Nevermind. It's Been Fixed.

[neuroshock]

Hey Folks,

I'm pretty frustrated- frustrated enough to offer to some genius that solves my problem here some hard cold cash payable in USD via PayPal if they can deliver.

Here's what I'm trying to accomplish:

I'm a C3100 owner and would like to upgrade the 4gb internal Hitachi Microdrive with a new 6gb Retail version Hitachi Microdrive. There are no compatibility problems with the 6gb drive it is recognized fine in either the interior or exterior CF drive bay and I can rudimentarily move data to and from it with no problems.

Just to be painfully clear up front I want the finished product to work with Cacko 1.23 Heavy.

Apparently the C3100's Microdrive comes fdisked from the factory into 3 partitions:

1.) The first is a 9mb partition that is apparently empty, Meanie's site says that the C3000 uses this for a copy of the system files but that it is unused on the C3100. It is formatted with ext3.

2.) The second is another 9mb partition that is also apparently empty, Meanie's site says that the C3000 uses this partition also but that it appears to be unused on the C3100. It is also formatted with ext3.

3.) The third partition takes up the entire rest of the disk and is formatted with FAT 32. The C3100 has this partition formatted to FAT 32 to provide the user access to it for storage reasons from within the C3100's OS environment as well as providing the ability for the C3100 to be recognized as a USB storage device by a Windows 2000/Xp machine.

The Fdisk partitioning table for the stock 4gb Hitachi Microdrive is as follows:

Device Start End Blocks ID System
/dev/hda1 1 20 10048+ 83 Linux
/dev/hda2 21 40 10080 83 Linux
/dev/hda3 41 7936 3979584 c Win95 FAT32 (LBA)

After switching out the HDD’s what I wish to end up with is a partitioning scheme that includes the following:
-Complete compatibility with Cacko 1.23
-A 512mb Swap Partition (NOT a swap FILE!)
-A 2gb partition formatted with ext3 that is visible from within the Cacko 1.23 environment – It must be possible to install programs onto this drive!
-A 3gb FAT32 partition for hdd3/hda3 so that I can still use the Z as a USB storage device under Windows 2000.

My competency level is sufficient in hardware concerns to be able to handle the actual physical switching of the hard drives, (I’ve already done so several times.)
My competency level in Linux in general isn’t nearly as good. (If it were you wouldn’t be reading this post and taking my money.) =) But I can handle some command line duties (cp, ls, mkdir, etc.) as well as simple file editing tasks. I’m also very competent within Fdisk itself. Beyond the basics I’m asking for complete hand-holding and that’s what I’ll be paying for.

I want someone who has definite knowledge of the C3100 and it’s specific hdd issues - You will need to give me step by step, detailed instructions for me to follow in order to be able to accomplish what I’ve listed above. This includes EVERYTHING, do not assume that I know anything, (you’ll be disappointed if you do.) This will need to include every step from Fdisking to formatting to editing of the scripts that the C3100 uses to mount it’s internal drives on boot.

I know you’ll pm me anyway but for all those who are going to send me a PM excitedly telling me about the How-To that’s available in the Zaurus Wikipedia that covers this EXACT SUBJECT and that if I go read it I can save my money etc. etc. etc. I’ve read it. It doesn’t help me- enough. Plus my issues are different from his scenario in several ways. Besides that particular how-to is a bit deceptive in what the author actually offers. (Don’t get me wrong- GREAT info it just doesn’t stick to the labeled topic- which is how to convert the FAT32 partition to ext2/3.) The first section he explains rather well how to repartition and format the 4gb internal hard-drive from FAT32 to ext2/3. However when he continues on he offers the reader his own edited scripts for the reader to compare his/her own to and modify accordingly. However if you read carefully it turns out that the partitioning scheme that he is using is an ext3/ext3/FAT32/ext2. Therefore they won’t work specifically for the user who is simply trying to convert his ext3/ext3/FAT32 drive to a ext3/ext3/ext3 partitioned drive (as the title of the listing would indicate.) So it leaves the reader to then have to extrapolate what they need/don’t need from the scripts to make it work for them and after looking into the scripts he listed I knew it was beyond me right away.

