non-standard USB sockets on 2.5" drive enclosures

  • Thread starter Thread starter Dan Lenski
  • Start date Start date
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Dan Lenski

Hi all,
I just bought a USB 2.5" hard drive enclosure, so that I could use an
old 20gb notebook drive as portable storage. The unit I bought is a
cheap model, and it's blocky and ugly. But it's small and transfer
speed is good, so no complaints there.

My real beef with this model is the COMPLETELY NONSTANDARD use of a USB
"Type A" socket on the enclosure (photo
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-173-018-03.jpg).
Why did they use a "Type A" socket, which is supposed to go on the
host computer and never on the USB device, according to the standard?
The slightly more expensive enclosures all use a standard "Mini B"
socket, which allows you to connect the drive with a standard A-MiniB
cable. Such as this one:
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-146-065-01.jpg

With this cheap enclosure, I pretty much have to use the bizarre
Type-A-plug-to-Type-A-plug cable which comes with drive. That means I
have to carry around the cable which comes with it, which is a pain.

Does anyone know why they chose to use the wrong type of plug on these
devices? Is it possible to desolder the Type A socket and replace it
with a Mini-B socket?

Lastly, is there anywhere I can buy a spare USB cable with Type A
*plugs* on both ends? I poked around on Froogle and couldn't find a
single one. Anyoen have a source?

Thanks!

Dan Lenski
 
Dan said:
Hi all,
I just bought a USB 2.5" hard drive enclosure, so that I could use an
old 20gb notebook drive as portable storage. The unit I bought is a
cheap model, and it's blocky and ugly. But it's small and transfer
speed is good, so no complaints there.

My real beef with this model is the COMPLETELY NONSTANDARD use of a USB
"Type A" socket on the enclosure (photo
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-173-018-03.jpg).
Why did they use a "Type A" socket, which is supposed to go on the
host computer and never on the USB device, according to the standard?
The slightly more expensive enclosures all use a standard "Mini B"
socket, which allows you to connect the drive with a standard A-MiniB
cable. Such as this one:
http://images10.newegg.com/NeweggImage/productimage/17-146-065-01.jpg

With this cheap enclosure, I pretty much have to use the bizarre
Type-A-plug-to-Type-A-plug cable which comes with drive. That means I
have to carry around the cable which comes with it, which is a pain.

Does anyone know why they chose to use the wrong type of plug on these
devices? Is it possible to desolder the Type A socket and replace it
with a Mini-B socket?

Lastly, is there anywhere I can buy a spare USB cable with Type A
*plugs* on both ends? I poked around on Froogle and couldn't find a
single one. Anyoen have a source?

Thanks!

Dan Lenski
Click to expand...
Newegg has at least one.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...ables"&Submit=ENE&N=0&Ntk=all&Go.x=15&Go.y=32
 
Pen said:
Newegg has at least one.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produ...ables"&Submit=ENE&N=0&Ntk=all&Go.x=15&Go.y=32
Click to expand...

Thanks! I've since found a really cheap A-A USB cable, 3 feet for
$1.69: http://www.firefold.com/ProductInfo.aspx?productid=USB-AA-3-IVY

I still don't understand why this enclosure was designed with a Type A
socket. Kinda retarded... I think the same PCB is used in all the
cheap 2.5" enclosures, since they all seem to have the exact same
stupid Type A socket. Oh well.

Dan
 
Dan Lenski said:
Thanks! I've since found a really cheap A-A USB cable, 3 feet for
$1.69: http://www.firefold.com/ProductInfo.aspx?productid=USB-AA-3-IVY

I still don't understand why this enclosure was designed with a Type A
socket. Kinda retarded... I think the same PCB is used in all the
cheap 2.5" enclosures, since they all seem to have the exact same
stupid Type A socket. Oh well.

Dan
Click to expand...

Well, talking about the SIZE we may have at least 5-6+ different sizes,
but luckily for computer and computer devices alone we may only have around
2-3 sizes. Then when dealing with transferring we have 2 types and I have
learned a hard way.

