Acquired le1700 w/ hatachi 30gb hdd - htc426030g5ce00

[chukker]

I read the whole thread from another member regarding his acquisition of an LE1700 with a 30 GB HDD and he wanted to upgrade. I have a similar situation.
My education ended I read he had the Toshiba drive. I don't; I have the Hitachi drive. Did I make a mistake buying this LE1700? (The Hitachi drive seem to cause all kinds of problems when upgrading because of cable thickness, etc.)
I'm not an advanced techno geek, but I'm learning, so please bear with me when I ask stupid questions. . .
Why is it not possible to upgrade to a SATA HDD? If there were a connecting adapter available - what would be some of the critical issues? (SATA's are larger, cheaper, and give off more heat says the research, so why can't we use them?) I have a a Toshiba 120GB MK1229GSG HDD1F12 1.8" Micro SATA HDD hanging around - what is it that makes such a thing incompatible?
What are my other choices? (I found a 1.8" SAMSUNG HS122JC 120GB ZIF LIF 5400 PATA Hard Drive; would this work?
Help me as I muddle through the morass of new lingo and technology with which I've been heretofore unfamiliar. PLEASE TALK DOWN TO ME; THE MORE REMEDIAL the better until I get up to speed with all this.
I must have a larger HDD for what I do (illustration, animation with TVPaint). What are the options for me? Thank you very much all who respond to this befuddled "tablet noob."
Oh, one more thing: back in December dante101 posted that he couldn't remove the keyboard dock from his LE1700. I find myself in the same situation. The dock seems like it wasn't used because it still "pops" when I adjust the tablet to different angles. When the dock is rarely used, is it common to have difficulty separating the two? What now?

[John Hill]

The issue is that Motion Computing used two different cable/hard drive combinations in the LE1700. The Hitachi connector has limited upgrade options because it is ATA and the Toshiba is ZIF. You can upgrade the Hitachi to a 100Gb drive I think although I don't have a model # for you. Most people want to go to an SSD when they discover this problem, but either way, you can buy the Toshiba cable here.

Not only do you have to make sure that you have the right connector but also that the disk height is OK which is way you can't just use any drive. Unfortunately, with replacement drives for these units, the choices are limited.

[chukker]

John, does this cable give me options? Would I then be able to buy a toshiba drive of a greater GB or an SSD as long as the drive is slim enough?
Let's say I bought the cable, give me specific drives I could examine, please. Thank you.

[John Hill]

Your best bet is to search this site for what others have done. My tech guy is the person who does the upgrades for us and he is out sick today so I can't ask him. Maybe some other folks can post what hard drive or solid state drive they have used.

[chukker]

Anyone? All advice is more than welcome.

[wiggy1]

Chuck,

The cable that John sells will allow you to use a Toshiba ZIF drive. That 1.8" Samsung ZIF PATA drive would also work. I have used the KingSpec SSD's but already burned up two drives in my LE1700. Great drives when they work, but my data suggests a short life if you are going to use the machine for extended periods of time each day. I was using it 10-12 hours a day. Good luck on your search and welcome to the forum.

[chukker]

Thank you so much, Chuck, for your specificity.
I found a website link on this forum that shows how to remove the Hitachi HDD, so I screwed up the courage and thought I'd give it a go.
Success without any issues! Now, I'll put it all back together feeling a bit more confident to complete the swap when I get the correct HDD.
I hope that I can count on you (and forum members) to help me as I continue on this foreign soil.
Thank you again.

[chukker]

Thank you, all you dear souls who helped with input before.

I turn to you once again.

I purchased an 80GB Samsung HDD and True Image 2011. I cloned the hard drive onto a USB external hard drive.

Miraculously, the old Hitachi ribbon worked with the Samsung drive. I was quite astonished.

Now I'm at a point where y'all come in again...

Now what? I searched the True Image User Guide front to back looking for the remedial instructions on how one "unpacks the clone" onto a new hard drive. Obviously, they assume that one ought to know this, but I don't. I've never done this before; I've never had to restore my computer after a crash, etc.

How do I let the LE1700 know that the clone is on the external? Must I go into BIOS or type commands in the DOS prompter?

Please help me. I'm so close, yet so far!

[chukker]

OK, this is what I've tried since I last wrote . . .

I went into BIOS BOOT and there are 4 choices: floppy, CD-ROM, Marvell NIC(?), and the HDD. Does this mean that my USB port isn't recognized right now?

What is Marvell NIC? Is that the motherboard manufacturer?

It's always the tasks that you think are going to take a few minutes that end up taking hours . . .sigh.

[chukker]

It would appear from my further investigations that one cannot boot from an external hard drive. I guess I will have to clone the clone to multiple DVD's or CD's. I sure wish Acronis had mentioned this when it instructed me I could clone to an external HDD . . . the big dopes. :-(