looking for an usb to ide/pata adapter

voodoo47 on 26/2/2016 at 21:18

but not the usual "allows to connect an ide/pata drive to an usb port", but rather the "allows to connect an usb drive to an ide/pata interface". they are (http://mail.salvationdata.com/data-recovery-equipment/USB-IDE-Adapter.htm) a thing, but it looks like my google-fu is not strong enough. so, if someone manages to stumble upon one, please let me know.

trying to get rid of mechanical drives in my main retro machine, and not much luck so far - a pci usb card won't allow booting (required), and I think ide/pata to sdhc adapter would be too slow for this (might try anyway, as they are available, and laughably cheap).

bikerdude on 26/2/2016 at 22:53

I found your adapter but its silly money @$150 -

- (http://www.pctool-parts.com/USB-IDE-Adapter-2.html)

You can buy Compact flash to IDE -

- (http://www.amazon.co.uk/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Dcomputers&field-keywords=Compact+flash+to+IDE)

Addionics are a good place for weird drive adapters, -

(http://www.addonics.com/sitesearch/index.php?sitesearch_box=IDE)

You can usually find what various adapters Addionics sell on amazon.

voodoo47 on 26/2/2016 at 23:58

ouch - I'm no stranger to dishing out ridiculous amounts of money for odd hardware (you don't want to know how much I've paid for an agp2pci adapter), but $150 is a bit too much for what I have in mind. I'm quite surprised that no made in china clone is available, normally they seem to churn out all sorts of crazy adapters like there is no tomorrow.

CF or SD adapters can be bought on ebay, no problem there - guess I'll just get one and see whether it will be enough to operate win98 at decent speeds.

zoog on 27/2/2016 at 09:13

[off]Are SD's speed rates of 20..30MB/s not enough to work or play?[/off]

voodoo47 on 27/2/2016 at 11:05

*(http://www.ebay.com/itm/3-5-40-Pin-Male-IDE-To-All-SD-SDHC-MMC-Card-for-Desktop-PCB-Bracket-free-ship-/271724540592) clicks on buy now* guess we'll find out in about 10 days.

Zerker on 27/2/2016 at 11:35

Let me know how that one works for you. I'm rocking a compact flash to IDE adaptor on my retro machine, but it would be nice to know how the alternatives are. The speeds on my adaptor are totally fine for my needs at the moment. Though to be fair, for the CF adaptors, it's extremely dependent on the capabilities of the card to the point that some cards don't actually support enough features to be boot drives!

voodoo47 on 27/2/2016 at 12:35

yeah, I'm hoping that a new sd card would support everything (the adaptor itself supposedly does) - things might get slow without DMA and PIO and stuff like that.

voodoo47 on 18/3/2016 at 15:21

yep, looks like it's going to be ok;

[video=youtube;Yn9vwOf19XE]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yn9vwOf19XE[/video]