Mini Drives for Mini-CDs? 56
fist_187 asks: "i'm working on a semi-portable MP3 player project, and would like to include a CD-ROM drive in my setup, but a full size drive is a little bigger than I'd like. so, I thought about using a drive designed for mini-CDs...but I can't find any! I know that there are several MP3 portables that use mini-CDs, but does someone know where to find the drives themselves (preferably in a USB or IDE variety)? The only thing I've been able to find, after some searching, is the Imation RipGO!, but that's already a player... defeating the purpose of building from scratch in the first place. Does anyone have advice on where to look?"
And the problem is... (Score:4, Funny)
You want to build a product from scratch. While looking for components, you found a inexpensive complete product that meets your needs, available off the shelf, that has too many features for too low of a price.
And the problem is...?
Re:And the problem is... (Score:1)
another problem (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:another problem (Score:2)
It's arguable that anyone would want to spend ~$100 on a 750M Zip setup where the disks cost ~$15 each when you can get a good CD-RW drive for much less (~$70 for a Sony)... that takes 700M disks and works with almost every system built in the last 4 years...
If you really want the smaller size, you can always get Mini CD-RWs...a pack of 10 will hold a total of ~2G of data and will cost ~$10...
As far as ruggedness, if you need more than the MINI-CD Jewel Case that comes with it, you can always buy a MINI-CD carrying case (just check out camera stores)...
And then there's the write speeds...4 minutes to wtite 66M to a 250M Zip disk on the new drives...and it won't even write a 100M disk...
Re:another problem (Score:2)
Re:another problem (Score:2)
Re:another problem (Score:1)
Re:And the problem is... (Score:1)
Re:And the problem is... (Score:3, Informative)
if you can think of a better combination of durability, compactness, and low price, let me know...
Hard disks are fine for car use (Score:1)
Just make sure you spin the disks down. I have the expendable 210mb with Linux and custom GPS/Ogg/mp3 software on it and the big music disk is only spun up when necessary.
If you really want a CDROM, there is a chap on the net who tried using a thirty foot cable to the boot: and it worked. Shove a standard CDROM under the seat.
Just don't try it with a 15K rpm disk
Re:Hard disks are fine for car use (Score:2)
one of the advantages for cds (or any interchangeable media) is being able to bring the music collection on the road from home to work and back, and be able to listen to it in all 3 places. i'd consider carrying the hard disk with me, but i'm very prone to dropping things... especially expensive things...
Re:Hard disks are fine for car use (Score:1)
I have an ethernet port in the car and just run a cable out of a window. Wireless would be easy and cool
Just remember to spin the disk down as much as possible. Think hdparm -a -m stuff and custom buffer routines. Linux 2.2 and noflushd if necessary.
Re:Hard disks are fine for car use (Score:2)
hah- sort of like a fuel pump for mp3s.
Re:And the problem is... (Score:1)
1. 2. 3. (Score:5, Funny)
2. Disassemble; make note of component manufacturers and part numbers. Call said manufacturer(s) for sample(s).
3. Reassemble. Return unit to Best Buy for a refund.
Re:1. 2. 3. (Score:5, Funny)
5. hop around and cuss.
Re:Give credit for your sig. (Score:1)
I'd love to give JWZ proper attribution, but it seems that Slashdot's sig length limit is so pathetically small that it just won't fucking fit.
Why not strip a full-sized of its casing? (Score:2)
If you can't reduce the travel distance of the shuttle, why not just live with a slightly long shuttle and make a housing for the lazer in a Mini-CDR format?
Re:Why not strip a full-sized of its casing? (Score:2)
Dear Slashdot ... (Score:4, Funny)
I am sure that with my new invention and some simple mass production techniques I will be able to sell these new people movers at a slight profit for less than $200,000 apiece.
(Ok Dean Kamen if you are reading this - we are laughing with you, not at you.
-:-
Honestly though, if you want to build it just to build it because that is what you want to do, just buy a single one one of the ones off the shelf by Imation, reverse engineer it via destructive analysis (take it apart), use the parts and ideas from that one that you like, like someone else mentioned track down the OEM part maker for the drive and look into a bulk purchase of that part, then re-evaluate the viability of the project. But if it is in your heart, build it - that is for sure, and we stand behind you on building your prototype 100%.
If you can't build it in mass quantity cheap enough to sell it at the price point of the Imation less 10% (because between now and then prices are coming down on hardware) then it isn't a viable commercial product. If you can build it for a third the cost of the Imation unit, go for it.
