I know there are many of these guides allready out there, but i think some stuff is missing im those, allso, i had noting better to do. My guide had too many images, so i'm linking directly to it. Sorry about that, but i can't really cut out any images and keep the guide intact. there are about 1 megabyte of images that load immediately and another 4.3MB in links and clickable images. (56k warning) http://hd.ghlargh.com/ Here is a picture of the final result so you don't click in vain
Don't do that, i just did a 40 and a 80 gig, and those died. (no loss to me thou, i got the 40 for free and the 80 was too loud to use) Same error in both, the head hit the platters after the mod, probably because the distance between the head and platters is so small that the change in tilt in the reader arm from removing and re-screwing the screws made the heads hit. Either that or microscopical ammounts of dust was enough to crash the heads into the platters. I couldn't photo the effect of the heads hitting, it's too faint, but it looks like the heads were made from wax and hit the platters (greasy marks from the head) These were IBM deathstars, maybe other brands would work, but i only had IBMs to waste.
I have actually not been able to find someone who writes in first person about a successful mod to a drive over 20 gigs. The Milennium bug is probably the most famous one, and allso a typical outcome, the drive works for about a day to a week and then completely gives up. Mine did that too, worked for 2 days and then started dying rapidly until they wouldn't clear self check. I have seen a lot of people writing about a mod that they themselves read about somewhere or they have a friend that did this to a larger drive. The ones i have been able to track down were either, like the milennium bug, functional for a while, then died. Or the friend got the size wrong, a 4 gig easily becomes a 40 gig by rumour. I have been successful with mods to drives up to 10 gigs thou, and i think i'll stick with those until larger drives start getting dirt cheap
If you really want to do this, you best can remove the cover of the drive as described in this guide, but do it in the bathroom!! - Let the hot shower run for a while and fill the bathroom with steam. - Turn off the shower and take some time to let the steam vaporate / settle down. - The steam will pick up alot of dust particles in the air (they get heavy from the steam and fall down.) You might want to add to your guide And as said, don't try this on big drives, it's won't work.
That mod is only a month old, i'd wait a while before calling it a success. Allso, i am starting to think that the crash of my larger drives were due to the extra weight added to the reader arm... See this picture for explanation: This mod has worked fairly good on low density drives, but perhaps it doesn't work so well on high density ones, or it might be glass platters that does it. All 3 tests with LED on the reader arm on high density glass platter drives has failed. And before you start saying there is no such thing as glass platters: As for including the shower idéa in the guide. I haven't actually seen any conclusive proof that it is better than just a closed container, i have seen just as high percentages of failed mods using that method as just using a sealed container.
When I said about the mod being done before, I didn't mean a higher density driver, I meant someone windowing the HDD without any long term problems. Like the LEDs though! However, I point out one problem with windowed HDD apart from the fact that it is fragile, is that you won't see the window if you put it in a computer. This is why in my mod I'm to chrome the HDDs. I just need to find out whether this would contain the heat to the HDD.
Yeah, i have about 10 completely successful mods of harddrives, some with LEDs on the reader arm are successful too, but the success rate is obviously lower for those And you will see the window if you mount it in a smarter way than in the HDD bay, you could screw it to the outside of the chassi, or you could fasten it to the inside of a window or stand it upright inside a windowed case. Here is a list of all my window mods to harddrives. http://ghlargh.com/modstatus/index.html
Not keen on the shower theory. I don't want water vapour in my HDDs any more than dust! Would much rather build a glovebox as seen at Boxgods (Apologies for pimping another forum here) Or I could just do it at work, where I build mass spectrometers, parts of which are designed to work at 0.000000002 atmospheres!
I am currently planning on Chroming a computer had have red up on the process If you were to Chrome your harddrive it would most lickly over heat because chroming traps in heat. you might be able to have it work if you water cooled the under side. I have awalys wanted to do a hard drive window mod but I have no use for it because i would never be able to see into the window.
nice!!! I've done several windowed drives myself using 3 zip-lock© baggies to store the drives in. They have all come out good and are still working (well, except for the one that I fried by setting it circuit board side down and a raised part of the metal chasis in the test 'puter at school! ) Anyways, I have some questions for you . . . how the hell do you get an LED on the arm!!! Did you use a Surface mount, or a normal indicator type?? Please let me know as I would be interested in adding that to my next drive!! Also, what controler did you use for pin-39 activity readout?? Was it that same one that I saw around on here before (I think it was posted by linear?)?? Thanks for the info and great guide!!!! ~SongCloud~
I use loctite 330 to secure a 2.1x2.1mm low profile LED to the arm. Loctite 330 has the advantage of not emitting any solvent fumes that may possibly damage the drive. Before gluing it to the arm, i solder 4 thin laquered copper coil wires to it, wind them into one collected wire and encase the LED with epoxy to keep the solder connections isolated and to get a better surface to glue to. To encase in epoxy, i place a small dot on a piece of CD case, push the allready soldered SMD LED into the blob and secure it by pushing another piece of CD case onto the top, i use acrylic CD cases because epoxy doesn't stick to it very well, and i have about 700 of them. Then i cut excess glue off after removing it from the CD case. To glue it, i use a cotton swab to place a thin layer of Loctite 330 on the end of the solid part of the reader arm, then i use the bottle of hardener and place a thin layer on the bottom of the encased LED. Pressing them together is easiest to do by guiding the LED into place using the wire, then pressing it down using a cotton swab. You have to use common sense for how hard you press, how you loop the wire etc. Practice on a broken drive if you have not done this kind of thing before. The controller is easy, it's an opto coupler, a presettable 4bit up/down counter and an AND (or NAND) buffer, i don't have a diagram for it atm. Don't forget the resistors for the LED and the opto coupler or you will damage things
Just so you know, Holley posted a guide to doing his 200gig harddrives I believe on futuremark. Nice, well written informative guide though!
