Hack@Home: 16GB mSATA SSD to Amiga IDE - for about £10

[Havie]

@Zetr0: You have mail!

[Zetr0]

@Thread

Sorry guys, have been swamped with work over the last couple of weeks, its been hard to catchup with EAB.

Currently my SSD solution is still running strong with the Vampire - I have yet to get this up and running on the FAST-ATA ZIV (Thanks to Keropi-san ) sadly this will have to wait atleast until next week as I am off to Events city tomorrow in Manchester

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@Havie
indeed, so do you and more so

[Havie]

Thanks for returning the ssd - still having problems though...

[Zetr0]

@Havie

Glad it got back to you sir!

So for completeness here are the tests I performed.

With my mSATA SSD to 44 pin IDE adaptor -

A600 (Vampire 2: Silver 9 A'080 - 128MiB RAM)

• Booted (complained a lot about no IDEFix) : modified startup-sequence
• Loaded WHDLoad Games (Various)
• Transferred 100MB of Data between all partitions
• Just over an hour and a half total testing time

A1200 (Apollo 060@80 64MiB RAM)

• Booted : I installed my IDEFix so it wouldn't complain
• Loaded WHDLoad Games (Various)
• Transferred 100MB of Data between all partitions
• Just over an 3 hours total testing time split over 4 days (nights)

*NB initially I had an issue without the Apollo 060 libraries so I did copy them across and removed them when I was done (just ensure it wouldn't have issues with the Vampire or WinUAE 040+JIT

WinUAE (040 + JIT + 128MiB RAM } 4x Pentium 3GHz 4GiB RAM )

• Booted (complained a lot about no IDEFix) : modified startup
• Loaded WHDLoad Games (Various)
• Transferred 150MB of Data between all partitions
• Just under an hour total testing time

What I suggest my good fellow is that I send you my set up here and you test on your equipment. I will be back home Sunday, so I will pop my mSATA card and and adaptor in the post - see how you get on with it.

[Predseda]

Is there a solution for the LED problem?

[klx300r]

@ Zetr0

a nice bit of hackery kind sir

[Havie]

Originally Posted by Zetr0

@Havie

Glad it got back to you sir!

So for completeness here are the tests I performed.

With my mSATA SSD to 44 pin IDE adaptor -

A600 (Vampire 2: Silver 9 A'080 - 128MiB RAM)

• Booted (complained a lot about no IDEFix) : modified startup-sequence
• Loaded WHDLoad Games (Various)
• Transferred 100MB of Data between all partitions
• Just over an hour and a half total testing time

A1200 (Apollo 060@80 64MiB RAM)

• Booted : I installed my IDEFix so it wouldn't complain
• Loaded WHDLoad Games (Various)
• Transferred 100MB of Data between all partitions
• Just over an 3 hours total testing time split over 4 days (nights)

*NB initially I had an issue without the Apollo 060 libraries so I did copy them across and removed them when I was done (just ensure it wouldn't have issues with the Vampire or WinUAE 040+JIT

WinUAE (040 + JIT + 128MiB RAM } 4x Pentium 3GHz 4GiB RAM )

• Booted (complained a lot about no IDEFix) : modified startup
• Loaded WHDLoad Games (Various)
• Transferred 150MB of Data between all partitions
• Just under an hour total testing time

What I suggest my good fellow is that I send you my set up here and you test on your equipment. I will be back home Sunday, so I will pop my mSATA card and and adaptor in the post - see how you get on with it.

That would be very kind of you.

I also will trya few other things my end (obviously changing 1 thing at a time)

1. Beefier power supply - I have a Wizard Power box.
2. New ide cable.
3. My second A1200 (not sure board revision but different).
4. I also have a A600 that I could try.4.
5. Formatting card below 4gb.
6. I will try formatting on an actual Amiga.
7. Can't think of anything else...

When I get you adaptor, I will compare the 2 to see I there are at obvious differences. I wonder if there may have been a revision which affects compatibility?

As we have confirmed the ssd works and is formatted correctly then I guess it comes down to:
1. Another faulty adaptor (that would make 3 and the last one came from a completely different supplier).
2. Unknown compatibility problems with certain motherboards.
3. Power.
4. Changes to adaptor revision.

