Patent ID: 7734771

Claim:
A method for remotely managing resources associated with a set top box (STB), comprising: receiving at a service provider a first item of information from the STB, wherein the first item of information relates to resources for provisioning of audio/video services associated with the STB; retrieving at the service provider a second item of information from a database of the service provider, wherein the second item of information relates to an expected configuration of the STB; comparing at the service provider the first item of information with the second item of information; and sending an instruction from the service provider to the STB such that the instruction performs a function on the STB that is related to the resources, wherein when a user of the STB has installed a new fixed disk drive associated with the STB without authorization, the instruction modifies an amount of available disk space on the new fixed disk drive associated with the STB by instructing the STB to access only certain portions of the new fixed disk drive.