How-to: Use your TiVo Series3 eSATA port to add an external drive

Ever wish you could use that friggin eSATA port TiVo taunts you with on the back of your Series3? If so your moment has finally arrived -- and not a moment too soon for many a DVR-loving TV fans whose drives are filled to the brim with HD programming. Best of all: you don't even have to crack open your box or nothin'. Ready to get it going on? Let's upgrade that TiVo.

Before we get started, be forewarned that this hack supposedly only works on unmodified TiVo Series3 units. Not that we have any idea how the machine knows whether it's been upgraded (we had a how-to for upgrading your internal drive, too), but supposedly if you upgraded your internal drive, this isn't going to work. (If you want to try anyway, let us know in comments how you fared.)

Equipment

• TiVo Series3 (and remote, duh) running 8.1.1 software
  and...
• eSATA enclosure + drive with eSATA cable
  or...
• SATA drive with external power source and eSATA to SATA cable

Directions
This is a fairly easy procedure, so we'll run through the steps.

Power down your TiVo.

Connect your eSATA gear. If you're going to use a straight up bare drive (which we don't suggest), make sure you've got some kind of power source for it.

Turn on your drive, and while you're powering on your TiVo, hold down the pause button. Make sure you keep your remote aimed at your TiVo the whole time!

Keep holding it. The front panel lights turn off, then the orange LED will light up. Now you can go ahead and let go of the pause button; then punch in "62" on your remote. (Apparently this maneuver is called "kickstart 62".)

You'll then reboot, and some bidness starts happening.

Did it work? If so you'll get the screen above. (Sorry about the overscan that cut off the text.)

Boom, now you've got more space! More friggin space, just like that! It's a TiVo miracle. For reference, we took this virgin 250GB Series3 unit up to 370GB with a 120GB 2.5-inch laptop drive in an eSATA enclosure (see above). Besides going to your TiVo's system info, you won't be able to see that you got more space or have a second drive running.

Other bits

If you pull the drive while the unit is still on you'll get the lengthy error message above. Basically you have to either turn the TiVo off, reconnect the drive, and turn it back on, or continue on in single-drive mode, as you were before.

Be forewarned, though! It looks like the Series3 may record simultaneously to both drives (drive-pooling), so if your drive dies or gets pulled, the error states you may lose shows. In other words, don't pull the drive if you don't absolutely have to!

Apparently this technique has been verified up to 1TB total storage -- anyone with a massive eSATA array want to take the plunge and see if we can get a few terabytes of TiVo going on up in here? Leave it in comments.

We didn't have a chance to run some tests on the programs stored on the secondary drive, but let us know if you see anything worthwhile.

Finally, big ups to spike2k5 on TiVo Community who pioneered this technique. Now go forth and expand.

[Ryan McGinty @ Mar 21st 2008 7:37PM]

I've got the new TivoHD and it upgraded to version 9.2. It has a place in the software to setup your external drive, however I'm now getting the error "This device may not be setup."

It seems that many of you have been able to get it to work so please let me know if you see that I'm doing something wrong. I'm using a 750GB Free Agent Pro. I'm pretty sure my cable is working as the lights goe off and come back on when the Tivo restarts.

I've also tried the 62 option without luck. It sounds like this was taken away with the software update. If I would have know that I would have installed my drive before letting it upgrade!!!!

Thanks for any help.

[Videobob @ May 26th 2008 3:24AM]

I think the instructions need to be updated.
I have been trying to do that friggin KickStart62 on my Series3 for the last
few hours with no success.
However after reading some of the notes I noticed all the complaints about these eSata cables.
I too bought that blue "LinkDepot" cable from Fry's for $9.99
and I noticed that it was so stiff that it wouldn't stay in the connector
and didn't fit well.
Believe it or not I was messing with it and the clip came right off the end
of the damned thing and I had to carefully work it back in.
I used a razor knife and trimmed about 1/4" off each end and they
did fit a lot better. I fired up the TiVo and low and behold the thing
was detected!!!! It asked me the warning questions and it worked!
My drive is a Acomdata PureDrive 1TB for less than $200.
Now I have 165 HD hours, and 1561 SD hours.
So yeah, I'm covered and won't have to worry about deleting stuff
again. My only fear is something going wrong with the drive and
loosing everything!!!
So far it's good, thanks!!!

[Perry @ Jul 16th 2008 12:22AM]

VideoBob,

I have the same 1TB PureDrive that you have. My TIVO HD with 9.2 is reporting "This device is unsupported and may not be set up with your TiVo HD DVR."

