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Problem transferring to Ext HDD via USB

C

cirens

New Member
I’ve been transferring to a 320GB USB ExtHDD then running the Foxy utility on my computer, and transferring back to the Hummy to decrypt.
But I’ve just started experiencing problems transferring the recordings off the Hummy.

Transferring a recording manually it displays “copying” on the TV and this disappears after a minute or so, as I have grown to expect of a successful transfer.
However immediately attempting to transfer a second recording, it displays “copying” for only a second or so. Clearly the file did not transfer.

In the case of recording from Channel 4; alongside the recording name on the Hummy (next to where it says “ENC” there is a picture of a disc with a cross through it. Attempting to transfer this recording again to Ext HDD (via USB) results in the message “The copy process of a protected file is not allowed.” These recordings do still play fine on the TV they have not become corrupted.

If the second recording to be transferred is from a BBC source there is no such icon of a disc. Nor is there a displayed warning when attempting to transfer it again. However the recording is not transferred to the Ext HDD (via USB).

Now, if I look at the first recording, transferred to my Ext HDD on my computer (for the recording that “did” transfer) it is missing the all important hmt file.

Does anyone know
1) why the transfers are failing?
2) what has happened to the hmt file?
3) Can I recover my Channel 4 recordings to transfer

Thanks.

The last update to the Hummy was 10 June (ota), it is running software 1.02.20 and I transferred recordings with no problems about a month ago. I am unaware of anything having been changed to my set-up since then.
 
The first alarm bells which sound with me are about file size. Have you read the introductions Black Hole's Trail Guide and the Encyclopedic Glossary? What format is the external HDD? Can't be NTFS if you are still using Foxy - installing the software extensions to be able to write to NTFS makes the whole Foxy process unnecessary. That leaves Ext3 (formatted on the Humax or a Linux PC), which would not be readable on a PC without help, or FAT32 which will not accommodate files greater than 4GB - which can be less than an hour of HiDef recording (and if you need to use Foxy they must be HiDef recordings).

However, even if you are using FAT32, the Humax only fails when it reaches 4GB. That will take something like 20 minutes to transfer. Just because the Humax didn't say it was copying, was the drive lamp flashing? You must allow the transfer to complete before unplugging drives (and there is an option for safe USB dismount in the hidden service menu - see the Glossary and the Index to Informative Threads).

I'm not sure about the detail of your problems, but much of it will be solved by installing and using the Modified Software Project. Even without, there is a much quicker way to deal with Foxy as long as you add the Humax to your home network. You can FTP the .hmt file to the PC directly, without the other files and particularly not the .ts file. This makes it much quicker, the .hmt can be Foxyed and FTPed back again. Then you only need one copy process to decrypt.
 
cirens said:
alongside the recording name on the Hummy (next to where it says “ENC” there is a picture of a disc with a cross through it. Attempting to transfer this recording again to Ext HDD (via USB) results in the message “The copy process of a protected file is not allowed.”
Click to expand...

That picture means that the file is copy protected and has reached the limit of copies that are allowed. I think Foxying it again might reset that.
 
Thanks Black Hole

Sorry, I should have stated:
Am using an EXt3 formatted drive (formatted by the Hummy) and then read on XP computer using Ext2FSd. Which I have done many times before with no problems regardless of file size.

The Hummy is not networked as in a separate area of the house and is not really practical to do so. I'm not fussed about about the time and repetition of the transfer to make it work.

I'm not sure about the detail of your problems, but much of it will be solved by installing and using the Modified Software Project. Even without, there is a much quicker way to deal with Foxy as long as you add the Humax to your home network. You can FTP the .hmt file to the PC directly, without the other files and particularly not the .ts file. This makes it much quicker, the .hmt can be Foxyed and FTPed back again. Then you only need one copy process to decrypt.
Click to expand...

If I were to do this could I recover the Channel 4 recordings it won't let me copy?
 
af123 said:
That picture means that the file is copy protected and has reached the limit of copies that are allowed. I think Foxying it again might reset that.
Click to expand...