But follow your dreams. Old men laying in their death beds never look back and say 'damn I am glad I played it safe back when I was young.'
Re:Dear Slashdot ... (Score:1)
Re:Dear Slashdot ... (Score:2)
If you croak... (Score:1)
Yes, but you only regret for the short period of time between realizing that you've just killed yourself and actually dying. A short, sharp shock, so to speak.
Re:Dear Slashdot ... (Score:2)
If you want an aftermarket engine or one from another manufacturer, you can search google for "crate engines" [google.com]
HTH.
I've been looking for these, too. (Score:4, Interesting)
I've filled out the full size bays in quite a number of machines I have, and most still have floppy size bays available. I could put a floppy or zip drive in there, but a floppy is way too tight to build the rescue disk system I need to have (because it has more software than can ever fit on a floppy ... it's about 32MB in size). I've tried Zip drives, but all three I've used turn out to be regularly unreliable (I can coax them to work, but this isn't the kind of thing I want to put in customer locations). Maybe it's the media, but either way, the Zip drive option isn't where I want to go.
A small mini-CD drive that fits in the floppy drive bay would be ideal. Such a product would also let us start downsizing computer cases in a lot of new ways for the special purposes that don't need large amounts of CD data (such as firewalls and specialized mini-servers).
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:3, Informative)
Get a CompactFlash reader. They come standard in a lot of new multimedia machines, are available as external units via USB, and I think are available as drive bay units as well.
You can also put a PCMCIA reader (standard on laptops) in a slot bay and use a CompactFlash to PCMCIA adapter (adapter is a PCMCIA card you slide the CompactFlash into, costs about $10 - $20.)
Granted the media is a little more than mini-CDs but if you are not sending out updates all the time it isn't that expensive (plus with a CF-IDE adapter you can actually boot from it like a hard drive - not unlike a CD come to think of it)
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:1)
Yep, but the mini-cds have one other distinct advantage over CompactFlash. Most, if not all computers today have some sort of CD Drive (or DVD, or CD Burner, or DVD Burner) that are compatible with mini-cds.
The only type of drive I can imagine that is probably incompatible with it could be the drives on some apple machines (though, no currently shipping models, I think)... the old iMac comes to mind, with those car stereo style, tray-less cd-drives. In theory loading a mini-cd into one of those should be possible (correct me if I'm wrong with this assumption), but I'm not too sure about doing it consistently (I'd have to see it to believe it I guess, a bad picture comes to mind, for some reason, of the mini-cd playing pin-ball inside your computer if improperly positioned while loaded...).
Other than that, most modern drives are compatible with the media. Consequently, most computers would support updates / boot disks / etc. from mini-cds regardless of the sized drive and can burn them from any modern CD Burner...
I like the compactflash idea, though! Also, an even more expensive option is the (formerly IBM Storage) Microdrive [hgst.com]. Of course, these all, as you've pointed out, can't currently touch CD's in any size on price point... and hey, those mini-cd's can hold 185 MB!
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:4, Insightful)
1. They are a real pain to convince to boot. I've heard it done, and there are distros that boot from Compact Flash, but I'll be damned if I can do it.
2. They are incredibly "fussy." Not only do the cards have to stay in at all times (without removing them), but sometimes you just can't boot with them in, or will get strange, somewhat random errors (under XP) which can be rectified by removing the card. Of course, removing the card will often crash the computer, but sometimes it won't (And no, unmounting under linux doesn't help). Quite often, if I'm having an unexplained propogation of errors on a running system, it is because I accidently left a CF in the drive.
With Compact Flash you also have the problem of 1,000 Read / Write cycles per cell, or 3 read / write cycles per day for one year. Obviously caching data is essential, but you still have that low, low media life to contend with.
I'd personally take a mini CDRW any day of the week. But neither of these solves the other problem, which would be a lack of IDE connections. If no IDE connectors are available, neither solution will do you any good. If there are available IDE connectors, why not open the side of the case and plug in a vanilla CD drive?
1,0000? (Score:2)
I don't know of any flash memories limited to 1,000 write cycles at this point except for the program flash of Atmel AVR processors, but the only time such a unit should ever exceed (or even come close to) 1,000 flashes is during the software development cycle. (I think the average life of an AVR in Cornell's EE 476 lab is 2-4 weeks, due to the fact that it gets flashed every 2-3 minutes or more for 4-5 hours/day. In a production system the program flash should never need to be altered and in fact CAN'T be altered without external programming hardware in most AVR models.)