Any suggestions you can offer?

Thanks,

Perry

[captwatts @ Jan 31st 2009 3:31AM]

What is the tivo software version you have? I cannot get the same external hard drive to work. Drive not supported error.
Thx

[Marcia @ Jun 16th 2008 10:20PM]

I'm so happy to read that I can add an external drive to be able to record many more happy hours of tv on HD. I am just loathe to buy the "one" drive (WD mydvr expander) that they support. WD also makes a 750gb drive that supports esata (needed for Tivo), firewire and usb 2.0 for less money than the 500gb dvr expander. Won't this work as well with 50% more memory? Will I have to do anything other than the instructions I've seen to add it?

Thanks

[chris @ Jun 18th 2008 12:52PM]

Marcia before you get too happy read the two post above you. Im sure TIVO reads these threads and "fixed" the fact that any hard drive will work. I too pushed the *&^*# button for 30 min to get nothing. I called tivo and they said only the approved hard drive will work. I ordered one from amazon. Now a real hacker should see whats inside that hard drive and find a way to put it in any hard drive.

[Brent @ Sep 8th 2008 8:39PM]

Does anyone know if the process described in this article still works now that Tivo has an official solution? I know that WD now sells an official add-on 500 GB drive for the Tivo, but I want to add 1 TB instead. I'm just wondering if Tivo ever disabled the ability to add on non-Tivo-endorsed drives.

[Rob @ Oct 23rd 2008 10:13PM]

Why don't you reccommend using a bare drive? Please explain and add your explanation in the web page.

Thanks!

-- Quoted from the kickstart 62 page:

"Connect your eSATA gear. If you're going to use a straight up bare drive (which we don't suggest), make sure you've got some kind of power source for it."

[Jeff @ Nov 3rd 2008 8:02PM]

I tried this procedure on my S3 ... it went into a "Welcome! Powering Up .." infinite loop ... I'm sorta stuck in this loop, and I've tried powering down and letting it boot normally ... no go ... still in infinite loop.

What next?

[Octavio Lamas @ Mar 8th 2009 1:52PM]

Has anyone figured this out yet? I bought a 1 TB Seagate Xtreme Freeagent ST310005FPA2E3-RK and My series 3 HD tivo just keeps rebooting to the welcome screen. I've tried the Pause and 62 kickstart but never got the orange light and also tried to just let it boot and see if the TIVO will read the drive on it own to no avail. HELP!!

[Xirtam717 @ Nov 6th 2008 11:27PM]

I just connected a 1TB Fantom GForce external drive. {GF1000EU} The TiVo recognized it right away. I didn't have to kick start my Series 3. It did warn me that the drive was unsupported but offered to let me continue. When I said to continue The TiVo rebooted then it offered to format the new drive. After that was done I had 135 additional hours of HD recording space available. It was almost to easy.

[Latteman @ Nov 13th 2008 11:33AM]

Does anyone know if this works for the TivoHD (The series 3's ;ottle brother) as well? I know it takes the WD 500GB MY DVR Expander but would like to use another ESATA drive I already own!

[Latteman @ Nov 13th 2008 1:12PM]

The previous posting should have read (The Series 3's Little brother) If anybody knows if any other external drive will work that would be great. I have a Tvio HD on order and will have to do something to increase its capacity. I am replacing a Verizon FIOS Multi room DVR. The FIOS DVR is a disaster. The navigation doesn't begin to compare to TIVO's, it cannot have its minuscule capacity increased and when I rigged a dual tuner Series 2 TIVO to it (just until I get the TIVO HD) it (the FIOS Motorola DVR) lost any semblance to a dual tuner unit! When the TIVO called for a recording it would chop off the FIOS box without engaging the 2nd tuner. As a result I have a box with mostly incomplete recordings!

Please respond soon on connecting an "unsupported drive!"

[Julian @ Feb 2nd 2009 4:47AM]

Does this hack work on a tivo in Australia?

Can i then take the recordings off the hard drive and put them on my computer?

[Gringo @ Mar 22nd 2009 7:57PM]

I have a Series 3 with software version 11, and tried the Kickstart 62. Guess what, it didn't work and the eSATA drive I am trying to use will not work through the normal setup. It does recongnize the drive, but says it's not supported. Does anyone have any other recommendations on how to get this to work?