Possibly the fatal difficulty here will lie in the partitioning scheme fundamentals. If for reasons that I don’t understand the C3100 MUST keep the hda1 (9mb ext3 partition), and hda2 (9mb ext3 partition), even though they are not technically “used” by the C3100 model then there will be no way to also add both a Swap Partition and a large ext3 drive upon which I can install programs and view the contents thereof. The simple reason being that you cannot have 5 primary partitions on one drive, the maximum is 4 I believe.

If this is confirmed to be impossible then I’ll have to decide which I want more- the Swap Drive or the FAT32/Windows USB drive capability. At that point I’ll make that decision and I’ll re-offer the reward for that configuration but I’m REALLY hoping that someone will find a way for me to have my cake and eat it too. As an alternative I could implement a loopback device to float my ext2 file system on a FAT32 drive but I REALLY want to avoid that performance hit!  - For the same reason I desperately do not want to have to settle for the performance of a swap file rather than a Swap Partition!

Regardless of all that I will post the exact procedure I followed from whoever claims the reward so that not only will that person get paid but the community will benefit from that knowledge in the future use as well.

The reward will start at $50usd. As those of you know who’ve claimed similar rewards from me in the past I tip very well also. If you feel the offer should be higher and you believe your skillz are up to the task feel free to suggest what you feel is appropriate. I certainly won’t mind you doing so- of course I may not be able to offer/afford that much but you can certainly run it by me. At any rate, my guess is that this will be easy pickin’s and someone will benefit from my ignorance very quickly. Not often do you find something like this that you can probably type up water-right instructions for in less than an hour or so. And you don’t even need to feel bad about taking advantage of me…. I WANT you to!

Likewise if someone wishes to rise to the occasion and provide this service but would rather not claim the reward for their personal use I will gladly donate it to the Zaurus developer of their choice instead.

If you need further information of any kind you have but to ask and I’ll make sure you get it as quickly as possible.

Please PM and/or Email me at your convenience.

Many Thanks,
-NeuroShock
dan@danzweb.com

[bam]

ok, here we go,
the swap partition(does it have to be a primary partition or can it be an extended partition?
Answers:
1. primary only, I have seen fdisk only present 4 partitions(primary) max for a 4gb microdrive. so the answer for this one(swap partition) would be no.
2. can be extended partition, then this can be done.


actually I have done this with the 4gb drive I have hdd1-4, #4 being an ext2 partition.(the tutorial is on my site), although I dont run cacko(stock for now) but the idea should be about the same, actually I think I know someone wh has found this solution. I will check into it.

[frobnoid_]

After switching out the HDD’s what I wish to end up with is a partitioning scheme that includes the following:
-Complete compatibility with Cacko 1.23
-A 512mb Swap Partition (NOT a swap FILE!)
-A 2gb partition formatted with ext3 that is visible from within the Cacko 1.23 environment – It must be possible to install programs onto this drive!
-A 3gb FAT32 partition for hdd3/hda3 so that I can still use the Z as a USB storage device under Windows 2000.

The simple reason being that you cannot have 5 primary partitions on one drive, the maximum is 4 I believe.

but I REALLY want to avoid that performance hit!  - For the same reason I desperately do not want to have to settle for the performance of a swap file rather than a Swap Partition!

First off, let me throw out that I don't own a 3100 so I'm unable to guarantee this works perfectly. However, since I don't care about a reward, I don't feel bad giving you  a "This should work" solution.

Why do all five need to be primary partitions? Unless there's some really quirky zaurus-related reason, they don't need to be.

