T420 and ultrabay HDD, they don't quite fit...

Purchased the Lenovo genuine HDD ultrabay SATA adapter for my Thinkpad T420 to keep a 500gb HDD in for storage.
Doesn't quite fit perfectly, as you can tell from the pics. As a result, you can hear the HDD spin/"whir" in the bay in a dead silent study room.
This is how I fixed it to make everything work much better, and solved all the problems. The pics tell all of the story.

1) Picture of the ultrabay of the T420:


2) Ultrabay SATA and HDD


3) Again:


4) Again:


5) Here you can see exactly what I'm talking about, quite the gap!


6) So buy some of this for $3 at Home Depot:


7) And all of your problems are solved:

 

You would think Lenovo would use some of that thinking power they're so fond of promoting and engineer a bezel we could buy for $5 bucks. Especially since they had the nerve to do this now on the W510, W520 and T420.

Hammer smack.

 

I'm just grateful they at least offer an end-user option of adding a 2nd HDD to a thin, powerful laptop.

But yes, engineering thought would be appreciated.

 

That's a pretty large gap, it almost looks like it was designed for the T420s. But I thought their ultrabays were the same height?

 

It is claimed to be compatible with quite a few of Lenovo's new Thinkpads from several series. I don't know anything about the T420s.

Honestly, with the $3 foam tape applied it is perfect, I really don't mind it at all.

 

The T420 bay is apparently 12.7mm like it's big brothers. Odd, really odd.

 

What part number is it for the caddy of yours? I know Lenovo made some revisions of the Ultrabay caddy over time, their latest one is the "Ultrabay Slim ThinkPad Serial Hard Drive Bay Adapter III” with FRU number 43N3415 but I find no documentation that it supports the T420 (only goes up to T410). Their previous one the "Ultrabay Slim ThinkPad Serial Hard Drive Bay Adapter II" has a FRU number of 43R1984.

The gap is really disappointing should it turn out to be the latest one though I commend your ingenuity with the foam.

 

sprtnbsblplya, why did you take out your 64gb ssd? Just wondering.

 

The caddy is probably designed for the T400/T500 and previous T-series Thinkpads, which used the 9.5mm UltraBay slim drive. Strange that Lenovo doesn't provide a properly-sized UltraBay caddy for the new standard-thickness UltraBay, though...

 

Yeah it would be nice if Lenovo design one that is compatible with the new 12.7mm ultrabay. The t410 and the t400 still uses the old 9.5mm drive, so this ultrabay is design with 9.5mm in mind. The only new Thinkpad that uses the 9.5mm ultrabay are the t420s.

 

Nice mod but does that foam affected the ability to eject the ultra bay drive?

 

I questioned the fit as well when I received my ultrabay adapter. My thought was that the gap was intentional to help with ventilation of the hdd.....

 

Yea, that's what Lenovo wants you to think.

 

Hearst, it is the SATA bay adapter III.

Because the Sandforce chipset is junk.

Nope, maybe a tad extra force but not really.

It doesn't appear to be a problem, AIDA reports both HDDs running within a degree (Celsius) of each other, never going above like 35 C or so, never heard of temps like that killing a HDD.

 

The one being sold is Lenovo - Find accessories for your laptop and desktop - Storage - 43N3412

 

^^^

Yup, same one being sold through Amazon.

 

Well I don't mind the gap. But a somehow unpleasant thing is that if you turn the laptop upside-down, the disk "skips/falls out" a little bit. So one would have to put a little of that foam tape on the top cover of the disk..

 

If this is the case then I can surely fit a 12.5mm HDD there.

 

Most likely. But I'd be curious to hear from someone actually having that setup.

 

I actually did just that, its perfect now.

 

This is the ultrabay adapter that Lenovo says to use with the T420? I would give them a call and let them know about this fitment issue.

 

Thanks for letting me know, I think the irony is that even third party hard drive adaptors seem to acknowledged the problem and is offering a 12.7mm thick version ( source). Whether they're compatible remains to be seen but come on Lenovo, if these guys already caught on with the problem then maybe it's time to bring out an official version!

 

Lenovo will say its not a fit issue but a well thought out design for added air cooling

 

What problems did you have with your SSD?

I put a Kingston V+ SSDNow 128GB in mine, flawless so far. I've done some registry tweaking and HD tweaking. I boot up in 20 seconds or less. I love having this thing in here, not only does everything load up instantly, but my computer is almost dead silent now, no more stupid HD platters whirring...

 

I lucked out and got the common SF-1222 BSOD upon awake from sleep.
And every now and then the BIOS would pop up saying primary HDD not detected.

 

I know you didn't direct this at me, but I can also provide my experiences with SandForce-based drives.

1) OCZ Agility 2. Failed less than three months after purchase. The controller sporadically would seize up and stop responding during the middle of requests, causing the link to be reset -- pretty much the equivalent of repeatedly bashing its head into a wall until it forgot everything it ever learned (which in this case was about 60 GB of my data.)

2) OCZ Vertex 2. One month after purchase it simply stopped working. No longer detected by any machine that I plugged it in to. I had less data on this one, but still annoying.

Now I know those are just two anecdotes and that the plural of anecdote is not data... but still -- with two SandForce-based drives both failing in so short a time (and considering that my X25-Ms are coming up on their third and first years of flawless service), I can't help but think that SandForce needs a little more time to make their controller production-ready (or at least competitive, reliability-wise.)

The V+ SSDNow is the only drive for which I'd worry about using up all your NAND cycles. From AnandTech (emphasis mine):

 

I wonder if this is also true for the Intel SSD.

 

I have an original vertex that has been going strong for 2 years now, but after the OCZ Vertex / Agility 2 debacle, I don't think I would ever trust OCZ again. Unacceptable and shady business practices.

