Iomega 34508 eSATA DVR 1TB Expander Drive

SOMETHING IS VERY FISHY with this product. It came in a "Shaw" box. Who is Shaw? There was no identifying model number on the box, and the only reference to IOmega was the photograph. There is also no model number on the product itself. The device recorded properly the first few times, then stopped recording before the program was complete. The last time, we tried to record a basketball game for 3 hours and 40 minutes, and it stopped recording after 10 minutes. I looked at the installation instructions, and it said to connect the device to the cable box and power it on, and then contact Shaw to have the device activated. I did this on their website via chat, and was told that the device did not need activation, that it should work right out of the box, and that Shaw no longer offers DVR Expanders, and does not offer support on this item. They said that I should contact IOmega for technical support, even though there is no IOmega documentation. I think this may be a counterfeit item.I contacted Amazon, and they were very helpful, as usual. I will be returning this item for a full refund, and try something else.

I got this DVR expander to replace a WD expander that pooped out. Problems with the WD drive didn't really begin until my cable company switched from Passport to Mystro software for the SA8300's (but it may have been a coincidence because the DVR was recently swapped out).Upon first receipt of the Iomega I believe I may have interfered with the formatting process (which can take minutes)by believing it had not taken and rebooting the machine. The DVR came back and said the drive was installed and ready to use but there was no reduction in used space. Nothing I did changed this.So, my remedy was to swap DVR's again. This time, the unit installed and the unused space was increased but the playback of recorded video (including replay of live TV) was unstable and full of stuttering and break up. Iomega's solution was an exchange for a refurbished unit which had the same problem. So, Iomega assumed it was a bad esata cable and sent me a new one. There was no change. So, I began to consider the possibility that the DVR had a bad esata port or was otherwise the problem and not the drive.I swapped DVR units again and upon installing the drive it did not format but was already recognized by the DVR and it did not reduce the amount of used space (now, I wonder if I got my original unit recycled back to me).I gave up for a week or two because I got sick and when I was ready to tackle it again I talked with the cable company and iomega both really didn't know what to do. Iomega was on the verge of going through another exchange with me. But I had begun to think that perhaps it just needed to be formatted to something else and then it would trigger reformat back to the DVR properly. Then, that idea was suggested by the cable company but they could give me no idea about how to do it since my computer had no esata ports. Iomega also had no idea about what to do.Then I got to thinking that there might be an esata to USB adapter that I could use to format the drive. And indeed there was. USB to eSATA / SATA Adapter So, I got this adapter and when it came in connected the drive to the computer, fumbled my way to formatting it for the computer and for good measure, saved an insignificant file to the drive.The moment of truth, this is it. I unplugged the DVR, plugged in and hooked up the Iomega drive via the esata cable and plugged things back in. When everything came back, it asked me if I wanted to reformat the external drive (so far, so good) and a couple minutes later it tells me the formatting is complete. I look at the used space and it's... the same. Oh no....I turn off the list and turn it back on again to make sure and... NOW it shows more space (just took a moment to kick in).That was about a little over a month ago and I sure have been giving this unit a run for it's money, making up for lost time. It's been as high as 50% (I do record lots of movies off HBO and Cinemax that I can take a while to get to or at least I can take a while to get to them now) and the recorded tally on that 50% was a little over 85 hours of high definition and almost 17 hours of standard definition (yes I added it up, I wanted to measure the capacity).Anyway, I got this thing in early June and finally worked out all the kinks and got it working after August.The performance has been fine with no glitching of the recordings beyond the occasional ones that happened before the expander drive. Same for the occasional dropped or split recordingSo, it was a long journey complicated by not knowing where the problems actually were (it was probably unnecessary to return that first drive unless it had a problem along with the DVR) but thank goodness it got figured out.

This Iomega DVR expander drive was easy to install, but the manual leaves a little to be desired if, like me, you take things literally. The skimpy instructions leave the impression that you MIGHT lose any data (programs) you have stored on your DVR, but I think it's only in case of accidental unplugging. In any case, the actual connecting of the device is simple. You turn off your Scientific Atlanta DVR and unplug the back. Included data cable from DVR back to device back, and power cord from device back to your household outlet. There's a stand you can use to prop up the device. I laid mine flat without the stand. Once you reconnect the power to the DVR, the device will ask to be rebooted. Here's where I worked up a sweat: first the DVR rebooted. Then a blue box came up on the screen asking for the drive to be formatted. This was mentioned in the instructions. I pressed A for yes and waited for another reboot. So far, so good. Then, when the DVR box had rebooted, the same blue box popped up and asked for the device to be reformatted again. Again I pressed A for yes, and waited. This made me nervous -- why the extra reboot? Then the reboot was over and the same blue box popped up again. Reluctantly, I pressed A for yes again, but this time nothing happened -- no reboot. I pressed the green List button on my remote and was surprised (but happy) to see that my 95% full DVR now showed 11%. And it's been a full week now of flawless operation. As far as I can tell, the DVR box manages the Iomega exactly as it's supposed to. All remote functions work. No program data was lost. The extra reformat commands were surprising and not at all covered as possibilities by the manual, but I didn't panic and all was well. I would say the instructions should refer to possible extra steps, but otherwise the device earns an A+.--W.D. Gagliani, author of Savage Nights