A nice score from a dumped Sky HD+ box

everthewatcher

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I've mentioned before that dumped Sky+ boxes will usually have a perfectly good Seagate 500GB drive in them, same model as used in the HDR, albeit with a high power on time of sometimes >2000 days. I've got a stack of them here plus a 250GB one that I must do something about and every one passed Seagate's Seatools long test OK.

The other day a slightly different black-fronted Sky box came my way with "2TB" on the front. Inside was a WD20EURX drive with 740 days and currently with a 55 PoC, 10 of which will have happened while I've had it. I've now got to decide what to do with it.
 
It would also indicate that the WD10EURX and WD20EURX are a good choice should you need to replace the original Seagate.
 
Pulled a 2009 WD2500AAJS WD Caviar Blue drive from a dumped Sagem Freeview box yesterday. 162 days, 2470 PoC and so many duff sectors it's unrecoverable.
 
Pulled a 2009 WD2500AAJS WD Caviar Blue drive from a dumped Sagem Freeview box yesterday. 162 days, 2470 PoC and so many duff sectors it's unrecoverable.
You win some - you lose some,
I returned my Sagem box to John Lewis after a month or so as too unreliable to use and got the Humax HDR T2 instead, I haven't looked back since :)
 
IMO the WD Blue is not a good choice for a PVR...
I'd agree with that. The design has it screwed to the PCB which in turn is hard fixed to the case so probably not the quietest STB. No fan either.

Current Pending Sector Count is 1,465...
 
Two more Sky HD+ boxes turned up yesterday and I think we may have a new record.

One box was dated '09 and had a WD Greenpower WD3200AVVS drive with 3194 days / 105 PoC on it - that's 8.75 years. Passed WD's Data LifeGuard Diagnostics extended test with no issues.

The Seagate 500GB in the other one was fine too, with only 1020 days / 90 PoC.

[Edit] The WD box was an early design I've not seen before with two fans, one dedicated to cooling the HDD which also had a louvred heatsink bolted to one side.
 
Make a NAS box with striping et al ... ?:)
With a similar 500GB drive surplus, I was considering that but it wouldn't be worth it for fewer than 5 (say ~2TB usable capacity) and the cost of an enclosure for 5 or more 3.5" drives seems to be prohibitive (especially compared to the 0 cost of the drives) ... unless anyone has any suggestions?
 
With a similar 500GB drive surplus, I was considering that but it wouldn't be worth it for fewer than 5 (say ~2TB usable capacity) and the cost of an enclosure for 5 or more 3.5" drives seems to be prohibitive (especially compared to the 0 cost of the drives) ... unless anyone has any suggestions?

Use USB interfaces and a Rasberry Pi? A USB hub would allow one to attach a very large number (as in more than 3-5) of drives and Linux would handle the striping/mirroring to make one large drive.
 
Use USB interfaces and a Rasberry Pi? A USB hub would allow one to attach a very large number (as in more than 3-5) of drives and Linux would handle the striping/mirroring to make one large drive.
Quite, but I think the real problem is a box with mounting points, fan and power supply in which to put the numerous drives, and then perhaps that the whole thing would be some sort of unplanned convection heater.
 
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