10-10-2005, 09:17
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Make your lousy 2 or 4 Gb Nano a great 200GB Ipod.
Citaat:
Before you start
The iPod Nano is a great testament to clean engineering, design, and efficiency in a portable device. However, Apple failed to consider that the available storage capacity is very small! UncycloMedia Commons has released this guide to installing additional storage on your iPod Nano brand device. It might be a good idea to set aside a good two to three hours to installing this addon, but it's pretty easy to perform, as long as you know what you're doing.
Before you Start
Before you get started, you're going to need the following components, easily orderable online.
(1) iPod Nano 4gb model, white.
(1) Soldering iron
(1) Silver non rosin core solder
(1) Philips screwdriver
(1) RAIDMAX IDE interface controller, model 323RS-0
(1) Maxtor Diamond Plus 9 200gb IDE 3.5" HD
(1) Rounded IDE Cable
(1) Chain Saw
(1) Brass Monkey
Note that this set of instructions will not work with the black version. Be sure to ask your retailer which model you are receiving prior to shipment. As well as not working with the black version, this will also not work with the 2gb version so check the version and space before doing any modification to the iPod.
Note that the 200gb capacity enables you to store about 50 000 pieces of music. If this capacity is filled with illegal "warez" mp3s, you can be fined up to 75 000 000 USD. (204 800 megabytes, 4 megabytes per song, 10 songs per CD, average CD price 15 USD).
Step 1 - Disassembly
First, put on a static wrist strap and attach it to a grounded surface to avoid damaging the iPod Nano. Open the package. Remove your iPod Nano from the protective casing. Admire the packaging. Remove the packaging from your hard drive, and lay it on the table.
Step 2 - Jumper settings
Set the jumpers on the hard drive for cable select. Using any other setting could cause harm to your iPod Nano. Attach the rounded IDE cable to the hard drive, black end into the unit. Take care to align the red wire with pin 1 on the main interface line.
Step 3 - Opening it
Disassemble the iPod Nano using a screwdriver, and a Dremel. Use a very fine bit on the Dremel to avoid tarnishing the finish. Separate the two halves of the shell, and lay them on the table. Remove each part and place them separately. Remove the click wheel, and battery components to expose the mainboard. Remove the LCD screen with care, as it is very delicate. Avoid allowing dust to settle on it. When you are done, it should look like this.
Step 4 - Desoldering Flash
As your new iPod Nano with expanded storage capacity will no longer require the puny amounts that it originally came with, you should use solder flux and braid to desolder the flash onboard the iPod Nano. The chips you need to desolder are indicated in the diagram below. You only need to desolder one chip, but two makes it easier to work with later. Once you've done so, you can throw away the memory chips, as they are no longer necessary.
Step 5 - Attaching an ATA connector
Remove the RAIDMAX RS series daughterboard from the original board. It should be easily removable, as the board was designed for expansion and easy intergration. Solder the following pins to the mainboard where you dismounted the memory (don't worry, Flash and ATA are similar enough that the onboard controller can handle the signal conversion without a firmware update. After all, the CompactFlash protocol was designed with ATA in mind. Finally, Windows formats USB memory sticks in FAT32 anyway.)
You should have the following when you are completed with your soldering.
Step 6 - Attach your hard drive
Connect the IDE cable end to your iPod Nano now, and using the Dremel, drill a big hole in the case so that it can come out. Pass the wires through the hole, clamp the case shut. Apply a liberal amount of hot glue, and rubber band it to the hard drive. You can now carry it successfully.
Conclusion
Here is our finished product. Beautiful, isn't it?
Now you have 200gb of storage space, fill it up with songs! We found in our benchmarking results that the addition of the ATA hard drive adversely affected battery life. However, we believe that this is a small price to pay for an over 50x increase in storage capacity. Using Apple's own bitrate calculations, we can now store over 150,000 minutes of music! You'll never listen to the same song twice. This is such a great advantage over the original model that we urge all iPod Nano owners to upgrade immediately.
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