Project - SSD Mods

Im new to this, is CF significantly faster than using say a 4200rpm hard drive?

 

That depends on the speed of the cf card, but the harddrive has a very slow searchtime, up to 20ms.
And the cf card is around 0.5ms

 

I tried this mod with 4GB transcend 300x card and eBay CF reader + flip cable. It can see the CF card, it shows up as TRANSCEND in the BIOS, I tried to install windows on it... I format as FAT32 then setup transfers the files over, laptop reboots, I choose not to boot from CD but it wont boot from the CF HDD, just a black screen with a white text cursor... Tried leaving it for 20 minutes but nothing happens, just the flashing cursor.

Anyone know what is wrong with this? Do I need to do anything to make the CF card bootable?

Thanks

 

Its been awhile since i did mine as i recall you have to format the card.search for Hp usb utility.I think i followed the same procedure as asus hope this helps,i.m very happy with my setup...Found the quide i used. google .eeeguides install windows from usb....

 

Hi Andy53

I've arrived in HK and plan on staying here for a while. I'm new to the area and was wondering if u could point out any place that I can buy a reliable 300x card in mong kok? Maybe u could also refer me to someone who could do the mod for me? or is it simple enough to do your self?

Thanks

 

it seems an easier mod may be upon us. MY Digital Discount have will soon be shipping runcore 1.8 inch ssds with 80/45 read write speeds. They are not a direct swap I dont think but if a hd fits these should.

Connecting...
Connected by HTTP.
Douglas Hare: Hello, how can I help you?
Client: do runcore plan to make a direct replacement for the aspire one
Douglas Hare: yes
Douglas Hare: which drive does that have in it?
Client: zif
Client: pata
Douglas Hare: http://www.mydigitaldiscount.com/Catego ... cat=Browse By Brand:RunCore:RunCore 1.8 inch ZIF SSDs

Client: those are in a case the aspire one ssd is bare
Client: will it fit?
Client: this is what the aa1 ssd looks like http://www.mydigitaldiscount.com/Produc ... 1222405827
Client: ?
Douglas Hare: sorry, give me a sec
Client: no probs
Douglas Hare: I am under the impression it works the same
Client: im sure it works fine but does it physically fit? there are no mounting holes and the zif connector is on the side not the top?
Client: also do you have dimensions for it
Douglas Hare: the dimensions are in the description... unfortuantely we have never had any of these in, so I do not know much technically about them
Client: ok I just wasnt sure if they planned to make one specificallly for the aa1 with the same dimensions and physical characteristics like they have done for the eee and mini9
Client: i cannot find the dimensions
Douglas Hare: I'm sorry, I guess they are not in there...
Douglas Hare: I'm sorry, we really do not know too much about them yet
Client: ok ill check back later

 

I tried to format the CF card with HP USB utility, and I made a boot disk using grub4dos & DOS. I put the CF card in and it loads past the bios. grub4dos just says "Try (hd0,0): NTFS" I tried with FAT 32 but neither gets past that screen. Is it the CF card that doesn't work or could it be the ZIF CF card reader? I dont understand, if i load up via USB stick i can work with the CF card as a drive, but it just wont boot :evil:

 

ok now i can boot linux from the CF in a usb CF reader, just not via the ZIF to CF card!

 

This looks excellent.. I can assure you a 1.8 inch fits. I modded mine with toshiba 1.8 inch hard drive which looks to be the form factor of the ssd here http://www.mydigitaldiscount.com/ProductDetail.jsp?LISTID=8000091C-1230363043 I had to knock down some of the mouting holes, but with a little 3m spongetape from teh 1.8 inch to the underside of the motherboard, I had a solid built machine.
My mod though physically successful didn't yield any result.. I could not get the drive to show up in the bios. It would never spin up. Maybe a defective hdd. I even ordered the correct toshiba to normal zif cable (toshiba is thinner) I spent a good 5 hours on it and just gave up. I have the other crappy ssd in right now and am looking towards a relatively cheap alternative which i can run windows 7 on. From the vid they have there, this drive looks great. I think i will definitely be getting one and i will let you guys know of my results. I don't have a digital camera, but maybe i can find one to post some picture when i finish. By the way thanks a lot for the link to this fantastic find.

