DIY: Adding SSD or HDD storage using an optical bay caddy

If I'm not mistaken, the ebay caddies have mounting holes on the side.
I asked about that to notebookelite but I haven't got any reply yet.
If the holes are on the side, will 9.5mm hdd fit? or is it need to be escalated a bit?
In my place it will be hard to find 12.5mm hdd, thats why I will be using 9.5mm one..
Thanks

 

I can't be sure about the 12.7mm sata-to-pata caddy. It's got more sheetmetal than the 9.5mm version. Though I can assure you the 9.5mm version has holes neither on the side, nor the bottom. Very unusual why they give you 4 screws for the HDD.

The newmodeus caddy does have 4 mount points to screw the HDD to the base. It wouldn't matter if it's 9.5mm or 12.5mm hdd, since mount points are at the same location.

 

Having purchased the 12.7mm sata-to-pata caddy, I can inform you that the caddy doesn't have screw holes in the side. What it does have though, is 4 screws for you to screw into your hard drive, not into the caddy itself.. Then inside of the caddy where the hard drive sits, 4 little tiny plastic 'holders' that will use the screws on the side of your hdd to 'press' the hard drive down. It kind of sucks, but it's better than nothing. It also comes with a cheap plastic 'plug' that will fill in the space infront of your hd and press the front of the hd down.

 

So that's it.. Thanks for the info
Are you using 9.5mm hdd? or 12.5mm one?

 

I'm waiting on a dell studio 1555 and I'm looking to have an ssd and hdd in it. Ideally I'd like to have one that could accommodate the 12.5mm drives although I'll be using a 9.5mm drive for the near future. So which one do I need?
Cheers.

 

According to google, Dell Studio 1555 comes with a 12.7mm slot-loaded sata optical drive, so try a ebay or newmodeus 12.7mm sata optical bay caddy as shown in the first post. The single ebay vendor selling the 12.7mm sata caddy shows what appears to be a picture of the 9.5mm version, yet implicitly says 12.7mm. Go figure? Would be curious to know if it truly is a 12.7mm unit.

 

can we make mounting holes at the bottom of ebay caddy ourself ?
say.. drill 4 holes so the harddisk can be secured inside the caddy

 

Hi Nando4 could you tell me if the Sony CW optical drive is 9.5mm or 12.7mm?

Thanks

 

If you have the notebook, just Google the part number by going to My Computer and right click -> Properties and checking the Hardware tab.

 

Adding HDD mounting screwholes to the ebay caddy

Easily done for the ebay caddy. All that's really necessary is the 2 front screws as the sata connector (or pata connector for the pata version) holds the HDD in place on the rear. Could use a marking liquid on your HDD screw points, insert HDD into caddy, press down to mark the spot. Then drill a hole. Would also need a light drilling with a slightly larger drill to place a bevel so the screw head sits flush with the plate. Left: newmodeus caddy and ebay caddy bottom side-by-side. newmodeus caddy has 4 screwholes in place to secure the HDD to the chassis.

 

Great this will do.
I'm not in US and newmodeus caddy's price will increase with shipping fee.
I'll report back when the ebay caddy arrives.
Thanks nando4 !

 

About a week ago I ordered a 12.7 mm SATA-SATA caddy from ebay.
(seller: it-glasses - search for R400)

It arrived just now - record time!
China - Europe in less than a week.

Technically it is working like a charm.
Plug in, startup and go!

In business for 14 US delivered

I was a little worried about the quoted weight of these units.
Happy to report it's only 89 grams on my scale. The net weight of my laptop will hardly be effected.

 

Just noticed that the light is working as well.
I understand this isn't always the case.

 

The HDD LED on the system doesn't work using the sata-to-pata caddy unless it's modded. The sata-to-sata caddy will work since it's just passthru.

