Hard Drive has disappeared ?

[flamehearted]

Hi all,

I left the box on overnight recording. When I woke up the morning it had the message E-HW on the front. Since this point the box has been making a strange clicking noise. The box takes about 10 minutes to switch on, but when it does the recording ability and the HD seem to have disappeared. Nothing happens when I press the record button and I now have a games option instead.

Can anybody help with this ? Has the HD gone ? The box is only a month or so old.

Many thanks,

Martin

[Martin Liddle]

Can anybody help with this ? Has the HD gone ? The box is only a month or so old.

Try turning off at the mains and leaving it switched off for ten minutes. If the hard drive is still not found then you can be pretty certain that it has died; get the box exchanged by the supplier for a new one.

[flamehearted]

Many thanks Martin

Would you be able to tell me the contact number I should call for Humax from the UK ?

[Barry]

Welcome to the Forum:)

Product Information & Customer Technical Support see this link:

http://www.humaxdigital.com/uk/support/contactus.asp

[Martin Liddle]

Would you be able to tell me the contact number I should call for Humax from the UK ?
Given that the box os only a month old contact the supplier not Humax and get a new box. If you go to Humax you will get an exchange box that may (or may not) be significantly older.

[redhum]

In the last few weeks my Hummy 9300 takes an age to boot up and then appears not to detect the hard drive. All references to recording or recorded programmes disappear from the menu system, however, there is no error message.

I've removed the HD and connected it to my PC and although it spins up, it is not recognised by the PC.

I'm assuming I need to replace it - my question is, will any similar sized 3.5" SATA drive do or is the spec more specific...?

Thanks,

Andrew

[Martin Liddle]

I've removed the HD and connected it to my PC and although it spins up, it is not recognised by the PC.

Have you tried to format it in the PC?

I'm assuming I need to replace it - my question is, will any similar sized 3.5" SATA drive do or is the spec more specific...?

You ought to fit a type of drive intended for PVRs. The only 9300 I have seen inside had a Western Digital WD4300AVJS fitted. They are widely available eg http://www.scan.co.uk/Product.aspx?WebProductID=850924

[aldaweb]

I've removed the HD and connected it to my PC and although it spins up, it is not recognised by the PC.

The PC cannot recognise the humax file format, without using humaxrw (or possibly hummyreadfiles though I'm not sure it's been tested with 9300 drives) though the drive should appear in the management console.

[redhum]

Yes, Vista wanted to Initialise it and then format it - I stopped it from formatting in case I could recover the data. However, I then returned it to the Humax and on start up it did a very fast format. I've lost all old data but at least it works :)

[Martin Liddle]

Yes, Vista wanted to Initialise it and then format it

So the PC did recognise the drive; it won't recognise the file system. The PC has probably written a partition table on the drive which could have been corrected with humaxcheck.

- I stopped it from formatting in case I could recover the data. However, I then returned it to the Humax and on start up it did a very fast format. I've lost all old data but at least it works :)
I would still be tempted to format it in the PC if you have any further problems.

[redhum]

The PC originally didn't recognise it - I think this was purely down to the fact that I connected it via USB and then powered it up rather than the other way round.

Anyway, second attempt worked and it looks like I've saved £40 by not replacing the drive :)

I was reluctant to format from the Vista Box as the only option available was NTFS rather than FAT.

[Martin Liddle]

I was reluctant to format from the Vista Box as the only option available was NTFS rather than FAT.
It doesn't matter as the Humax uses neither and will rewrite its own file system whichever you use. The point is to try and get the disk controller firmware to map out any bad sectors.

[redhum]

It doesn't matter as the Humax uses neither and will rewrite its own file system whichever you use. The point is to try and get the disk controller firmware to map out any bad sectors.
I see - I'm learning so much ;-)