5-Minute Project: Homemade Hard Drive

I like your idea of DIY videos. The video is quick and shows how easy such a project really is and the fact that it can save you money, which in really is equivalent to the time that you spend doing conversion from internal to external hard drive yourself, but so much more fun.

One more thing that i would appreciate is explanation of what role each of the additional components play in the final product - external hard drive. For example, you need a case to protect the hard drive from being damaged. What I am not familiar with is what role does a back plate play in this assembly. I see it has some electronic components on it: maybe a transducer and what looks like some capacitors. So what is the purpose of the back plate?

Thanks

Technology is fun!

A few years back I wanted to build a 500MB external drive. I bought at least four different shells at Bestbuy, and none of them worked. The bestbuy GeekSquad even fried two of their own hard drives. Not the most focused group. I hope todays shells are built for far greater capacity. I had to buy multiple 1TB western digital external MyBook's to get my Bluray library onto my screen.

For historical sake, I'm going to have a quick laugh at SolidState hard drives being so limited in the storage department: Ahahha...hehehe....hohoho....hahahaha. Oh now on to the nano-scale science. Get with the program, Intel and everyone else making nano-stuff!

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Often reading: The Message, The Bible in Contemporary Language.

wadlust:

Inside your computer, an internal hard drive gets it's data connection (SATA or IDE) sent straight to the motherboard, and the power connection straight off the power supply.

When you put the hard drive into an external case, it can't get these connections like this. The circuitry you saw on the plate was to allow the drive to send data and get power. Most external drives connect to a wall outlet (some smaller ones just take power straight through a USB drive). It appears that this case has a firewire connection, and possibly a USB connection on the front plate, and all that is set in the circuitry on the back panel.

No mention was made of jumper settings on the hard drive. Common jumpers settings include MASTER, SLAVE, and CS (Cable Select). I would think the enclosure and electronics MUST specify which jumper settings you should use in order to get the drive to actually work

Compassman Where does the beater laptop come in? Do you mean a working hard drive out of any computer? If yes, why mention a laptop in the first place. This is a nice DIY video but not for 5 Minute Projects.

I didn't realize when I asked a guy to take my picture I was talking to a bonified internet superstar! You and John helped me and my friends out by taking our picture at SXSW interactive this year. I saw you on Food Detectives a couple days ago, searched the internet and there you are.

Just wanted to say Hello, congrats on your success and this website. It really is a work of art. Keep up the good work!

Kristen