Ultrabay Slim, can you fit generic drive

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Utwig · #1 Post by **Utwig** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 9:40 am

So I can get HP Multibay II UJ-842 Multiburner for a good price. Now if I unscrew HP multibay rail and backplane converter, it's generic 9.5mm laptop optical drive. I can also swap bezel from my existing Ultrabay drive and I get badass DVD burner.

Does the Ultrabay slim work with generic optical drive connectors or not?

aaa · #2 Post by **aaa** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 10:34 am

*Reminds everyone that the usual drive thickness is 11.7mm*

I don't know about the connector, but one issue I've encountered is the plastic bezel not fitting (for some reason the holes for tabs were arranged differently).

Utwig · #3 Post by **Utwig** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 11:06 am

It's a different connector, so no.

aaa · #4 Post by **aaa** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 11:51 am

Keep in mind that there's usually a second connector/adapter attached to these things... pretty sure the Ultrabay Slim uses one.

frankiepankie · #5 Post by **frankiepankie** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 1:35 pm

With UltraBay 2000 is is 100% possible

Look at this page to find out how:

http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/How_to_bu ... aBay_drive

Ultrabay Slim is "slimmer", and uses slimmer drives, and i believe that the connector is soldered to the device, and not an removable connector like with the Ultrabay 2000 system, and with other laptops.

#6 Post by **rkawakami** » Thu Mar 27, 2008 2:08 pm

Ultrabay Slim, as in your T42p, accepts 9.5mm thick optical drives. I believe that the 11.7mm drives would fit inside an Ultrabay Enhanced, but not the Slims. Here's a couple of pictures from a 39T2505 Combo drive I have in my T41:

http://www.kawakami-ca.com/image/ultrab ... _drive.jpg
http://www.kawakami-ca.com/image/ultrab ... nector.jpg

The back plate is held on with three screws. There's no "adapter" to speak of like on the Ultrabay 2000 drives. The drive will physically fit as long as the existing connector on the optical drive looks like the second picture (and you also transfer the 1" plastic latch on the right side of the drive). It's kind of hard to see, but the connector has a "blade" in the middle with electrical contacts on top and bottom. Whether or not the drive will operate is another story. I would assume that it should as long as the drive is set to "master" or "cable select". My understanding is that some drives are set as "slave" and therefore may not work in the Ultrabay. I've adapted many 12.7mm (Ultrabay 2000) bare drives, including the UJ-820, UJ-840 and UJ-850 without problems.

Utwig · #7 Post by **Utwig** » Fri Mar 28, 2008 1:13 am

OK, speaking of ultrabays: The curved bezel is for T4x and the flat bezel is for T6x.

Is this correct?

Ultrabay Slim, can you fit generic drive

Ultrabay Slim, can you fit generic drive

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