Buy.com has the Western Digital 500GB eSATA My DVR Expander on sale again for $131.99. This is the only drive officially approved for use with the TiVo Series3, TiVo HD, and TiVo HD XL. That’s a great price on that drive, so if you’ve been thinking about getting one, now is a good time.

It isn’t quite as good as the recent $131.99 deal at Buy.com, but it is still a good one. Amazon is selling the Western Digital 500GB My DVR Expander eSATA drive, compatible with the TiVo Series3 and TiVo HD (and Scientific Atlanta cable DVRs) for just $134.99. That’s 29%, $55, off the usual Amazon list price of $189.99.

Thanks to my friend Jer for the heads up on this great deal. Buy.com is selling the TiVo-approved Western Digital 500GB My DVR Expander eSATA External Hard Drive for just $131.99 - and that’s with free shipping. That’s a great deal, Buy.com has the list price as $179.99 and TiVo.com still lists them for the old $199.99 MSRP. This is the only eSATA drive officially sanctioned by TiVo for use with the TiVo Series3 and the TiVo HD. I’ve had one connected to my Series3 for quite a while and it works great.

EDIT: Reader Mike Turpin points out that you can get the same deal through Amazon.com from the seller BuyNow Incorporated (see the ‘More Buying Choices’ on the right) and avoid the sales tax Buy.com charges in several states. BuyNow Incorporated is really Buy.com, so it is the same deal, without tax for those who would be charged from Buy.com. Thanks Mike!

In a post to the USENET group alt.video.ptv.tivo (Google Groups) user Douglas Bullard shared a cautionary tale. Apparently Western Digital changed something in the way they prepare the My DVR Expander eSATA drives and this causes the TiVo HD to not recognize it as an approved drive. (Since the Series3 works with most eSATA drives I’d expect it to still work with the S3.) It seems that Douglas was the first (un)lucky person to discover this change in the wild, so the extent of the issue is currently unknown.

TiVo and Western Digital are now aware of the issue and are investigating, so there will probably be a fix for the issue forthcoming. TiVo is replacing Douglas’s drive with one that will work with the TiVo HD. So if you buy a WD My DVR Expander and have trouble getting it to work with your TiVo HD you might want to contact TiVo and/or WD. If this impacts a batch of drives just returning to a store for another may not solve the issue, as other drives on the shelf are likely to be from the same batch.

Mark noticed that Amazon is now carrying the 500GB eSATA Western Digital My DVR Expander, the only drive currently approved for use with the TiVo Series3 and the TiVo HD, in fact the only drive that works with the TiVo HD without hacking. It looks like Amazon started stocking it on April 30th. The $192.23 price is better than the full $199.99 MSRP that TiVo.com sells them for, but not the lowest price available online, for example, Buy.com has it for $172.99. I use one of these with my Series3 and it works great. I’ve also updated the site store.

Gear Live’s The Bleeding Edge has done a video of an installation of the Western Digital My DVR Expander on a TiVo Series3. (The same drive also works on the TiVo HD.) I can’t say it is riveting video - installation involves plugging in the eSATA and power cables into the drive, connecting the eSATA to the TiVo, rebooting, and following the prompts - but if you’re curious, check it out.

While both WeaKnees and DVRupgrade have been offering special order upgraded units with up to 2TB of capacity for a while, WeaKnees announced in their blog that they’re making the 2TB Series3 an official offering on their site. The 2TB unit has one internal 1TB drive and on eSATA 1TB drive. What does 2TB of capacity get you? How about up to 292 hours of HD content, or a staggering 2777 hours of SD content? Yeah, you need to be a serious couch potato, or someone who likes to archive a lot of content, to use that much capacity.

I rarely had issues with the default 250GB drive in my S3, and since I added the official 500GB eSATA drive I have more space than I know what to do with. As more of the content I like moves to HD, I’ll probably need the space though. Right now, most of what I record is still SD.

How much will this TiVo-of-plenty set you back? $1599 after the current $200 rebate. It is an expanded Series3, not a TiVo HD, so you do get the nice remote, fancy case, and THX certification for that money. That’s worth it… right?

I asked DVRupgrade about their plans to offer a similar unit. They said that, while they do currently sell ‘off the menu’ upgrades, such as 2TB units, as special orders, they do not currently have any plans to make a 2TB unit a standard offering on their site. They cited a low demand for the larger capacity units, likely due to the higher costs, even with an increase in demand due to the current $30 Hitachi rebate. They prefer to stress the higher reliability of single drive units over the dual-drive configurations.