Cisco 8742HDC Contour Does Not Support External Drive

Hi,

The receiver and software are on our list of receivers that are compatible with eSATA drives. We do not provide any installation or technical support for the eSATA drives. However, we have responded to other similar inquiries with the follwing steps to connect the external drives: http://forums.cox.com/forum_home/tv_forum/f/4/t/3231.aspx

Connect the external drive to the SA 8240HDC as follows:

1. Turn off & UNPLUG power to the SA 8240HDC box
2. Install an eSATA cable into the port on the SA 8240HDC box
3. Connect the eSATA cable to the SATA drive
4. Plug in the power plug for the SA 8240HDC and wait until it completes rebooting
5. Plug in power for the SATA drive and turn on the power
6. It may take a moment, but an on-screen prompt will appear stating when the external drive has been detected
7. Press the yellow triangle button on the remote to permit formatting of the external drive

Please give these steps a try and let us know if this helps!

MichaelJ said:

Hi,

The receiver and software are on our list of receivers that are compatible with eSATA drives. We do not provide any installation or technical support for the eSATA drives. However, we have responded to other similar inquiries with the follwing steps to connect the external drives: http://forums.cox.com/forum_home/tv_forum/f/4/t/3231.aspx

Connect the external drive to the SA 8240HDC as follows:

The 8240 is a Passport receiver, not a Contour receiver. As far as I know, Contour as released does not support eSATA drives.

Michael,

As Domino noted I was not asking about a Scientific Atlantic DVR, but the Cisco Contour DVR.  You did not read my post.  I suspect Domino is right that the Contour does not work with eSATA drives, but I would like to hear it from you.

Kurt

Are they the Scientific Atlanta Contour 8642 and 8742 or the Cisco Contour 8642 and 8742 that are on the list??

CoxFatherInLaw said:

Are they the Scientific Atlanta Contour 8642 and 8742 or the Cisco Contour 8642 and 8742 that are on the list??

They are simply Cisco 8642HDC, or Cisco 8742HDC. Contour is the Integrated Program Guide, and is not part of the DVR model number.

ColleenD said:
CoxFatherInLaw, 

I'm sorry for the confusion. Please allow me to clarify. Both the Scientific Atlanta Contour 8642 and 8742 are showing as being compatible with eSATA Extended Storage for HD DVRs. The Record 6 however, is not. 

I hope this helps.

ColleenD,

Please help with this confusion: The data sheets for the Cisco 8642HDC, 8742HDC, and 9865HDC (Record 6), all indicate that they are eSATA compatible, software controlled. Why does Contour make the 9865HDC non-compatible and not the 8642HDC or 8742HDC ??

Becky said:
Hi Domino,

If I remember correctly, the Scientific Atlanta receivers would accept eSATA drives with a max of 1 TB HDD. I'm not sure if the Cisco 8642HDC and Cisco 8742HDC have that same limit.

Even with the larger hard drives of the Cisco 8642HDC and Cisco 8742HDC, I can see how having an extra 1 TB of external storage space might come in handy. (If my 1 TB DVR is more than half-full, programmed recordings would record to the eSATA drive.)

The Cisco 9865 HDC (Record 6) has a 2 TB hard drive, so unless it is more than half-full, the eSATA drive will sit empty. (Half-full equals 172 hours of full HD recording time.)

We forwarded your question to our video engineering team and hope to have an answer for you soon.

Whether or not it is needed is a different matter. The question is WHY did somebody feel it is necessary to have Contour disable eSATA on the 9865HDC. Wouldn't its usefulness be a question for the customer?

BTW, one of this forum's moderators is telling us that datasheets for the 8642HDC, 8742HDC, and 9865HDC indicate that eSATA is disabled. True? Not true?