09-15-2004, 10:00 PM
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Editor Emeritus
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 15,171
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5GB Microdrives Hitting The Market -- From MP3 Players
To the best of my knowledge, both the new Creative MuVo2 and the Rio Carbon use the new Seagate 5GB Microdrives. Instructions have started floating on the 'Net as to how to extract these -- supposedly, they do work much like the Hitachi 4GB did on earlier Creative units. You can get instructions on extracting the drive from a MuVo2 here, and from the Carbon here.
Units have also started appearing on eBay, as it's apparently cheaper to extract it than to buy it standalone. Of course, if you decide to try the extraction trick yourself, realize that you're doing it at your own risk. That said, if anyone has played with the 5GB units in their Pocket PCs, report back and let us know!
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09-16-2004, 12:26 AM
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Theorist
Join Date: Jun 2002
Posts: 301
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I love my Carbon, but I didn't realize it's worth more dead than alive. It would be tough to take a screwdriver to it when I've only had it two weeks, but I'm tempted...
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09-16-2004, 01:26 AM
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2000 Posts And This is All I Get?
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 2,017
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Ok, so the temptation is to buy a muvo2, get the 5G drive out, replace it with an older 1G microdrive. And give the muvo2 to a friend as birthday present (of course you have to tell him/her that this is the 'limited edition - 1G version'). That way, you'll get 2 types of satisfaction :
1. The new 5G drive on your PDA, filled with oggs, movies and camera images.
2. The happy look on your friend's face.
By the way, the current price of the muvo2 has gone down to $240 in singapore. 5G drive for $240, while the magicstor 2.2Gdrive cost $260. This is weird economy indeed.
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09-16-2004, 04:59 AM
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Intellectual
Join Date: Mar 2004
Posts: 241
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hmmm . . .
Doin it tomorrow! Ill let ya know how it goes . . .
:devilboy:
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09-16-2004, 08:20 AM
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Theorist
Join Date: Dec 2006
Posts: 276
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Can anyone point me in the general direction of a net store that sells the 5G Muvos and that ships outside North America?
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09-16-2004, 10:09 AM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Jun 2003
Posts: 90
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by manywhere
Can anyone point me in the general direction of a net store that sells the 5G Muvos and that ships outside North America?
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If you like me find yourself in that situation more often than you like, then a mail forwarding service might be useful:
http://www.mail-forwarding-advisor.com/index.html
I use USA Box and I'm quite happy with the arrangement.
More on topic. I thought that the new drives were of the type that could not be extracted from the mp3-player?
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09-16-2004, 10:27 AM
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Thinker
Join Date: Aug 2006
Posts: 330
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by Oleander
I thought that the new drives were of the type that could not be extracted from the mp3-player?
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Quote:
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However, we can't be sure that the later batches of the Seagate ST1 drives in the MuVo� FM can work but the first batch does work.
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from the virtual-zone article!
Thats what happened with the older MuVo 2's
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09-16-2004, 04:27 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Jul 2003
Posts: 58
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I took one for the team...
http://www.mobilegadgetnews.com/modu...ticle&sid=2170
 
__________________
Sean MurphyFounder - Mobile Gadget News Devices - Dell X51v, MPx220, Sony/Ericsson GC83 Edge Card,*Dell X50v, Audiovox SMT5600 (WM5.0), Audiovox PPC4100, Voq Pro
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09-16-2004, 04:57 PM
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Ponderer
Join Date: Sep 2002
Posts: 109
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Quote:
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Originally Posted by wocket
Quote:
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Originally Posted by Oleander
I thought that the new drives were of the type that could not be extracted from the mp3-player?
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Quote:
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However, we can't be sure that the later batches of the Seagate ST1 drives in the MuVo� FM can work but the first batch does work.
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from the virtual-zone article!
Thats what happened with the older MuVo 2's |
It's odd that Creative went with a new drive that could be harvested from the MuVo�, especially after the debacle with the 4gig drives. The situation though was good for Creative as people were buying the units as fast as they could make them, but bad for Hitachi who was losing profits because they could not justify the huge mark up they were charging for the bare drives. Creative could have probably cared less if people were cracking the units open like Thanksgiving turkeys as long as the 4gig Muvos were flying off the shelves.
I don't see the same situation happening with the 5gig MuVo because Seagate is charging a reasonale price for the bare drives. Heck, they are practically the same price as the Muvo! There is no real advantage to buying the units and harvesting the drive unless you have a few CF cards that you want to get rid of. The bare MuVo's that housed 4gig drives were selling at about $20-30 on ebay, but there's no $100-150 profit to be made by harvesting these new drives. The unique economic situation with the 4gig drives was created by Hitachi alone -- being greedy, pure and simple.
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09-16-2004, 05:05 PM
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Philosopher
Join Date: Feb 2002
Posts: 516
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Are these Seagate drives any more energy efficient than the Hitachi drives? I suspect that they're about the same.
Sean, have you done any tests to see how using this drive has affected your battery life? Thanks,
Scott
__________________
Tapland
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