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Farming Hard Drives (2012)

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41 points floriangosse | 1 comments | 16 Oct 25 05:50 UTC | HN request time: 0s | source
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MarkusWandel ◴[22 Oct 25 17:16 UTC] No.45672207[source]▶
What fraction of external hard disks is still "shuckable" these days? I know the WD Passports aren't. The USB connector is directly on the drive's PCB, no SATA bridge.
replies(1): >>45672377 #
zampano ◴[22 Oct 25 17:28 UTC] No.45672377[source]▶
I think a lot of the larger form-factor/larger capacity models are still shuckable, though sometimes you still have to put kapton tape on one of the pins to allow it to work with a normal machine.
replies(2): >>45673249 #>>45674302 #
1. toast0 ◴[22 Oct 25 19:53 UTC] No.45674302[source]▶
> sometimes you still have to put kapton tape on one of the pins to allow it to work with a normal machine.

It's easier to cut the 3.3v wire from the power supply. If you have color coded wires, it'll be the orange wire; if not, it'll be the same color as every other wire.

To a first approximation, nothing ever uses 3.3v from sata power, so it made sense to remove it from the spec. Reusing the pins so that 3.3v inhibits functionality was kind of crazy though.