Re:1,0000? (Score:1)
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:2)
Write cycles are currently 100,000 to a million cycles per cell. Not forever but better than the 1 write cycle on CD-R's and mini-CD (do the minis come RW?) Once you get your system stable I envision the thrashing to be minimal if you set it up with that in mind (like a RAM drive for temporary files, etc...)
Then again once the drive is in the machine, mini CDRW media is really, really cheap compared to CF so
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:1)
They do. I've got a few 8cm CD-RWs by Memorex, I think they're primarily made for those digital cameras that write to mini CDs.
But there's gotta be some write limit on CD-RW too, right?
that makes no sense (Score:2)
It sounds to me you just have bad hardware, whatever hardware you have.
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:1)
One of the reasons CF won't be practical is that each machine will be in a separate customer location, and upgrades will be distributed by sending a replacement media to each location. At a few pennies per CDR this is practical. Mini-CD media is nearly as cheap these days. CF is nowhere as close. With CF now I have to arrange to have the old media shipped back. I'm better off with full size CD drives than with CF.
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:1)
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:4, Informative)
+small +"form factor" +"optical drive" [google.com]
--
Allen Gray
Re:I've been looking for these, too. (Score:2)
Re:Mini CD-R (Score:1)
I've got a pack sitting here....
Re:Mini CD-R (Score:1)
Re:Mini CD-R (Score:1)
As a pedestrian, the idea of carrying a CD in my hand on the way to a mate's house is not one to consider, and I don't want to carry a bag just for a single CD. I want to put such things in my pockets, and that is why I really like these little devils. That and they're funky..
* - Practically any pocket. Shirt pocket, jacket pocket, jeans pocket if they're in a jewel case..
Mod the RipGo (Score:1)
They are only available in mass quantity bare (Score:3, Interesting)
Other than that, no one is interested in making a mass produced version simply because it holds so little data. Perhaps if someone would finally come out with an 80mm DVD then the players for that (~1GB for dual layer) might be enough data to make it worthwhile.
At this point, I'd suggest you simply use a large 2.5" or 1.8" or compactflash hard drive.
No one wants to carry their music seperate from their players anymore anyway. It's cheaper to have them seperate now, and the user interface is a little easier since you don't have to spend so much time catagorizing your music and playlists, but this isn't the case for the IPOD, and future devices aren't likely to continue to do it this way.
-Adam
Separate music and players (Score:2)
There are two good reasons to have music separate from the player.
First, you can conveniently trade music away from your computer. I have an iPod. (I love it.) I can't trade music from my iPod to a friend's iPod without going through a laptop or desktop computer. You can argue this is a software issue Apple could fix with a firmware change, but the little lcd screen really isn't a good way to do selection for "send this but not this". That's probably part of why you can't delete songs on the iPod unless you hook it up to a computer. (Though I'd really like to be able to do that too.)
Second, you don't use any battery power by handing your friend a cd or mini-cd. This is a wonderful thing for a device with no swappable battery. These things live and die by battery usage.
slimline cd drives (Score:1)
Forget mini-cd's!!! (Score:2, Informative)
That way, you can store data, import mini-discs and anything else you want. Mini-discs are small enough for what you are seeking.
Re:Forget mini-cd's!!! (Score:2)
However, I have a friend that just bought a Sony MiniDisc/MP3 player from Best Buy [bestbuy.com]. Incidentally, it was $129, less than half the price listed here. I am not entirely sure it was the same model, but I think it is. I have no reason for the price discrepancy.
In any case, if you were not set on the medium (optical vs. minidisc), this might suit your purposes. You could disassemble this and make it smaller, though it is pretty damn small as it is. You were unclear in your post whether your desire is just to prove that you can hack an MP3 player together, or whether you were trying to save money, but $129 is pretty darn cheap. If it is missing the features you want, you could buy this and hack those in. A bigger LCD would be nice. Also, there is this, a computer MiniDisc drive [sony.com]. It might help you with construction/experimentation, or even using this device in your ultimate invention.
The cons as I see them are that you are tied down to a proprietary, closed-source medium. It is relatively popular, but not ubiquitous (like CDR).
The pros: it's cheap. It's easy. It's small.
Good Luck. -Foster
Welcome to 1995. (Score:2)
It's time to move on and find something else to build from scratch. Nobody's gonna be impressed by a bunch of machinery and duct tape that doesn't quite fit in your pocket and only holds about 8 hours worth of music. And it's gonna end up costing you a lot of money and (more importantly) time.
- A.P.
RipGo available for $100 (Score:1)
The Imation RipGo is available here for $100:
http://www.ssdonline.com/detail_page.cfm?Product ID=41608&affid=h57