Just a brief look at my new product in my iFlash series.
While the iFlash enables the iPod to work with Compact Flash and SDXC cards, the new iFlash-Sata opens up all Sata based storage devices – mSata and externally powered Sata Hard drives and SSD drives.
The iFlash-Sata will work in the Video iPod (5g, 5.5g) and the newer Classics (6g, 6.5g, 7g).
Be warned the current crop of mSata drives are power hungry, so runtimes are not great compared to CF/SDXC – but still worth while if you must have a 1Tb iPod!
Here is some pictures of the mSata configuration.
iFlash-Sata Front
iFlash-Sata side mSata
iFlash-Sata Angled Shot
@Tarkan, I got a 128 GB U3 PNY Elite SDXC. Not I need a regular iflash for my 6G 80GB unit?
@Maingey – You will need the standard iFlash-Bundle to install the SDXC in to your iPod.
I apologize. I meant to say the link I sent you is for a 128GB micro SD U1 for 60$USD after rebate. That is what the link was for. and it is Samsung evo+ either way I am on the train. I have to purchase the card then I will purchase the adapter, adn hopefully it is just the hdd that is the issue.
@Tarkan, thanks for you fast reply again. I did take a look and in the US they have the Samsung EVO+ (You have Evo 64GB listed as compatible) for about 60$USD. That is around the same price as the Regulard SD class 10.
http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/searchtools/item-Details.asp?sdtid=8059952&EdpNo=9784726&SRCCODE=LINKSHARE&cm_mmc_o=-ddCjC1bELltzywCjC-d2CjCdwwp&utm_source=Linkshare&utm_medium=Affiliate&utm_campaign=lw9MynSeamY&AffiliateID=lw9MynSeamY-AWNTgAperUjNtMwo9ygjow
@Maingey – for that kind of money you can pickup a 128Gb PNY UHS-I (U3) SDXC. Which is not only double the capacity but is using a newer gen controller.
@Shane, thanks. You asked some of the questions I had.
@Tarkan – thank you for your fast response. Can a micro sd be put into an SD adapter and then used in one of your units? I’m looking around (for the 6G in my original question).
Yes MicroSD can be used as the adapters are just passive devices which marry up the connections. I would say in the 128Gb capacity standard SD card will be much cheaper. Very very cheap large capacity (64Gb >=)MicroSD cards tend to be fake.
@tarkan Sorry, what I meant was that if I were to install one of your boards (SD or SSD) would iTunes see the full capacity on the CE-ATA Classics?
@Shane – No that is why the CE-ATA 6g 160Gb model will be limited to 128Gb when using PATA drives.
@tarkan I get it now, cheers.
@tarkan So do the 6G 160GB CE-ATA Classics with LBA48 see the whole capacity in iTunes if you were to put in a capacity larger than the original 160GB drive?
@Shane – The problem is that no other CE-ATA drives were made – the only one in existence is the 160Gb used in the iPod. The Standard has effectively been dropped since no other devices were ever made using it.
@Tarkan “@Maingey – Sadly the 6g are limited to 128Gb, the only way would be to switch to EmCore/Rockbox operating system on the iPod – but that is not a recommend option for mSata drives. Your only solution would be iFlash-Bundle + 256Gb SDXC + EmCore/Rockbox to achieve what you want with the iPod you have!”
Can I ask, how does the 128GB limit on the 6G iPod Classics work with the 160GB hard drives they were originally shipped with? Am I missing something because this has always baffled me!
@Maingey, I was determined to go down the SSD route, but after doing a good bit of reading on this site it seems like the 256GB SDXC card route is probably the best bet for the 6Gs, especially when it comes to power drain, etc. At some point down the line I’ll actually get around to doing this… By then 256GB cards might be in my price range (though they’re not overly expensive, I’m just on a very tight budget!)
@Shane – The 160Gb 6g use a CE-ATA drive rather than a PATA drive used by all the other models, and Apple use this to limit the PATA interface to LBA28 (128Gb limit), and allow full LBA48 on the CE-ATA interface.
