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x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Mon Mar 06, 2017 7:26 pm
by Whitieiii
I know the thickness of drives must be 7MM but how would you tell from places like ebay where they are not listed most of the time or are incorrect? my ssd I have in it now is 5MM and most of my HDD drives are 9mm but when I go to buy an ssd/hdd from ebay how would I tell the drive thickness?

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Mon Mar 06, 2017 7:46 pm
by Cigarguy
Manufacturer's website and/or Google search.

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Mon Mar 06, 2017 11:02 pm
by thinkpadcollection
Majority of the SSD is 7mm.

If you are buying HDs, only very few can make it to 7mm is HGST 500GB (Z7K500-500, model # HTS725050A7E630, 7200rpm 32MB cache)) and seagate 2TB barracuda.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/Seagate-BarraCud ... Swt5hYgTYV

Toshiba 1TB 7mm 5400rpm:

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/TOSHIBA-1TB-MQ02 ... SwnHZYkMWX

WD black 1TB Solid State Hybrid Hard Drive ,7mm SATA6.0Gb/s WD10S21X SSHD, 7200rpm.

Cheers, thinkpadcollection

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Tue Mar 07, 2017 8:03 pm
by jdrou
thinkpadcollection wrote: If you are buying HDs, only very few can make it to 7mm
That's true of older drives but half the SATA-6Gb notebook drives on Newegg are 7mm. 9.5mm is probably close to being a dead format with new drives being all 7mm for laptops or 15mm for enterprise use.

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Tue Mar 07, 2017 8:29 pm
by thinkpadcollection
jdrou wrote:
thinkpadcollection wrote: If you are buying HDs, only very few can make it to 7mm
That's true of older drives but half the SATA-6Gb notebook drives on Newegg are 7mm. 9.5mm is probably close to being a dead format with new drives being all 7mm for laptops or 15mm for enterprise use.
False. Not all have money or need for SSD upgrade for older computers so they had to opt for 7mm HDs. Also there are plenty of newer regular and also other decent notebooks that still offers spinning 9.5mm HDs since SSD are still expensive option.

Cheers, thinkpadcollection

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Wed Mar 08, 2017 10:07 am
by TankPad
Although the specs say 7mm (from memory), I've been able to fit 9mm drives in my X220. There's no wiggle room or anything, but they fit without any force. Anyone else tried it?

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Wed Mar 08, 2017 1:23 pm
by dr_st
With or without the rubber rails?

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Wed Mar 08, 2017 5:08 pm
by jdrou
thinkpadcollection wrote:
jdrou wrote: That's true of older drives but half the SATA-6Gb notebook drives on Newegg are 7mm. 9.5mm is probably close to being a dead format with new drives being all 7mm for laptops or 15mm for enterprise use.
False. Not all have money or need for SSD upgrade for older computers so they had to opt for 7mm HDs. Also there are plenty of newer regular and also other decent notebooks that still offers spinning 9.5mm HDs since SSD are still expensive option.

Cheers, thinkpadcollection
I wasn't referring to SSDs. Most newer spinning drive models seem to be 7mm so they aren't rare or hard to find. Many of the 9.5mm drives on Newegg are tagged with 'newer model available' and that newer model is 7mm. None of Seagate's current models are 9.5mm although WD still has a couple (and not any higher capacity than their 7mm models). I'll grant you that 7200rpm drives are disappearing because of SSDs becoming more common but you can still get 500 GB 7200rpm 7mm drives for around $50.

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Sat Mar 18, 2017 6:31 pm
by TankPad
dr_st wrote:With or without the rubber rails?
Sorry about the late reply. It is with the rails, though they are harder to fit to the drive than with the thinner drive. They need a little persuasion. :)

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Sun Mar 19, 2017 9:32 am
by thinkpadcollection
jdrou wrote:
thinkpadcollection wrote:
False. Not all have money or need for SSD upgrade for older computers so they had to opt for 7mm HDs. Also there are plenty of newer regular and also other decent notebooks that still offers spinning 9.5mm HDs since SSD are still expensive option.

Cheers, thinkpadcollection
I wasn't referring to SSDs. Most newer spinning drive models seem to be 7mm so they aren't rare or hard to find. Many of the 9.5mm drives on Newegg are tagged with 'newer model available' and that newer model is 7mm. None of Seagate's current models are 9.5mm although WD still has a couple (and not any higher capacity than their 7mm models). I'll grant you that 7200rpm drives are disappearing because of SSDs becoming more common but you can still get 500 GB 7200rpm 7mm drives for around $50.
Not true. 9.5mm is more common at any given capacity that is the reason I gave few models that are true 7mm hard drives.

To Tankpad: are you sure you have a 7mm rubber rails?

Cheers, thinkpadcollection

Re: x220 HDD thickness

Posted: Tue Jun 20, 2017 9:37 pm
by apojoga
I have a 9.5m in mine. It went in without the enclosure and rubber rails. It wiggles sideways a little once installed, pushing in a q-tip next to it fixes that.

Taking it out is a lot more involved, you need to take the palmrest/keyboard/bezel off and pull hard enough on the motherboard connector to give you a minor heart attack. :shock:

But they make 7mm 2TB drives today so this is no longer necessary.