Installation guide

Other currently produced brands or models of hard drive should work. Seagate drives have been popular replacement drives
because of their 5 year warranty.
So is there a drive or line of drives that's a sure thing to work in a ReplayTV? There's no easy answer. Maxtor makes a line of
drives specifically designed for use in PVRs - the QuickView line. Seagate also makes a PVR specific line of drives - the DB35
series. These drives handle error correction differently than a standard PC drive - and are good choices for replacement
drives. On the other hand, newer firmware may at some point make these drives also incompatible in ReplayTVs. I recently
used Western Digital 300 GB (WD3000JB) drives in my 3 ReplayTVs and they worked fine. These drives are still readily
available.) I'm currently using Seagate DB35 (ST3500841ACE) 500 GB drives in my 3 ReplayTVs.
At one time, drive compatibility was fairly easy to define - most drives worked, while only a few drives did not. If you
encounter problems after an upgrade that you believe may be related to the type of drive used, your best bet would be to at
least test the ReplayTV using a different type of drive. The vast majority of ReplayTV problems are caused by a hard drive
problem or corruption of the software on the hard drive.
• Drive Size Limits
The OS and hardware in the ShowStopper and ReplayTV 3000 series limit drive size to the first 137 GB of any drive, so 2 drive
upgrades in these ReplayTVs allow for more than 137 hours of storage. Later ReplayTVs do not have the 137 GB limitation and
will use the full capacity of any size drive, including the current generation 300+ GB drives.
• Commercial Advance and Internet Video Sharing in 55XX series ReplayTVs
Commercial Advance and Internet Video Sharing were removed from the 55XX series ReplayTVs. (Making that the only
difference between 50XX and 55XX ReplayTVs). After the initial release of the 55XX series, it was possible to easily enable
those features on a 55XX even though they were not sold with the features enabled. Beginning with software build 144,
(released 8/2004), it was no longer possible to easily enable those features on a 55XX.
A 50XX remote has a button labeled "Commercial Advance", while a 55XX remote has the same button labeled "Input". The IR
code put out by either remote is the same; the software running on the ReplayTV determines how to respond. So on a 55XX
with CA and IVS enabled, the CA button on a 50XX remote and the Input button on a 55XX remote will toggle CA. On a 55XX
without CA and IVS, the CA button on a 50XX remote and the Input button on a 55XX will toggle the input. Likewise, in a 50XX
ReplayTV, the CA button on a 50XX remote and the Input button on a 55XX remote will toggle CA.
Although not as easy as initially, it's still possible to enable CA and IVS on a 55XX series ReplayTV. The ReplayTV must run a
software version prior to version 144 (version 19 or version 140) and all net connects must be made through WiRNS running on
a PC. If you want to invest a little time and research, here are some sources of information -
Kevin Moye's web page with CA and IVS for 55XX series info:
http://replayguide.sourceforge.net/rtv5504/index.html
Long thread about enabling CA and IVS in 55XX ReplayTVs.
rbolen70's WiRNS site (Latest WiRNS that runs as a service):
http://www.wirns.com
WiRNS docs/screenshots (by codemantx)
michaelbell_a's WiRNS installation guide
michaelbell_a's WiRNS FAQ
Revert to a previous ReplayTV software version without re-imaging.
If that thread is not available, the same info from j.m. is available here.
j.m.'s ReplayTV Tools:
http://s95184944.onlinehome.us/ReplayTV.html