Hello,
I was just wondering if the interface on a 1.8in HD is the same as for a Compact Flash adapter? I just saw an item on ebay that claims to convert from IDE to CF that is claiming to work with 1.8in HDs. If this is so,
why hasn't anybody taken one of the fairly cheap drives available for the iPods and used it in their Z? I've seen 30Gig drives going for under $100
on ebay.

Ebay item

Bill

Probably because they aren't compatable, they also won't fit. The larger iPod drives are the size of a pcmcia card. The only iPod that has a smaller drive is the mini, and it won't work.

actually that allows you to plug a CF card into a PC or laptop, not the other way around so you cant plug a 1.8 inch drive or any other hard drive into your Z using that method (the plugs are the wrong type)

DB, I am aware of what the board I used as an example is for... I've used something similar to hook up laptop drives to my desktop machine.

I was really focusing on the side labeled CF and wondering if the connecters were the same for the 1.8in drive and a CF HD card.

BarryW, in what way are they not compatible, the connectors look very similar from what pictures I've seen, and in looking inside my 3100. I haven't found a URL that gives the pinouts of the two connectors yet. Can somebody point me at the hardware specifications for the CF slots in the Z? Can they be used like IDE connectors where you can have a master and a slave device hooked off one connection? With the difference being a twist in the cable.

Not having seen a real CF card yet, or one of these 1.8in drives I don't know how the two devices compare size wise. I would assume that the CF drives are more square, and maybe thinner? I look at a 30gig iPod, and wonder because it's so tiny compared to the Z :-)

Go easy on me, I've never really payed attention to CF before.

Bill

Here's a pic of an iPod drive and a pcmcia card.


The connector looks like cf, but the card itself is the size of a pcmcia card. The iPod mini drive is the exact same size as a cf card, but is an ide card. It doesn't work as a cf card, I have two of them at home, the Z doesn't recognize them.

These aren't 1.8 inch drives though. The platters in microdrives are about 1 inch I believe. The 1.8 drives are about the size of the clamshell Zs, not quite as wide though. Cf doesn't do master/slave configurations.

is that because it tries to boot the card as CF memorey and not in ATA emulation mode

the way to test it is to get an adaptor and plug it int your IDE bus

i wish more people knew about the CF bieng in ethire of to modes and that most hardware is of one type and not the other (ie it is a CF slot not ATA emulation mode or both at once). i dont mean to implie that this is the mistake made here but this type of thing does keep on popping up

btw you can hook an ATA disk up to a pxa270 via thi VLIO interface, as far as i know the CF slot dosent speak ATA emulation. there is a white paper from intel that tells you how to connect the hard drive to the VLIO interface and i have documented all the pins required to do it (its the same pins as required for the 2700G)

all the infomation you would need is in the hardware section

btw the reason that they sell the microdrives in ATA mode to OEMs is so that they cannot be used in consumer devices as they all implement the CF mode only, in the open PDA thing we will be using the ATA mode which means that you could steal the microdrive from an MP3 player and it will work, or if the ipod uses ATA then you could have a fat capacity drive

Thanks for the picture.

So can I infer that the micro drives (around 1") that are used are connector compatible with CF, but you were not able to have it recognized by the Z? Possibly because we would need a driver change to tell the CF slot to be running in ATA mode?

Is the 1.8" drive also connector compatible with CF? Leave aside the fact that the drive is the size of a PCMCIA card, and just focus on the connector right now.

Thanks for the info about the master/slave thing.. too bad. I was thinking that it would be nice to put a flat cable hooked on the internal CF to wire up the interface to Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, still having the HD available. This would result in no dangerous mods to the system board. I don't have a steady enough hand, plus the C3100 is still too new to me.

I got the above idea from the sandisk 128M/Wi-Fi card, but since then I've found out that you can't use both the memory and the Wi-Fi at the same time on that card, which is very interesting.

Bill

All CF memorey cards can pretend that they are ATA drives.

basically that sums its up, notice i did not say that the host hardware can talk to an ATA drive. in some rare cases it can however it is most likly you will never see it

Hitachi and others ship the microdrives to OEM's locked into ATA mode, this is so that you cant use it in your devices however you can still plug it into your IDE bus and boot off of it

i assume the ipod drive is simply a smaller ide connector, i havent really looked into much but if it is then you could use it in your PC however i dont think it is CF (99.999%) and most likly it is an ATA drive which is what that Ebay add seems to indicated

so:

^ = XOR
Cf card = CF mode ^ ATA mode
MD from inside of MP3 Player = ATA mode
Ipod drive = ATA mode
PDA = CF Mode