Photos of 12.7mm sata-to-sata caddy

Can you post photos of how it's a 12.7mm sata-to-sata caddy? The single seller on ebay has somewhat ambiguous advertising. The ad suggest it's a 9.5mm tall chassis with a 12.7mm faceplate. Not that it really matters. Indeed, it could take a 12.5mm HDD since the sata connector is in the same position for 9.5mm or 12.5mm drives, just that the drive would be taller than the top plate of the chassis if it's using a 9.5mm tall chassis.

 

Figuring out how to post pictures here took some time.

Here they are:



The links work, but no idea how to make thumbnails here.

Comments:
- The depth from bottom plate to top is 12.30 mm.
- SATA connector is close to the bottom plate, so not sure if it would fit a 12.5 mm drive.

- The caddy is not modified, as suggested by the pictures of the ebay seller. It is 12.7 mm all over.
- No mounting holes for the harddisk. Apparently there is some kind of adapter for this which I do not have. I will make them later when i get my hands on a small drill.

PS: I ordered the rubber rails for a thinkpad harddisk for ebay, so there will be no need to make additional holes.

 

US$25-delivered 12.7mm sata caddy Thank you Fintab. The linked pictures have been uploaded to imageshack with thumbnails on the right. This is the real deal. Great for Clevo/Asus or any other notebook using standard 12.7mm tall sata optical drives wanting to add more storage.

 

From the link that nando posted, looks like you're stuck with 9.5mm.

 

I just disassembled my ebay 9.5mm sata-to-pata to figure out "if a 12.5mm drive would fit in the ebay 12.7mm optical bay caddy". This is what I see:

- bottom plate is like 1mm thick and is designed to sit absolutely flush against the plastic edging that holds it. The plate is definitely not 2mm thick. 1.5mm at most.
- the HDD sits on top of that plate, so bottom edge+1mm(plate)+12.5mm=12.6mm. Optical drive is 12.7mm so it would fit a 12.5mm drive with I'd say 0.05-0.1mm spare.
- I am assuming the sata connector is in exactly the same position for 12.5mm and 9.5mm drives.

I'm 90% confident a 12.5mm drive would work in that 12.7mm sata caddy. Any pioneers want to make that 100%?

 

Wow, this could be potentially great news. Wouldn't have to dish out the cash to NewModeUS then. From pictures, it looks like the WD 1TB 12.5mm drive has SATA connectors in the same spot as typical 9.5mm and is just taller.

 

On the caddy I got the bottom plate is definitely less than 1.5 mm thick.
Measured 12.30 mm, I guess the two tenths of a millimeter will be fine.
The only thing in question is connector position, if it's like sgogeta says it should be no problem at all to fit a 12.5 mm high drive.

I would try if there was one available. All my 2.5" drives were intended as primaries - so all are low.
If it fits it would be interesting the get a 1 TB drive and a primary ssd.

 

nando4: An issue I'm having with this old Acer Travelmate 800 (Pentium M with ICH4M) is that it lacks 48-bit LBA. AFAIK, it's a BIOS limitation in this case.

I don't know how common this is, but maybe you'd want to share this in your first post since computers with this issue can only handle <137 GB on each HDD.

 

If such a limitation exists (on a specific machine), then you only need to format it to less than 137GB for it to be a boot partition. Depending on the O/S used, it may be fine to leave it at 'full' size if it will be only used as storage.

 

I have a 12.5mm 500GB HDD in my 12.7mm caddy, sorry I didn't mention this earlier.
My caddy's from newmodeUS.com

 

Windows XP can only handle 128 GB maximum on each HDD, and the rest isn't available at all. It's a BIOS limitation.

The reason for adding this warning to the first post is obvious:

If your computer have this limit, then there's no point in buying anything larger than a 120 - 160 GB HDD since you can only use 128(137) GB in total anyway, no matter how many partitions you have. A larger HDD is a total waste of money.