So, start a terminal and:
su
fdisk /dev/hda
d 3 #delete partition 3
n p 3 1 +3072M # create a 3GB partition #3
n e 4 (enter) (enter) # create a ~3GB extended partition #4
n l  (enter) +512M # create a 512MB partition #5
n l (enter) (enter) # create a 2.5GB partition #6
t 3 b # label partition #3 as FAT32
t 5 82 # label partition #5 as swap
t 6 83 # label partition #6 as Linux
w # write changes back to the disk

Now you've got your five partitions and are back at a command prompt.
mkswap /dev/hda5 # make partition #5 a swap partition
mke2fs -j /dev/hda6 # make partition #6 an ext3fs (-j makes it ext3...)
mkdosfs -F 32 /dev/hda3 # make partition #3 a FAT32 filesystem

Now you've got your filesystems created and just need to update /etc/fstab
load that up in your favorite editor (you need to be root to edit it, so do it from the command prompt, or run "chmod a+rwx /etc/fstab" first so user zaurus can edit it too...)

Change the fstab to add the following lines at the end:
/dev/hda5 (tab) none (tab) swap (tab) sw (tab) 0 0

You haven't specified where you want your new filesystems to be mounted.
Add the following line to your /etc/fstab, replacing /FOO with the mount point you'd like to reach the ext3fs at (/tmp for example [which is probably not a particularly good use of the space ])
/dev/hda6 (tab) /FOO (tab) ext3 (tab)  (tab) 0 0

Your new fat32 file system will continue to be mounted in the same place as the old one.

If you'd specify exactly where you want the filesystems, I'm happy to go into much more detail as to the appropriate lines to add to /etc/fstab.

Now reboot.

[frobnoid_]

So, start a terminal and:
su
fdisk /dev/hda
d 3 #delete partition 3
n p 3 1 +3072M # create a 3GB partition #3
n e 4 (enter) (enter) # create a ~3GB extended partition #4
n l  (enter) +512MB # create a 512MB partition #5
n l (enter) (enter) # create a 2.5GB partition #6
t 3 b # label partition #3 as FAT32
t 5 82 # label partition #5 as swap
t 6 83 # label partition #6 as Linux
w # write changes back to the disk

 I should note that these are made into lines for convenience of explanation, each (space) in these instructions is really hitting (enter) and the hash mark (#) and data following it are comments and shouldn't be typed in.

[neuroshock]

First off- everyone that is PM'ing me PLEASE UNDERSTAND THIS:
I am NOT trying to modify my 4gb drive that came with my C3100! I am REPLACING that drive with a factory clean retail version 6gb Hitachi Microdrive!  YES I KNOW there are directions for altering the third partition of the original drive- they don't completely apply here.  That only affects a small facet of what I'm trying to do. In the document everyone keeps referring to ONLY ONE PARTITION IS ALTERED. What I'm attempting will require at LEAST THREE partitions to be altered.  This means that the MAIN problem that has to be dealt with is that at least one of the first two PRIMARY partitions must somehow be freed from what the C3100 startup scripts demand/expect in order for it to boot. Please read my original post and this one completely and you should completely understand the debacle. Normal instructions for partitioning and mounting for Linux in general and Zaurii specifically for the most part DO NOT APPLY here.  It is a problem unique to the C3000-C3100 series.

So far I think Bam is the only one who's grasped the signifigance of the situation and who also understands the C3100 limitations. It's VERY easy misunderstand the full scope of the issues here.  

A special THANK YOU to everyone who has PM'ed or emailed me trying to help, I appreciate your support tremendously and your encouragement is the only thing that's keeping me going at the moment on this project. Don't feel bad if you gave suggestions that have turned out not to apply- I appreciate the help and if you wanna take a new run at it just reread these two posts and I'd be thankful for anything you can learn in this direction. I value your time and your willingness to share it with me is a testament to your friendship.  

