From: john <ruttmannn_at_gmx.de>
Date: Tue, 30 Oct 2007 10:56:10 +0100

Hi

As some of you might agree, it would be nice to have the possibility
to upgrade the old Iriver and IAudio Players harddisk drives. How
about an iriver H140 with 160GB? Sounds nice? Read further...

You cannot just insert one of the new 160GB drives into an iriver,
because the interface is not the same. But basically the old Micro-ATA
connector and the new ZIF/FPC connector are electrically identical. So
it is absolutly possible to use one of the new drives, although the
mechanical layout may be a bit tricky. I am currently investigating
possible solutions that do not require soldering, which works for
sure.

Up to here this does not really belong into this mailing list. But
what really is a hot issue here, is the software interface for the
harddisks with 80GB and more. Drives up to 60GB should just work. But
as I followed the problems with the development of the IPOD 5.5 80GB,
I wonder if just plugging a 80GB drive into an Iriver might work. I
guess, the boot loader of the IPOD has been patched for the 80GB
drive. But what about the boot loader for the Irivers, IAudios and
Gigabeats? And does rockbox on all platforms automatically support the
80GB drive?

And what about the 160GB drive? ATA 28 Bit addressing might be a
problem, limiting access to 137GB. But didn't I read that the 80GB
drive uses 1kb blocks? Does this mean, that the limit is 274GB, so the
160GB drive would work out of the box with rockbox in an IPOD 5.5?

I would really appreciate if someone lightens me up, what does work
and what needs to be done, until I order and adapt an 160GB
drive. Someone willing to help within the software department?

Thanks
John
Received on 2007-10-30