Apple TV 250GB Hard Drive Upgrade Success - with instructions

Cave Man said:

My experience it that the method you use somehow corrupts the update process. What you should do is retrieve the three disk images off of your original ATV an onto your Mac's hard drive ATV Cloner. Then use ATV Cloner to put them onto your new drive. After that your update process should work.

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Depending on the hard drive, you maybe be getting this error:

http://dynaflashtech.net/2009/08/18/atv-drive-problem-children/

If so (after using atvCloner's normal cloning method ) use "Large Drive Formatting" to get a proper format.

Try it first without though.

Edit: note, I will try to elaborate on when to use the "Large Drive Formatting" in atv cloner, however basically it would be sure if you see anything described in the link above in you're AtvCloner activity log when using the normal drive prep method.

Fried ATV?

Well after trying to use a laptop IDE extension cable to connect my external 1GB HD, I think I may have fried my ATV. Has anyone had experience with their ATV failing to turn on? The amber light comes on but nothing after that. Thoughts anyone?

On a side note, everything was working great before I decided to screw with the extension cable.

Have you put your ATV back in its original configuration? There shouldn't be a problem unless you inadvertently put too much voltage through a line.

By original configuration, do you mean the original HD back inside or the 'new original' with the external HD hooked back up as it was when working?

I have the external HD hooked up just as when it was working, but I get no response from the ATV besides the amber light. No fan spinning like it used to when all hooked up. I'm stumped.

tabosco23 said:

By original configuration, do you mean the original HD back inside or the 'new original' with the external HD hooked back up as it was when working?

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Yes, that's the best way to tell if the ATV is functional. You need to isolate the problem and this should be the first step.

I hooked up an internal IDE drive directly back to the ATV housing and I've still got nothing. The drive spins up when plugged in but I get no response beyond that. Thoughts/suggestions? I think I may have somehow nuked it but is this possible by just connecting IDE cables?

Yes, it's possible but unlikely. Can you connect the drive to a Mac and let Disk Utility see it? How many partitions are there?

Everything appears fine on the drive. I used Dynaflash's cloner to format the drive which has worked fine for me in the past.

Fortunately, I just found out my ATV is still under warranty, assuming I can get it put back together in a 'factory like' state. We'll see how it goes but if you have any flashes of brilliance in the meantime please let me know.

Software update problems after HDD upgrade

pgavinski said:

Help! TV

I upgraded primarily using the Engadget method. My Apple TV works with 1.0. Obviously I want to upgrade to the latest software update. When i download the update and then update, it restarts as it should and gets to the progress bar but then states something about not being able to update and takes me to a screen to either factory restore, reset, or run diagnostics. I've tried doing the factory restore several times and then doing the update, i've tried reset and then doing the update, and the diagnostic says the Apple TV is fine.

What do I need to do to get this software update to apply?

Again, the apple tv works with 1.0 but won't allow me to update.

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Sorry for the long quote, but I wanted to keep any future readers from having to figure out where my post was coming from:

I had this exact problem. I spent a good 4 hours messing with terminal trying to figure out what the problem was. In the end, the fix had to do with where the EFI, OSBoot and Media partitions on the drive lived. diskxsy where x is the disk number in terminal. I used the dd command to clone the original drive and saw that my upgraded HDD had a different order to it. While using Paduck's guide (http://guides.macrumors.com/Apple_TV_250GB_Hard_Drive_Upgrade) i noticed he said he didn't see why he would need to, but removed and recreated the Media partition. It wasn't until I did this step that the upgraded drive worked for me. Grrrr. After comparing the partition order of the cloned drive to the upgraded drive I saw the partitions were in the same order. Grrr.

I also found out how much of a waste using the dd in terminal was. I'm going to keep the efi.dmg and recovery.dmg on hand for the next upgrade:

Just use ATV Cloner. It is so easy.

True! But I like to keep my options open. Plus, I learn more by doing it the hard way.

1tb western digital

I found this thing on the internet:
http://www.provantage.com/western-digital-wd10tpvt~7WNDO066.htm
Do apple tv's have room for 12.5 millimeter drives?
This would be a great all-in-one solution.
Thanks!

That's a SATA drive and would require a PATA to SATA bridge.

Apple TV upgrade failed

I upgraded the hard drive on my Apple TV to 250GB successfully. Although, prior to doing it I did a factory recovery on the old 40GB. Now when I try to update the software on the new drive, I get the "update failed" warning on my ATV. Also, when I sinked some movies to it that I bought from itunes, I get the "Apple TV is not authorized to...."