In a perverse way - it is always uplifting when I run into these "drive me crazy" issues at it reminds me how many friends I've got here on the forums. It's what makes this place great. =)


Frobnoid,

Thank you, but it's problem specific to the C3100.  Your suggested directions were almost identical to my 2nd attempt of 16 total attempts.  The problem lies herein and is twofold:

One.)  The first and second Primary partitions MUST exist as ext3 and MUST be 9mb in size apeice. Furthermore the number of sectors for each of those partitions must be identical to the original hard drive installation (20 apiece).  This gives us two useless 9mb partitions and only two other primary partitions to work with. Or one Primary with extended partitions. This is mandatory for the machine to boot at all. (Not what I WANT but mandatory nonetheless.)

Two.) On the C3000 and C3100 the three partitions that come factory on the original 4gb microdrive are mounted via scripts only and automatically.  If you screw with the partition tables of the first two partitions the unit will refuse to reboot. At all. You CAN change the variables for the third primary partition.  The unit will STILL refuse to reboot but when it halts you can press Ctrl-c to get it to continue and finish the boot.  However when it finishes booting you will find that you have no access to the third Primary partion at all and it is impossible to manually mount it.  The scripts I'm referring to try to manually force the third partition to be FAT32 and if it is not they simply refuse to mount it and prevent any other method of mounting.

Probably the key to everything that I'm butting my head up against at the moment is inside those scripts.  Unfortunately they are complex and WAAAY beyond my understanding - sinec these scripts control everything else during boot as well including access to the read only file systems and their compression/expansion I do not wish to simply "hack away" at them indiscriminently to see what will or won't happen.  You could easily lock yourself out at this point.  I don't wish to go there. Yet.

So the person that comes through for me on this will definitely either have to already HAVE a c3100 at their disposal or at least done quite a bit of work with one and can spout the needed changes off the top of their heads etc.  

For the good of the C3100 community someone needs to sort out what Sharp has left us screwed with.  It's just bizarre.  And all of the "problem areas" go back to the fact that for some reason the C3100's are being crippled down to the hard drive partition limitations that the C3000's were forced to live with because they had virtually no flash memory.  It's JUST LIKE Sharp to give a device 128mb of flash memory to fix the problem and then continue to enforce limitations on the hard drive structuring that are NO LONGER NEEDED due to the increase in Flash Mem! There is just simply NO NEED for Sharp limiting the C3100 in this way and forcing the user to have to deal with empty partitions that we cannot use nor modify! The loss of two primary partition slots and 18mb of HDD space for NO GOOD REASON is infuriating.

It is one of the the BLATENT little sharp edges that need knocked off and polished smooth for the good of the platform. And if I'm sizing it up correctly it is completely a matter of simple script-reworking and basic config file altering.  This should be EASILY well within the grasp of us.

BAM has pointed me to some more material that is at the heart of the issue, however it still seems beyond me by just a bit.  He is the original author of the "how-to" document I found in the Zaurus Wikipedia was tailored after.  The person that posted it tweaked it a bit for his personal use before posting and so I've finally determined why there are two parts that seemingly did not jell together in that document.  Bam has also stated above that he will also continue to look into this (and dangit if he can't do it with his background, knowledge, and skillz I'll be greatly surprised! He's given a HUGE amount of technical help to the Z community over quite a long period of time. ) BUT I don't know how much time he has to throw at this at the moment.

SO if ya wanna pick up some quick and easy money- or if you'ld like your favorite Zaurus Developer to get a nice Christmas Bonus, jump on in here and help me out!  I'll pay to the first person who can get us through this one even if someone comes behind you and does it better later.  I REALLY want to start messing with some projects that are going to require that 6mb drive and I'm completely stalled at the moment.

In the mean time I'm going to take my limited amount of skillz and go back to Bam's THE GRINDER and try to see if I can learn enough to save myself $50 bucks or so. (NOT likely!) I'm just not that smart.  But I may be that stubborn.

Frustratedly Yours,

-NeuroShock

[frobnoid_]

One.)  The first and second Primary partitions MUST exist as ext3 and MUST be 9mb in size apeice. Furthermore the number of sectors for each of those partitions must be identical to the original hard drive installation (20 apiece).  This gives us two useless 9mb partitions and only two other primary partitions to work with. Or one Primary with extended partitions. This is mandatory for the machine to boot at all. (Not what I WANT but mandatory nonetheless.)

