you all know if the people I sent it back to have any joy.
Thank you for all your help and advise.

[PG]

Just a follow up on the same problem I am seeing as described above.

I have tried connecting the ME1 to the PC and doing a Safe Eject.
Without powering down the ME1 and connecting it to the TV I am now
able to see the HD volumes but once I do a full power down/up I am
again missing the HD visibility.

So its back to the drawing board. Maybe doing a full format via the
PC, starting from scratch and creating a 100% Fat32 volume may fix
things but before that I was wondering if the OP, nematode, had heard
anything back from the supplier? I will contact the supplier myself
but may be quicker to hear of a potential fix. Nematode - did you hear
anything back?

Thanks

[nematode]

Yep - the ME1 is being shipped back to me and I am told it was a
problem with the drive. I am curious if it will be replaced with a an
SATA drive or something different?

I will let you know when I find out.

[nematode]

Looks like it was replaced with a sata, but it's a western digital and
not a hitachi

[PG]

I think the original 1TB Hitachi was SATA too - thats what I have. You
would have had the IDE/SATA convertor intsalled in the ME1 that was
sent to you. See this link http://emprex-me1.blogspot.com/2009/01/convert-ide-to-sata.html

The vendor seems to think that it was the Hitachi HD that was at fault
and that others such as the Western Digital will work.

Let us know how you get on with the Western Digital. If you are still
having problems I might do a 100% Fat32 partition when I get my
replacement and see if that helps. A previous poster mentioned that
having the NTFS partition may be contributing to the problem.

> > I will let you know when I find out.- Hide quoted text -

[nematode]

Western digital drive seems to mount no problem at all now. Set up
with 50/50 FAT/NTFS.

I only have one strange problem left which I believe is unrelated to
the harddrive. When set to record (on schedule or not) it sometimes
crashes and needs to be unplugged and restarted to recover. This only
happens when recording and it seems to only record 5 or so minutes
(once it got to 21 minutes). Then I noticed that it always recorded
perfectly when I left it and was not in the room. This led me to
believe that it has an anxiety complex or used to be a kettle in a
former life. When I thought about it more I began to suspect that I
was crashing it by maybe using another remote control for my TV,
digibox or video. So, I have begun to experiment. The last few times
I have recorded I have covered the ME1's IR window. So far this seems
to have worked but it may be too early to tell.

On Mar 19, 12:10 pm, PG <guer...@gmail.com> wrote:
> I think the original 1TB Hitachi was SATA too - thats what I have. You
> would have had the IDE/SATA convertor intsalled in the ME1 that was

> sent to you. See this linkhttp://emprex-me1.blogspot.com/2009/01/convert-ide-to-sata.html

[nematode]

I spoke too early. It crashes sometimes when recording and covering
the IR window has no effect. I seem to be having a similar problem to
this:

http://groups.google.com/group/Emprex-ME1/browse_thread/thread/c4949b022a59a549