Hopper PTA EHD Problem/Question

[bf3000]

I am currently in the process of upgrading my 2 Hopper2000's to 2 HWS's (thanks MikeH!), but I am having a problem. I want to back up all of our programs to an external hard drive so that I can transfer them back to the HWS's once they are up and running. I had no problems backing up everything on our kids' Hopper (no PTA), but when I tried to backup the programs on our Hopper (PTAT Enabled), I could not transfer the most current episode of any of the PTAT shows that we have timers for. I have the timers set up to 'Save Series', and the shows are there when I hit the DVR button, but when I go into the EHD transfer menu, they are not there. Any suggestions as to how to get around this? If I turn PTAT off, will those shows be 'released' for me to transfer? (I didn't want to try this without asking here first for fear that the shows might just disappear altogether if I do that). Thanks!

 

[thomasjk]

Reduce the PTAT retention time to 2 days. That is the best you can do. The default is 8 days.

 

[ChadT41]

Make sure to save any shows to your folder prior to changing that to 2 days.

 

[bf3000]

Thanks for the tips - if I have the shows saved in my folder, will turning off PTAT release all of them, or is shortening the retention to 2 days the best I can do?

 

[david_jr]

You could also turn off all but one day and all but one network. Don't know if the shows would disappear though because I've never tried what you are trying.

 

[ChadT41]

The retention time would still remain as a saved setting, so turning it off would not help your case.

 

[thomasjk]

2 days is the best you can do. Depending on when the program was recorded you will be able to transfer some programs.

 

[bf3000]

Ok, I set retention to 2 days and turned off PTAT (so I don't keep getting shows that take me 2 days to save). Unfortunately, my last week's worth of programming still is unable to transfer - I guess the setting can't be changed on files that have already been recorded. looks like my upgrade time will be slightly delayed.

 

[bf3000]

UPDATE...Looks like I was worried about nothing - the PTAT shows that stayed behind on the Hopper also transferred to the EHD. I didn't think that Dish allowed the program to exist in 2 places at once, but after transferring all of the programs from my EHD back to my new HWS, I noticed that the episodes that I thought had not transferred were there after all. Good to know for anyone that is preparing to make a similar transition. Thanks to everyone for your responses.