Ake Usb Pcmcia

Hi guys,

I'm trying to find a slim USB 2.0 PCMCIA card for my CF-28 and for an IBM T23. I stumbled across the AKE USB BC168, which seems pretty popular and has good reviews on Amazon. Seems to be quite expensive in Europe, though, so I turned to ebay. The problem is that there are many versions of this card on sale. I think some of them are copies/fakes.

The original one actually received by an Amazon customer has both AKE and NEC written on it. The other versions have only AKE, or only NEC, or are missing both. The back of the cards is also different - some have a bar code, some don't. The CD can also be blue or white and red.

Sorry for all this analysis, but after getting some fake stuff from China and reading about some other that is out there, I am now overly careful with everything I buy off ebay.

My question is: which AKE version have you got, and how does it work? Also, what's the transfer speed you get with it from an external HDD? Someone on the German Amazon complains about slow reading and writing speed.

And another thing: is there also a slim USB cable to use with the AKE card? If I have 2 PCMCIA slots, the AKE is in the bottom one and above is some other large card, I would need a USB cable with a connector as slim as the card to slip it under the large card.

There's also an AKE USB card which has bluetooth ( BC138). This one is 3mm thick, while the other one was 5mm thick. Should I care about this?

 

The AKE USB Cards are ALL cheap Chinese made crap, none of them are made by NEC. they USE an NEC made (or licensed) chip.

These USB cards work great when they work, however quality control is very hit or miss - on average 1 in 3 DOA, and of the 6 I bought, 1 still functions after a couple years use. I can take credit for smoking one of them by trying to plug a USB powered CDROM into it; they just can't handle the load from ANYTHING normally powered by the USB port (Well, anything more than a USB Flash drive).

The problem is this: they have an inverter circuit inside to step up the 3.3V from the PCMCIA bus to the 5V out for the USB ports, but the PCMCIA bus can only supply a TOTAL of 400ma current to the card; this includes the power the card uses itself. The specifications for a USB 2.0 port mandate up to 500ma EACH and there's TWO on the AKE card.

Yes, they provide a power dongle so you can draw additional power from an existing USB port; that is how I've kept my last one working this long. I NEVER use without that dongle EXCEPT if I'm plugging a SINGLE USB Thumbdrive into it. I NEVER use a USB-powered CDROM or HDD with it; even with the dongle it burned out two of them on me.

That said they're pretty cheap here in the States or direct from Hong Kong; you're not going to get any better quality by buying from Amazon, though of course you will get the peace of mind that their customer service offers.

My process was: bought one off Amazon; it died. Bought several from Hong Kong, but they were so cheap it didn't pay to ship them back when they died. You get the idea.

mnem
Economies of scale.

 

I bought on of those. It worked fine for my thumb drive. Only issue I had was I got the NEC chipset version and my CF29 had Via chipset for the usb built in. On the first install the drivers did not play well. If I had to do it again, I would get the Via one so it only installed the one driver in XP.

 

Thanks for the in-depth reply mnementh, it was exactly what I was looking for.

Are there any other more reliable alternatives out there, also slim size that go completely inside the slot?

 

I don't wanna comment on this. Ask me how know it. It is as the same as those china made AC adaptor that may caught your house on fire, Lol.


ohlip

 

So far, we haven't seen them; it's been a topic of great conversation here for use in the hidden PCMCIA slot on the CF-28. I even hacked mine internally; one port to the USB socket on the back of the CF-28 (The only one you'll ever see with USB 2.0 THERE), one to a hub inside the laptop which connected various USB add-ons I was tinkering with. I used +5V from the CDPD MODEM board to power the USB hub.

mnem<~~~UTP~~~<<<

 

Mnementh, Just a comment on your knowledge but more than that on your taking the time to write it down. Attaboy!

I write things down whether I know of what I speak or not.

 

MicroCard makes a USB 2.0 CardBus 32 bit PC Card that fits totally inside the PCMCIA area of a CF-28 or CF-29 (until you plug in a USB cable) and lets you still shut the door. There's one on eBay now for $25 at:
PCMCIA Cardbus USB 2.0 Mini Micro card 2 port Laptop x1 - eBay (item 270609286904 end time Feb-12-11 23:25:35 PST)

 

Yeah, but to use it you need to carry around the little mini-USB to female USB adapter dongles; while I'm sure you could make one with a little soldering, replacements are NOT going to be readily available when you lose one.

Also, since they have the mini-USB connectors at the card bulkhead, soldering directly to the USB port is out of the question for internal hacking.

And lastly... I'd bet you a dollar that inside, with the exception of the actual purts and plastic bulkhead, they're probably the same d@mn thing as the AKE branded ones.

mnem
Yuckyputz.

 

I suffer from the occasional bout of logorrhea myself; (or perhaps, my readers do the suffering) but I do TRY to keep that to a minimum... :laugh:

mnem
"We have a cure for ignorance; but you can't fix stupid."

 

The Microcard one has two standard "A" type USB connectors - no dongles required.

You're probably right - but I guess I got the lucky one, it's been working fine for a year or so now.

 

I use the cheap china one for usb keychain drive, and the one in back for and drives or such i need to power. Also found the cheap china usb card thing does not like my cheap china bluetooth adaptor thing. You might think being from the same place, they might play nice together, but you would be wrong.

 

Are Toughbooks fireproof from the inside too? Does anyone have experience? Perhaps a Youtube video?

 

It seems IBM used to have one, and that was in fact a relabeled Apricorn EZ-USB 2.0. Read more details about it here and a comparison with the AKE card here. This one is made in USA and is much better built. It seems it doesn't recognize some peripherals, but having a NEC chip its compatibility should be the same as AKE's. Also, what mnementh said about the other one applies to this one as well - you need to carry around the dongle and replacements are not going to be readily available when you lose one. And concerning the power, as the PCMCIA bus can only supply 400ma and USB 2.0 needs up to 500ma, this might also be an issue.

Anyway, this one is really hard to find and at the moment is only sold on the Amazon Marketplace, which isn't available to Europe.

 

Ummm... maybe the one YOU have has standard type A USB ports; but the one in the auction does not. Read the parts list carefully.

mnem
Why do we always have take something that WORKS and make a "mini" or "micro" version of it that's always flimsy and just begging to get broken?

 

Sorry, you're right. Mine definitely has the standard connectors but, like you said, somebody had to go and "improve" (aka "cost reduce") it.