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Home / I-Opener Areas / I-Opener General Posts *Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! Just a super duper clean hard drive mod :-)

*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) oproot Profile Hey guys. Just wanted to show everyone the job I did on modding my second I-Opener. You *WILL* be impressed, I guarantee. http://iopener.darktech.org/ - Only pics for now, ill make it into a page with thumbnails and explanations later *oproot* 03-04-2001 01:25:16

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) 02U2 Profile Okay, Whats the guarantee.... 03-04-2001 05:42:47

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) GWIZAH Profile | Email good job, Although I have two questions, 1. it looks difficult to remove the 32 mb of memory, do you have to upgrade that before installing the hd? 2. It also looks like you forgot to put the RF shield back on when you closed the IO back up, arent you worried about running it un-shielded? Or was that just to show the closed lid? 03-04-2001 10:12:10

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) oproot Profile GWIZAH: 1. Yes, you have to remove the hard drive to upgrade memory, but really how often do you need to do this? 2. lol. I just didn't have it on in that picture. I did not have to cut up the RF shield at all either. It’s perfectly in tact. The only thing about this way of mounting the hard drive is that your going to need a *thin* hard drive to mount it this way. The drive I have is (I believe) one of the 9mm drives, and it is flush or a little bit lower then the heat sink. A 12mm drive may work, but it prob would bow out the RF shielding. Side note: In case any one is wondering what that little black thing on the far left of the I-opener with the white cable coming out of it going to the rear case, that’s my sound output hack with the LM324 op amp chip and a couple capacitors (wrapped in electrical tape). I forgot to take pics of it before i wrapped it up. *oproot* 03-04-2001 10:32:14

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) YouBecha Profile Is the modem still there, under the HD? Why the LCD switch (just curious)? Stock processor or something faster? http://www.geocities.com/mr_bubba_zanetti/ 03-04-2001 15:53:56

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) oproot Profile No modem under the hard drive, I’m eventually going to make both serial ports accessible externally. This iopener is going in my car. At night, the LCD becomes rather distracting while I’m driving. Thus, the switch solves this problem And yes, stock cpu. I've been looking up and down for the winchip2 200mhz upgrade, but haven’t been able to find one. *oproot* 03-04-2001 16:09:30

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) GWIZAH Profile | Email oproot, hey thats really cool, I think maybe I'll use this mod on my next I-opener since Im still waiting for my I-MOD3 (then again, who isn't!) I like the idea of pulling the modem out but what exactly are you planning with the external serial ports? r_fl_z, has a thread on this board here has a hack you'd be interested in. 03-04-2001 18:35:48

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) oproot Profile GWIZAH: I never ordered an IMOD3, but it does seem that *no one* is getting theirs . I would have gotten one for myself if it weren’t for the fact that you had to buy that lasagna fan also. The whole reason I’m hacking another iopener (this is my second) is because my friend wanted one for himself. He got one off ebay (which turned out to be a version 1 in PERFECT condition!!), and gave it to me to mod for him. Well, I kind of kept putting it off, and he got mad... So I ended up giving him mine, and keeping his new one. I’m so glad I did that too, because now I have allot of experience with modifying it, and I can do a really nice job on this one (my old one was SOOO ugly inside lol. I wish I had pictures to show) As far as the serial ports: I'm using one to hook up to my Garmin II+ GPS receiver. The second port will just be there for expansion possibilities. I've already made one of the tty->rs232 circuits from scratch for my first iopener, and it wasn't that hard at all. At the moment, im just waiting for MAX235 chips to arrive in the mail for my new circuits Also, once i get some more money, I’m also going to be doing the internal ethernet hack described here: http://www.lvcm.com/lna/#usb Happy hacking Oh yeah, I’ve also been adding more pictures here and there, so go check back to my site if you want to see J *oproot* 03-04-2001 19:16:33

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) deadbolt Profile | Email Very elegant solution to the Hd mounting problem. I may do this as well as I hope to retain the heat sink with an AMD k63+ running at around 300 or so MHz. Trouble is your HD is mounted right where I mounted my wireless keyboard receiver so I may have to rethink my kbrd hack. 03-05-2001 03:04:09

