Hard drive connections

Forums › Laptops and mobile computers › Hard drive connections

Rickles

3107 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 445

Trusted

#102906 25-May-2012 09:39

When looking at a 2.5 inch SATA drive I can see the two sets of pins that make up the standard SATA connection, but there are also 4 small pins that don't seem to be used in the drive bay.

Anyone tell me what the 4 pins are for?

Cheers ... R.

garvani

1873 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 83

Trusted

#630197 25-May-2012 09:42

They are the jumper settings. You add a plastic jumper over some pins for various things, such as limiting the drive to sata1 speeds, limiting the drive to XXgb etc.

Rickles

3107 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 445

Trusted

#630199 25-May-2012 09:44

Thanks Jason, I'd not thought about jumpers for SATA drives, and all the ones I've seen had no jumper caps at all.

R.

josephhinvest

1550 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 322

ID Verified

Trusted

#630214 25-May-2012 10:20

I was going to say maybe temperature / other sensors.
On the 3.5 inch seagate and hitachi hard drives in new iMacs, they use the third connector with proprietary plug, of course, for temperature sensor connection.

Cheers,
Joseph

Edit... Brain fade!

jpwise

jpwise
591 posts

Ultimate Geek
+1 received by user: 13

Lifetime subscriber

#633302 31-May-2012 12:19

Likewise my guess is debug interface. As jofizz said they use it with 3.5" drives on on iMacs for thermal monitoring.

Working for Service Plus - serviceplus.co.nz

Authorised Service Provider for Apple, Asus, BenQ, Dynabook, Lenovo, and others - refer serviceplus.co.nz/brands

stevenz

2802 posts

Uber Geek
+1 received by user: 125

#633308 31-May-2012 12:27

Some possible uses:

http://wdc-de.custhelp.com/app/answers/detail/a_id/981/~/how-to-physically-install,-set-jumper-settings,-and-set-up-a-serial-ata,-eide,

@KnightNZ