Thanks.
Hmm. The files haven't left the Humax to be Foxy'd.
Am stuck with USB transfer as the only way I can see of getting files out (I can't really network it) :-(
 
All is not lost - a Cat5 and a laptop will sort it! If you have no laptop, I got a 15m Cat5 for about a fiver - surely that would reach from your Humax (temporarily) to your desktop?
 
Thanks guys,
Was able to connect a laptop by cable. FTP'd in and then foxy'd the hmts which did (as af123 siad) reset them.
I can now try downloading the recordings again (which have the benefot of also being unencrypted at first pass.
:)
 
Having had success at recovering these recordings through the network cable. I thought I'd have a look at what's available via the modified firmware.
Reviews seem to agreee that it is easy to install (and recover) so I am very tempted to give it a go - particularly seeing the auto unprotect package that would save me a step or two.
It woud also be nice to decrypt on the box (but not necessarily automatically) to make eventual transfer to pc quicker.
I have a 1TB drive in the hummy with about 700GB taken up that I don't want to lose. I don't know if I need to do a reformat for the Virtual drive. Once decrypted to the virtual drive can I transfer out via USB (still the desired option for me.)
I've read lots of posts that talk about the need to telnet during installation but others that say you don't (probably the age of the posts?)
Sorry but I've gone round in circles for the last few hours reading posts and can no longer see the wood for the trees. Can you please point me to where I need to go to find out more about how the virtual drive works.
Thanks
 
I don't see that decrypting to a virtual drive and then copying to USB is going to improve anything. I agree auto-unprotect will make things much slicker, but if you insist on transferring by USB that's all you need.

Regarding Telnet, we did away with that apart from some advanced play. You will need your Ethernet wire though, connected to the outside world (as well as a browser). All you need to do is install the custom firmware by USB (same as a firmware update), then access the web interface for the rest. If you can't get Internet access to the Humax, we can advise how to load the respective packages from USB - and then you will need Telnet.
 
Thanks for all your help Black Hole

Black Hole said:
I don't see that decrypting to a virtual drive and then copying to USB is going to improve anything..
Click to expand...
I thought the decrytping to virtual drive was quicker than the decrypting via USB. Although it would still be two process to get the files off I thought that would be quicker. Am I mistaken?
If it is quicker, how does the virtual drive affect any files on the computer. Can I safely install and run the virtual drive package without affecting my other recordings?

As things stand I have installed the modified software. Horray!
I coudn't for some reason get full web access (I was connected by network to a laptop that had wi-fo access)/

Black Hole said:
I agree auto-unprotect will make things much slicker, but if you insist on transferring by USB that's all you need.
Click to expand...
Regardless, I manually installed auto-unprotect via USB. The USB shows the log file to confirm installation but currently no recordings have been unencrypted (that weren't previously). I thought it initially ran through all the recordings and then just periodically thereafter.

(Sorry that the thread title is not longer accurate)
 
Whoops! It might be just a typo but it's best to be clear right from the start that auto-unprotect does not unencrypt (or decrypt) anything. It just resets the flag that tells the Hummy that this is an HD file which must not be decrypted. I.e. it's a replacement for Foxy, not for the decryption process.

On the subject of speed, recent results I've seen here suggest that copying to the virtual disk is not actually much quicker than using an external drive. The bigger advantage is that you can copy to virtual, then ftp or samba the decrypted file from there to your PC, removing the worries about what format to use on the external disk. Of course, that only works if the Hummy is networked. (And even then, this technique has since been superseded by other, more convenient methods.)

In your situation, I'd suggest forgetting about the virtual disk. Install the ntfs-3g utility, giving the Hummy the ability to write to an NTFS disk. Use auto-unprotect to keep all the HD protection flags clear, then decrypt by USB copying to your external (NTFS) disk and walk the files to wherever the recipient machine is located.
 
fenlander said:
On the subject of speed, recent results I've seen here suggest that copying to the virtual disk is not actually much quicker than using an external drive.
Click to expand...

