CompactFlash - SSDs for the common man/DIYer

The following is a rather long synopsis of a project idea that I've been playing around with the past few weeks. All relevant research is

So, I want an SSD in my CF-28, and I want to run my OS (gasp!) off it. My specific reasons for desiring an SSD setup:
1.) Durability against temperature extremes
2.) Durability against physical shock

Yet at the same time, I don't want to have to worry about my main "hard drive" suddenly failing due to write cycles.

But, I cannot bring myself to spend $2000, or even $400, on just this piece of equipment. This is where CompactFlash comes in. Yes, there are some concerns that arise, but I'm getting there, okay?!

So, I've known about CF-to-PATA/IDE adapters for a while, but they are a PAIN to mount. You want the device to be anchored to your chassis/caddy... gel pack notwithstanding. Similar problem in desktops, as well as non-Toughbook laptops, but thats another discussion altogether.

A little research uncovered a little gem in the form of eBay item # 220382195740. It's a dual CF-to-IDE (44-pin) adapter with an outer bracket in the form factor of a standard 2.5", 9.5mm hard drive. So there's the first step - making it physically fit, properly, where a regular hard drive would go.

The media itself
It should be noted in advance that most of these CF cards seem to originate with the professional or semi-pro photography industry. There are also "industrial-grade" CF cards out there, and they're certainly very impressive, but you're then looking once more at very high prices. They're actually harder to find (from a consumer's perspective) than high-quality SSDs. So, pro/semi-pro photographers' cards will be my focus here. Moving on...

UDMA support was basically a must, (please chime in if you've found it unnecessary), since my Pentium 3 has better things to do than be bogged down with I/O. Also, I wanted resistance to temperature extremes. I started my research with the SanDisk Extreme III, if for no other reason than that it's a market leader that seems to meet a lot of my specifications.

With regard to temperature - the Extreme III has an operating range of -25°C (-13°F) to 85°C (185°F). Keep in mind that this is during operation - I'm not looking to wait for my system to warm up before it's safe to use. Some of the other CF cards don't have quite this range, but still far better than most hard drives, as you'll see below...

Further research (Google is your friend... spec sheets are your friends, too) determined that regular motor-driven laptop hard drives are spec'ed for an operating range of 5°C to 55°C. This seems to be regardless of interface (SATA or PATA/IDE), regardless of spindle speed, and regardless of manufacturer. Seems strange, although it does simplify my research.

As for physical shock resistance - I didn't look into this too much, because it seems obvious. Flash devices have no moving parts, and should thus be able to (hopefully) withstand being thrown around, as long as the connections don't come apart - 44-pin PATA connector, as well as the CF slots themselves. Not too concerned here.

Prices (see attached PDF)
First of all, let it be known that out of all the cards listed, only the SanDisk Extreme III and the Transcend 133x support UDMA. I'm pretty sure of this - please correct me if I have erred. The best price point, then, is held by the Transcend 133x, 8GB and 16GB versions. Newegg has better prices than even eBay sellers in Asia... I don't know why, but that's how it seems to be at the moment.

I'm interested, then, in filling my dual-CF adapter with either an 8 and a 16, or two 16s. This will keep my total cost, including the adapter, under $100.00 USD.

The write-cycle question
This is the part that you cynics have been waiting for. Will the device survive the repeated writes expected of a system drive? To throw a wrench in the works, I even intend to dual-boot WinXP and Linux (probably split the storage 50/50).

I'll go ahead and drastically summarize my findings as such - while flash memory of any kind will eventually run out of write cycles, the combination of wear-leveling used in modern CF cards, plus the fact that each sector will be expected to last between 10 and 100 thousand writes, means that these devices should last for years, even when used as a system drive, and even if used for swap. See the following links for detailed information.

"Dumb then, smart now" - http://www.dansdata.com/flashswap.htm

ThinkpadWiki article on similar use in the X40 series - http://www.thinkwiki.org/wiki/Compact_Flash_boot_drive

http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/multi_page.asp?cid=6007

The last link comes from Rob Galbraith's digital photography site, which is considered quite reputable. I'll quote a relevant paragraph:

Yet, despite all this, I'll be the first to point out that there is no specific data on my CF of choice (Transcend 133x) that states that it will meet these generalized expectations. That is, it could be that the Transcend isn't as electrically rugged as these other pro-photography cards, and may not last as long as expected.

But you know what? It still seems to me a reasonable enough expectation, and furthermore, I don't use my Toughbook for critical applications (not yet, anyway), where data loss is a really scary prospect anyway. I'd say it's worth it, and I'll be making the purchases in the near future to give this a try.

Regardless, I hope this was thought-provoking if not informative. Please do contribute your thoughts on the matter.