I read that Anandtech article, and I was worried too about the V+, but I got a good deal on it and (yes I know this is lame) but its the SSD Apple uses in some of their lineup, and I know Apple has high standards. I don't plan on keeping my drive full either, so thats supposed to help w/ NAND life. Hell I have 80 gigs free out of 128 on it right now.

I think Intel is the champ for reliability from what I've read.

 

If it uses 30-40 nm NAND, probably. I doubt it affects the Intel drives' longevity though. Intel were the folks who first championed low write amplification, and the X25/320 controller has a write amplification factor of something like 1.1x.

The Indillinx drives are decent in my experience, and I haven't had the problems that I have with the SandForce-based ones. The only trouble with them is that now that the X25 series has dropped in price and the other low-end controllers have caught up, there's not much reason to get them.

 

Apple uses that ssd because it has very aggressive garbage collection built into it, this offsets the fact that OS X doesn't have TRIM functionality. Not saying it's going to fail before it should just that it will wear itself out faster compared to other drives that clean up less often.

 

Someone already installed a 12.5 mm hdd in the adapter on W510 successfully. Please refer to here:
12.5mm HDD as 2nd hard drive in W510 using Lenovo ... - Lenovo Community

Since W510 also use ultrabay enhanced, So the T420 would also work.

 

So let me get this straight, If i use this for a t410, i wont have this issue?

 

I'm wondering if anybody contacted lenovo about this issue.

 

T410 use the ultrabay silm, it's a 9.5mm height. So no, you won't have that gap.

 

I don't think it's an issue per say. It says it's compatible, which means it will work with the T420. It's just that it will have a gap.
Think about it. For the adapter to be able to work with both the T420 and the T410, it has to be 9.5mm high. Look at the compatible systems section, it lists them ALL. It's just so that you can interchange them with different systems. I don't see how this is an issue at all.

 

Question is, Lenovo should seriously consider to provide the ultrabay enhanced 2nd hard drive adapter...

 

Is the hard drive in the ultrabay hot-swappable? Do you have to re-start your computer when you insert or remove the ultrabay drive?

 

Yes, but now that the release the push level are on the bottom, you nee to be a contortionist.

 

I've not used an ultrabay before. Is it just the hard drive in the ultra bay that is hot-swappable, or would the entire bay be swappable?

 

Sprtnbsblplya, thanks for sharing this mod. Gave it a try and I like how it came out. I also noticed that it helped stop the flexing of the case when the gap was present.

 

I bought the same HD adapter and have the same issues. I clearly does not fit correctly and the HD flops around if the laptop is turned upside down. The HD is not very secure in the adapter.

I have contacted my sales rep at Lenovo with some pictures but have not heard back yet.

 

That sucks to see people have been misinformed/not informed regarding ultrabay height and adater height differences when buying ultrabay slim adapter for ultrabay enhanced equipped machine.
Arent there any other adapters on sale with Lenovo?
I wouldnt leave it this way and return adapter and get one from ebay instead, if Lenovo cant provide ultrabay enhanced adapter.

Funny to see that T410 has slim bay while T420 has thicker one.
I wonder if Lenovo will dump ultrabay as a whole during next big ThinkPad refresh on 14" machines, probably with mSata and regular HDD there is no use of such expensive addition as ultrabay ODD. Lenovo probably could make more money from selling external ODD's rather than giving them for free in their laptops

 

Do you have the Lenovo wrapper around the 2.5" drive? It's the sheet metal wrapper, 4 screws, and the Mylar pull tab.

Those 4 screws are important.

 

These ultrabay HDD adapters come with nothing in the box except for the adapter and the instructions, no wrappers.
I just put a piece of adhesive backed foam on mine and no movement, solid as a rock.

 

Hi,

I am also thinking of buying a HDD adapter for the T420. I know the Ultrabay page on the Thinkwiki and the Ultrabay page on the Wikipedia which both provide a great listing about which Thinkpad models work with which Ultrabay adapter. Sadly, on neither page the new Thinkpad models are listed.

On the Thinkwiki the T410 is listed as "Serial Ultrabay Slim", so maybe the T420 also uses that one. I looks like the thread starter sprtnbsblplya also ordered this one. However, when I push out the DVD drive which came with my T420, it says "Serial Ultrabay Enhanced DVD MULTI III". So I am thinking of ordering a generic HDD Ultrabay adapter on eBay which is advertised as compatible with an R400. Does this make sense? Will it work without the gap?

 

If you don't want your hdd to flap about inside the ultrabay you need to put screws in the hdd (not screwed TO anything) and then slide the screw heads under the four little plastic notches in the ultrabay hdd adapter.

 

Interesting thread - I just received my W520 RAID machine today - the Ultrabay caddy has a spacer/HDD lock screwed in, and there is no real gap showing. I'll post a picture in the next day or so when I get a chance.

 

The official ultrabay RAID adapter is 12.7mm high. The problem is that it is not available as an individual part. Even though I'm pretty certain that it contains no electronics, its just a SATA connector just like the non-raid ultrabay 2nd hdd adapter. The RAID-capability comes from the RAID-enabled firmware on the PCH (southbridge). Plympton, maybe you can have a closer look and let us know if there is any other difference to the non-RAID adapter?

 

I brought one of these, barely any gap .

Ultrabay SATA 2nd Hdd Lenovo ThinkPad W700 W510 12.7mm | eBay

I think its the drive bay for the w510 etc. After this tread I thought I would give it ago. It fits a lot nicer than than the ones in the photos, there's hardly any gap on the T420 and it fits perfectly.


W

 

I really cannot find out why the hell Lenovo did 10.5 mm caddy. Why why why.