 

Mats,

I think you'll have to reconsider what you're saying. I just helped someone (here) replace a 60 or 80GB HD with a 320GB model, he just had to format it to less than 137GB, as you state, then, once in Windows XP, he formatted the rest of the available space. I am just not sure if he did one large 'Data' partition, or if he/she had to make two or more, but he/she did report back that it worked.

The limitation should only be for the boot partition. As for the rest, depending if you format with XP and SP3, you may get away with one large data partition and thereby, use all the space on the HD.

 

I've added the Optical drive caddy into my M1330 successfully at first. My computer was actually in hibernation when I took it apart (battery and all) to install the caddy. I took out the slot load drive and installed a Momentus 500gb drive. Put the Comp back together and started. Vista recognized the drive as if it were just plugged in. On reboot though, the drive is no longer detected. The "fixed bay device" notification in the bios under device info claims that nothing is there, when it would normally show the DVD drive. Device Manager does not show the device once Vista is booted, and it does not show up when I scan for new hardware. The computer boots fine as it did before, and I even rebooted using a thorough POST behavior to try to force it to recognize the HDD in in the caddy the PATA slot. So ...

It recognized it at first, being able to copy and move files to and from the drive. Once the first reboot happened, and the BIOS became involved, the drive is no longer detected in both the BIOS or Windows ... Is it conflicting with my Primary HDD??? is there something I can do in the BIOS. I am reluctant to take the laptop apart, since I know the drive functioned correctly once recognized.

Can anyone help???

 

You will probably have to take it apart.

Try changing some BIOS options. If that doesn't help then try taking out the drive and hot-plugging when you boot into windows.

Maybe also try the pin mod to make the drive master/slave.

 

I have actually found the solution... the SATA to PATA caddy had jumper settings that were conflicting with the Motherboard. It threw me off because I originally saw the drive attached when resuming from Hibernation. I re-opened the computer and swapped the jumper settings, and success! Sorry to bother, but I replied so maybe someone in a similar situation won't be pulling their hair out like I was.

 

Based on picture shown here either of the following caddies would do the job. In both cases without the faceplate:

- US$42+delivery newmodeus 9.5mm sata-to-pata
- US$28-delivered ebay 9.5mm sata-to-pata

The ebay product defaults to slave mode on my system, but can be jumpered to be master by bridging pin 47+45 on the JAE50 connector as shown here. Newmodeus' website has only their 2510P sata-to-pata caddy making mention of the master/slave jumper on it. This comes with a revised REV_C board as shown here. Are you referring to master/slave jumper and if so, what exact product did you buy with this jumper? (Please provide link).

 

I got the OBHD9-SATA-B Caddy from newmodeus.com and removed the faceplate. I actually removed the Jumpers from the master/slave pins on the Rev_C board and inserted one jumper sideways (vertical) on the 2 right pins. The Hard drive has been working flawlessly with file transfers in the 60 - 80 mb/s range. I have moved over all data and temp files and directed numerous programs to use the second drive as their cache or scratch disk. I am getting prepared to replace my primary hard drive with a ssd in the near future, once prices go down and reliability goes up (I'm looking at the 128gb range).

 

I'm up for trying this on my Vostro 1510. It has a slot loading drive, which needs almost the whole laptop to be taken apart to get to, but I reckon its worth it.

I can't find detailed specs as to the size of the drive.

But here's some pictures.. What caddy would fit this:

 

What's the model number?
You can find the specifications quickly enough with that.

In the first post there's a list of the 4 models:
- 12 or 9 millimeters height
- SATA or PATA connection

Good luck

 

Hi Fintan, I can't get a model number by searching anywhere. Have asked the Dell Support by email but not sure if they'll help.

Device Manager shows it as: Mata DVD+- RW UJ-875S

 

it's Panasonic Matsushi ta
I don't know about 875S, but here's UJ-875A
12.7mm height, SATA:
http://www.panasonic.com/industrial/computer/storage/optical/models/UJ-875A.asp

edit: forget this post, see nando4's correction below

 

This tells us it's a 12.7mm unit and various Vostro 1520 optical drive cables on ebay confirm it's a PATA unit. So suggest a US$22-delivered Dell 12.7mm sata-to-pata ebay optical bay caddy.