Okay, thanks. Won't bother with that then.

fenlander said:
Whoops! It might be just a typo but it's best to be clear right from the start that auto-unprotect does not unencrypt (or decrypt) anything. It just resets the flag that tells the Hummy that this is an HD file which must not be decrypted. I.e. it's a replacement for Foxy, not for the decryption process.
Click to expand...
That was indeed bad wording on my behalf. I should have said "currently no recordings have lost the ENC icon.."

This still stands 20 hours later on. Does autoprotect do in initial run through all the recordings followed by periodic? Still none of mine have lost the ENC icon as the do when externally foxy'd. Do I need another package installed (in addotion to the MOdSoftware itself and auto-unprotect) to make this work? How frequent is the "periodic" check?
 
cirens said:
This still stands 20 hours later on. Does autoprotect do in initial run through all the recordings followed by periodic? Still none of mine have lost the ENC icon as the do when externally foxy'd. Do I need another package installed (in addotion to the MOdSoftware itself and auto-unprotect) to make this work? How frequent is the "periodic" check?
Click to expand...
There is no longer a periodic scan, new recordings have the ENC flag removed when finished. It should also scan the disk for new recordings at startup. However, there is a bug in the script in which the scan does not take place. If this is a new installation it should still remove the flag from all existing recordings (despite the bug).

If you have just one or two recordings with the flag still set then they can be cleared using the OPT+ button on the web interface. If there are lots which need to be cleared then I suggest you try deleting the file /mod/.unprotect.last and then restart the box.

PS. There should be a new version of auto-unprotect available soon (it will not help with existing recordings though).
 
Thanks xyz321 have been reading through posts to see your progress on this

xyz321 said:
There is no longer a periodic scan, new recordings have the ENC flag removed when finished.
Click to expand...
That's what I call perfect! Fantastic. So many thanks.
(I can manually unflag older recordings so they're no problem.)

I manually installed the Modsoftware via USB and then loaded Auto Unprotect 1.0.3 again via USB (a log file back to the USB stick confirmed this was okay.) However, even new recordings do not have the ENC flag removed, even after play/stop or even playing whole way through.
a) Do I indeed have the latest version of autounprotect?
b) Do I need some other package installed too to make it work (e.g. virtual disk so it has an environment to run in?
c) I can't seem to identify a thread dedicated to Auto Unprotect. Is there one?

xyz321 said:
PS. There should be a new version of auto-unprotect available soon (it will not help with existing recordings though).
Click to expand...
Why? What you have described above already sounds perfect!
 
I would like this topic restored to the non-mod forum: it starts as an enquiry about non-mod affairs.
 
Black Hole said:
I would like this topic restored to the non-mod forum: it starts as an enquiry about non-mod affairs.
Click to expand...
It's definitely ended up as a mod topic! Maybe the thread title should be changed? Or can the last couple of posts be moved and started as a new thread?
 
cirens said:
I manually installed the Modsoftware via USB and then loaded Auto Unprotect 1.0.3 again via USB (a log file back to the USB stick confirmed this was okay.) However, even new recordings do not have the ENC flag removed, even after play/stop or even playing whole way through.
a) Do I indeed have the latest version of autounprotect?
b) Do I need some other package installed too to make it work (e.g. virtual disk so it has an environment to run in?
c) I can't seem to identify a thread dedicated to Auto Unprotect. Is there one?
Click to expand...
I think the reason that it is not working for you is that the package has dependencies and you are installing from USB. Normally these despendencies would be automatically installed but they may not get installed if you install via USB. I would expect that it would fail to install auto-unprotect if these dependencies are not already installed. You would need to install 'busybox', 'inotify-tools' and 'hmt' before installing auto-unprotect.

Why? What you have described above already sounds perfect!
Click to expand...
In addition to the bug in my previous post there is another bug with the current version in that it can fail to remove the flag. This happens if a recording is in chase play mode and the play is left to run on to the end of the recording.

Edit: Missed out hmt in the list of dependencies.
 
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