E220s 9.5mm SSD.

Over in one of the x220 threads there was talk of owners fitting 9.5mm drives into their units by not using the included drive caddy/lid. I was looking at the service videos for the E220s and it seemed like the same should be doable on the E220s.

I was considering pulling the trigger and buying a 240GB Vertex 3 MAX IOPS, and was hoping for some input from current owners (my unit is in the air) before I burn 600 dollars on a hunch.

I know the E220s has an mSATA slot, but the intel 310 really doesn't hold a candle up to modern sandforce drives speed wise.

Cheers,

 

I was looking at the service videos yesterday, and noticed that the hard drive is mounted upside-down. Considering that the main common design points between the 7mm and 9.5 drives are the SATA ports, we would run in to problems trying to simply slide in a 9.5mm drive. However, once we ignore use of the drive rail, we're probably still off by 1.5mm. We should then be able to use a shim to raise the bracket on which the internal SATA receptacle is mounted.

Fingers crossed until Thursday (when mine arrives)

 

Great update. My unit arrives in a couple days as well. I've been holding off on buying an ssd unit this business is sorted out. It's nice too see someone else taking an interest.

 

It'll be the second thing I do once I receive it (after installing the mSATA SSD), and the third thing I do will be to report the results

I'd sure love to get my 750GB WD Black in there... but after seeing the idle power usage between the Black and the Blue, I just might consider a trade...

http://techreport.com/articles.x/20255/9

 

So... I'm quite confident that it will take a 9.5mm drive. The SATA connectors seem to be the right height within the bay. But:

-The rail system used does not add to the height of the drive (it really only covers the sides), meaning we gain nothing by not using it. Actually, we should use it both for physical stability, and to be able to ever get the drive out again.
-There is a hearty amount of foam glued to the inside bottom of the body, which of course cushions the 7mm drive, but adds an obstacle to getting in a 9.5mm drive. I would suggest we use something along the lines of a piece of thin but rigid paper on the "top" of the drive, while we slide it in so we can reliably get below the foam.
-There was some yet-unidentified object that was obstructing my drive from sliding in more than 1/2". Granted, I didn't try very hard to figure out what that was yet. Also, we need to angle in the drive to get past the lip on what is the top in the attached pictures.
-For those of us wanting to put in a 9.5mm HDD, we'll want to shield the PCB side of the drive before inserting. There is plenty of metal with which we could fry a drive.

I might get around to putting my 9.5mm HDD in there this weekend, if I'm feeling a bit more brave.

 

What is the blue foam glued to (palmrest or keyboard bezel)? Whatever it is, remove it and you'll get a clear idea of what you're dealing with.

 

The machine is upside down in those pics. The foam is glued to the bottom.

I'm a little hesitant to do away with the foam... I wanted to keep it all appearing to be as it was from the factory.

 

Then remove the palmrest (and keyboard bezel) and slide the 9.5mm drive in. Otherwise it looks like you'll destroy the foam sliding the drive in with that in the way.

 

Probably this weekend, yeah...

 

Looks as if this weekend is going to be eventful for the E220s. My unit is going to be here in the am.

Also, toast, with your permission, I would like to update the OP with your information, so that we can keep it together nicely.

 

Of course, go for it.

edit: or perhaps we should start up somewhat of an e220s knowledge base thread, and hopefully have it stickied...

 

Start an owners thread or like thread.

There is a brand new e220s in the outlet for $644.84. Must resist......

I might as well give a link: http://outlet.lenovo.com/laptops/thinkpad/thinkpad-edge/503mp00n8y.html It won't be there for long at that price.

 

My one issue with owner's threads is how unwieldy they can become with time. But then again, the e220s isn't yet a massively popular machine, so it could work for a while.

I'll start one up this weekend, once I have some definitive content to post regarding fitting a 9.5mm HDD. So BlinKSilver, how about holding off from incorporating my content until I properly test it out...

Oh, regarding your link the the Outlet Store sale... for some reason they're quoting a substantially lower battery life (3.5hrs vs 6hrs)

 

It's a ghost town around here when it comes to the Edge models and there are hardly any posts on the laptop.

It also said it has an 8 cell battery..... At least they got the color right. That's what matters.

 

I agree an owners thread is probably the best bet, there are just not going to be be enough edge E220s users to make that thread unwieldily. As far as I can tell, there are like 4 users in the NR forums that have it. And that number includes toast and myself.

Which is not to say I am complaining, most times a few like minded individuals is more effective than a crowd.

 

Also, one more reason to fit a 9.5mm drive into the E220s

Samsung Electronics Unveils Terabyte Hard Drive for Notebooks | The SSD Review

 

Well I ended up trying the drive swap tonight, and it does work, but we need to remove the whole palmrest assembly. I took some pics along the way which I'll post this weekend, but I'll just cut to the chase and say that I'm going back to the 7mm drive. Having the 9.5mm in there does create a gap in the trim, and it looks pretty bad around the drive door.

 

Well that is too bad, looks like i will just have to go with the Crucial M4 then, still plenty fast

EDIT: Ordered.

 

I've really been thinking about this since last night... I figure that since I'm already in this deep, I may as well go all the way. The obstacle that is causing the drive to sit higher is the internal portion of that corner's "foot" (highlighted section in pic). There looks to be enough surplus material there that I can file it down, while properly fitting the drive and keeping strength for the foot.