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) GWIZAH Profile | Email Nice pictures! Did you code that mp3 player yourself? and, I love the anime chick in the BG, really nice hack especially the audio out mod and serial where the 2nd usb would be. 03-05-2001 10:23:54

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) wkoehler55 Profile I am also interested in what MP3 software you were using. You mentioned you were looking for a Winchip2. I bought one last month for a reasonable price from upgradability.com The web site is useless though. Just send them email at individual@UpgradeAbility.com and tell them what you're looking for. 03-05-2001 14:35:03

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) snuckleton Profile oproot, Looks good. I'd like to hear more about the LCD Switch. Can you describe where on the board you found a place to break the LCD backlight circuit? Thanks 03-05-2001 20:10:38

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) oproot Profile GWIZAH: Thanks And yeah, i wrote that mp3 player thing myself. (Coded in VBasic, Graphics in Adobe Photoshop) wkoehler55: Thanks for the tip on the winchip2!! Hopfully they still have some left! As far as my 'mp3 software': I use winamp to play the actual mp3, and my VB program (what you saw in the pic) just lets you select what you want to listen to.. my next post will explain in detail everything my program does snuckleton: With your iopener open, in the upper right hand corner there should be a 2 wire connector (white and yellow wires) pluged into the mobo. The yellow wire is + and the white is -. You will have to put the switch so it switches the + wire. On a side note, this method does not *completly* turn off the backlight. For some reason, it is still on, but very dim. Ive tried using 2 difrent switches, and both of them yeilded a difrent "dimmness". *oproot* 03-05-2001 20:28:14

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) oproot Profile Updated: http://iopener.darktech.org/ *New thumbnail browsing system. Enjoy 03-05-2001 21:26:58

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) tinkerer Profile I believe those wires are the high voltage source to the LCD backlight. Very high volrage + very low current = perhaps some leakage through the switch. I wonder if there is a safer way that disables the supply to the LCD in the low voltage domain. Must be 'cause the OS can do it. BTW, really cool mod and pic site. I especially like the fact that the circuit doesn't bake the HD, unlike mine. 03-05-2001 23:23:01

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) deadbolt Profile | Email It sounds like the dim level may actually be a good thing unless you can see it when you leave the car. If you want complete darkness there are 2 methods. One way is to tap into the circuit before the HV invertor. That is the small flat wirewound transformer on the board near your connection to your switch. The second way is to use a DPST switch cutting both sides of the circuit instead of the SPSST switch you are using. Since you have a nice switch, method one might be a better choice. Backlights are fluorescent tubes similar to the overhead tubes in most offices. If you've ever changed a tube with the switch on you may have noticed that the tube can actually light with only one contact connected. Your switch is similar allowing the tube to be partially energized. I think it is finding an alternate ground path somewhere. Maybe someone else can jump in here to teach me more about fluorescents. 03-06-2001 02:50:54

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) mdetz Profile From upgradability.com: "We have the following: WinChip2 200 $40 WinChip2 240 $55 (True 240MHz Chip) WinChip2A 200 $40 WinChip2A 233 $50 (200MHz chip tested and guaranteed by us at 233MHz) There are some differences between the WinChip2 and 2A. The WinChip2 only supports whole number multipliers, so you get 2, 3, 4, etc. The 2A supports fractional multipliers, and some odd ones at that, 2.33X, 3X, 3.33X, 3.5X. The 2A also officially supports a 100MHz bus, while the 2 doesn't officially. In most cases, the 2A is a better chip, but in some cases, the 2 can be useful, like old systems without a 66MHz bus speed where the 4X multiplier allows the chip to run a 200MHz using a 50 MHz bus , and at 240 with a 60MHz bus." 03-06-2001 06:48:46

RE:*Very* clean hard drive mod with pics, take a look! (modified 0 times) Tackhead Profile First off - my compliments on a beautiful mod. (Using surface-mount capacitors for strain relief on the wires to the audio mod was a seriously nice touch!) Second - add a "me too" for info on the VB wrapper you wrote around WinAMP. My next projects are gonna be car-related and home-stereo related, and both would benefit from a "big fonts" look-and-feel. (And I'm stuck in 'Doze because my GPS software for the "car" half of the project is 'doze-based...) 03-07-2001 11:26:29

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