SATA HDD on S1 Tivo

[s2156593]

Hello,

I'm wondering if anyone has tried using a SATA HDD, with a SATA -> IDE adapter, on Series 1 Tivo? As you all aware it's getting difficult to get brand new decent size IDE HDD now...

[Skolink]

Yes, well aware :)
http://forums.oztivo.net/showthread.php?t=2046

People on the mailing list recently suggested:

Western digital green power 24/7 drives from MSY

Seagate option listed here, including the SV35 AV drives.
http://www.staticice.com.au/cgi-bin/search.cgi?q=750gb+pata&spos=3
http://www.staticice.com.au/cgi-bin/search.cgi?q=750gb+ide+-serial+-usb+-sata&spos=1

[Skolink]

I have successfully used a SATA-IDE adaptor which has a SunPlus SATALink SPIF223A-H022 chipset, in conjunction with a Samsung HD502IJ 500GB drive.

Sunplus 223A adaptor.JPG

In order to image the drive the adaptor had to be plugged into the Secondary IDE controller on my PC (and the CDROM on Primary) otherwise it would not boot. BIOS reported the drive as 137Gb but the ozTiVo boot disk reconised it as 500Gb.

[petestrash]

Skolink, you may want to be clear in your previous posts.

99.9% of IDE-SATA convertors on the market do not work with TiVo.

This is one of the rare .1% that seem to.

Peter.

[Lurker]

Would be interesting to know where you sourced it - could find no reference to a Sunplus adapter with GoogleFu

[Skolink]

I just bought 5 of these, so when they arrive I'll let you know if they work.
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=350255745731
Pretty pricy at 99c each ;)

[petestrash]

There seems to be small differences between your board and the eBay one. Is this the same seller you bought the first board from?

Peter.

[Skolink]

No I have no idea who I bought the first one off. It could have been 2 years ago, and I only just tried it a week ago.
Yes I noticed that Q1 is not fitted on the photo of the latest ones. It looks similar enough that I decided to risk a few $.

[petestrash]

The board model number appears to be the same, just a few slight differences in population.

When did you order these?

Peter.

[Lurker]

US99c - the only ones I could find from Dynamix were above $30 - wow

Let us know if they work and what the postage was in $NZ as I bet there might be a few people interested.

[petestrash]

There is another adapter recently found to work.

It has the same board number, and does appear to use similar components (albeit different layout).

What are the details for the IC on your board.

Peter.

[Skolink]

Postage was US$2.07 per board. Oh I had to fork out US$0.70 for a SATA cable and US$0.70 for a Molex-SATA power adaptor too.

I ordered them only a couple of days ago. In my excitement I actually forgot to ask what the chipset on the boards is :o

[petestrash]

Have these arrived yet?

Peter.

[Skolink]

Yes they arrived on Wednesday (finally), however I don't have a SATA drive to test them with at the moment :o
They look identical to working one, aside from Q1 not being fitted.
Happy to post one to you.

[petestrash]

No need thanks. Just curious if it also works.

Peter.

[Skolink]

The adaptors I recently bought (see post #6) do not work 'out of the box'. Since the working adaptor is identical but with the board fully populated, including a couple of 0ohm resistors (jumpers), I'm hoping that it is something to do with 'cable select' vs 'master'.
Unfortunately I can't seem to find the SunplusIT SPIF223A-HL022 datasheet.
I'm sure someone posted it here or to the mailing list (Darren?). Could you please repost it.

[Darren King]

Unfortunately no data sheet, just the product overview from their website. Like most chips these days any actual information on the "guts" of how a chip works seems very devoid on the net - at least to the general population.

I have, however, filled in the request form on the SunPlus website asking for any available datasheets so we shall see what happens. The website mentions you can request datasheets so maybe they are friendly enough to oblige.

[Islander]

Skolink I have emailed you a copy of the datasheet I have (@paradise).

Hope it helps.

[Skolink]

Awesome thankyou, I searched the web for ages for that. Can I post it here or did you get it through some NDA? You wouldn't happen to have the reference design also?

[Islander]

I was unable to upload it as when I tried I kept getting file too big messages.

I found the sheet by google search.:)

[Skolink]

I had another go at the adaptors I recently bought (see post #6). I modified the boards to be identical to the original working adaptor, shifting some jumpers and a capacitor and fitting the transistor. They still did not work.
I did notice another difference though, and that was that the chip on the non-working boards is a SPIF233A-HF022 rather than -HL022 on the working board. Unfortunately I can't find any documentation to tell me if there is actually any functional difference between the two versions. It may just be Pb(lead) free vs non.

[petestrash]

Are both PCB's marked as the 629A version?

[Skolink]

Both PCBs are marked "RXD-629" on the front and "SPIF223 IDE TO SATA" on the back.

[Skolink]

I bought another SATA-IDE adaptor for a FreeNAS box, but I tested it in a TiVo and it works!
"GK5882 IDE to SATA / SATA to IDE Converter Adapter 2 in 1", Ebay item #280794004780 from seller gogo21shop. Only US$2.72 including shipping!
The chipset is marked only
IDE/SATA
00F

Incidently the SunPlus adaptor I previously couldn't get to work in a TiVo works just fine in my FreeNAS box.

[petestrash]

Thanks for the followup.

Peter.