Have wonderful time at Play (not jealous at all )

[Havie]

Righto:

1. No adaptor seems fine.
2. Have got sdd to show up but only by running HDtools?
3. Don't think this is a problem but haven't go this far yet (see 2.)
4. Works to a degree so probably not an issue.

So - if I boot on the 1200 and run Hdtools then the ssd shows up - not in the ealry boot menu only in workbench (this is on my spare 1200 which has no extras). This is a good sign and makes me wonder if it is something to do with the install. I have noticed that if I set the disk up as IDEO 0 in Winuae then it doesn't boot or show up which again makes me think it is something to do with my install. Next step is to try and install from a real 1200 and to see if I can get it to show up.

Will keep you posted...

[Zetr0]

Originally Posted by Predseda

Is there a solution for the LED problem?

Yes, I will do a "simple guide" when I get mine back from Havie =)

Originally Posted by klx300r

@ Zetr0

a nice bit of hackery kind sir

Thats very kind to say, I look forward to the community making it theirs and and taking it to bigger better places =)

@Havie

A little package is on route my friend, I have included the IDE mSATA adaptor, SandDisk SSD and 44pin IDE cable.

Since mine is set for the Vampire2 3.9x ROM you will need to modify the start up sequence from the current one to the following -

Boot SDH0 with no start up (into CLI)
type

ed s:startup-sequence

Use the ";" at the begining of the first 20 lines to "REM" them out - then change the way set patch is called

Set SCSIUpdate 1
If EXISTS C:IDEFix
	C:IDEFix
	Set SCSIUpdate 0
EndIf
If $SCSIUpdate EQ 1
	SetPatch QUIET
EndIf
Unset SCSIUpdate

This will get it up and running without the IDEFix - give this a crack first and THEN install IDEFix
That should get you going =)

[Havie]

Thanks Z - will wait for package!

Have had a bit more of a go this evening by trying to prep the SSD from a real 1200. Runing Hdtools and collecitng info seems ok (numbers are obviously out), then set up a few partitions and save to drive. Once rebooted nothing happens! Could this be because the ssd is 16gb? it's frustrating the the Amiga can see it in HDtools...

[Havie]

Just to let you know that I'm still waiting for package - hope it hasn't got lost in the post. beginning to think this whole ssd thing is jinxed for me and considering breaking out a proper hard drive instead...

[Havie]

Hi Zetro - still no sign of the package. Hope everything is ok. if you haven't got round to sending it yet, it would be great to have it next week as I am a head teacher so will have a few days to play with it. Cheers mate!

[Doda]

I did the same thing for A4000 on SCSI controller. Look at the monster:



mSATA SSD disk
mSATA -> 44pin IDE inteface
44pin IDE -> 40pin IDE (2.5" -> 3.5") conversion
IDE -> SCSI 50pin interface (from Yamaha CD-ROM)
SCSI 50pin -> SCSI 68pin conversion

It surprisingly works. I did some quick speed tests and with smaller data block it's 2-3 times faster then ordinary SCSI (hot and noisy 10K RPM LVD/SE) disk but it has a limit about 17-20MB/s with large files vs. 35MB/s on old disk. Because it's not a common task to copy 1GB file on Amiga, I don't care.

[xraynorm]

Hi

Any updates on the led issue?

[dirkies]

Good to know some 60/128gb 2.5" ssd's only contain like 1/3 of the enclosure as actual pcb making it an interesting alternative.

[Spacemonkey]

Anyone know of a 44 pin IDE to M-Sata adaptor with a master\slave jumper

[nogginthenog]

For what it's worth, my 40 pin IDE to msata doesn't have one either. Can't you set the other device as slave?

[Spacemonkey]

Originally Posted by nogginthenog

For what it's worth, my 40 pin IDE to msata doesn't have one either. Can't you set the other device as slave?

Tried that, doesn't work. Which is weird that the other CF reader did work (set to Slave) and it does work with another CF in the primary slot and set to Master

[nogginthenog]

Try swapping the positions on the IDE cable. IIRC Master needs to be at the end.

[Spacemonkey]

Originally Posted by nogginthenog

Try swapping the positions on the IDE cable. IIRC Master needs to be at the end.

The Adapter is a KA60 (see below) and the CF reader (set as Salve) is plugged into the 40 Pin IDE port with a IDE single cable. The m-Sata was plugged in to the 44 Pin port which should be master.