iMac G3 Teal HDD Expansion

ACS,

..I was thinking I could install the two HDD like PC systems but I was mistaken as there is only enough room for one. Is there any modifications I can do to include the second HDD?

I've done this but it required modification of the of the connector cable. There's room if you remove the optical drive. Then you have to mod the connector for the optical drive since it's longer than a standard ATA connector and the key is in the wrong place so it has to be shaved off.
It worked fine as I recall. I think the drive set for master was the last on the chain.
Richard

Message was edited by: spudnuty

Hey ACS,

Is there any URLs on doing this

No I've never seen any. It's kind of a weird thing to do.

Well turns out I've still got that cable kicking around in my tech shop. I just put pictures here:
http://www.photolava.com/view/k1e8.html
http://www.photolava.com/view/k1e7.html
It looks like I did was to put a ATA connector that I pulled off a ATA cable in that position that you see. It probably came from a PC. I have a lot of iMac and PC parts laying around.
Now that I look at it I had to remove that optical connector since it was in the way.
So with that taken apart connector carefully aligned I pressed together in my gigantic vice. This is hard to do correctly and I've messed this job up a bunch of times. It also takes a careful analysis of how those connectors lock together to take one apart.
So I would say you'll have to find a bunch of parts and give it a try.
Now that I look at it you could just use a standard PC ATA cable. I do remember shaving off the "key" on a cable so it would do this. So it might be that this cable I just shot didn't work and the way I did it was to use a regular PC HD cable and shave off the key so I was just using the part of the flex that's away from the red band. Be very careful if you try this. If you plug this cable into the wrong place you could either kill your iMac's ATA bus or the hard drives or both. That would be because the optical draws power from those extra parts of the flex that don't come down to the hard drive/s.
I remember I did this since I had a bunch of small drives and wanted to put two in an iMac to have more storage in there without having to buy a larger drive.
Oh and you'll have to make a special power cable for the 5.5 and 12 Volt power. It will have two connectors vs the one. That's easy compared to the ATA flex.
Richard
Richard

Message was edited by: spudnuty