HDD Space Notification

[tezza007]

When I'm setting up timers, will the T3 tell me if there's not enough space left on the HDD for that timer?

[peteru]

How could it? How would it know how big a file will be? It may need to 2GB or 14GB, depending on what bitrate the broadcaster allocates at the time. Also, how will it know how much disk will be free at the time the recording actually starts? You may delete stuff in the meantime, copy stuff from the network or other recordings may fill up the HDD.

[prl]

If you don't regularly clean out your Trash, then the T3 will automatically do that for you if the free space available is less than the margin set in MEDIA, MENU>Settings>Disk space to reserve for recordings (in GB). It defaults to 40GB.

This check is made while the a record timer is being prepared to start a recording. As peteru says, it's not possible in general to know how full the HDD will be at some time in the future (indefinitely far ahead for people who have standing timers for recording news or current affairs programs).

If you run your T3 with its HDD so close to full of non-deleted content that this is an issue, then you need to regularly tend to it. To misquote the aphorism, "the price of free disk space is eternal vigilance".

[tezza007]

I've got a vague memory that the T7160 and the DGtech do notify you, but I may be wrong. I don't have anything in the deleted folder, I always empty it.

[prl]

I've got a vague memory that the T7160 and the DGtech do notify you, ...

How?

[tezza007]

You've obviously mistaken me for someone who knows how these things operate

[prl]

You've obviously mistaken me for someone who knows how these things operate

OK, then just what does it do?

If it just tries to estimate the size of the recording and see if there's enough room to record it now, then it doesn't seem to be much use to me. It would be easy enough to implement, but I really don't see the point.

If your HDD is so fill that this is really an issue, get a bigger HDD.

[tezza007]

I just told you I haven't a clue how they operate; I barely record anything on it now; and as I said it was only a vague memory, not a statement of fact.

It's not a big issue, i have another 4TB drive ready to go, but i just wanted to know if I needed to keep a close eye on the remaining space or not; seems I do need to

[prl]

I just told you I haven't a clue how they operate; I barely record anything on it now; and as I said it was only a vague memory, not a statement of fact. ...

I was asking about what your expectations of what something like that would do for you. I'm happy to think about how to do it, as long as it's not impossible.

A 4TB drive is nearly 100 days worth of SD recordings.

[MrQuade]

It's probably just a generic low space warning. I reckon anything less than 20-50 gig left would be sufficient for a reminder when setting a timer.

[tezza007]

I just told you I haven't a clue how they operate; I barely record anything on it now; and as I said it was only a vague memory, not a statement of fact. ...

I was asking about what your expectations of what something like that would do for you. I'm happy to think about how to do it, as long as it's not impossible.

A 4TB drive is nearly 100 days worth of SD recordings.

OK, I was hoping when setting a timer it would tell me there's not enough space left or might not be enough space left.

My first 2TB drive went from May til the 24th of July, the current 2TB from then til now, 69 days and there's about 140GB left
The 4TB should last me, given Christmas is coming up, til about the end of February by which time I'll have emptied 1 or 2 drives from the Topfield and the internal 1TB drive of the DGTech. Not worth selling, so I'll stick it inside the T3

I'm thinking now there was a setting on the 7160 to tell it how many GB per hour and that's how it tells you how many hours are left. Not the timers at all now I think. Shame

[prl]

There are a number of problems with warning when a user sets a timer:

• If the timer is a T3 normal repeating timer, it represents the consumption of an indefinite amount of disk space, and the amount of space its recordings will have used at some point in the future is impossible to know.
• Similarly for an Autotimer or IceTV timers; they represent an unknown amount of disk space. The T3 isn't even aware of whether there is a recording set up for a program on IceTV, and certainly not whether the timer is a repeating one. All that the T3 knows is that it gets sent timers to set from IceTV for individual program events.
• Timers set from AutoTimers or IceTV appear on the T3 without any direct user intervention. It would be possible to pop up "short of space" warnings when those timers are set, for example when you're in the middle of watching a program, but is that what you want? They might appear while the T3 is in standby. To see them from that state, they'd have to be set to never time out.

Warning at other times can have other problems: warning at startup won't work for people who rarely shut down their T3s. Warning at timer creation and/or timer startup won't help when the recorder is unattended for a time (the only time I've ever run out of HDD space was when I was on holiday, even though I thought I'd planned to have enough space for all the recordings).

The problems are mostly not technical ones; they're more about how the T3 can sensibly and reliably convey the information to the user.

Do you have a reasonable expectation that you will ever watch even a small fraction of the video you are stockpiling (and appear to intend continuing to stockpile)? 4TB is the equivalent storage of about 450 full DVDs.

[tezza007]

Do you have a reasonable expectation that you will ever watch even a small fraction of the video you are stockpiling (and appear to intend continuing to stockpile)? 4TB is the equivalent storage of about 450 full DVDs.

Definately, I'm just 9 months behind at the moment
I just started watching the 1st of January on the 7160 which has a lot til about mid May when it started to peter out as I got the T3 working. Last recording on the 7160 is now 2 or 3 weeks ago.
Next recording to watch on the DGTECH is 7th of January and has 41 recordings up til the 7th of May. As soon as I finish that I'll junk it and toss the 1TB HDD into the T3
I've had a lot of things going on in the last 18 months which caused me to fall behind, but I'm finally catching up