[Quixotic @ Apr 17th 2009 10:29AM]

Regarding adding storage to a Verizon Fios, it is or will soon be possible. On 3/31/08 I was on the helpline with "Garlin" and got him chatting about tech stuff while waiting for the Fios box to "cold init". Anyway, he said that in the next month or so Verizon was going to enable the eSATA plug on the back of the DVR boxes. I found this set of messages while doing some searching for the right drive to buy. Garlin recommended "thinkgeek.com". Does anyone have experience with them or have another recommendation? Thanks in advance.

[Rob @ May 4th 2007 10:58PM]

Nice... I guess no one cards 'cause no one has a series three?

[horngreen @ May 4th 2007 11:07PM]

A hack that records to both drives...please.

[jrepetti @ May 4th 2007 11:29PM]

Great beard of Zeus, it worked! 98 HD hours, 927 SD hours with my 500gb external seagate.

[Diane @ May 4th 2007 11:38PM]

this completely and totally rocks, I have a 500GB SATA drive I cna use and there's an eSata case on the way for Monday.

This made my weekend, thanks guys!

[Ryan Block @ May 4th 2007 11:52PM]

Our pleasure!

[Sneezy @ May 5th 2007 12:10AM]

Now, can somebody tell me where to get a Series 3 TiVO for less that $200 legally with no subscription costs or at it's current pricing that allows me to something as simple as word processing on it?

[Brandon Humphries @ May 5th 2007 12:11AM]

I think I peed a little when I read this. How awesome it is that you don't have to open the case or use any MFStools stuff. Back when I had a Series1, I accidently formated my Windows HD that had all my music, movies, photo's, and documents on it when I was trying to bless a drive for use with the tivo. I was a linux noob who got his hda and hdb's mixed up, plus i was an idiot for not backing up (don't worry, i learned my lesson).

[Randolph Lee @ May 5th 2007 1:44AM]

Any experts out there that can help me get High Def shows off of my 2 HDirecTiVos? HR-10-250 model or of of the hard drive on my Cable box DCT6412 III motorola type provided by Adelipha but now being leased from Time Warner Cable the new owners they all seem to have the needed USB2 or firewire ports but with no way to use them(and I am hearing rumors that if I want the promised extra HD content on DirecTiVo I will have to junk my HR10-250s for a new non TiVo DVR (Heck I use the Motorola DCT6412III about 5% of the time as it as I hate the interface on it so much... but with it i only pay a low monthly rental fee the DirecTiVo HD units the first cost me almost $1000!! (Yes I live at the bleeding edge of technology)and the otheron a bargan at $500 and now after 3 years they are junk? and I am to shell out again... well which ever comes through with the High Def shows and stations T I want to watch I hope it will be so I can dump the other provider... it costs a small forturn each year to have all these systems to see the best selection of shows... and where are the history HD stations? oh dear my RANT button got pushed again

I have 3 HD DVRs and I can not do anything with them I would love to be able to take the shows off of them all on to the 4 X500 gig raid 5 drives on my quad 3ghz MacPro 2 gig ram (can get more if needed and x1900 video card so the shows can be redistrubited about the home via ny new 802.11 N Apple TV

So far I have not found anything to do this job... and my faith in the Tivo hacker comunity is being shaken

[Geoffrey Sperl @ May 5th 2007 10:34AM]

This is really off-topic for here, but here's the scoop: Nothing will help you because the shows are already recorded and encrypted. If you were to hack your recorders today (which would require losing all of the old recorded material unless you get really in-depth and figure out how to slice in the hacks as opposed to formating the drive and going from there), and turn off the encryption (an easily done maneuver once the hacking is finished) and then add in the downloading tools you could grab any subsequent recordings.

It's not rocket science, but it's not easy. Google is your friend. As are numerous forums.

[xr @ May 5th 2007 6:31AM]

Thank you for eSATA.

-Randolph Lee

Take a look at these links:

http://www.macosxhints.com/article.php?story=20040426151111599

http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=386740

http://dvr2mac2dvd.blogspot.com/2007/04/this-is-how-i-did-it.html

[Primate @ May 5th 2007 12:47PM]

Ok here is the question can you remove the drive inside of the tivo completely and have it just record directly and use the drives for the tivo linux os ?

[eric f. @ May 5th 2007 10:58AM]

SO Awesome. I can't wait to get an eSata enclosure to add more HD storage!

This will be great for recording current full seasons of shows like Rome that I discovered late and haven't caught up to yet on DVD.

