HOW TO: 5v USB power for 2.5'' hard drive

[wiretap]

I have the windows ce format method on my 100GB drive.. I have around 50GB of music and 25GB of videos. It doesn't recognize from a cold boot, but it recognizes just fine and plays all my music/vids within 30-45 seconds of plugging it in.

[apathyps]

well its a new day, time for some more testing on my F900.

 

For reference:

F900BT

WD 250GB my passport essential external

all music in either .mp3 or mp4 format

formatted the hdd using fat32format via command prompt in vista64

usb y-cable for extra hdd power

 

 

my goal is to get 130GB of music recognized >5 minutes.

 

last night i went through the drive and deleted all the cover art .jpgs, .m3u playlist entries, and random .txt and video files. when the drive was filled with about 68GB, it seemed to lag out the F900BT so that i could not choose a source to play music from. i was in a rush, so i didn't give it more than 3 minutes once i saw that it was lagging. this may have been able to be recognized had i given it another minute or two.

 

 

my last test was just trying to get 40GB of only .mp3's and .mp4's recognized. this works, but will not reliably cold boot. sometimes its recognized within 30 seconds, sometimes 2 minutes, other times 4 or 5. so far it seems like its a waste of time to wait to see if it will cold boot, so for the sake of time saving, im going to be plugging the HDD in once the system has booted (30 seconds after key turn).

 

will update later today as i make more progress.

[Tillude]

i did ficks the plugin problem by installing a time-relais in the USB cable this will make the usb drive start 20 seconds after power, so no need to unplug it everytime i boot

[FeloniusMonkey]

wiretap,

 

This is a great tutorial. I was wondering if we could go one step further...

 

The lead on the power module is 4' long, and the fuse is built into the casing. Shouldn't we just be able to cut off the plug on the end, and attach the vampire clip to the bare wire ends, thus negating the need for the additional socket? It's pretty tight under my center console/emer brake cover, and I don't know if I can squeeze the plug and socket. It would also allow me to drill a smaller hole in my glove box, since I wouldn't need to pass a 1" wide DC plug through it.

 

EDIT: Found a detailed PDF regarding this: http://www.magnadyne.com/MagPublic/Pictures/DVU-2-INS.pdf Says if you want to hardwire, you need to attach the power lead to a fused 20A source, and the black lead to the chassis ground. Would the vampire tap method you illustrated achieve this? The unit body does have a fuse in it, but maybe I'm missing something. BTW, is the ground wire of the "tappee" power line attached to the vehicle chassis, or to the battery (-) terminal (or is it the exact same thing)?

 

Thanks.

[wiretap]

Yes, you can hardware, and I mentioned you could do that.

 

The reason I made a big hole in my glove box was for USB cables and other cables to pass through easily.

[FeloniusMonkey]

Yes, you can hardware, and I mentioned you could do that.

 

The reason I made a big hole in my glove box was for USB cables and other cables to pass through easily.

Thank you, but please stop calling me "hardware".

[wiretap]

I mean "hard wire", as in you could hard wire it. lol. I was probably typing from my phone. Sorry about that.

[my_black_RS5]

Then something like this should work in theory too although I'm having trouble recognizing the hd after it spins up.

 

http://www.amazon.com/Cables-Unlimted-Z ... 647&sr=8-6