Then add the following before the commands I've provided:
fdisk /dev/hda
n p 1 (enter) 20 # make partition 1. Make it 20 sectors in size.
n p 2 (enter) 20 # make partition 2. Make it 20 sectors in size.
t 1 83 # make partition 1's type  be linux
t 2 83 # make partition 2's type  be linux
w

(back at the shell prompt)
mke2fs -j /dev/hda1 # make partition1 ext3fs
mke2fs -j /dev/hda2 # make partition2 ext3fs

You've now got two 9MB partitions which come first on your drive.
Following the other directions will get you the other three partitions setup.

Primary partion at all and it is impossible to manually mount it.  The scripts I'm referring to try to manually force the third partition to be FAT32 and if it is not they simply refuse to mount it and prevent any other method of mounting.

This shouldn't be a problem, in my example the third partition remains FAT32.

[ThC]

The scripts moutning the partition is the one I asked you in your other post ... please provide your /etc/rc.d/rc.rofilesys file and I'm pretty sure someone here will make it so you can have your disk layout (I'll make a try btw ...)

[loc4me]

I have a C3000. Could someone explain to me what the purpose of the two 9mb partitions are on the hard drive. It has been said that they are not used at all on the C3100 so what is the purpose on the C3000? Thanks

[neuroshock]

One.)  The first and second Primary partitions MUST exist as ext3 and MUST be 9mb in size apeice. Furthermore the number of sectors for each of those partitions must be identical to the original hard drive installation (20 apiece).  This gives us two useless 9mb partitions and only two other primary partitions to work with. Or one Primary with extended partitions. This is mandatory for the machine to boot at all. (Not what I WANT but mandatory nonetheless.)

Then add the following before the commands I've provided:
fdisk /dev/hda
n p 1 (enter) 20 # make partition 1. Make it 20 sectors in size.
n p 2 (enter) 20 # make partition 2. Make it 20 sectors in size.
t 1 83 # make partition 1's type  be linux
t 2 83 # make partition 2's type  be linux
w

(back at the shell prompt)
mke2fs -j /dev/hda1 # make partition1 ext3fs
mke2fs -j /dev/hda2 # make partition2 ext3fs

You've now got two 9MB partitions which come first on your drive.
Following the other directions will get you the other three partitions setup.

Primary partion at all and it is impossible to manually mount it.  The scripts I'm referring to try to manually force the third partition to be FAT32 and if it is not they simply refuse to mount it and prevent any other method of mounting.

This shouldn't be a problem, in my example the third partition remains FAT32.
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But on a 6gb drive you can only have a total of four primary partitions, or three primary with extended. (as Bam already pointed out.) This is preclusive as both the swap partition and whatever you choose for partition 3 both will also demand to be Primary. You would then have four primary partitions and that prohibits any logical ones- and you would have to have at least one more to meet my requirements.

Also this just addresses the partitioning. I also need to know how to properly copy the data from the old 4gb partitions to the new 6gb ones.
I've been told to use the dd command.  I'm totally disknowledgeable in it's use.  Can you enlighten me to its use? Or offer a better alternative?
I'm VERY thankful for your help and don't want you to give up on me!  I sincerely feel like you hold animportant part of the solution for me, and it's obvious ther is MUCH I can learn from you!

-NeuroShock

[bam]

dd command, why not just cp -a /hdd1/* to wherever you want or perhaps download the tar backup od hdd1/2 then follow the instructions.(again look at my site, or here in the forums)

[frobnoid_]

But on a 6gb drive you can only have a total of four primary partitions, or three primary with extended. (as Bam already pointed out.) This is preclusive as both the swap partition and whatever you choose for partition 3 both will also demand to be Primary. You would then have four primary partitions and that prohibits any logical ones- and you would have to have at least one more to meet my requirements.

