Handtops, UMPC - Hard Drive Upgrade

07/25/07 + wormdrummer

Is it possible to upgrade the hard drive in the flipstart?????... If so, any ideas what drive I can upgrade to??

07/25/07 + tknguyen

You can upgrade the hard drive in the flipstart to a 40 GB 1.8" hard drive, 5 mm thick, zif connector. I do not think a higher capacity hard drive in this form factor exists. You can also upgrade to a 64 GB ssd. However this drive is not available yet for consumers.

Recent Blog: Extra USB port for Flipstart

07/25/07 + elsewhere

Toshiba makes 60, 80, 100 GB 1.8" drives, but they're all 8mm thick.
Toshiba's 20, 30 and 40 GB drives are pretty cheap- ~ $100 or so from ewiz.com
Samsung's 16 and 32gb SSD (flash) are not cheap, but much faster/better ~ $250/$500 from newegg.com

I *believe* Samsung's drives are 5mm.... not certain

07/26/07 + tknguyen

I just replaced the 30 GB hard drive of the Flipstart with a 32GB SSD from sandisk sold by Dell. However I obtained this SSD from ebay

link

I need to take the drive (which consists of 2 ram broads connected together) out of the casing for it to fit the Flipstart.

I do not have hard data. However it seems that the Flipstart with a SSD is more responsive compared with the OQO 01+ with a SSD ( I have both). For the OQO 01+, I do not feel an improvement in performance except at boot time.

Recent Blog: Extra USB port for Flipstart

07/26/07 + edgemaster

Do you notice a solid increase in performance?? Do you think it is worth 500$?? Does it make it noticeably faster?

Recent Blog: OQO vs. Flipstart

07/26/07 + muntaser7

if not faster, is it running cooler and more quite?

07/26/07 + edgemaster

BTW, Muntaser, did you ever catch up on the Autohotkey advice Logan gave you?

Recent Blog: OQO vs. Flipstart

07/26/07 + tknguyen

For the programs I frequently use (matlab, visual basic,..) it seems to run faster. I do not notice this with the OQO 01+. I think the SSD is worth $500. I only have to pay $375 from ebay which is $200 cheaper than the 32GB drive I bought from newegg.com for my OQO 01+. However the Flipstart does not wake up from standby with the SSD. I can hear the fan on but the screen is completely dark. I have to reboot every time and I do not know what is the problem. I appreciate any suggestion.

Recent Blog: Extra USB port for Flipstart

07/26/07 + educationk12

I have had various computers with a 32GB solid state drive. I seem to think the majority of 32GB SSD drives are all the same as far as performance. They make no noise, so they don't have the spinning hard drive sound. They of course don't get hot so your computer will be slightly cooler. They don't use much power so you'll say 1 to 2 watts of power consumption. As far as blazing speeds. I do notice a difference...but I'm not sure I notice a $500 difference! ;o) If you look at reviews that have done performance tests...keep in mind that it doesn't really help all the other components very much...it's just that one component that is faster, so it all depends on what computer you put it in. I was disappointed when I first used them, but now I dislike spinning drives because they are noisy and slower. The other good thing is you don't defragment SSD drives and they don't break when you drop your computer...if that should happen. No moving parts to break.

So noticably faster, yeh you will notice it but not lightning fast like people have made them seem...kinda like the difference you notice between a 4200rpm drive and a 7200rpm drive if that makes sense? Obviously SSD is faster than 7200...i'm saying the speed difference you experience between a 4200rpm and 7200rpm would probably be the difference you'd feel but after $500 you might not feel anything.

Worth $500...that's subjective. I'm not sure it is really, but it's nice to have that's for sure. I guess it depends on how drastically they drop in price. I remember paying $550 for a 1GB sony memory stick back when they first came out, now they are worth hardly nothing.

edited: Jul 26 2007 + educationk12

Not sure how thick the samsung drives are but they seem thinner than 5mm...possibly 3 or 4mm. They are very thin! Some of them come with black rubber on the bottom, others have some aluminum type material around them, etc...depends on whether they have stuff around them, of course you can take them off and most dont' come with that, it's more of an OEM manufacturer decision.

07/26/07 + muntaser7

hey edgemaster, I tried it again and got very frustrated and gave up.
I am going to wait a year and then upgrade to SSD. hopefully by then the prices are at least half of what they are now.

07/27/07 + tknguyen

My flipstart can not resume from standby with a SSD. I have to reboot every time. Any idea about the problem? Thanks for your suggestion.

Recent Blog: Extra USB port for Flipstart

07/27/07 + edgemaster

Did you already install the service pack 1 from flipstart?

Recent Blog: OQO vs. Flipstart

07/27/07 + tknguyen

I have problem install the service pack 1 from flipstart since it keeps asking me to uninstall the previous flipstart control software even though I already uninstall everything I saw in the remove programs from the control pannel. I hope that I will not have to reinstall XP.

Recent Blog: Extra USB port for Flipstart

07/27/07 + elsewhere

tknguyen said: "I just replaced the 30 GB hard drive of the Flipstart with a 32GB SSD from sandisk sold by Dell. However I obtained this SSD from ebay"

How difficult was it to open the device and replace the drive?
Is the drive buried deep in the machine (needing many screws and much, much patience)
or is it relatively easy to locate and extract?

I could imagine... keeping multiple drives (XP, Vista, Linux, (OS X?)) and swapping them in as needed
though if as I suspect, the operation is too delicate;
one might not want to do too many swaps too often (if at all!)