No HDD on AvTech DVR

[HSVZ 0]

Hi all, 1st post on this forum...

 

I have been running an AvTech DVR for about 4 years and yesterday it came up that there was no hdd installed. I had a 400 gig drive it it which has worked well till now. Naturally I thought it was a mechanical error on the drive so I replaced it with a working drive, once again it said no hdd. I then swapped it again for another hdd and up came the dreaded no hdd again !!

 

Has anyone else had this problem and maybe have a solution ??

 

Cheers

Glenn

[scorpion 0]

We would need to figure out a few things.

 

Can you see camera video on your DVR monitor out? Can you change from cam 1 to cam 2 to quad screen?

 

If yes then the mind of the DVR appears to be working.

 

The hard drive may not be bad. It may not be getting power therfore it appears to be a bad hard drive.

 

You will need to measure the voltage to the hard drive. You cannot just stick multi meter leads in to the hard drive power connector. It needs to be done while under load.

 

Note that there may be a relay on the power wire to the hard drive. The DVR will boot up then trigger the relay to send power to the hard drive.

 

It would be best to check the hard drive power wires with an oscilliscope to check for AC leakage.

 

Based on the power level that you find that should tell you what you need to know about the hard drive status.

 

Worse case is the chipset on the board that sends, and receives data to the hard drive could be bad.

[HSVZ 0]

Thanks for the reply Scorpion

 

Yes, everything else is working fine, monitor output, all cameras, remote access etc etc etc.

 

I was thinking down the path of power to the hdd too.

 

I was also thinking of an external power supply to test just for the hdd but thinking it may damage something (dont think it will ???)

 

I dont have an o/scope but I will check with a multi-meter.

[scorpion 0]

You can go to a computer store and ask for a laptop universal power supply. They come with multi tips. Select the one that matches your power jack.

 

http://www.manhattan-products.com/en-US/products/7585-power-adapter

[HSVZ 0]

I had a few desktop power supplies hanging around here, after doing a google on how to power it up without being connected to a computer (finding out what to jump to energize it) I have plugged it into the hdd within the dvr.

 

It worked !!!

 

My hdd is alive again !!!

 

Now to work out whats wrong with the power supply to the hdd within my DVR.

[scorpion 0]

Does your DVR have a relay to contol power to the HDD?

[HSVZ 0]

Doesn't look like it does, there is a separate "mini" board where the power comes in which is attached to the mother board. The hard disk power is fed off this, the wires to the connector for the hdd are soldered into this board.

[rafaga 0]

I had same problema with a AVC792H AVTECH DVR, I solved putting the HD on another AVTECH DVR and clearing it there, after that took the HD and pput it back in the original DVR and started the clearing function and it performed it and it work good.

My conclusión it is not a hardware failure it is a write HD error. Once it was working good I upgrade the firmware.