Posted by Flarky on 11/28/06 22:24

Hi all,

I bought a 40 gig hard drive for a laptop computer once,
and I've since sold the laptop but not the drive.
It's a good Hitachi drive, with a parallel interface and
probably has data on it that I can use or need.

However I can't make use of the drive.

1. My current laptop is SATA, so I can't
install a PATA drive.

2. I have a USB 2.5" enclosure, but USB doesn't provide
enough current to run the drive. The drive
needs 1 ampere. Another 4 gig drive that I had
did work with the enclosure. It used 0.5 amperes.

3. I don't have an iPod or any other MP3 player
to put the drive into, and thereby hook it up to the computer.

4. The AC power supply for my enclosure is
rare and costs $6.5 + $16 shipping from
coolerexpress.com, which is ridiculous.

After if get any data off the drive,
the question remains, how to make use
of it for backups and/or for music/video.

Option A
I have noticed that there are now 2.5" enclosures
that have MP3 and video playing capability,
but no screens (!). I don't want to waste my
money on one of those. They don't even come with
AC adaptors usually.

Option B
Buy an old iPod and put this drive in it,
discarding the original drive. Does anybody
know if the original iPods will even take a
40 gig drive?

Option C = preferred
Does anybody know if there is an MP3 player
manufacturer that sells an MP3 players
with a screen on it but with an empty hard drive
bay?

Thanks.

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