I don't know much about these boxes, but is that not a bit drastic?? have you flashed/ formatted the HDD to FAT 32, I found a great free tool for this last night, if it is any good to you. is it the VIX image you are using, because it is quite simple on my octagon to mount a HDD?
VIX/MountManager/setup mounts, then you can choose to set it up as media/HDD, or Media/Usb, etc.
Again if you want to start from scratch and it is VIX image, Menu/Setup/Factory reset. this gets rid of any settings you may have chosen and allows you to start from scratch.