Does WINUAE work in a USB HD 2.5?

[Harrison]

The same seller is now selling those for £1.93 + £2.94 postage (£4.87) which is still a good deal, but I think for £6.98 the one I've seen that also has an SATA to USB connector and an external PSU in addition to the IDE connectors is worth the extra price as I'm sure it will come in handy when I am repairing PCs.

[Tiago]

Yes external power for the 3.5 is a good option, mine doesn't have it. The 2.5 doesn't need but the 3.5 has that problem. So i think that one can be very goog.

I bought it for the amiga, i dont have a standart pc, only a laptop, so is the only choise i have to use the Amiga HD.

By the way, i try to connect a 2nd Amiga Hd in the 2.5 converter, and try to install AmigaSYS3 AGA in It, i did it just like the manual said and gives me a error "checksun error" ... the error occur after copy more then 10MB of data, then i try to simply install WB3.1 and he same error.... any idea?

[Harrison]

Sounds like you have a read/write error on the HD itself. Try to do a full PC format of the drive, and then reformat it as an Amiga drive and try again. If that doesn't work then you will need to run some harddrive software that can check the disk and repair any bad sectors on the disk.

I'm not sure if any of the Linux/DOS software will access a USB disk but have a look at http://www.ultimatebootcd.com as it contains lots of tools that can fix these problems. But if the tools on that disc can't access a USB drive then the ones on the disc at http://www.ubcd4win.com should be able to, but you need to follow a guide to build the CD image for that one before you can write and use the disc, whereas the ultimatebootcd is just an ISO you download and burn and can use.

[Tiago]

Thanks Harrison, i will try it.

[Harrison]

My similar HD to USB adaptor arrived today from Hong Kong. That took about a month to arrive, so not exactly fast delivery, but I suppose due to the festive season that is partly to blame.

I connected a 2.5" laptop drive to it and that worked perfectly. I was able to access and use the drive at full speed. And that has already proved very useful as my girlfriend's old Compaq laptop died and she had a load of pictures on there, so I've now managed to back that lot up to DVD for her.

I also had a spare 3.5" SATA drive lying around so gave that a try, but sadly it didn't work. I followed the instructions included. Connecting the external PSU to the drive first, and I could hear and feel the drive spinning up and unparking itself. I then connected the SATA data cable to the USB adaptor, and then plugged it into the PC. But nothing! It didn't recognise the adaptor or the HD. Nothing listed under the USB devices. Strange. I'm sure the actual drive is fine.

One odd thing I've had happen a couple of times though is that Windows has thrown up an error message, while I've had the 2.5" HD connected, saying "delayed wirte failed". I looked this up and checked that write caching was disabled in XP, but it still sometimes happens. Have you had this happen to you using this usb adaptor?

Another thing that has happened a couple of times is that the HD has been lost by Windows. I've been accessing the HD contents and looking through the directories, but I've tried to open a directory and the contents is blank. I've disconnected and reconnected the USB cable and then I can access it again. Strange. I'm wondering if there is an HD size limit with this USB adaptor as the 2.5" I'm using is 40GB. I will try another I have that is 6GB to see if that causes the same problems.

[burns flipper]

That's like the ones I've found on ebay. I've now also found one that also has a SATA port on the top, so you can connect both 2.5 and 3.5 IDE, as well as SATA drives via USB which could be very useful. Plus it comes with an external PSU too so you can connect up 3.5" HD's and supply them with power. That one is £2.99 + £4.95 postage (£6.98 total) and the seller is in the UK, so I might get that one.

I got one of these a few weeks ago. I plugged in my Amiga 3.5" HD but it didn't recognise it. I had to plug it into my main IDE interface to be able to access it.

[Harrison]

Did you have an external PSU connected to the 3.5" HD powering it?

I've not tried a normal 3.5" HD yet with mine. I might give that a go this afternoon with the drive from my A4000.

[burns flipper]

Yes.