Multple external hard drives

geordie

Member
Hi

I wanted to export recordings onto different external drives (movies on one drive, tv series on another). However, the Humax seems to be struggling with 2 usb drives plugged in.

I plugged in 2 external drives - both were 1TB in size.

However, I had problems with the Humax recognising the drives together and copying to them.
- Sometime only 1 drive will be recognised unless I reboot the Humax then both were recognised.
- Sometimes not all the files on one of the drives were shown.
- I cannot copy from 1 drive to another even though it looks like it is copying but nothing happens.

When the drives are plugged in on their own, there are no problems with seeing files or copying to the drive.

Has anyone managed to get 2 drives plugged in and can copy between them or to each one?


Thanks
Jason
 
A while ago but yes. Two USB powered drives, one in each port. If I recall correctly the from one was ext3 and the other FAT32.
They were probably just under 800mA in total. Some USB drives run very close to 500mA each and would exceed the HDR-FOX T2's 800mA limit.

To quote the manual:
"USB ports on your product supply 800mA in total. This 800mA is shared among all devices connected
to product."

You may need to use a powered USB hub.

Also the HDR-FOX T2 will only copy files of formats it recognises of the type (e.g. video) that it is browsing.
 
Thanks for the replies -I have not seen a powered drive for a while. The drives I see are not powered separately.

Has anyone connected 2 powered USB drives and are there any recommendations?
 
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Where are you connecting your second USB drive? Are you using a USB hub?
I am asking because you have posted this thread in the HD-FOX T2 forum, and that box only has one USB port.
You have not told us which box you are referring to, but if it's actually a HDR-FOX T2, this thread can be moved to the correct forum.

Edit: The OP has a HDR-FOX T2, so I have moved the thread.
 
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Thanks for the replies -I have not seen a powered drive for a while. The drives I see are not powered separately.

Has anyone connected 2 powered USB drives and are there any recommendations?
USB drives called "External" or "Desktop" rather than "Portable" are usually powered, and supplied with a PSU. They will usually be big and chunky, based on 5.25" or 3.5" drives rather than 2.5" drives, and (these days) be in the upper end of capacity (2TB+). As per the info I linked you to before, for ease you need to stick to no more than 2TB (especially with HD-FOX).

Your easiest/cheapest route is to use portable drives and a powered hub.
 
BH: You're absolutely correct in your description of the difference between "external / desktop" and "portable" drives, but in the interests of pedantry I should point out that 5.25" drives are virtually (if not entirely) unknown nowadays; the "big and chunky" drives are invariably 3.5".
 
Thanks for the replies.

I have added a power hub and plugged in 3 2TB drives. When the Humax detects them, it does not detect all folders. When I have 2 drives plugged in, it seems to work but when I add the third, it seems to remove a folder on one of the other drives. Does anyone know how the machine catalogues the folders and files and what would cause this to happen?

Thanks
 
That does seem odd. I've had lots of USB drives connected at once before, each with several partitions and didn't notice any kind of strange behaviour like this.
If you run custom firmware, the rag.log log file may shed some light on what's happening.
 
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