My Humax Forum » Freeview HD » HDR FOX T2

USB questions.

(9 posts)
  1. NormB

    NormB

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    Hi All,

    First post!

    Had the box one week now, great piece of kit, would tell any one who is looking at this forum because they may get one to stop reading and go to the shops

    As said in other posts most people who comment usually have problems, I don't really have problems just a few questions I need to clarify things.

    Used the forum to see what the icons mean on the front display, thanks for those posts, I bet the powers that be at Humax wonder why the display was not put in the handbook

    Right questions, USB related. I presume if I went to the shops and bought a USB powered hard drive upto 1TB, stuck it into the correct hole at the back then I could use that as a sort of overflow for the internal hard drive, just copy over to it. Can the machine record straight to it?

    I have a small USB stick 4GB. When I plug it into the hole at the front and go to it to format it, the machine "reboots" everytime and will not let me format it. Is this because the stick has actually two drives in it when I plug it into my PC, one very small 1MB and the other the rest of the 4GB? Never had a stick with "two" drives, it is a Maxell. I don't really want to use the stick, but I have to play with things to see how they work.

    Cheers
    Norm

    | Sun 6 Nov 2011 11:33:58 #1 |
  2. Barry

    Barry

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    Welcome to our Forum

    1. You would be able to copy content to an ext HDD but not record directly to it.

    If you wanted to copy files over 4GB in size the ext HDD would have to formatted as ext3.

    2. I think there is a minimum size of pendrive/HDD that the HDR can format, around 120GB min iirc.

    | Sun 6 Nov 2011 15:30:42 #2 |
  3. aldaweb

    aldaweb

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    NormB - 5 hours ago  » 
    Never had a stick with "two" drives, it is a Maxell. I don't really want to use the stick, but I have to play with things to see how they work.
    Cheers
    Norm

    Dual partition sticks normally have an encryption program on one of the partitiions (often on a virtual CD drive)that is supposed to autorun when inserted to allow you to access files which are on the other (encrypted) partition. There is normally a program included or downloadable to remove the partitions and make the whole drive available. Once done you may be able to format it to EXT3 using a Linux live distro such as the one on the blog here (link) but even if the HDR sees it you may not have enough room for anything but a short SD recording.

    You can also use the live Linux CD to preformat an external HDD before connecting to the HDR.

    | Sun 6 Nov 2011 17:10:27 #3 |
  4. NormB

    NormB

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    Hi

    Thanks for the replies. I will not bother with the 4GB stick, not worth the trouble.

    If I get a proper external hard drive, say 500 GB, will the box format it for me? I have never heard of EXT3 until I bought my Humax.

    Cheers
    Norm

    | Sun 6 Nov 2011 22:28:25 #4 |
  5. grahamlthompson

    grahamlthompson

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    Yes it will. EXT3 is a file system used by the Linux operating system not Windows. Because Linux is an open source system (full details of how it works is available if you understand the complexities).

    As a result it's used in many set top boxes. This means that some really clever people can add pretty amazing capablity to the box (including the one you have )

    | Sun 6 Nov 2011 22:43:38 #5 |
  6. ezra pound

    ezra pound

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    NormB - 1 day ago  » 

    I presume if I went to the shops and bought a USB powered hard drive upto 1TB, stuck it into the corr
    Norm

    There is a possible problem using 'a USB powered hard drive', USB sockets do supply power BUT, Users have reported that some drives that can be powered from a P.C. USB connector can't be powered from a Humax USB socket. I have a 30Gig HDD that powers from the Humax but some of the bigger ones won't. So the solution is to borrow a drive and make sure it works before buying one or buy a HDD that has a seperate power supply

    | Mon 7 Nov 2011 14:01:50 #6 |
  7. aldaweb

    aldaweb

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    Note that you can get drives which are USB powered that have a 'y' lead with 2 USB connectors on so that you can uas an alternate power source such as a USB phone charger, other drives have a small (3.5mm?) power socket in addition to the USB connector for external 5V input. Seagate IIRC do one of the latter types.

    | Mon 7 Nov 2011 19:06:31 #7 |
  8. NormB

    NormB

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    ezra pound - 10 hours ago  » 

    NormB - 1 day ago  » 
    I presume if I went to the shops and bought a USB powered hard drive upto 1TB, stuck it into the corr
    Norm

    There is a possible problem using 'a USB powered hard drive', USB sockets do supply power BUT, Users have reported that some drives that can be powered from a P.C. USB connector can't be powered from a Humax USB socket. I have a 30Gig HDD that powers from the Humax but some of the bigger ones won't. So the solution is to borrow a drive and make sure it works before buying one or buy a HDD that has a seperate power supply

    Sorry I did not make myself clear, my fault. When I said "USB powered hard drive" I meant " USB, powered (from a power supply)" not just using the power from the USB socket.

    | Tue 8 Nov 2011 0:09:09 #8 |
  9. NormB

    NormB

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    Just been trying something out. For many reasons that are boring I have a spare 320 GB Sata hard drive hanging about. I also had a kit I got off ebay that can convert it to IDE or USB. So I connected it up via USB to the hole in the back and formatted it. Success

    Going to get a better purpose built interface for it, but I know the drive works even if it is not big, but will do for the time being.

    | Fri 11 Nov 2011 20:43:38 #9 |

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