The CF-to-SATA hard drive adapter

While we've already seen that a four-barrel SD-to-SSD adapter will run you a stiff $258.50 sans flash cards, users who can't seem to find a good use for those CompactFlash cards that used to rule to roost in your recently replaced Nikon D70 finally have a solution. The much more reasonable CF-to-SATA hard drive adapter simply takes any CompactFlash I/II card and snaps it into the 2.5-inch SATA HDD slot on the bottom of most lappies. The device then allows the CF card to be recognized as an "ordinary hard drive" which can even be "configured as a boot device" without any additional drivers. Moreover, it supports DMA and Ultra DMA modes, and is said play nice with just about every flavor of Windows dating back to 3.1, Linux, and OS X operating systems. The best bit, however, is the attainable price, as we could certainly see ourselves forking over $35.99 just to see how a CF boot drive would really effect performance.

[Josh Warner @ Apr 26th 2007 1:53AM]

Not a bad idea all told. Far cheaper than a SSD with most of the advantages (shock tolerance, battery life, access time, almost-instant boot) but not the large hit to the wallet. With a 4GB or larger drive, preferably a speedy one, this could be quite useful for those who travel a lot.

[Sam @ Apr 26th 2007 1:56AM]

Sexy. If my laptop could support a second drive, I'd be all over this.

[Keaton @ Apr 26th 2007 2:12AM]

One step closer to an inexpensive, silent Linux box....

[Piter @ Apr 26th 2007 2:39AM]

SSDs are optimized for distributing writes along the whole capacity, while I guess this device is not.
So how long will a CF card last when used as a boot device?
We would need a stress test before buying into this.

[Dan (thoughtfix) @ Apr 26th 2007 2:44AM]

I did a review and video of the IDE version of this in an Origami ultra-mobile PC.

http://www.ultramobilegeek.com/2007/04/homebrew-ssd-umpc-test.html

Short conclusion so you don't have to read it all: Cheap CF cards won't do. You need very high-end cards to out-perform hard drives. Don't pay attention to the "100x rating" or whatever the card says. Test it on your own.

[Kamokazi @ Apr 26th 2007 3:09AM]

I've got a Raptor for my boot drive, but this may be nice for a page file...

[rgm @ Apr 26th 2007 4:01AM]

Affect performance.

http://www.askoxford.com/asktheexperts/faq/aboutspelling/affect

[Panq @ Apr 26th 2007 6:19AM]

I'd like to see the performance with the dual-CF to IDE adaptor (http://www.addonics.com/products/flash_memory_reader/ad44midecf.asp) and a pair of fast cards (probably using software RAID). I wouldn't think it lightning-quick, but it'd probably be a bit cheaper than a 16GB SSD.

[djbarry @ Apr 26th 2007 6:24AM]

here is the IDE version at same site
http://www.addonics.com/products/flash_memory_reader/ad44midecf.asp

[spam_from_engadget @ Apr 26th 2007 7:05AM]

> SSDs are optimized for distributing writes along the whole
> capacity, while I guess this device is not.

I believe that the controller chip in the CF card will do all the wear levelling, so this adaptor doesn't need that intelligence itself.

(I have been using USB, IDE and CF flash devices exclusively in my no-moving-parts home network for over a year. I have had one 1G USB flash drive fail and another was dead-on-arrival. But I don't think either of those failures is due to the flash "wearing out".)

[Johno @ Apr 26th 2007 7:34AM]

Looks nice,
Gutted though as i've just recently bought a dual channel PATA one.

With regard to Kamokazi's comment about using it for a page file, this could probably be the worst thing you could use a compact flash card for. A CF card has a limited read/write cycle and paging on that card would probably kill it within a matter of weeks or worse still days. The best use for these devices are as keaton says building a silent linux box.

[chris @ Apr 26th 2007 8:44AM]

I wonder about this as well. If that silent linux box is a server or running a bittorrent client with a lot of read write action, will that effect the CF card's life? I hadn't thought about the lifecycle of a CF card really. I don't see why it would be short.

I'd love to integrate such a hd replacement for my linux box, but if it's acting as a light weight server, would that be running a risk of loss of data even as short os one or two years later? Essentially, you'd have to create a backup constantly... and where? On a traditional hd? Online? Hm.

[Darren Wilson @ Apr 26th 2007 8:58AM]

"users who can't seem to find a good use for those CompactFlash cards that used to rule to roost in your recently replaced Nikon D70 finally have a solution"

Well maybe they have now bought themselves a PROPER DSLR in the form of a Canon which does use CF/Microdrive cards in favour of those cheap & nasty SD Cards that are ruined by the slightest bit of moisture (unlike CF or Microdrives which I have here that have been thoroughly soaked & still operate perfectly fine).

[Kev50027 @ Apr 26th 2007 10:20AM]

I've been using SD cards since they came out, and I've never had any problems with moisture. Are you diving with an SD camera with no enclosure or something?

[Mark @ Apr 26th 2007 9:20AM]

Now I can install that SD RAID I've always wanted.

[Pekar @ Apr 26th 2007 10:20AM]

I submitted this Addonics link to Engadget.
Here's my own experimentation and some links to more info.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/47642593@N00/447124880/
Pekar

[babakm @ Apr 26th 2007 12:01PM]

Combine with the $35 8 gig CF card that was floating around on a couple of sites last week and you have a $70 8 gig SSD!

[babakm @ Apr 26th 2007 12:09PM]

or could've combined two of the CF cards with the dual IDE version for a $105 16 gig drive...

Wow. I may actually go out and do this.

[GBaz @ Apr 26th 2007 1:37PM]

I created a raid array with another variatoin of this CF-to-IDE. It was slow and it stunk. If your CF card does not support DMA (and very few do) it will run slower then the rated speed. I Used SanDisk Extreme III cards. When it did work windows did not like booting with it pluged in. My advice is to not wast time or money on this and buy a premaind SSD en the end they are cheaper.

[michelle @ Sep 15th 2007 11:08PM]

I buy some SATA-CF,IDE-CF adapter from a china factory , and find it good quality and lower price,so i want share with others my feels.Especially,the SATA-CF:$9.9 and IDE-CF only $1.98
Websit: http：//www.soarland.com

[Goglu2 @ Apr 26th 2007 1:42PM]

You could go to eBay some CF 2 IDE go for $2 each even Dual ones.

[GhostDoggy @ Apr 28th 2007 9:09AM]

Tommy hardware has an august 2005 article on the Addonics SATA CF product. Who makes this one such that its being reported 18 months later? Who can I buy this from?

[Douglas W. Goodall @ May 1st 2007 8:46PM]

Since there is a limited number of erase/writes, I think the best configuration for a no moving parts linux box would include enough ram to not need to swap. If you must swap, do so on a seperate CF chip that can be replaced without touching the boot/root filesystem when the swapping occasionally fails because of wear-out.

[eagle @ May 29th 2007 12:21PM]

we also can produce this item.We are one professional manufacturer of CF to IDE adapter in china.We can provide very low price to customers.Also we have many items of cf-ide adapters,our website: http://www.sintech.cn/en/index.html

[Marv @ Jun 16th 2007 8:42PM]

Puppy Linux is optimized to minimize writes to the CF card and has an installer that recognizes and cleanly installs to a CF card in an IDE adapter. Writing this on a throwaway Dell inspiron 4000 using such an adapter, a Rosewill 256 Mb CF card and Pup 2.16.1. Totally silent, even more robust. Give it a go..
Developer link is http://www.puppylinux.com/news/