I'm not aware of any requirement that swap be a primary partition. With that said, I don't know that I've ever tried swap on an extended partition. If you've seen it stated as a requirement, can you point me at such a reference? (I'm always interested in learning something new)

Also this just addresses the partitioning. I also need to know how to properly copy the data from the old 4gb partitions to the new 6gb ones.
I've been told to use the dd command.  I'm totally disknowledgeable in it's use.  Can you enlighten me to its use? Or offer a better alternative?

The following should be sufficient (as would bam's suggestions):
With the 4GB drive in place:
dd if=/dev/hda1 of=~/hda1.dd # read all data off partition 1, store that data in "hda1.dd" in your homedir
dd if=/dev/hda2 of=~/hda2.dd # read all data off partition 2, store that data in "hda2.dd" in your homedir

With the 6GB drive in place, properly partitioned:
dd if=~/hda1.dd of=/dev/hda1 # read from ~/hda1.dd and output it to the new partition 1
dd if=~/hda2.dd of=/dev/hda2 # read from ~/hda2.dd and output it to the new partition 2

dd reads/writes the raw bytes from the filesystem ("if" is "input file", "of" is "output file").

If you put both disks in the Z at once, you should be able to do the dd directly without storing to the internal flash by doing:
dd if=/dev/ORIGINAL1 of=/dev/NEW1
dd if=/dev/ORIGINAL2 of=/dev/NEW1

where ORIGINAL is the location of your 4GB CF and NEW is the location of your 6GB CF. "hda" is the one internal to your unit. I don't whether the other will be "hdb" or "hdc" (If you have no SD card in, run "df -k" from the prompt, and you'll see which of the two is in use...)

[adf]

I couldn't find the "how to disassemble a 3000/1000/3100" directions. If anyone could send me a link, i'd appreciate it.  6gig is here and 3100 was sent from Japan friday


I'm thinking that I'll just install pdax to the flash, then swap drives, then do a nice easy cfdisk....Assuming I can see how to open the thing up.

[neuroshock]

Great. Cool, I've used both methods to copy drive contents via DD and CP (Thanks Frobnoid and Bam!) in a test run and both seem to work very well. Got that one knocked out- turned out to be a LOT simpler than I thought it would.  'Bout time things started going in that direction.


Hrmm. I'm like you Frobnoid, I've never tried a swap drive via a logical partition but that may just be what makes this thing feasible.  My apologies Bam, I see now that you were trying to say that very same thing in your PM to me.  I'm getting ready to give a go at a 9mb ext3/9mb ext3/(whatever the exact size etc. the stock FAT32 partition is/and then make two logical partitions with one formatted as SWAP and the other as EXT3.  This still doesn't truly deal with the issue being the 18mb of wasted space and two uneeded primary partitions but I think it's the best I'm probably going to be able to get until more users start upgrading their C3100's in the future with larger drives and someone comes up with a more elegant solution that addresses the first two primary partitions and the mounting scripts.

I'll post my results back here to this thread.  If this fails I'm going to fallback to  a 9mb ext3/9mb ext3/FAT32 with loopback device installed for ext3 usage/SWAP partitioning scheme.  Either that or dump the SWAP partition in favor of an ext3 one and use a Swap file instead.  I'll probably benchmark both ways to see which gives me a better performance scenario.


Loc4me  On the C3000 the first 9mb ext3 partition houses the system files that the C3100 keeps in Flash memory.  The second partition is also used for something important (can't remember right now.)  But basically since the C3000 has so little flash memory that model uses the first two microdrive partitions to handle this job instead.  The C3100 was given 128mb of Flash memory which is more than enough to handle those jobs without having to use space on the microdrive.  It also makes the C3100 much faster in some respects because most programs are loaded in Flash Memory rather than on the microdrive and data transfer from a cold call is virtually instantaneous as compared to having to get the data from a microdrive which has to spin up before transfer.  Once the drive is spinning however it's not so big of a speed differential.  So do NOT alter those partitions on a C3000!  They are "vestigial" on a C3100 and seem to hold no purpose other than to waste a small but noticeable amount of resources.  I'm sure in future ROM revisions etc. those resources and space will be recovered- but for now it's not generally a big enough issue to draw enough attention to get fixed.