@Tarkan,
I saw it posted but had to ask again. I have an Ipod, 80GB (A1238 and last on serial are Y5N) so I believe it is a 6G ipod. In compatibility list I saw that it can go up to 128GB, but I saw another poster talking about getting a Samsung 840 1TB working in it. It the size capability larger? I really would like at least a 250GB drive. Any other way of getting it to work in the unit?
@Maingey – Sadly the 6g are limited to 128Gb, the only way would be to switch to EmCore/Rockbox operating system on the iPod – but that is not a recommend option for mSata drives. Your only solution would be iFlash-Bundle + 256Gb SDXC + EmCore/Rockbox to achieve what you want with the iPod you have!
I got an old 5.5 gen iPod Video working with the iFlash-SATA adapter and MyDigitalSSD BP4e – 512Gb. I installed the guts of the iPod into a new 80g case (and faceplate, and clickwheel…) with a 1900mAh battery.
It was a tight squeeze with the thermal pad, if the pad was 33% less thick maybe it would have been a better fit.
Itunes formatted the drive without any problems.
Running RockBox as modified by beyondwind for use with mSata (but with the superior iFlash-SATA), I am happily playing tunes at my desk today.
@Hector – The thermals pads are not designed for those after market high capacity batteries. You can use it but you need to cut the thermal pad in to small 1cm square pieces, this way the pad will spread easier and make it a easier fit. Otherwise glad you are up and running ok.
Today i pimp my iPod Classic 160 Gb (made in 2010) with Tarkans iFlash-SATA and an Samsung MZ-M5E500BW 500Gb SSD.
For me, I am not a trained electronics engineer, the task was quite easy after reading the tutorials on ifixit.com and here at Tarkans Page. In less than 30 minutes the conversion was done and now i synchronize my iTunes running Library. Thank you for this great product @Tarkan!
PS: That should’ve said MX200, not M200.
When it comes to reads, are SDXC cards A LOT better than mSATA SSDs? How durable are SDXC cards to writes? Would filling say a 256GB SDXC in one go damage them as such? I was always under the impression that SD cards didn’t take extensive writes very well?
@Shane – The MX200 250Gb model is known to work ok. Modern SDXC cards have great reliability, my own PNY & Kingston 256Gb cards have had around 2Tb of data written to them and they are still working great – about 9 full restore & sync 238Gb cycles each (so far!!)
@tarkan Cheers for the prompt reply. I’m stunned at what you’ve written to your 256GB cards, my impressions about write wear on SD cards must be old school compared to what modern cards can do! So, that ticks that box, looking into a Kingston SDA10/256GB SDXC card (reported working on the SD card list), only £85 at Amazon.co.uk. I won’t get my entire collection on it BUT if I can just about chop it down to the 148GB available for use on 160GB then I should be fine (for now!) I’ve been meaning to EmCore/Rockbox my iPod Classic for a while and as far as I know that removes the LBA28 restrictions, I may do this today to allow me get used to Rockbox.
Has anyone had any experience with the Crucial M200 mSATA drives? I’m now at the stage where getting new music onto my iPod Classic 6G 160GB is just an annoyance of trying to figure out what I can lose in order to get some more on it. I think a 250GB will do me for now, but just wondered if anyone has used that SSD with any success.
@Shane – I will search my notes, but I recall the M200 are too power hungry to work in the iPod. The other thing have you checked your model against my compatiblity list? as the 6g model will be limited to 128Gb due to LBA28 restrictions by Apple.
@alan
Try testing the SSD with the mSATA to SATA adapter on your computer to see if it locks up. Could be the SSD where the problem is.
no problem copying straight to drive . loaded 14000 songs rather quickly. drive stayed around 50-60c during transfer. loaded drive back into ipod left ipod open so could monitor temp. Synced 500 songs fine. next 500 it made it to 420 songs then bogged down syncing about 1 song every 5 min. drive running 40-50c , this is what has happened every time I sync it will eventually cause iTunes to stop responding.
