Despite the ubiquity of very usable USB flash drives, the good old hard drives are not going to give up their positions, ahead of all other storage media in terms of affordable volume and cost. Moreover, if there is no revolutionary breakthrough in the field of information storage, the situation will remain unchanged. The difficulty is that if flash drives are designed only for the USB bus (with the exception of card-like ones, which we do not consider), then everything is not so simple with respect to hard drives.
Problem history
The first hard drives were connected to computers via the IDE interface (we’ll leave out very old modifications). On the device there was a rectangular connector 80 × 10 mm in size with a comb of recessed in-pin contacts.
Using a special loop containing 80 conductors, pairing with the motherboard was performed. Then the serial
interface SATA became the standard
, and the hard drives got a more compact connector. From that moment, the owners of older devices began to use adapters for hard drives, which made it possible to connect the "old people" to new computing systems. It might seem that the problem was finally resolved, but subsequently the situation only became more complicated.
"Magic" adapter
The IDE-SATA hard drive adapter was a small electronic circuit located inside the plastic case of the device. A wire departed from it for the serial bus, ending with a corresponding plug, allowing you to connect to a computer. But the IDE parallel bus connector (“mother”) was part of the body of the adapter itself. The old hard drive was connected to it.
Power was supplied to the hard drive through a small separate power supply. This is not a very convenient solution, but due to the rather high power consumption of the hard drives there was no alternative.
As a result of such manipulations, the computer could work with an outdated, but still functioning drive, as well as with the new SATA variant. In addition, this practically did not affect the overall performance of the system.
USB time
After the advent of the universal serial bus, the development of peripheral devices of computing systems accelerated markedly. Convenience was obvious: a separate power supply, as a rule, was not required, since the standard initially assumed 5 V supply at a maximum current of 500 (revision 2) and 900 mA (new 3rd version); the connector itself was placed on the outside of the case (for IDE and SATA, it was necessary to open the system unit). Moreover, the USB adapter for the hard drive that appeared right away made it possible to perform a “hot” connection without shutting down the entire computing system.
Physically, such an adapter is completely analogous to the described IDE-SATA, with the only difference being that there is a USB connector (“male”) on one side and a universal block with connectors for hard drives for parallel and serial interfaces. Despite the fact that some devices no longer require a separate power supply, for compatibility with very old solutions, their own current source is usually attached.
Winchesters for laptops
Recently, a 2.5-inch adapter for a hard disk is very popular. These hard drives are installed in laptop computers and differ from the usual ones not only in their reduced dimensions, but also in a reduced level of consumption. An important feature is high reliability, which is largely explained by resistance to shock and shocks, tens of times higher than these characteristics of desktop counterparts. Such drives are so widely used that calling such solutions "laptop" is no longer entirely correct. Most often, they are designed to work with the SATA interface.
Design
Adapters for hard drives of the above type are conventionally divided into several types:
- adapters designed to replace a regular DVD-RW device with a second hard drive in laptops;
- the so-called pockets that actually turn the drive into a huge portable flash drive;
- universal, similar to the first IDE-SATA, but more technological.
The use of one or another adapter depends on the range of tasks that are supposed to be solved with its help. Let us dwell on this moment in more detail.
Laptop Upgrade
Some adapters for hard drives enable the laptop owner to increase the total available disk space by installing a special design inside the system case. First, a long-lost CD-ROM drive is removed. According to its dimensions, an adapter for a 2.5-inch SATA hard drive is selected.
Relatively speaking, this is a metal box in which the hard drive is placed, fixed by screws. There is also a small scarf equipped with SATA connectors, with the help of which data is exchanged between the system bus and the device. The box with the hard drive is inserted into the DVD-RW and fixed with regular bolts. On the visible side there is a plastic pad that simulates a
CD drive panel
. Such adapters for hard drives support the new SATA-3 standard, although it is unlikely that the user will see a difference in performance compared to the previous revision.
Huge flash drive
Very often, adapters for hard drives are used to turn hard drives into portable self-contained drives. For example, to watch high-definition video on a TV, Wi-Fi speeds may not be enough.
In this case, you have to either stretch a network cable to it, which is not always possible, or pre-record the clip to a USB flash drive and connect it to the TV. At the same time, with an increase in resolution, the occupied volume also increases, so the drive must be of the appropriate class, and this affects its cost. As a result, it turns out that it is much more profitable to purchase a SATA-to-USB adapter-pocket, a simple 2.5-inch hard drive and use this solution instead of a flash drive.
Structurally, such an adapter is a small metal or plastic box with an interface board. A hard drive is inserted inside and closed by a cover. It turns out a completely finished product with a mini USB-connector, which can be transported without fear of damaging anything. The appropriate cable is inserted into it and connected to the desired device. Sometimes the cable is split into two USB branches. Double attachment is necessary if the hard disk used does not have enough power from one port to operate.