[ltp] Flash HD in R51 (via CF and ultrabay)

[nico]

Richard Neill wrote:
>
>
> Laurent Gilson wrote:
>> Hello,
>>
>> i plan to upgrade my R51 with a flash-based HD and i'm seraching
>> for the cheap way out. I only need ~2GB space and speed is not the
>> real problem. I'm well aware of the limited-number-of-writes problem
>> and plan to use a wild combination of RAMfs, unionfs and 2 GB RAM.
>
> What are you trying to achieve?  The IDE-adapter/CF approach will give 
> you:
>   Silence
>   More Physical resilience
>   Much faster seek time (but possibly slower writes). Boot time is 
> about unchanged.
>   Cooler running, much lower power consumption.
>
>> So i'm thinking about a CF <-> IDE adapter 
>
> I've done this with an X20, and it works really well. I now have a 
> nice, totally silent media centre :-) In my case, I simply put the CF 
> card + adapter into the regular HDD slot.
>
> (like this:
>> http://www.mini-itx.com/store/?c=16#p2620 ) 
>
> You can buy these new on eBay for about $3.
>
>>
>> 2. Do these HDD adapters show up as a real, normal IDE-HD ?
>
> Yes, these work exactly like a normal IDE disk. The OS can't tell the 
> difference. [In some cases, you can't enable DMA with them, but it 
> doesn't seem to make a big difference in practice]
>
>
> YMMV about whether the thinkpad will boot with ONLY an ultrabay device 
> and no device in the normal HDD socket.. It seems to be thinkpad 
> specific - certainly when I tried the X22 with USB boot (which 
> normally works fine), the BIOS failed if the HDD socket was empty.
>
>
> Caveats:
>
> i)You may want to back up your *data* elsewhere periodically - since 
> CF cards aren't all that reliable, especially with a journalling FS. 
> But 1 million writes is still a pretty good lifetime. It depends on 
> your application: for the media centre, I don't really care if the 
> disk dies in 2 years, since all I'd lose is the OS itself; my data is 
> on NFS.
>
>
> ii) The physical mounting of a CF/IDE adapter isn't that great. I 
> advise some foam packing to help it stay put.  You'll also need to 
> insulate the bottom of the adapter PCB with something. [Eg a plastic 
> sheet cut from a CDROM wallet. Don't use insulating tape - it 
> disintegrates over about 3 months]
>
> iii)The HDD plastic cover is normally fixed to the HDD itself. So, if 
> you want to hold this in place, you'll need some workaround. I just 
> made an interference fit with some expanded polystyrene foam, which is 
> fine for me, since I never move the machine.
>
>
>
> HTH,
>
> Richard
the usb boot work's fine on an x24 with usb disk or dvd writer