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3400c Hard Drive Recommendations? - 2008/01/08 08:51Good morning all! I have a PowerBook 3400/240 144MB with a 3GB hard drive that I'm thinking of upgrading. I am running Mac OS 7.6.1. Am considering IBM TravelStar 60GB, Seagate 40GB, and a new dual CF Card/IDE adapter from Addonics with one (or two) SanDisk's CF Card 4GB Extreme IV at 40MB/sec transfer speed (or Extreme III at 20MB/sec). I am concerned about not being able to upgrade the new hard drive's drivers with Apple's DriveSetup. Also, I thought I read somewhere that the 3400 could not use an ATA-6 hard drive. Can anyone make any suggestions as to how I should upgrade? Thank you, Carl
Post edited by: triplec, at: 2008/01/10 21:35
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krowmagnum
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Re:3400c Hard Drive Recommendations? - 2008/01/08 14:03I'm not that familiar with old Powerbooks but I'm pretty sure you are correct about the ATA-6 drives.
And I don't know if the fast data transfer the cards have will be possible on the 3400's PC card bus.
You could try the Apple Discussions forums on Apple's site if nobody here can answer your questions.
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triplec
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Re:3400c Hard Drive Recommendations? - 2008/01/14 14:35I opted for the Addonics Dual CF-IDE Adapter (Model: AD44MIDE2CF). It is not a PC card adapter but actually replaces the internal 3GB Toshiba hard drive that originally came in the 3400c and connects to the existing 44-pin IDE ribbon. I placed two CF cards into this adapter: Sandisk 4GB Extreme III in the "master" slot and another Sandisk 2GB Ultra II into the "slave" slot. On the 4GB I had previously installed OS 7.6.1 and had been successfully booting and operating the machine from that when I was using a PCMCIA/CF Card adapter. The 2GB I only want for storage so had formatted it on my Pismo as Mac OS Standard. The machine prefers to startup from a CD if one with an OS is in the CD module but it will startup from the 4GB CF Card if no other startup disk is available to it. And if it is selected in "Startup Disk" it will then restart successfully from the CF Card. Other than that, everything seems just fine and VERY quiet! Also, the other CF card (no OS, just standard formatted) does not show up on the desktop and I cannot discover it anywhere. I may just remove it later. A lot of fun!
Carl
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krowmagnum
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Re:3400c Hard Drive Recommendations? - 2008/01/15 00:37Interesting.... I know people have used the CF cards with a PC Card adapter but never heard of anyone using an internal IDE adapter on an old Powerbook.
At least you got it to read one of the cards. Better than I would have guessed on a 3400. That should help a lot with battery life too.
The 2GB card does not show up in the Disk Utility either ?
I wonder if a 3rd party utility like Hard Disk Tool Kit or SilverLining would recognize it.
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triplec
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Re:3400c Hard Drive Recommendations? - 2008/01/19 22:01Since I ordered a new PRAM battery for the 3400c I thought I would go ahead and go into the hard drive again. I removed the smaller SanDisk 2GB Ultra II CF card from the Addonics dual CF Card/IDE adapter (since the machine would not recognize it anyway) and just left the larger SanDisk 4GB Extreme III card that I have Mac OS 7.6.1 installed on. The machine will still "prefer" to start from the CD module if a CD with a startup disc is inside but otherwise there is no problem booting from the CF card. I then placed the 2GB CF card (still formatted in Mac OS standard and still empty for storage use only) in a PCMCIA/CF card adapter and inserted into the side of the machine. Almost immediately it appeared on the desktop and seems perfectly normal and ready for use. I'm thinking that the problem with it is just that the 3400c is not sophisticated and modern enough to deal with two CF cards where there was one conventional hard drive. I can live with that. All in all, a very futuristic and successful solid state drive 3400c system I think!
Thank you, Carl
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stewieno1
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Re:3400c Hard Drive Recommendations? - 2008/02/08 20:02I have thought of doing something similar with my 3400 but had other projects as well so... I think your second CF card not showing up may have something to do with the logicboard not being able to see both master as well as slave - either one or the other , not both. As for the ATA-6 issue , it seems to be a YMMV scenario. Some report even older Powerbooks being able to be fitted with ATA-6 HD's while newer ones like Wallstreets sometimes even have problems. I think it is more down to individual model and makes of HD's that cause this problem. A friend tried a 20Gb ATA-6 Samsung HD in his 1400cs which wouldn't work no matter what he tried but I installed a 30Gb Toshiba ATA-6 into my exact same model 1400cs and it worked no problem.Both were formatted the same from DU on an OS9.1 retail CD . Boot times from the CF card would be very quick too I believe.
Stewie
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