Hi
I got av560, and i also have spare 40gig laptop harddrive.
If you slide av500's lefthand side button written "ARCHOS" it opens up.
This revels Toshiba hard drive.
It got 6 torx screws and 2 small philips screws covering its header.
If i replace harddrive, will it work?
Has anybody done it?

Hi,
in this very moment i am on the way to change the drive.

My first try to simply put an formatted (fat32) drive in the av500 is failed with error
afther booting the unit.

Next, i will try to make a acronis true image copy from the orginal drive to the new hdd.....

We will see what happen then..

magusel (germany)

Next, i will try to make a acronis true image copy from the orginal drive to the new hdd.....

We will see what happen then..

[/quote]

Ok, also with the drive copy function the hdd will not recognized from the AV500.

Possible the problem comes from the different between the two hdd´s, i try´d an IBM with just 30gigs... the original is a toshiba with 100gig.

If i got the same toshiba drive soon i will try this one...

Magusel

You are my hero! I've been searching everywhere and as far as I can tell you are the only human being attempting this. How's it going? Have you had any luck? If you can post pictures that would be great.

Have you tried using the unit to do the re-format? I assume there's no reason for it to be fat32...

Sean

Hi folks,

i am back again...

Sorry, but i think there is no way to change the hdd on the av500.

I tried the following:

1. Make a sector to sector copy from the original drive to another toshiba 100 gig drive with linux. (dd)

2. Copy the master boot record with DD ,, also not works..

3. The unit must have an check for the serial number of the drive (hardware dongle) so no chance this time....

I am out, you guys from archos did a great job...

Magusel (germany)

It may not help us this time round, but theres a petition to stop them resticting the next gen of AVXXX players

Sign the petition

http://www.petitiononline.com/av500700/petition.html[/b]