Proposal (2): Adding a Removable IDE-USB Drive Bay to Ultra
Posted: Sun Jun 15, 2008 6:26 pm
Hi Everyone,
I suspect this will be of interest, and this is a phase 1 post to get thoughts.
Just had a thought. With all the mess of having
a) losing SCSI support on new Macs
b) having to maintain an old XP box just to transfer samples
c) having a mess of a time and expense of using SCSI CF Readers/IDE Converters (I have done it all!)
What I would really like to be able to do is either have a nice network (like SCSI originally provided) or a simple way to share complete drives from Mac to PC and Sampler.
i.e. to bring the vision Emu originally had with the sampler becoming the centerpiece of the studio, but with really simple movement of samples from contemporary DAWs. They never did get a chance to launch the Emu USB card before creative F%^&&**ed it all up.
Anyhow, its struck me recently that one way to do this is a SATA Drive conversion for the IDE interface in the Emu - hardware translation that is transparent to the EMU IDE mechanism.
As it turns out, there are TONS of such bi-directional adaptors out there - most are for converting old IDE drives to SATA which is no use to us - but many convert old IDE motherboards to accept SATA Drives, such as this (expensive) one so you can see the specs.
http://cooldrives.stores.yahoo.net/saidecomisat.html
So, what comes out of your EMU Motherboard with these adapters is a SATA cable.
Scanning ebay reveals there are tons of these for $2-$5 a piece too - the bi directional ones to adapt old motherboards. So, in theory this could be a cheap, cheap upgrade. Of course, this will only work with the Master mode of the IDE drive, but no big deal there.
to see , search ebay on "IDE to SATA bi directional" keywords (without the quotes).
Now, whilst this extends the life of our beasts to accept newer, lower power, and cheaper 2.5" storage which is now predominant, it also opens up the possibility of having an external SATA interface that powers the drive and provides the data feed to an external connectors.
Think this: Replace your EMU IDE adapters with a SATA connector. Extend the SATA connector to either a new slot in the rear, or better yet, on the front e.g. where the floppy drive is - inclding some nice swappable bays that then convert to an External USB 2.0 Drive - so plug and play into your Mac and PC for file transfer (FAT32- direct on EOS 4.7) or via Translator on the Mac.
Check this out:
http://www.aneotech.com/main/main3-2.as ... od2idno=54
Seems like this may also do it directly off the IDE port, but there are more choices for SATA options.
[Note: there are some IDE 2.5" caddys that do this today - ICY DOCK make them - however, there is no adapter that easily allows the drive to be swapped in and out from internal IDE caddy to external USB 2.0 as they all have a proprietary bus connector for the caddy-IDE mapping.
This could even be done with the SCSI-IDE-SATA (2 adapters) for old Non Ultras in theory.
Having this ease of data transfer would make translator more appealing too.
Thoughts ? Interest in investigation ?
M
I suspect this will be of interest, and this is a phase 1 post to get thoughts.
Just had a thought. With all the mess of having
a) losing SCSI support on new Macs
b) having to maintain an old XP box just to transfer samples
c) having a mess of a time and expense of using SCSI CF Readers/IDE Converters (I have done it all!)
What I would really like to be able to do is either have a nice network (like SCSI originally provided) or a simple way to share complete drives from Mac to PC and Sampler.
i.e. to bring the vision Emu originally had with the sampler becoming the centerpiece of the studio, but with really simple movement of samples from contemporary DAWs. They never did get a chance to launch the Emu USB card before creative F%^&&**ed it all up.
Anyhow, its struck me recently that one way to do this is a SATA Drive conversion for the IDE interface in the Emu - hardware translation that is transparent to the EMU IDE mechanism.
As it turns out, there are TONS of such bi-directional adaptors out there - most are for converting old IDE drives to SATA which is no use to us - but many convert old IDE motherboards to accept SATA Drives, such as this (expensive) one so you can see the specs.
http://cooldrives.stores.yahoo.net/saidecomisat.html
So, what comes out of your EMU Motherboard with these adapters is a SATA cable.
Scanning ebay reveals there are tons of these for $2-$5 a piece too - the bi directional ones to adapt old motherboards. So, in theory this could be a cheap, cheap upgrade. Of course, this will only work with the Master mode of the IDE drive, but no big deal there.
to see , search ebay on "IDE to SATA bi directional" keywords (without the quotes).
Now, whilst this extends the life of our beasts to accept newer, lower power, and cheaper 2.5" storage which is now predominant, it also opens up the possibility of having an external SATA interface that powers the drive and provides the data feed to an external connectors.
Think this: Replace your EMU IDE adapters with a SATA connector. Extend the SATA connector to either a new slot in the rear, or better yet, on the front e.g. where the floppy drive is - inclding some nice swappable bays that then convert to an External USB 2.0 Drive - so plug and play into your Mac and PC for file transfer (FAT32- direct on EOS 4.7) or via Translator on the Mac.
Check this out:
http://www.aneotech.com/main/main3-2.as ... od2idno=54
Seems like this may also do it directly off the IDE port, but there are more choices for SATA options.
[Note: there are some IDE 2.5" caddys that do this today - ICY DOCK make them - however, there is no adapter that easily allows the drive to be swapped in and out from internal IDE caddy to external USB 2.0 as they all have a proprietary bus connector for the caddy-IDE mapping.
This could even be done with the SCSI-IDE-SATA (2 adapters) for old Non Ultras in theory.
Having this ease of data transfer would make translator more appealing too.
Thoughts ? Interest in investigation ?
M