Can anyone help?

astbaker said:

I upgraded the hard drive on my Apple TV to 250GB successfully. Although, prior to doing it I did a factory recovery on the old 40GB. Now when I try to update the software on the new drive, I get the "update failed" warning on my ATV. Also, when I sinked some movies to it that I bought from itunes, I get the "Apple TV is not authorized to...."

Can anyone help?

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I have the same problem in that I upgraded the drive on my ATV to 250GB and it is now saying 'update failed'. However, when you check the version my ATV says it has updated to 3.0.2 but still thinks the update has failed. Odd.

johnny1970 said:

I have the same problem in that I upgraded the drive on my ATV to 250GB and it is now saying 'update failed'. However, when you check the version my ATV says it has updated to 3.0.2 but still thinks the update has failed. Odd.

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Has there been any progress made on this particular snag? I know CaveMan was encountering the same bug.

A big thank you to everyone for the assistance provided via this thread.

-Nathan

Hi there,

does anyone of you have a detailed instruction of how to upgrade the Apple TV with a WD 1TB hard drive?
Theres one guy on ebay UK who would do the upgrade for £50 and I was wondering how to fit a 12.5mm hard drive into the ATV. Would be nice if someone could post some links to some online shops were all the necessary parts for the upgrade could be bought as well. Im not sure which IDE-SATA adapter to buy and where and also which modifications to the housing have to be made to fit a 1TB into the ATV.

Thanks

Much Simpler route

http://www.atvflash.com/product_info.php?products_id=27

$50 software app. Doesn't void your warrantee

mcforman said:

$50 software app. Doesn't void your warrantee

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We all know about this software. It has its limitations, such as requiring a slower USB drive and breaking the software with each ATV OS update. And $50 when you can do it for free? No thanks.

Oh, and welcome to the forums. Perhaps you should learn about the search tool before you post since yours doesn't belong in this thread.

Why has this happened?

Bar sobbing uncontrollably I have no way forward with my problem.

A friends ATV HD died so I took my ATV apart and used it to take the images using ATVCloner. I restored those images onto my friends new drive.

I put my untouched ATV back together and now all I get is a flashing amber light followed by a question mark with the amber/white light flashing. I have written nothing back to the drive - I've only used it to obtain an image for my friends drive. What could have happened to cause this? Any suggestions as to how to fix it please?

Lastly do all of the instructions about the ATV work with the version 3 firmware?
Thanks for any help.

Firstly, it's not firmware, just software. There's nothing different about any of the ATVs other than the OS version.

Can you mount the drive to your Mac using an enclosure? If so, run Disk Utility on it to make sure it's in good order. This tells you the drive is OK. If it is, then there might be a problem with your ATV. It's tough to screw one up, but I suppose it's possible. You still have the images that you made with ATV Cloner? If so, you can try to reimage the drive as a last resort.

Cave Man said:

Firstly, it's not firmware, just software. There's nothing different about any of the ATVs other than the OS version.

Can you mount the drive to your Mac using an enclosure? If so, run Disk Utility on it to make sure it's in good order. This tells you the drive is OK. If it is, then there might be a problem with your ATV. It's tough to screw one up, but I suppose it's possible. You still have the images that you made with ATV Cloner? If so, you can try to reimage the drive as a last resort.

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Thanks for the prompt response.

The drive mounts fine under OS X 10.6 and Disk Utility finds nothing wrong with it. Also I've tried the images from that drive on two other drives using ATV Cloner and the result is the same: alternate amber/white flashing light. And the drives have been tried it two separate Apple TVs.

This was a perfectly working ATV and the only thing I did was pull it out to make a clone of it.

There isn't a hardware trick with the cases is there, that is it won't boot if the enclosure isn't closed correctly?

I assume you only removed the drive and that you did not remove the cable from the ATV's logic board? The cable has to go on in the right direction (four possible combinations). If the cable is not properly attached to the logic board AND the hard drive, then it will not see any drive.

re Apple tv images

hello! ,it works perfect ,could not be easier with dynaflash program ,many !many ! thanks for such a well put atv cloner program .
Hey ! Dynaflash any way to donate a small gift to you through pay pal ,for such a good program ,such a program needs to be rewarded for the super easy way to use it .Thank you !

is this what i need to use a new sata laptopn drive in the atv? thanks