Finally got 500gb msata ipod to sync. I had to uninstall my iTunes and reinstall then restore again and everything worked perfect, iTunes must have been corrupted. everything appears to work normal now. I did not have trouble before uninstalling with a Toshiba 240 hdd guess its something to do with the msata to flash . Gonna celebrate now and baby this bad boy from now on.
@Alan – that is very interesting. Not sure why re-installing iTunes would fix it, was it possible the iPod USB drivers were in a bad state, which the install fixed?
Not sure, but I have synced the iPod several times now and it works like a charm . iTunes writes to the drive at normal speed , before it would start syncing normal get to a point not always the same, around 2000 songs and then it would slow down to about a song every 5 min then iTunes would go unresponsive and then after 10-15 min give me the message that it could not write to the iPod and when I eject I would get red x . I have 6 iPods wanting to do a 1tb but because of cost wanted to get bugs out with the 500. I have 1 of you flash drives with a 128gb transcend card, it works great. Maybe when my drive failed before due to power loss it corrupted the iTunes program.
The slowdown you mention sounds to me like when the battery power starts getting flakey – so this the same iPod using the battery as before!! Very strange, well I am glad it is working now, something to remember in the fault finding advice arsenal I suppose.
Finally got adaptor to restore my 500 gb evo drive. restored drive reformatted to fat32. Using dual firwire cable to sync, drive will sync between 2000 and 3000 songs and lock iTunes up(not responding) and get red x after ejecting. have restored drive on both mac pro and windows 8 with amorei software and same thing happens on both drive. Any suggestions? Also tried syncing 300 songs at a time did same thing when reached over 2000 songs. Just for kicks I reinstalled old 240 hard drive and synced entire library 222gb no problem,
That’s interesting how the iPod completely removes power to the mSATA drive when it’s not using it. I would think it would keep it in standby or a low power state.
Sole reason for that is with PATA devices like the original HDD, the controller circuitry still draws quite some power while in sleep mode. Of course modern mSata drives have ultra low power shutdown modes, but the iPod firmware is not mSata aware to do that.
Tarkan do you know if mSATA drives do background tasks like garbage collecting inside the iPod or do they only do that when inside a computer running an O/S?
The mSata drives do not get a chance to do any tasks like that due to the aggressive nature of the iPod power saving.
The iPod only powers up the mSata to read/write to it and then is very quick to shutdown and remove power.
I suppose garbage collection would happen when the iPod is connected to the computer. iPod keeps the mSata powered up and in an idle state when it is not actively syncing, so I would expect the mSata drive to use that idle time to do the various housekeeping functions it needs to.
The above only happens when the iPod displays connected, not when it is ejected and charging.
A different language does not matter I would think. It does seem strange and would steer away from it.
@ Max: It appears to be in a different language. Maybe that is why the capacity seems higher? Anyway seems shady to me besides that.
Hello,
I found someone selling this Ipod: http://img15.hostingpics.net/pics/560582ipod1tb.jpg
The seller has not many informations about the model is selling
I thought the biggest mSata card was the Samsung EVO840 1Tb which gives in real 931Gb free space in FAT32 format
If you have any comment about this, please share….
Thank you
@Max – The Samsung 1Tb are the largest mSata drives out there – that iPod about screen is very odd.
It was my bad , that caused the power loss . Had a couple of CDs to sync thought it would be ok to sync on standard cord without FireWire. Did not realize Mac pro was not pluged in and had a low battery, thus I now have red x. The tarkan iflash-Sata adapter has worked flawless until this error of mine. I’ll get an adapter and try to restore the drive. Thanks
When you do get the mSata to Sata enclosure – before doing anything distructive, try running a surface scan or drive check, shutdown machine before removing mSata, re-install in to iPod – if you are lucky iTunes may correct the error areas and resume the syncing.
Will do thanks for all your input will post my results.