 

ah, why didn't I think about checking to ebay don't mind my earlier post

 

Glad to see you found the right option for you.

Just an observation, would it be right to say that SATA drives don't have to connection circuit board or ribbon cables attaches? It looks like mine directly connects to the motherboard.

 

The rear end of your optical drive can be a SATA or (JAE50) PATA connector. Many notebooks' systemboards just have the opposite mating connector, so the optical drive just slides in and connects. So it is correct - there is no intermediate circuitboards or ribbon cables. Such systems allow hotswapping.

Some, like the Vostro 1520, have an additional ribbon cable that connects off the back of the JAE50 (PATA) connector to the systemboard. Since it's designed for a slot-loaded optical drive without a faceplate tray opening AND there is an additional ribbon cable, a replacement caddy could never be a hotswap unit.

 

For clarity, mine is SATA now.
My previous laptop all PATA, which had the connection circuit board - even if there was not hotswap ability.
I wondered if SATA does require a direct connection?

 

I thought I posted in this thread... but apparently not. Why does the Newmodeus website list certain brands? Are these caddies all specific to a brand or are they universal, only dependent on the vertical size?

I have a Sony CW, but they don't list Sony.

 

newmodeus make some system specific caddies, eg: 2510P/2530P. I guess they decide which system have sufficient demand for them to develop a specific caddy.

If there isn't one for your system, could try a generic caddy from the first post of this thread. These caddies are a replica of a 9.5mm or 12.7mm optical drive used in the majority of systems, so likely fit with a mismatched faceplate. Worst case scenario would be needing to dremel the faceplate or removing it all together.

 

Hi

I got a pata to sata interface from newmodeus with the board that has jumpers.

The laptop I have is a toshiba satelite pro a120.

When I swap out the cd drive with the hard drive caddy windows xp recognises it, installs the drive and I can access it. As soon as I reboot the 2nd hdd is not recognised in xp or at bios.

I read earlier in the thread someone else had the same problem and changed the jumpers and it worked. I've now tried every possible jumper config and still no joy.

When I reboot I get a cdrom error before the boot menu loads up. It seems like the bios only wants to see a CD drive on the secondary IDE.

The 2nd hdd is fine as is the caddy because windows recognises it but doesn't on reboot.

The bios is latest version. In the bios doesn't let me change mess with the ide channels ethier.

Is there anything I can do? It's driving me crazy.

Thanks

 

Moral_Hazard reported virtually the same behaviour using the ebay sata-to-pata caddy with his Tecra A9. Hotswapping the optical drive with the caddy after Windows bootup worked fine, but booting with it was as if the caddy was whitelisted by the bios.

My only suggestion was to use R-W Everything to capture the IDE Controller data (0/31/1) when system is working with the optical drive, reloading it in Windows startup when the caddy is attached. Though I believe that to have a low probability of success. I believe the problem is with the ATAPI data being sent to the caddy by the bios.

If you *remove* the optical drive and caddy, load Windows, insert the caddy, then do a "Scan For New Hardware", does it see it? If so, may need to ask newmodeus modify their circuit to incorporate a ~7 second startup delay so that bios boot doesn't see the optical drive at all. Either that, or ask Toshiba for a bios fix, or request a refund from newmodeus for incompatibility reasons.

 

Hey folks, How goes it?

My caddy arrived (ebay one) and I've put it in, but had to perform surgery on it with a penknife to make it all fit.

Problem is BIOS sees the 320GB WD drive, but Windows 7 detects D:/ and immediately asks to format it. When I click on Format it says its a 95.9GB drive. After I click 'Close' (I dont want to format it, it has data on it that I need) A message pops up saying "Check to see that the disk and drive are connected properly, make sure the disk is not read only, and then try again."

