Hopper with sling hard drive failure

[ChadT41]

Now the Bedroom Hopper has hard drive failure daily. Won't even record. Here we go again. Gotta make the call. Tired of pulling out power cord. Will insist on a new one, no refurbished one.

Can insist all day... There is not a single person that can order you a new one there. You get what comes next on the shelf.

 

[JSheridan]

If you have a good local dealer they can replace it with a brand new one.

 

[Skytrooper]

You guys are right. After insisting on a new one the rep finally confessed he has no control with what they send me. I did get them to waive the 15$ shipping charge and they gave me Blockbuster free for 3 months.

I never thought about contacting a local dealer.

 

[garywiley]

I got my replacement HWS several days ago. The unit seems to be OK. No Hard drive fail message.

 

[Skytrooper]

Got the replacement Hopper yesterday. So far, so good. It's a refurbished unit. They were nice enough to give me 2 Pay Per View certificates when I made the call to have it activated. They also gave me Blockbuster for 3 months and waived the 15$ shipping fee. So, bottom line is when you have issues, ask for Freebies. If I asked for nothing, I would of got nothing.

 

[ewindowman]

Well my hard drive finally died .after years of false reports .I bought a exact replacement from amazon and plugged it in .I am still getting the same error saying bad drive . I called dish they said that is normal let it sit 24-48 hours and the motherboard will give it directions to reformat .any suggestions on how to force a drive format ?

 

[Grandude]

I had the same problem. Solution for me if I recall correctly was to format the new hard drive on my PC and then install it in the H2. The hopper then formatted it and after a couple of boots it is now functioning just fine.

BTW, while I had the lid off I found that the little fan was almost completely blocked with dust. Don't know if this was contributing to the hard drive failure problem but cleaned it out and also just left the lid off. Had to anyway as I left the failed drive in place and just set the new drive on top of the old drive and moved the power and signal cable to the new drive.

 

[ewindowman]

I was hoping that there was a remote service code To force a format I found one for 622-722 but not a hopper yet . I will probably pull the drive out and format it in my computer.

 

[pattykay]

She said that no one goes near it except her when she cleans around it once a week. I asked her to show me how she cleaned it and she walked over with a swiffer and dusted the top. Then she lifted the front corner and dusted under it and just let it drop from her fingers with a thud to the shelf. I pointed out the sticker on the top of the DVR and told her again that they don't like shocks.

This is why I never dust under my receivers. If I can't see the dust, it doesn't bother me anyway. Also, I always peel off that sticker every time I get a new DVR. I just think it looks tacky, and since I already know not to jar a DVR, I don't need a sticker to remind me.

 

[ewindowman]

I took out the drive and did a format . Some how my MBR on my computer got corrupted now my hopper and computer can't recognize the drive. I will have to rebuild the MBR .The problem I see now is that the old drive tested out perfectly normal. Now I am thinking it's not the drive but something else causing the error.

 

[Grandude]

Yikes, when it rains it pours.
How did you install the drive in your PC?
I installed the drive in my PC as a separate, new drive, not the primary boot drive.
I don't know what would happen if you installed it as the boot drive on your PC, but I don't know why that would hurt your existing PCs hard drive.

BTW, there is always power to the PC main board, even when powered down, you need to trip the breaker whenever connecting or removing components from the PC.

 

[Bobby]

Yikes, when it rains it pours.
How did you install the drive in your PC?
I installed the drive in my PC as a separate, new drive, not the primary boot drive.
I don't know what would happen if you installed it as the boot drive on your PC, but I don't know why that would hurt your existing PCs hard drive.

BTW, there is always power to the PC main board, even when powered down, you need to trip the breaker whenever connecting or removing components from the PC.

Or maybe simply unplug it!

 

[charlesrshell]

Or maybe simply unplug it!

If laptop, I would take the battery out of it too.

 

[ewindowman]

I hooked up the drive externally and used the seagate disk wizard software. No problems. Go and turn on the computer the next day and now have a error code . Windows won't load . Tried the rescue disk and it says hard drive is locked . Unlock before you repair disk . Just got done working outside all day in the 96 degree heat going to have some cold ones than try to figure it out . Worse case is say hell with it and go to the dark side and buy a Apple.

 

[Jim5506]

The best thing I have found for removing Windows and other partitions from a hard drive is an old Windows XP boot disk.

After loading the opportunity to delete partitions is there, simple, fast no sweat.

The blanked drive is immediately formatted by your receiver.

Just be sure you don't delete partitions on your boot drive.