Recording TV to external USB HDD on a UE49KS7000 when in standby

[Apollo11]

I have a UE49KS7000 UHD TV and have been trying to get it to record TV programmes to an external USB HDD.  It works fine if the TV is on, but that's fairly pointless as I generally want to record things when I'm out or in bed.  When the TV is in standby, it occasionally records, but more often than not, it doesn't.

I have had much dialogue with Samsung about this and they now advise me that, if it doesn't work, I need a HDD with its own power supply.  Now, I've tried three self powered HDDs, two are rated at 550mA and the other at 900mA.  The HDD USB port on the TV is rated at 1A which should be ample, so this is a puzzle.  I don't particularly want to buy a fourth HDD (with it's own PSU) in the hope that it might work and, in any case, such drives don't appear to be widely available these days.

Has anyone else experienced this issue and solved it?  In particular, I'm thinking:

1. Can I just use a USB flash drive instead of the HDD - would this work?

2. Would a solid state external drive work without the need for a PSU?

3. Is there an in-line power supply (goes on USB cable between TV and HDD) on the market?

[paul1111]

Sorry not having it. What about the Samsung TV's that do work OK , are you saying that none will be using a Seagate or Toshiba drive like I have which work in the older set but not the new. Also one drive is USB 3 and one USB 2, also they did work perfectly for a couple of weeks when the main board was changed, so no I find your explanation hard to except, or it might be to take the heat of Samsung so they can blame some one but themselves. Do you know which spec these TV's are in and as I am aware the new spec is to make all USB drives more compatible. Where your argument really falls down is in respect to recording a program I am watching and time shift and program pause which all work fine on the UE65KS9500, it just will not record from the schedule.

Paul

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@Phil12 wrote:

Hi

No one is trying to blame anything, just trying to help work out where the problem is.

It is never as simple as these things seem.  For example a USB storage device, depending on the host can operate in two different modes, one is the older spec of USB Mass storage device, and the newer one is is USB Attached SCSI.  The newer model may support USB Attached SCSI which being a newer spec isn't working well with the USB drive, an older TV may connect using the older and better supported USB Mass storage device protocol, and works fine.

So even though the same drive is being used, they may be operating differently on each TV.  

These problems can be very difficult to track down and you can't necessarily rule out the USB drive on the basis it is working with another TV.  It's keeping an open mind to where the problem is that will eventually provide a solution.

Regards

Phil

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[Phil12]

Hi

I don't work for Samsung and have no connection with them, why would I want to take the heat of?

Samsung sell hundreds of thousands of TVs yet very few people here are reporting having the same issue as you.  Also the PVR functionality in these TVs is a bit of extra, I'm not aware they advertise the feature.

 Does it record from the schedule if the TV is already on?  Is it only failing to record when the TV is in standby?

USB drives have lots of compatibility issues, a lot are around power management issues, just do a google for "external hard drive not working after standby" and see what I mean.

Samsung should really sell a USB hard-drive that they know works with their TVs 100%, the trouble is, this would be more expensive than buying a standard brand so people wouldn't buy it anyway.

Regards

Phil

[AntS]

I can confirm that (unless they're very well disguised), Phil12 doesn't work for Samsung. Happy to have Phil12 (and others, of course) in the Community though. :robothappy:

Also, it's worth bearing in mind that troubleshooting isn't always an instant or successful process - and that sometimes even pretty easy stuff can be missed on both sides. (Still have memories of my nightmare first couple of days on Mobile Tech Support back in 2014...) On here, regardless of the ultimate result it's always worth having the back and forth discussion - if only because it may help someone else out there solve something similar but ulimately not the same.

[Tomas1234]

Hello everyone,

I have SAMSUNG TV UE49KU6452.

SHORT STORY:

I've solved exactly the same problem on my SAMSUNG TV, the problem is in some kind of error in the NFTS file system on the USB flash memory stick.
My investigations are still ongoing, try (in this order):

1. command "chkdsk :usb_stick_letter /r" under Windows - this command identified error everytime,
when I was not able to properly record on the USB stick.
Sometimes it was able to repair the USB stick, but sometimes not...

2. slow formatting under Windows (FAT32 or NFTS, whatever will work for you, whatever settings will
be able to finish the slow formatting correctly)

3. yesterday I had to use for the first time GParted in Xubuntu and I was scared a little bit,
because maybe there will come a day and I won't be able to repair my USB flash sticks anymore... 😞
But I am not giving up!


LONG STORY:

A) There is hard work behind this post. I am pushing myself to post my solution to help
others (at least to help one human being) 🙂

B) I didn't talk to SAMSUNG's service. I was very disappointed when I read on the internet that people
contacted SAMSUNG's service and they didn't help them at all. However, if I had to buy
brand new TV again I would still purchase for 100% TV from SAMSUNG. Playing with SW tools
to repair NFTS is nothing compared to what I've heard about SAMSUNG's competitors at work from my colleagues 😉

C) At some point I took every USB stick I was able to find to finally solve this. I wanted to have a stable & reliable
recording over the night on my TV. I didn't believe that placing the TV in service would help.

The symptoms I was facing:

   C.1 I was able to record on some no-name USB stick, but not when TV was in the standby mode.
   I was thinking that maybe in the standby the USB stick doesn't have proper power, so I bought:
   https://www.tsbohemia.cz/premiumcord-usb-2-0-hub-7-portovy-s-ext-napajenim-a-vypinaci-portu_d108061....
   with adapter to 220V, but it didn't help 😞

   C.2 I tested working and not working USB sticks for speed. However not working USB sticks
   had better test results 😞 (copying large/small files ...) I was confused 😞

   C.3 I borrowed ADATA S102 PRO 16GB and it worked perfectly. Based on this I bought ADATA S102 PRO 32GB,
   but it didn't help. After some time of using it, the recording in standby was crashing.
   I was more confused. It was hard to believe that there is so different chipset in 32GB version 😞

And then I've found that every not working USB stick has an error in NFTS.
However up to now:

   - I don't know what exactly is causing this error. What exact operation damages NFTS.
   - I don't know what is a proper way to repair the NFTS file system. As you may see above,
   I am testing several SW tools from Windows 10 Pro and Xubuntu 14.04 LTS.

P.S. Maybe somebody from SAMSUNG could give us a hint...

Hope this helps!

Tomas Gajdarus, Ostrava, Czech Republic

[inspectorGadget21]

im looking to get a tv that must record in standby, otherwise i will go for something thats cheaper. a basic function that seems to have been missed

[inspectorGadget21]

Firstly, you would expect to be able to format the drive when connected to the tv, so whatever file format the TV decides on, has to be the right format.
If the TV sees and records to the drive when its switched on, then the TV sees the drive, and it likes the file format.
It could be power supply but there’s nothing I’ve seen on the internet that absolutely determines this. It seems to be hit and miss.
There is a definite issue that Samsung should be sorting. I find it odd that a major player does not fully investigate and fix this issue. According to the EU directive, if an issue is there from the start you can demand a refund for up to 6 years.
Its because of this issue that I’m hesitating to buy a Samsung TV.