Swapping ext. HDD drive for iBook drive?

[GrahameR]

Hi, I have a LaCie ext HDD 160Gb USB 2.0 and an iBook G3 800Mhz, 384Mg RAM but with only 30Gb on the hard drive.

I didn't realise the iBook was only USB 1.1 when I got the ext HDD - otherwise I would have got a Firewire HDD (for speed). So I'm trying to salvage the situation with what I've got until I upgrade.

Apart from backing up, part of the reason for wishing to shift stuff off the iBook is because it's becoming full (and slower?). Thus the idea was to shift infrequently accessed stuff completely off the iBook onto the ext. HDD - thus freeing up space on the iBook.

So I thought one solution could be to swap the two hard drives. If this was possible then I'd have a 160Gb int. hard drive and a 30Gb back up ext. HDD.

Is this possible? If so, is it difficult etc?

TIA,
Grahame

[agentx]

I would think it is possible as long as the external drive is P-ATA not SATA.

It is quite a hard process taking apart the ibook g4s and you have to be very careful with the mouse cable connecter as it is very prone to fail.

But overall it should work....

[trevor]

The drive that is inside the Lacie case would need to be 2.5", 9.5mm tall, and ATA (also known as PATA, or incorrectly as EIDE or IDE). And even then, I think that the old iBook G3 800 MHz is only going to be able to see the first 128 GB (or 137 GB, depending on how you measure your Gigabytes) of a 160 GB drive.

If you swap the drives and reformat the drive that used to be in the Lacie while it is in the iBook, it should work fine, just with diminished capacity of only 128 GB. But if you don't reformat that drive while it is in the iBook, you won't be able to read or write the upper space above 128 GB, and you will probably have some spectacular crashes.

Trevor

[GrahameR]

Is it difficult to swap both drives and then get them both working plus, as you say, reformat the 160Gb drive?

How? What safety precautions etc?

NB: I am not a techo - but I am very good with hammers, drills, saws etc. :)

[mclbruce]

There are many models of LaCie external USB drives. Some models are simply too big to fit in the iBook. What model of LaCie drive do you have?

[trevor]

Is it difficult to swap both drives and then get them both working plus, as you say, reformat the 160Gb drive?

How? What safety precautions etc?

NB: I am not a techo - but I am very good with hammers, drills, saws etc. :)

Yes, the iBook is very difficult to work inside of. You'd need a good take-apart guide, a great deal of patience, and you will need to keep extremely careful track of where every screw came from.

If you're good with hammers, drills, saws, are you also good with very small-bladed screwdrivers?

Trevor

[GrahameR]

The LaCie is model 301266. But it sounds like it's not worth the effort - and not worth paying a techo to do it.

I'm okay with small screwdrivers etc but it sounds like too much can go wrong. And besides, the LaCie will be more useful when I upgrade to a USB 2.0 machine.

So I guess here endeth the questions.

As usual, thanks guys - typically full of helpful ideas.

(I can't get over what a resource this is for non-techos like me!)

[trevor]

It's hard to track down definitive information about what type of drive (ATA or SATA) is internal to the 301266. Lacie doesn't mention that themselves, since they don't particularly want you to be swapping drives in their cases. But I *think* that the drive internal to the 301266 is a SATA drive, not an ATA drive, which means that it wouldn't work in your iBook anyway, as the iBook takes an ATA drive.

Trevor