This is an automated archive.

The original was posted on /r/datahoarder by /u/_SquareSphere on 2023-08-08 13:41:04+00:00.

So I’ve purchased a SYSTOR 1-9 DVD Duplicator. Works great. Upon closer inspection, it turns out that this thing also supports storing disc images onto a Hard Disk. I had an old 500GB SATA Hard Disk in a box, so I thought I’d sacrifice one of the disc drives in order to use this spare Hard Disk I had lying around.

I installed the Hard Disk into the duplicator, booted it up and wolah! - Hard Drive detected! Do you want to format it? - Yes, of course! - So I got the duplicator to format it (No idea what method it’s formatted and partitioned it in), then I got it to rip a disc to the Hard Disk I just installed, BAM! - worked first time!

Another feature this duplicator has is that it came with a USB 3 SATA switch on the back of it. The switch basically toggles whether you want the SATA interface of one of the disc drives to interface with the USB3 IO, or if you want it to connect to the duplicator controller. This got me thinking: “What if I attached this switch to the Hard Disk, so I can upload disc images from my PC and then get the duplicator to burn them? - Yes, this is exactly what I want to do!”

So I wire up the USB3 interface with the Hard Disk, so now I can toggle between whether I want the Hard Drive to work as a USB mass storage device, or be accessed by the DVD duplicator. BOOM! - it works! - But this is where the problem starts…

When I access this drive via the USB3 controller, it detects the Hard Drive make, model, serial number etc perfectly on my PC and my Mac, but both machines say that the drive’s not initialised. Now, obviously its been formatted in some sort of weird, obscure way that both Windows and MacOS don’t recognise.

My question is, how can I determine how a Hard Drive has been formatted when the installed OS (Either Windows or MacOS) doesn’t recognise it? - I don’t want to initialise the disk on my PC or Mac, otherwise it will get formatted in a way that the duplicator won’t recognise. Also, how can I read the disk and write files to it?

TIA!

Details of Duplicator: SYSTOR 1-9 DVD Duplicator. Firmware: JPS707 R:4.2

One of the chips on the PCB of the duplicator reveals that it’s an ACARD rebrand. It says ACARD ARC8012-B on top of it.