1. Most devices use regular type and it should work with all devices
connects to computer.

2. But if you have a portable storage with option to connect a Memory Card
reader to it so you can transfer data between portable hard drive and memory
card using Memory Card Reader without computer, then you will need a special
USB adapter/cable (the small plastic inside the connector usually WHITE).
 
Thanks! I've since found a really cheap A-A USB cable, 3 feet for
$1.69: http://www.firefold.com/ProductInfo.aspx?productid=USB-AA-3-IVY

I still don't understand why this enclosure was designed with a Type A
socket. Kinda retarded... I think the same PCB is used in all the
cheap 2.5" enclosures, since they all seem to have the exact same
stupid Type A socket. Oh well.

Dan
Click to expand...


I'd imagine they did it deliberately to prevent use of a
normal cable, in case a drive used more than 500mA power.
I'm thinking this because their cable has the 2nd plug that
might be used to deliver more power as it wouldn't have any
other purpose and would have otherwise been cheaper to omit.

That doesn't make it a good design though, and IIRC the
sockets have a different mounting configuration so you can't
just replace the offensive socket, unless the PCB happened
to be designed to accept either. It's hard to tell if the
case is even deep enough once you factor for the PCB
spacing, otherwise at worst you might rotate the new plug by
90', put down a sheet of insulating plastic over the PCB
then epoxy the new plug in place - soldering jumper wires to
the original holes. Might not be as easy as that since it's
so small but a similar approach could work to mount the jack
wherever space permits.
 
kony said:
I'd imagine they did it deliberately to prevent use of a
normal cable, in case a drive used more than 500mA power.
I'm thinking this because their cable has the 2nd plug that
might be used to deliver more power as it wouldn't have any
other purpose and would have otherwise been cheaper to omit.
Click to expand...

Yeah, that is possible... it's still dumb though because most computers
don't need the second plug, so it would be nice to be able to use a
normal A-to-Mini-B USB cable. The nicer enclosures still use the split
plug on the computer end, but they have a Mini-B plug on the other end.
It's really weird that whoever made these didn't stick with the USB
standard, although the device is otherwise quite functional.
That doesn't make it a good design though, and IIRC the
sockets have a different mounting configuration so you can't
just replace the offensive socket, unless the PCB happened
to be designed to accept either. It's hard to tell if the
case is even deep enough once you factor for the PCB
spacing, otherwise at worst you might rotate the new plug by
90', put down a sheet of insulating plastic over the PCB
then epoxy the new plug in place - soldering jumper wires to
the original holes. Might not be as easy as that since it's
so small but a similar approach could work to mount the jack
wherever space permits.
Click to expand...

That's a good idea about the epoxy to hold the smaller plug in place.
It just might work!

Dan
 
Dan Lenski said:
Yeah, that is possible... it's still dumb though because most computers
don't need the second plug, so it would be nice to be able to use a
normal A-to-Mini-B USB cable. The nicer enclosures still use the split
plug on the computer end, but they have a Mini-B plug on the other end.
It's really weird that whoever made these didn't stick with the USB
standard, although the device is otherwise quite functional.
Click to expand...

Well, if all computers come from same manufacture with same design then we
may not have different size's and price's. But sadly we have many different
choices of many different designs and the computer also have the option to
connect to other device like the external enclosure which is much smaller
than the computer, and there are many devices even lot smaller than the
enclosure like standard size digital camera, super thin digital camera, and
MP3 player etc. that the height can be smaller than the regular USB
connector <g>

Me, I think we are so lucky to have many different choices for our liking,
and have all tools available at very reasonable price.
 
So... I ended up making my own homemade USB A-to-A cable. I simply cut
two old cables in half and spliced together the wires. This cable
works perfectly fine with this hard drive enclosure. I was actually a
bit surprised that it can do high-speed USB over this cable with no
problems, considering that the spec requires a TWISTED pair of signal
wires. I guess the length of wire that I mangled is only a few cm...

Dan
 
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