 

How did you get that to work.. I have the 40gb version and i cannot get it to be recognized. I ordered the toshiba cable which i believe goes from .25mm to .35mm. Everything seemed to fit correctly , but i get nothing. No spinning, no recognition. I plug the old ssd back in and it works fine.

 

I found another picture that may be the real thing. Who knows

Either way, I am sure i can make it fit... Now do i order 16gb or 32gb

 

i have performed the cf trick using a sandisk extreme IV 4gb card. the model i started with was the 16gb ssd, 1gb ram, linpus edition. i have tried installing windows using ide-usb adapters and a dvd drive (errors every single try), and using a usb flash drive (using the eee tutorial) but when i used that, i needed to keep the thumb drive in until i have booted. i just want a regular install, not needed the thumbdrive to boot or anything. does anyone have an idea WTF is going on here? im about to throw this retarded thing out the window!

 

Have you tried the CF card in a different device to make sure it is opperating correctly? May want to pop it into a reader and run chkdsk on it. Also, i am not sure if hd tune error test works on ssd, but you could try that. Sorry if my answers seem a little novice, its just the first thing that comes to mind. Also, have you tried installing any other OS. Maybe your installation media is messed up

 

yes i have tested in 2 other devices: my axim x50v, and a multi-card reader. i have previously installed ubuntu eee to the sandisk, with no problem whatsoever. when i installed xp to the sandisk, it was incredibly fast ( as one would expect. ) the only thing i could complain about was the fact that i needed a boot disk (the usb flash drive.) i am currently posting from the same computer using a different (albeit slower, and inferior pny 266x 4gb) there are others on the forum that have used the sandisk extreme IV cf cards for this very hack (except those were 8g instead of 4g) when booting, the sandisk was not showing up in the bios, however when in the boot menu, it would display the drive info.

over the past 2 days, myself and 2 others (of which are the most knowledgable in the computer field that i personally know) used every single method of creating a bootable partition on the cf drive we could think of. we used the tutorial from eee user blog linked to in another thread here (using the flash drive to install xp.) we also tried gPart to create and change partition sizes then copy an installation onto the smaller partition, then tried installing to the c drive (larger partition) from the d drive (smaller partition, where the files were copied to.) after all files were copied during xp installation and it rebooted, it came up to a prompt with something like "ntldr not found"

on a hunch, they took out the sandisk and replaced it with the pny 266x, that does appear in the bios menu, then used the very first method we tried (the usb flash drive- conditioned using the tutorial from the eee blog) and it worked the very first time without a single hiccup.

although yes, it does work now, i would much rather have the 300x sandisk in place of the 266x. after all, i did pay a nice bit of $$$ for the extreme IV. any thoughts?

 

Does anyone want to sell me the ZIF cable I need for the Zif to CF Adapter? I thought my adapter came with both cables, but it did not. And it seems like everyone here had to buy 5 or 10 just to get the right cable. Anyone near Saskatchewan Canada and want to sell me one? I'd greatly appreciate it!

Jay

 

sure i can... i have about 8 left. they are 15cm though, but you can tuck them away pretty easily.. just email me at [email protected]. Do you have paypal? that would be the best way.

 

anyone? i THINK i remember seeing on the forum that someone with the same problem had just reformatted the sandisk with ntfs numerous times until it was finally recognized by the bios. i cannot, however, find that post anywhere at this time. can anyone confirm? thx

 

Hi folks. I'm from portugal and i am a happy one that have a acer aspire one 110. Like we all know OEM SSD sucks, so i heard of this forum and i start modding it

I bought in eBay compact flash - ZIF adapter, like the most of you (5,89 EUR free shipping) and a CF Scandisk 4GB UDMA 300x 45mb/s (59€ in fnac - enough for OS and a little stuff).
Today i was plugging in all the stuff in the acer and in the BIOS the comon message: NONE.. damn... So i came here and i saw that miss the flip ZIF cable... If i bought it BIOS will recognize the CF? Maybe tomorrow i post some pics thanks for everything, we are much like a family.

 

One more thing. The common 1.8 disks are ZIF connector and the otherone with pins. The one with pins is male or female interface? IOf i plug one of that drives i need the flip ZIF cable?

 

fsilva:

you are describing my exact problem- with the exact same card. i used the flipped zif cables, filter, everything done perfectly. if you find something that works, please let me know!