Andy

 

i'd highly suggest an slc ssd instead. you can get an mtron 3500 16gb for 140$.

it has these temperature characteristics:

Temperature
Operating
0 to 70˚C
Non-Operating
-40 to 85˚C

if those temperature limits are enough for you? it's very rugged, and should allow your data to be alive longer than you probably are. and it's veryveryvery fast. i use those in my systems and they're great.

 

He needs a ide or pata type
Is the mtron compatable or is it sata?

Alex

 

davepermen - I can't seem to find the Mtron 16GB in a 2.5" PATA 44-pin configuration, which the Toughbook CF-28 uses. Any other recommended SLC SSDs?

Andy

 

Very informative, I am considering using a cf card in a PCMCIA adaptor as my paging file / swap file to reduce unnecessary writes to my SSD I would not need more than a 4 gig card and if it failed it would be inexpensive to replace.

 

Yeah... guys...

You really have no idea here how SLOW even 166x CF media is, dooya?

You are talking sustained data rates of 1.5-6 mbps (6 if YOU'RE LUCKY - those uber-fast rates are SPECIFICALLY hashed to show high burst speeds for storing things like a single photo)... typical for an AVERAGE SSD is 14-40 mbps, while the FAST ones are up around 70-140mbps. Using CF media for a boot drive is absurd unless its a command-line only version of Linux. Even more absurd is the idea of using it for a swapfile; you'll slow down your system to a crawl. Added to this is the fact that they are designed as sequential access storage, NOT Random access storage, makes them UBER-SLOW for OS use.

You are not the first to attempt what you are contemplating; the internet is FULL of sad tales of poor performance and wasted time/money.

mnem
FAST is a relative thing...

 

Hmmm.. What about using a RAM card that stays on and keeps your operating system active. Like the Atari, you turn it on and BAM your at the command line.

 

Agreed CF cards work very well as a boot drive in a linux based router system or WAP, but as for running windows on it the performance is horrid

 

Take a look at the PATA SSD's available at newegg. I ended up with at Transcend 64GB MLC drive in my CF-18. At $155 + shipping, it's a bit more expensive than your CF solution, but you get more space, and much better performance.

I've done a couple of simple tweaks to my system, and find that even with an MLC drive, I'm seeing performance that is better than traditional disks for 95% of the things I do. About the only place that I am noticing poor performance is when installing software (a very disk intensive process, with lots of mixed read/write I/O) but since I don't do this much, I'm willing to put up with it. The only tweaks I've done are:
1) align the partition. Lots of info on this can be found with a google search. This is defenately _THE_ key to getting good SSD performance. In fact, Vista aligns partitions by default
2) disable update of a-time. By default, NTFS keeps a last access time for all files. This creates a lot of small disk writes, which can really hurt performance.

Before I got mine, I had read much of the info on MLC drives, and how they were absolutely not satisfactory for use as an OS drive. I can tell you that before I did the partition alignment, that that information was absolutely correct. The system would randomly pause for 2-3 seconds at a time, so frequently that it was pretty much unusable. Once I did the partition alignment, it was basically a different system. I've never once encountered the pauses I was seeing before, and performance is excelent. In short, I'm totally sold on SSD's, especially the relatively cheap MLC ones, for use in older laptops. In fact, when payday comes on friday, I'm planning on ordering another one for my CF-29

nine

 

You NEED to run embedded Windows if you're going the CF route.

And yes, the cards may be rated at 133x, but that's reading. Writing to the cards, which Windows does A LOT with the pagefile especially with low memory computers. Windows Embedded solves that. Of course, every time you add an application you have to jump through 5000 hoops and reload the OS image on the CF card...

So to get faster write speeds, you have to go with the better more expensive CF cards. For reference, use Rob Galbraith's CF database: http://www.robgalbraith.com/bins/multi_page.asp?cid=6007

 

While I agree with Daveperman in that you should get a true SSD (and the Mtron 3500 is indeed a fine choice), I have been running XP Tablet on a 300x CF for more than half a year now. Back in Summer of last year, I got this CF card and an adapter for about $60 total for my HP TC4200.

Performance is fairly good; most of the time, including on startup, it's faster than the 5400RPM PATA drive I had before. If you really start to hit it, it does start to stutter, but overall it's very good for light loads. The only tweak I've done is disable my pagefile.

Reliability is indeed a concern with these CF setups; I really don't know how long it's going to last myself. I've had no data corruption for the past half a year and I have a friend using a 266x card who has had no data corruption for about nine months, but I suppose it could crap out at any time. I've been putting an average of three to four hours on the machine every day, largely browsing.

So yeah, just thought I'd share my experience. I think the bottom line is that it's quite feasible to run Windows XP on a sufficiently fast CF, even though it is far from the fastest thing you can get.

