External hard drive

[lynxville]

I have a Hopper Sling and would like to add an external hard drive, the only reason I want to do this so I don't loose recordings when Hopper is replaced. Where is a good place to buy one, is set up easy, and is it easy to use? Every time I upgrade I loose lots of movies and good shows. I was thinking about Radio Shack to buy one?

Thanks

 

[Keystone7]

Not sure if that can be added but here's some information. Just the other day I seen a 3TB external on TigerDirect site for $99.00. I believe the company was Western. I don't know if its still on sale?

 

[DWS44]

Radio Shack may have them...haven't been in one of those in quite a while, but if you're wanting to pick one up locally, you might be better off going somewhere like Best Buy. They are likely to have a larger selection and probably better prices. A place like Target will probably have some as well. Heck, my local WalMart carries a few Western Digital EHDs.

Side note...make sure you get one with its own power supply. Many of the smaller EHDs are powered via USB, which is not supported on the Dish receivers.

 

[JM42]

Just the other day I seen a 3TB external on TigerDirect site for $99.00.

Keep it at 2TB or smaller. Larger drives are not supported.

 

[Tony S]

I have always had the best luck with Western Digital drives with Dish. Most of the Seagate drives that I have tried had problems. When the drives went to sleep, the Dish receiver would not see it anymore and would not be able to 'wake up' the drive. The Western Digital drives that I have used did not have that problem.When the WD drives 'go to sleep', the Dish receiver still sees that it is connected, and wakes it up properly when it is needed.

Again, this was just my personal experience. Others have had success with various Seagate drives, but I have always had problems using them with Dish.

 

[Tron2012]

Western Digital I agree with. I'm not a person who lives by my external drive where I have to always have it powered on and connected. Just use it maybe every 6 months or so to move some shows I like to it that I may want to watch again in the future. WD seems to be reliable and has done well for me over the years.

 

[MikeD-C05]

Seagate is all I ever have used with DISH receivers since I first heard them announce that you could add one on their Charlie or Tech chat . They used a seagate in the demonstration and that is what I have always bought with out any problems.

 

[dlharm]

Seagate is all I ever have used with DISH receivers since I first heard them announce that you could add one on their Charlie or Tech chat . They used a seagate in the demonstration and that is what I have always bought with out any problems.

I also have always used Seagate Free Agent external hard drives with Dish Network and have had no problems--other than a 500gb go bad--after having it for 5 years or so--it was on constantly.

 

[harshness]

I recommend going with Western Digital or Seagate brand names. Many brands (except for Samsung, Toshiba and Hitachi) are actually using either of those two brand's mechanisms.

The drive MUST be self-powered (most 2.5" drives are NOT). If the enclosure is bigger than a Bible, it may have more than one drive in it and that's a no-no.

Finally, big drives mean putting a whole lot of eggs in one basket so I wouldn't go overboard on the drive size. The user space on a Hopper is right around 1TB.

The rules are simple. Don't try to be a hero and try something exotic as it just isn't necessary.

 

[bwexler]

The user space is about 2 TB on H2K and HWS. I have been using several Western Digital 2 TB external drives as well as several smaller ones for a couple years now. My main problem is that both HWS and most of the externals keep filling up.
I need to devise a new system for what to keep and what to erase.

 

[JSheridan]

The user space is about 2 TB on H2K and HWS....

On the External Hard Drive menu option it lists my HWS as having 1231GB Total Space. I think that means that of the 2TB HD there is 1231GB user space.

 

[bwexler]

I stand corrected. Most of the balance is used for PTAT. A while back I thought they had changed that so that user space and PTAT were merged into one large space.
Either my memory is faulty (impossible) or they changed it back.

 

[lucky86]

Ptat is part of the user partition.

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[JSheridan]

I'm guessing that between 1231GB and 2TB is the firmware, settings, buffers, apps, etc. etc.

 

[dwarren2]

The Hopper will support 2 ehd's at one time. Again I've had the best luck with WD's. If you had one with a VIP (not a 211) ird, the Hopper will recognize it

 

[charlesrshell]

Long time ago when DISH activated the EHD feature for the VIP722s, I purchased two WD 500 GB EHDs model name My DVR Expander that DISH recommend at the time. I think it was sometime in 2009 when I installed them on two VIP722s and they are on two Hoppers now. I haven't had any issues with them.

 

[ChadT41]

I'm guessing that between 1231GB and 2TB is the firmware, settings, buffers, apps, etc. etc.

Don't forget vod. That's probably the most of the space used.

 

[KKlare]

The Hopper will support 2 ehd's at one time. Again I've had the best luck with WD's. If you had one with a VIP (not a 211) ird, the Hopper will recognize it

Actually the Hoppers work with 4 EHDs simultaneously. Only 2 do the full set of operations. The later 2 used will only transfer but not even delete.