[eric f. @ May 5th 2007 1:30PM]

I found my eSATA enclosure. OWC Mercury Elite-AL "Quad Interface" eSATA, FireWire 400/800+USB2 Combo Drive Enclosure for SATA Hard Drives $109.99. It's for 3.5" drives, so you can even buy a new, huge 500GB drive for cheap. I'm gonna take a slower 200GB SATA drive out of my G5 for the Tivo and get a faster, larger drive for the computer.

If anyone finds a cheaper/better solution, please post it

http://eshop.macsales.com/item/Other%20World%20Computing/MEFW924AL1K/

[Craig @ May 5th 2007 5:06PM]

I'd just do this unless you can find a 500gb drive for less than $80. That is, if you're wanting to use a $500gb drive instead of your old one.

http://www.buy.com/prod/western-digital-my-book-premium-es-edition-hard-drive-500gb-7200rpm/q/loc/101/204143282.html

[Yeechang Lee @ May 5th 2007 4:04PM]

My MythTV box and its three high-definition inputs recording to 8TB in dedicated RAID storage laughs at you.

[BiG� @ May 5th 2007 2:57PM]

Anyone know if upgrading to 8.3 breaks this? I'd hate to get it all set up, only for a system upgrade to disable it.

[richsadams @ May 5th 2007 4:00PM]

Waiting for confirmation that this works on V8.3x and that it still works when originally installed on V8.1x. Can't wait!

[carlos @ May 5th 2007 3:12PM]

It works in 8.3. Read here:

http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/forumdisplay.php?f=51

[ptivo @ May 8th 2007 10:28PM]

Zoinks! Can it be that easy?! Thanks to the backdoor coders. Double glad to have lifetime on the S3.

[John Campos @ May 5th 2007 5:09PM]

Weird, how all the screens involving the external sata drive use a serif font; whereas TiVo pretty much always uses a sans serif font. Weird.

[LukeA @ May 5th 2007 5:50PM]

Finally TiVo users have all the features I've had for over a year on my Scientific Atlanta box. Only I didn't have to hack.

[Telk19 @ May 5th 2007 6:18PM]

wait, can really add eSATA drives to SA DVRs? I've got an 8300HD with TWC and would love some extra space - anyone got a link on how to do this?

[LukeA @ May 5th 2007 6:53PM]

Mine has a SATA (not eSATA) port on the back and the Adelphia/Comcast firmware supports it.

[Kevin Fox @ May 6th 2007 1:17AM]

Do I have to repeat the process whenever the TiVo restarts, or is the pairing permanent?

[Ralph Moore @ Sep 3rd 2009 2:29PM]

Can't get past the "Almost there." Screen

[L'Emmerdeur @ May 6th 2007 11:40AM]

Along with a HUGE "Thank you!" for this, I'd like to know: what was it about Friday that made so many of your posts email-worthy? I found myself forwarding post after post to friends - the Spanish solar power tower, buyshifting, this post, the space glove. Usually, I forward maybe one post per week.

[Ryan Block @ May 6th 2007 1:03PM]

No clue! Some days we have a lot of interesting news, some days there's just not a lot going on.

[JeffB @ May 7th 2007 7:03AM]

Has anyone tried this with a Series 3 that has been upgraded? I replaced my original drive with a 500gig drive that I bought on Ebay. I have 65 hours of HD recording possible now. I have 8.1.1 software. Not being as computer literate as others, will the external drive that I once used for my Scientific Atlantic box from Comcast work with the TIVO. I am not sure what the difference is between SATA and eSATA (as people have written) or which one I would have used with the Comcast box. Thank you in advance.

[Ceralor @ May 11th 2007 12:26PM]

eSATA is merely external SATA. It's essentially having a SATA drive but connecting it externally, kinda like using Firewire or USB, but it's as fast as SATA and only usable for storage. Great idea since SATA is hotpluggable.

[curiousj @ May 7th 2007 12:59PM]

Do any of the drives need to be formatted first? If so, with what?

[Randy Stevens @ May 7th 2007 1:59PM]

Anyone know how to do this to a Verizon FIOS DVR?

[jmorgan750 @ May 8th 2007 9:59PM]

This works great. Thanks for sharing this. I'm surprised tivo hasn't offered this. I had a power outage today and the tivo rebooted both drives without any problems. A battery backup is next.
Thanks

[theothereye @ May 11th 2007 12:59PM]

Nice trick, thank you !

--
http://www.otherworldvision.com

[Thomas @ May 15th 2007 6:35PM]

found some external 500GB drives that work. Comes with the eSATA cable for $199.

http://www.lacie.com/us/products/product.htm?pid=10811