Can't Mount cdrom with SATA Ports on PC only.

[crabell]

The Background...

I declared the internal Hard Drive on my S3 "dead" after it fell into a constant reboot sequence. I tried Kickstart 57, 58 & 52 with no results.

I tried using WinMFS but I just could not get it to work, it looks like the drive was beyond recovery.

So I decided to "retire" the internal drive that came with the S3 and move the External 750GB drive internally after using "Instantcake" on it.

The Problem...

My PC has 4 SATA ports and 1 IDE port. I have the "new" drive connected via SATA as well as my BD-ROM Drive. Instantcake boots just fine, but I just can't figure out how to mount the "cdrom". I tried identifying it as hda, hdb, ... sda, sdb,... with no results.

I tried connecting my "old" CD-ROM to the IDE port and keeping my "new" drive on the SATA port, but I still can't figure out how to mount the cdrom. I tried identifying it as hda, hdb, ... sda, sdb,... with no results.

I can see both drives on the BIOS, but I just can't identify them inside Instantcake. Is there a command that would help me identify the drives?

Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated!

[Lou Jacob]

You can do a a directory listing (ls) of /dev or more specifically try:

ls -l /dev/sd*

and/or

ls -l /dev/hd*

to see the devices available on your system.

Every PC is different.

[brianatthebeach]

Hi,

I bought instantcake for svr-2000 upgrade today Order Number: 73163. I have mostly usb and sata ports available in my home. In my reading of the forums it seems I can only access hd connected drives but I would like to connect to sd (usb) connected drives. Is this possible under advanced mode? I went as far as seeing that instant cake suggested to me hd attached drives so I stopped so I would not cause any problems.

In other words can instantcake be used nowadays with notebooks and other hardware where ide is becoming less and less available and usb and sata more and more prevalent? I would think sellers of software would adjust for changing landscape of computers. I can borrow a PC but for now and in the future would really like to make things like instantcake work on modern computers like usb notebooks or sata equipped desktops.

Long story short,
1) can we customize instancake install(use advanced mode?) to access usb connected drives for the tivo upgrade process and if so are there good links available to forum posts or websites that describe this process?

2) can I access instantcake image from my purchase and use mfslive to access usb drives as was suggested in tivocommunity? Also any suggested links?

I have tried searching forums for this but most will not let me search on a 3 letter word like USB :-)

Thanks,
Brian

[crabell]

I did not find a way to mount my cdrom on my SATA system, so I borrowed a SATA to USB adapter from my Company's IT Department and used an older computer (without SATA).

It took a few tries, but I finally managed get my SATA Drive working using the USB adapter and Instantcake... my TiVo has been runnig smoothly for a few days now.

I think the developers should look into improving their support for SATA only computers, in the meantime using a USB to SATA adapter seems to be the simplest solution.

[brianatthebeach]

Hi,

Thanks for the reply. From what you describe it still sounds like something I and others might be able to make use of. Can you give more details? I still want to use instantcake in a way that appears to not be documented very well. I have connected my tivo drives to usb external boxes and then to the computer's usb port. Now to use instantcake to install onto the usb connected drive eludes me. It appears instantcake only will give me hda-hdd connected drive choices not sd connected drives.

Thanks,
Brian

[Lou Jacob]

I can't keep up with all of the cross-posting, so let's close this thread and consolidate on the most current one here (http://www.tivocommunity.com/tivo-vb/showthread.php?t=415677).