SATA harddrive on an X40

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ginoT · #1 Post by **ginoT** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 5:34 am

just had a thought - as you can get pcmcia SATA cards would it be possible to remove the internal 1.8" harddrive and boot off an external 7200rpm drive?

the x40 is a great machine (much better build quality than either my x60 or x60s especially the keyboard) but it's not the quickest I feel. Just trying to figure out ways of improving it's overall speed

sugo · #2 Post by **sugo** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 7:55 am

If it's going to be external, why not boot from a USB hard drive?

ginoT · #3 Post by **ginoT** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 8:15 am

coz SATA is MUCH quicker than USB 2.0

SATA works out at 115MBps while USB 2.0 is at best (in the real world) 30MBps

so if i booted up from the USB harddrive (even with a 7200rpm 7k100) it would in all probability be slower than the crappy 1.8" 4200rpm drive I have currently installed

em500 · #4 Post by **em500** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 9:50 am

I don't think the X40 BIOS will boot from anything connected through Cardbus/PCMCIA.

JHEM · #5 Post by **JHEM** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 11:41 am

I don't have any X4X series machines to play with, but my SIL's employer has tons of them and their support people told me that if you can live with the HD sticking out of the machine slightly you can install any capacity and speed 2.5" IDE HD in them.

The IDE connector in the X4X is a standard one, it's just the location of the connector on the HD that's different between the 1.8" and 2.5" HDs.

Might be a better solution that lugging an external drive and housing around.

James

ginoT · #6 Post by **ginoT** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:06 pm

james - yup, ur right! it fits (an IDE harddrive that is) and is probably better than carrying the cardbus, cables, and external SATA drive as you said. Only thing is that the drive sticks out unprotected. I'll see if I can improvise somehow to give the drive at least some minimal protection. tx!

sugo · #7 Post by **sugo** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:13 pm

Using a 2.5" drive in X40 is an interesting idea. However, doesn't totally remove X40's mobility? With external drive, at least one can unplug as needed. The IDE connector isn't designed for frequent insertion/removal.

I thought about buying a X40 and put a 4GB 1.8" flash drive into it. My windows partition on T42 including all programs I use only occupies 2.1GB of storage.

ginoT · #8 Post by **ginoT** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 12:28 pm

can you boot off a flash card? What about the read speeds of using flash memory - will it be as quick/or even quicker than an IDE drive?

I agree that the IDE connector isn't designed for frequent use and so I could end up doing more harm than good. And having the drive sticking out unprotected is also a bit dangerous. To be thought about

I just wish there were 1.8 7200rpm drives out there!

em500 · #9 Post by **em500** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 2:06 pm

Has anyone actually tried using a 2.5" HD in the X40? I know the connector is the same, but I tried a Toshiba and a Seagate 2.5" drive some time ago and neither would spin up.

@ginoT: the X40 can boot from most USB flash drives: AFAIK the BIOS supported boot interfaces are 1) internal IDE, 2) built-in ethernet and 3) USB storage (flash, HD, CD, and maybe floppy/zipdisk). It can not boot from the built-in SD or PC-Card slots.

Compared to hard disks, most current flash devices have lower latency but also lower throughput. That means that lots of random access to very small files is faster, but reading bigger contingent blocks is slower. Even if you manage to install Windows XP on a USB stick, it will probably be slower than on the 1.8" HD.

JHEM · #10 Post by **JHEM** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 3:33 pm

sugo wrote:I thought about buying a X40 and put a 4GB 1.8" flash drive into it.

FYI.

James

ginoT · #11 Post by **ginoT** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 7:23 pm

I connected a hitachi 7k60 7200rpm and it got going no problem. nothing was installed on it so I have no clue whether it would work in an actual boot up.

to be honest, if there is no practical way of fixing the 2.5" drive onto the notebook so it stays as mobile as with a 1.8" drive, then I'm probably not that interested in the extra performance. The uneveness of having part of the drive sticking out is no big deal - causing serious damage to either the drive or the notebook is a worry tho.

and as if from what u guys are saying, that an external SATA plugged into the cardbus/pcmcia slot is not gonna be bootable, then I'll just accept the slowness of the machine and use my X60 which I don't like much!

sugo · #12 Post by **sugo** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 8:11 pm

CPU power and battery life aside, I have to say my trusty T42 is a much better engineered laptop than my X60s in terms of

- bios bugs
- heat dissipation
- fan noise at similar RPM
- keyboard build
- wireless LAN sensitivity
- electric buzzing noise
- LCD colors

I can understand why you may like X40 better than X60.

boon · #13 Post by **boon** » Tue Mar 13, 2007 11:21 pm

I agree on that, the T42 is better than any other models they have made. Even the later T series cant be better than the T42...

but sadly I just have to have those smaller sized notebook because of its weight and smaller form factor.

ginoT · #14 Post by **ginoT** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 4:28 am

thanks for the tip on the T42 - I've been looking at getting a T series laptop for basic use anyway. will focus on the T42 then

seneca · #15 Post by **seneca** » Wed Mar 14, 2007 11:30 am

you can attach a 2.5" hdd another way too, but I haven't tried it.

Step 1. Just connect a IDE cable (it's less pins on those cables, so an ordinary cable won't work) to the connector inside the drive bay and fold it back to the rear of the laptop.

Step 2. Connect the hdd fold it 90 degrees and attach it somehow (maybe use an old extended life battery casing).

Step 3.... Profit!!! (Or something like that.)

The benefit is a better typing angle and less protrusion (did I spell that right?) at the front (palmrest).

But as I said, it's an idea, I haven't actually tested it...

ginoT · #16 Post by **ginoT** » Thu Mar 15, 2007 5:48 pm

hmmm . that is an interesting solution. unsure if there will be enough room though inside the machine for the extra cables.

Of course I won't manage to get the full benefit of having a SATA drive, but the extra rpm's on a new disk should still help.

thanks for the tip!

berlin · #17 Post by **berlin** » Sun Mar 18, 2007 12:50 am

How much does it stick out? I haven't tried it on my X41

SATA harddrive on an X40

SATA harddrive on an X40

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