 

The list of pata ssd drives in 2.5" will be quite small
The 1.8" is fairly common but I don't like the adapter issues


Alex

 

I'm not too familiar with the process that you guys are talking about attempting, but I do have a thought on this.

I know that they are expensive, but wouldn't a Panasonic P2 card work well for what you are talking about doing? The transfer rates are well above that of typical CF cards. I'm not sure about the interface. That may be the only hold back. I just know that we move them from the patrol cars to the supervisor's CF-30 from time to time to review ICVS footage.

Just a thought.

 

d warner,
I'm sure they are pretty neat cards. They should be, a 64gb card costs $2400, a touch expensive for what's being discussed here.
CAP

 

Yeah, I know. After researching what additional cards would cost for our Arbitrator systems, we about died of a heart attack.

Just thought I'd bring it up. I don't even know if it would work like you are talking (you know, for someone who has the extra money).

 

Well... I will start working on SOT cards... But then it will be relative. It would depend on what you were thinking... (SOT= Speed of Thought) For some of us (Especially those of us that know Uncle Jack) Performance might be slow.... But .... we... can ... work ... on ... it....

 

Commander Wolf,

Can you provide a detail step by step guide on how you were able to load WinXP onto CF card? I have been trying to load winxp pro onto a 8gb Sandisk extreme III card on a Thinkpad X40 through CF to IDE adapter and have been having problems doing it. I have been through many forums and tried various methods and still unable to install winxp onto CF card.

TIA
tnhdg

 

I don't think anyone ended up doing this... At least they didn't post about it. Did you see mnem's post (#6) above?

 

I did read mnem's post.

I have found forums where linux was installed and it works great. There are forums where they also loaded winxp onto CF card, but the problem is that those threads are about two years old and no one has responded to my posting. Loading winxp is more complicated than linux. I have a really slow 40gb 4200rpm HD in my Thinkpad X40. The other forums showed better rates than my 4200rpm especially the booting time.

 

We've already been over that dewed... you're talking about the difference between read times and sustained write times... those are what will kill you. Believe me, they wouldn't be selling $200-$4000 SSDs if you could get even CLOSE to civilized with a $40 CF card.

Of course, if you try it and decide it sux, you can always buy an old iPod Mini for 30 bux off eBay and put your CF in there; with a new battery ($6) it'll run about 16 hours on a charge.

mnem
Yes, I have been iPwn'd. You can be too...

 

mnementh,

i see your point.
The cheapest i saw for SSD hd is about $150 for 32gb off ebay, i think it was kingspec brand. i just wanted to give it a try bc i bought my 8gb extreme III card for $4 and a cf to ide off ebay for $3.

 

Well dewed -

Since you've already BOUGHT the hardware, what you need is to find a way to make your CF card bootable. As I recall the last time I did one, I used a utility from HP for making a USB flash drive bootable; I have NO IDEA where that stuff is now, but if you Google for "Bootable Flash drive" or "Bootable USB flash" you should find OODLES on the subject.

mnem
Are we having fun yet?

 

mnementh,

i found the softwares i needed to make my CF card from removable to fix card, i am doing something wrong with my method bc it would hang after the first winxp installing part. i dont have a good understanding of programming languages. so, yes i am having fun =)

 

Are you still having trouble with this? What exactly isn't working?

I actually didn't need to do anything fancy with my installation. It was straight up install Windows, install drivers, done. Only disabled the pagefile after the installation.

I've been told that you should use FAT or FAT32 instead of NTFS in order to reduce the wear on your CF, but using FAT or FAT32 instead of NTFS is what seems to cause most of the headaches with this business.

 

Hi Commander Wolf,



1. formatted CF card to FAT32 in windows thru a CF card reader
2. made the card bootable to DOS and load atcfwchg onto it
3. booted Thinkpad X40 into DOS and ran atcfwchg and received pass notice
4. connected the CF card back to Thinkpad and booted it with USB-ROM loaded with winxp pro cd
5. during installation process, I installed winxp leaving the file instruction intact
6. winxp installs first part and when it goes to reboot to install the 2nd part of winxp, it just hangs with a black screen and a blinking cursor. I leave it over nite, but it is still stuck

i am using a thinkpad x40, 8gb sandisk extreme III CF card, dual CF to IDE adapter off ebay

TIA

 

Yep, this is how we tried to do it the first couple times on my friend's X40 as well. Messed with it for an entire afternoon before going with NTFS because we just couldn't get FAT32 to work. He's also using a Sandisk Extreme III, so my only suggestion would be to screw FAT32 and go with NTFS; it'll make your life much easier.

 

I've been playing about with CF based machines for a while, mainly for Linux based ultra-low-power routers etc.