I am not sure if my 'surgery' may have caused problems. I needed to do it to get the connector and the hard drive to fit. During the surgery I accidentaly cut a thin black wire that was going from the circuit board to the LED. There is a also a red wire going the LED. The LED doesnt work, but could it have anything to do with the black wire? I plan to solder it back, but I'm not sure.

Any ideas or how to step through troubleshooting this?

 

I suppose the surgery was needed on the outside and not at the connecting side?

The led is an unnecessary feature, could not reasonably cause such problems.

How is the disk doing in an enclosure? Could be worthwhile to check first.

 

Hi Webmack,

Some bios send some strange ATAPI data to the CDROM that appears to be incompatible when attaching a HDD in it's place. *could* see if this is the likely problem by disconnecting the caddy, boot windows, connect the caddy when system is up and running, Scan for New Hardware, test HDD again. Some other ideas:

1. Check transfer modes using hdparm-for-windows. Some bios writes very slow UDMA modes to the caddy:

'hdparm -i /dev/sdb' -> see what it tells you about the UDMA transfer mode. Switch modes using 'hdparm -X udma5 /dev/sdb'. Your drive may be /dev/sda, /dev/sdb, /dev/sdc. You'll need to try each until you can identify the string returned is your HDD.

2. Check if you are running 33 or 66Mhz timings as described here.

Enabling/Disabling the ICHxM (ICH8M or older) PATA Port

Try disabling/enabling PATA port using Baredit to see if that makes a difference.

(i) Find RCBA at PCI Device 0/31/0 F0 (4 bytes) using Baredit as shown here.

(ii) Disable the PATA port by writing to memory address RCBA+0x3418h, bit 1=1. It's the second bit from the right on this screenshot. -> Scan New Hardware.. IDE port should disappear. Disabling the IDE port in this way is documented in the ICH7M datasheet.

(iii) Enable PATA port, RCBA+0x3418h, bit1=0 -> Scan New Hardware. See if it makes a difference.

If this solve the problem, the writes using baredit can be automated into your startup folder.
That's about it. Cutting the LED cable will not make a difference to the operation.

Reset the device

Use the "-w perform device reset (DANGEROUS)" hdparm parameter to reset the PATA device.

Code:

hdparm -i /dev/sda  :& identify the correct drive
hdparm -w /dev/sda  :& perform reset

 

Okay now, I just received my WD3200BEKT today and here's some pics with ebay caddy

Thanks 4 the great post nando4!

some benchmark result with WD3200BEKT in caddy:


more: PerformanceTest and atto benchmarks


The 12.7mm sata-to-pata ebay caddy's faceplate does flex, and I'm having a hardtime pulling up the caddy for hotswap because it fits tightly.
And the HDD LED is also the same like 9.5mm ebay caddy. It only blinks on caddy
I'm positive the same modification shown here can be applied to the 12.7mm ebay caddy.

Cheers!

 

nando4, I'm having problem with hotswap feature,
when the notebook starts without any ODD/caddy plugged in,
and I tried to plug in the hdd caddy, it will not show the hdd.
Scan new hardware doesn't detect the inserted hdd.

But if the notebook starts with device in it, I can hotswap fine..
Now is it not meant to be played that way.. or am I missing something?

my drive interface is PATA if that helps? Thanks!

edit: and can we boot from hdd caddy? if we can anyone knows how?

 

Do you have a bios menu to allow bootup from a optical drive? The bios would refer to optical drive, just need to think that optical drive=2.5" HDD in caddy.

Quite likely your bios switches off the PATA port if it doesn't find an optical drive. Use steps here to enable the PATA port.

 

Bootup from optical won't work, I think my system is bypassing the ODD bcause it found a HDD not ODD device

for disable/enable the pata I found that my RCBA is FED18001,
but when I changed the bit 15 in FED1B418 to 1, the one affected was Integrated webcam (?)