G4-8RTA-D1 DVR not recognizing new HDD's

[alpine0000 0]

Hello,

 

I have a G4-8RTA-D1 DVR that came with 500gb of HDD space. A few months ago I added an additional 1TB (two 500gb drives) and when the DVR boots up, it recognizes them and says they're working fine, so I never thought anything of it...

 

Fast-forward to tonight: For the first time, I clicked on "DVR properties" in the client software, and in the window that pops up it says my new drives are on "standby", and "abnormal".

 

Can anybody tell me what I need to do to make these drives active? I didn't see anything in the owners manual (not to mention, it was written in VERY poor english and is not easy to understand).

 

I am upgrading to an IP solution soon, but for now I'd like to get this working properly.

 

I emailed tech support, but they are very spotty, and over the last two years have only replied to about 25% of my emails, so I figured I'd post here in the meantime and see if any of you guys could help.

 

 

Thanks!

 

William

[tracenet 0]

Hi William,

I think the first thing I would look at is why your first HD is in SATA port 5. The information I have on this unit says that it will handel 6 HD with a DVD installed.

The first thing I would do is plug the HD into HDD01 and move down from there.

Just my thoughts.

 

Jim

Trace-Net Network Services, LLC

[alpine0000 0]

Hi William,

I think the first thing I would look at is why your first HD is in SATA port 5. The information I have on this unit says that it will handel 6 HD with a DVD installed.

The first thing I would do is plug the HD into HDD01 and move down from there.

Just my thoughts.

 

Jim

Trace-Net Network Services, LLC

 

Thanks for the idea I will try that tonight when I get home from work and report back!

 

If anybody else has any other ideas in the meantime, please let me know

[Soundy 1]

I'm not familiar with this particular system, but in my experience, there would generally be something in the menus/options/setup where you have to format/initialize new drives, and/or add them to the drives available to the DVR... it's rarely as simple as just plugging them in and leaving it at that.

[alpine0000 0]

I'm not familiar with this particular system, but in my experience, there would generally be something in the menus/options/setup where you have to format/initialize new drives, and/or add them to the drives available to the DVR... it's rarely as simple as just plugging them in and leaving it at that.

 

Thanks, i will check into that! I wish this owners manual was written a bit better.

[alpine0000 0]

I'm not familiar with this particular system, but in my experience, there would generally be something in the menus/options/setup where you have to format/initialize new drives, and/or add them to the drives available to the DVR... it's rarely as simple as just plugging them in and leaving it at that.

 

Soundy,

 

You are correct. I went into the HDD manager, and dug deeper than I originally did a few months ago when I installed them, and see that the status of the two newer drives says "unformatted", and it gives me an option to format them. I am doing that now. It might take a few hours. Afterwards, it says I need to reboot. Then we will see if I am back in business!

 

I made the mistake of installing them, and then seeing the "false hope" icons when the machine boots saying all 4 drives are working properly.

 

No wonder I am only getting 10-14 days of recording still... Haha

 

Thanks again

[alpine0000 0]

looks like formatting them did the trick.

[Soundy 1]

wOOT!