One major problem I found is that a large precentage of CF to IDE adapters do not have the DMA pins properly connected, so when the OS drivers take over from the BIOS everything stalls..

The CF 'drive' reports it is DMA capable but the handshake connections are not there to allow it to work.

There are some working adapters about, but I only got one on my fifth or sixth purchase of different types.

 

Commander Wolf,

I finally was able to load winxp onto the sandisk 8gb extreme III only using the a Syba cf to ide adapter for the desktop. But I use this link to help me:

http://www.sentire.co.uk/software/s...-xp/installing-windows-xp-from-a-usb-pen.html

The cf boots perfectly fine on the desktop, but when I connecting to the thinkpad x40, thru a ebay bought dual cf to ide adapter, the system would just hang. The bios recognizes the cf card but just refuse to boot… over time I get a “disk error” message. But when I plug it back to the desktop thru the syba adapter, it boots fine. I guess rjenkins is on the spot with the DMA problem.



Rjenkins,

Can you list the adapters that work and the ones that did not work?


Thanks

 

These two worked for me:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812186050
http://addonics.com/products/flash_memory_reader/ad44midecf.asp

The Addonics adapter only works with one CF, though. If I load up a second card, the first one works fine in DMA mode, but the second one always defaults to PIO mode. I've not been able to figure out how to make the second one run DMA mode.

My friend with the X40 is also using the Addonics adapter, though I don't know if he's gotten the second card to work or not.

 

That's probably because MOST laptops have the HDD & CDROM configured as master & slave on a single IDE channel. The only way it CAN get an IRQ for that 2nd CF card is P/IO mode...

mnem
Fun,fun, fun... until daddy takes the T-channel away...

 

You know, that's what I was thinking too... but I don't have an internal optical drive and neither does the X40. So I was hoping for a way to "unlock" the second channel, but, as mentioned, no luck.

 

I understand that; however, you're not going to be able to access them both from the same header connector; you'd need to break it out into two headers, one for the master and one for the slave. In theory it can be done; however, I don't know that the CF adapters you're using would be able to address the individual channels directly.

mnem<~~~Surfer of the alternative channels~~~*

 

In general PC terms (not Toughbook..)

There is no reason a double CF adapter would not work on a single connector - that's exactly what they are designed to do.

You may get problems on a standard IDE cable if you try to use the middle connector and leave the end open, but this is due to the end of the cable being unterminated (transmission line effects) not the connector pinout.

The only difference between the two drive connectors is the Cable Select pin is either open or grounded & this is ignored if the device has a master/slave jumper (or uses both).

The big problem is when another device is already using one address so you get a conflict, which is quite possibly the cause of difficulties in the Toughbook.

 

That's NOT what we're talking about; what we're talking about is enabling DMA mode for BOTH CF cards - for that, you'd need to be able to address each IDE Channel independently, and therefore would need either a CF adapter with dual controllers, or you'd need to use one CF adapter for each channel.

You're imagining this as if we're trying to split off two IDE drives from ONE header connector on a standard 2 header IDE cable; THAT is theoretically possible, as long as you don't try to connect anything to the other header connector.

What we're REALLY talking about here is further up the data path - a closer analogy would be trying to take two hard drives with no control electronics on them, and trying to connect them BOTH to the same control PCB, which is THEN IN TURN connected to one header connector on the IDE cable. As a result, that control PCB can only have ONE IRQ, which can be assigned DMA mode to ONE of the drives; but the second would HAVE TO operate in P/IO mode - there is NO OTHER WAY with x86 architecture.

mnem<~~~Operating in Dragon Access Mode~~~*

 

Hi Mnem,

we are at cross purposes;

There is no 'control electronics' section on a CF adapter, they are purely passive connection converters.

CF Cards natively emulate IDE hard drives, complete with full DMA support.

Connecting two CF cards to a cable is no different that connecting two hard drives. The problem is when the adapter boards have the tracking wrong or plain missing from the DMA connections, which sadly seems very common.

 

I'll have to do a little further research on this one; I've got a couple CF/IDE adapters around here somewhere from when I tried this very project myself - I'm positive they had some form of control circuitry on them. Let me dig them up & see what's what...

mnem
IC... I see... an IC...

EDIT: Ahhh... I see. These adapters have a buffer IC to support both 3.3V and 5V CF cards.

Some quick investigation in the forums where I first got involved shows that some manufacturers of CF cards are playing fast & loose with the interface to optimize them for specific markets; not all CF cards are fully compatible with the IDE bus (read NOT BOOTABLE), and not all CF cards are DMA/UDMA capable either. As usual, it all boils down to doing a bit of research before you start; look for compatibility lists before you buy your hardware.

So... I stand SORTOF corrected; they SHOULD be pin-for-pin compatible with the IDE bus, but many aren't.