IDE to SATA conversion

5abr3 · 12 Sep 2009 at 12:22

Hi folks, my laptop has been on the edge of its 80GB IDE HDD for while now, opened up the laptop to find it has both an IDE and SATA connector in the drive bay so I was looking at the possibility of replacing the IDE drive for a SATA as they have higher capacity, speed and are cheaper. What appears to be the SATA mount has 8 pins in a row, first question is: is this a laptop SATA port, secondly, can these leads be purchased or are they difficult to acquire?

Thanks for the help

beermonster · 12 Sep 2009 at 17:11

Make and model of laptop would help but i've never come accross a laptop that supports both, its usually just a propriety ide to motherboard connector that your seeing.

5abr3 · 12 Sep 2009 at 17:24

Acer 5103WMLi, I can get an image of it if that would help?

beermonster · 12 Sep 2009 at 17:37

Yeah stick one up

5abr3 · 12 Sep 2009 at 17:59

Ok, here is a picture of the connector:

It's the white block near the cable routing mounts.

beermonster · 12 Sep 2009 at 18:24

I think thats a connector for an internal bluetooth module, its definately not a sata connector so you'll have to stick with an IDE drive unfortunately.

5abr3 · 12 Sep 2009 at 18:27

Ok, well at least I haven't bought a SATA HDD in advance!

FatalSaviour · 12 Sep 2009 at 23:06

Is that how your current hard drive connects to the PC (through that connector via a cable?)
Either way, as has been mentioned, that looks nothing like a conventional SATA port, sorry.

5abr3 · 12 Sep 2009 at 23:10

The hard-drive connects via a laptop IDE connector near it (they appear to share power rails).

Having had a search on an Acer-parts catalogue it does appear to be the bluetooth mount, why anyone would pay such amounts for an internal bluetooth card I have no idea! and why I didn't think to check there first either