Going now to try my hand at some of Bam's bag of tricks.

Thanks All,

-NeuroShock

[neuroshock]

Adf,

I haven't seen the dissasembly page you're referring to but it's a piece of cake.  You will need one phillips jewelers screwdriver.

- Shutdown your C3100.
- Remove any CF card.
- Remove any SD card.
- Remove all cables etc.
- Flip the unit over.
- Remove the battery cover.
- Remove the battery.
- Remove the small black screws that hold the bottom cover in place. (There are 6 altogether. 4 in deep holes and two in the recessed battery cover area.)
- Carefully remove the bottom cover- It helps to pull on the side with the irda first as the headphone jack on the other side partially anchors it.  Just pull from that side first, it'll be intuitive from there.
- Note the postition and placement of the small black "switch" that locks the battery compartment in place- it only properly goes back together one way- just be aware to look for it at that time because it will probably drop out.
- You will then need to remove 4 silver screws from the motherboard layer you will then be looking at.  For reference the processor is under the silver metal shielding. You should also note that the holes that the silver screws have small "arrows" printed on the circuit board to show you which holes they come out of if you forget. (nice of them eh?)
- Then pull carefully on the edge of the board at the FRONT of the C3100.  This is important as you will need to get the edge of the board at an angle before pulling FRONTWARD as the thumbwheel, dc input, and other buttons extend out the back of the unit.
- IMPORTANT- at this point it's a handy time to gently work the serial port cover out of it's slot- it should become partially loose on it's own but it needs removed before the  board will release totally from the bottom cavity.
- Once the board is completely free it's also handy to open the screen at a 90 degree angle from the keyboard and lay the C3100 with the back of the screen on the table.  - The keyboard should be sticking straight up and the motherboard will then easily set down on the table without straining any cables.
- There are two silver screws with very fat heads that hold the SD card slot onto the motherboard (the SD slot is on a daughtercard that easily unplugs from the motherboard once the screws are removed.) Set this aside.
- You will then find a black bracket that holds the CF drive in place. It unsnaps at two points on the SD side of the motherboard.
- Once unsnapped tilt that side upwards and it will slide up and off the back of the CF card.
- Gently pull the CF card off of the pins.
- Exercise great care when you plug in the new drive to make sure the pins go in the right holes as there is no guide.

- Reverse process to reassemble.
Very, Very, easy.  

The only difficult part is the partitioning issue if you plan on altering it from the factory presets.

Personally I'm simply putting the 4gb drive into the case that the 6gb drive came in and storing it for safekeeping if I need to reinstall it for warranty issues.  After the warranty is over I'll use it for something I'm sure but until then I don't want to add to any headaches I may encounter if a warranty claim is required.  This way I can just reinstall the original drive, do a NAND restore and I'm ready to ship it off.

I hope this helps.  If you can't find any pictures and still feel you must have them before you proceed let me know and I'll try to take some for you and post them.

As always with something like this YMMV and if you screw the pooch - you're on your own so proceed with care, and patience!

Best of Luck!,
-NeuroShock

[adf]

A). Thank you very much!!

. Warranty....hmmmm  maybe I should keep it in one piece while under warranty..
or Tom61 gets his mods goin....
C).  If I decide to delay dissection, maybe I should use a usb wifi dongle?   I ordered a D-link dwl-122 any guesses on getting it to work and putting the 6-gig in the cf slot (for a 101-gig z)?

D)Then again... it SOUNDS easy enough... ( I'm one of those people who tends to have a "mystery" part left over after disassembling and reassembling somthing)


On the partition issues...  If you pulled the drive from a 3100 wouldn't it just be a 1000? That is to say, won't it run from flash?  (say with something far from sharp, like pdax or gpe?) If so, would't the idea be to set a basic OS up in flash and just partition the thing?