2.5" Hard Drive in an X41?

[callmedrlove]

Ok I'll start by introducing myself. My name is Travis, and I'm thinking about buying an x41 Tablet. I have an offer to purchase one for $400. Does that seem worth it considering how bad the hard drive is? I mean, I don't want to buy a machine that barely works and has no option to upgrade.

Okay, on to my real question. I have been reading about the x41 and it is pretty much impossible to not read something about how slow the 1.8" hard drives are. So, I looked around for an alternative. First I checked Toshiba and Hitachi to see if either made faster 1.8" drives, and it appears that they don't, although they do make larger ones. Second, I checked these forums for information regarding SSD's. It seems like replacing a 1.8" hard drive with a decent sized, fast SSD is about 2 years away from being economically feasible. I also HAVE to run Windows, as I am going to be using this notebook to take exams on in law school, and the exam software only runs on Windows and Mac OS X.

So, I went back to the drawing board, and tried to find out if anyone ever tried replacing the 1.8" hard drive with a 2.5" somehow, when I found this:

http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site. ... MIGR-60512

Paying particular interest to the first box, which appears to say you can replace the hard drive in the X41 and X41 Tablet with a 2.5" drive. How can this be possible? Has anyone ever done this? Or am I just reading this page wrong?

[callmedrlove]

Ok after looking around a little more, I found this:

http://www.samsung.com/global/business/ ... 66&tab=fea#

which appears to be a 5400 RPM 1.8" hard drive. Is this even possible? Here is the detailed spec sheet for it:

http://www.samsung.com/global/system/bu ... _Rev02.pdf

Supposedly this drive is shipping in a dell laptop, the D430, so it must actually exist, and Dell has the same 5400 RPM spec listed on their product page.

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/s ... /specs.htm

I don't know a lot about hard drives, especially laptop hard drives, but would this drive work in an X41?

[cchsiao]

The problem would be that this drive is not using the standard IDE connector. It looks like they use a PATA connector which is the same as the one on Samsung's SSD. So... no hope of putting this into a X4x.

[K0LO]

callmedrlove:

Don't believe everything that you read about the X41T and its 4200 rpm hard disk. I have a 2-year old installation of Windows XP Tablet Edition on my X41T and am perfectly satisfied with its speed and reliability. Yes, the hard drive's transfer rate is slower than what you are used to in a desktop machine but it ain't bad, either.

The secret to good performance is to rebuild your machine with a fresh install of Windows. The preload factory image on this machine is really screwed up. It runs dog-slow and will frustrate you with its poor performance and unreliability. I'm not sure how IBM screwed this image up but they did, big time. Everyone I know who has tried using an X41T the way it came from the factory has been frustrated with its performance. But you don't have to put up with it if you are willing to do a little work.

Here is an article that I wrote on how to do this if you are interested.

[callmedrlove]

cchsiao: Is there no such thing as an adapter that would convert PATA to IDE? And where did you see that about the Samsung being PATA? I can't seem to find it. And also, here: http://forum.thinkpads.com/viewtopic.ph ... eplace+x41

the third reply seems to indicate that the X41 uses PATA connector, or am I reading that wrong?
Also, while I'm at it I'll go ahead and throw in this other link I found:

http://accessories.us.dell.com/sna/prod ... u=341-4872

A Dell 32 GB IDE SSD HD for only $550. Would this one work?

k0lo: I would definitely be interested, but there is a snag. The person I'm buying them from has already done a fresh install of Windows Vista Ultimate and I don't actually have a copy of Windows XP Tablet. I'm sure I could buy one, but that would up the price of the notebook by another $100 or so. Would Vista run at a decent speed if I up the RAM to 2 GB?

Also, do either of you think $400 is a fair price for this?

[K0LO]

You can get a copy of XP Tablet Edition by purchasing the recovery disk set for the X41T. Lenovo will sell you these disks for $45 but you may be able to do better by checking the forum want ads.

Vista is a bit of a stretch on this machine. The graphics adapter will not run Aero. Since Vista uses the disk heavily you will notice a performance penalty compared to XP. Yes, 2 GB of RAM will help.

[DVormann]

There seems to be some confusion about 1.8" PATA HDD connectors. I may be stating the obvious. Want to make sure everybody is on the same page:

1.8" PATA HDDs use two different kinds of connector. Most have a ZIF-connector on the short side. They do not fit into X40/X41(t). Only a single series of Hitachi HDDs has a 44 PIN connector on the long side. That is the same connector found on 2.5" PATA HDDs, just on a smaller disk. These Hitachi HDDs are used in X40/X41(t). There is no replacement HDD from any manufacturer. Most likely there never will be one.

A fresh install of Windows is a good and cheap way to improve performance. Try that. If the result is not fast enough for you then consider using flash. If you go for flash/SSD chances are you will have to perform a fresh install. Make sure you can first.

Most 1.8" PATA SSDs have above ZIF connector. (Samsung, Sandisk ...) They are mechanically identical to most 1.8" PATA HDDs. They do not fit into X40/X41(t). A few manufacturers offer SSDs in X40 form factor for big $. (Supertalent, PQI ...)


Regarding 2 GB ram in X41t:
I am using 2 GB in X41 (2528). There are various reports about 2 GB in X41t (186X) both working and not working. It is worth a try. It may work. It may not.

[cchsiao]

DVormann has explained the connector part clearly: most of the 1.8" PATA HDDs or SSDs come with a ZIF connector, and that's what I meant in my previous post. Sorry for the confusion.

So far it seems that the only upgrade option for X4x on HDD is Supertalent and PQI's SSDs. Some people do try IDE to CF adaptor to improve the performance of the HDD, and various issues concerning this upgrade can be found in another thread.

In addition to that particular thread, I would like to add another comment on upgrading to SSDs. Although Super Talent or PQI's SSDs come with 44pin connectors, it doesn't mean that X4x can simply benifit from these SSDs. According to njpatter who tried an super talent 32GB SSD on his machine (not sure about x40 or x41), these SSDs don't seem to boot after installing the OS. He tried Linux, VISTA and xp, and nothing works. He eventually returned the SSD to the store and stay with the usual HDD. However, he also mentioned that that store did report that some people successfully upgrade their X4x with a SSD from them. So... it might depends on the model again. The bottom line becomes: for now it seems that the only safe path one can try (to get rid of the slow HDD) is to do the IDE to CF trick. This info is not posted in that thread, and I got this by communicating njpatter directly.

My experience with VISTA is not that bad though, actually. First of all, I have 2GB RAM on my X41t (yes, a 2GB stick works on my 6TU), and secondly, I also bought a 2GB Extreme III SD card for readyboost. The overall performance is not as bad as in XP tablet (and I don't like XP tablet for some reason). Although one cannot runs Aero on X4x, but who cares? The only thing I actually care is how to use presentation director in VSITA, but it doesn't look like there is a way of doing that on all 4x series Thinkpad.