Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

[Per Hansson]

So I have this Conrad branded IDE & SATA to USB 3.0 converter. Conrad artno: 976534.
It's quite nice with external PSU and everything, however it has some issues.
When I connect the USB cable to the PC there can sometimes be a spark, and pop in the speakers.
So I started using it with the laptop only on battery power.
I mainly use it to make Ghost copies of drives for customers, and for troubleshooting.
But as I sometimes work on older systems I may need to limit the size of the drive so it can work with the host systems BIOS.
This requires direct SMART access so that for example HDAT2 can access the drive in DOS.
But this drive does not seem to offer it.
I was also shocked by how shitty some of the soldering is when I opened it up.
Can't say I understand why the power adapter manages to cause that pop in the speakers either.
The primary and secondary on the PSU are only connected by the transformer and an Y cap, which seems to have the proper safety ratings.

The power adapter is a Flypower Model PS30IBCAK2000E claiming to provide 2Ah 12v
It uses a Prolific PL2773 SATAII > USB3 controller.
And a Jmicron JMD330 IDE > SATAI controller.
Any recommendations for an adapter offering the same functionality but also supporting S.M.A.R.T access for DOS so HDAT2 can be used would be very nice!

Do note that my original adapter is only branded Conrad, it has been discontinued and now they are selling this one with the "Renkforce" branding on the cover.
Not sure if it's exactly the same thing inside or not.

[stretch0069]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

Funny....I've been going through old hard drives lately.

For SATA, I use a Termaltake BlackX Duet. Does what it says.

For IDE, A buddy let me use his adapter. Looked like a china generic thing. But it worked fine. Looks like this http://www.myphpnet.com/the-usb-ide-adaptor

I did run across a couple dual HD docks that had SATA and IDE, but I didn't get that far.

[ozzy214]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

You get what you pay for. I been using this for years with zero issues

http://www.ebay.com/itm/StarTech-com...cAAOSweWVXeIih

The nice thing is it actually uses ribbon cables to hook the ide laptop/desktop drives to it.

[diif]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

I use one of these. Can't fault it. https://www.amazon.co.uk/Magic-Bridg.../dp/B004HTIHKA

[shovenose]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

I like this SATA-USB Cavalry from Amazon for $35. Had it since 2013 with no problems, and a friend just got one too and is happy with it. It's not IDE, but who the heck still uses that? Even at work we barely ever have to break out the IDE-USB caddy!

[fzabkar]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

I'm not aware of any tool that is able to access the SMART data via DOS. I only know of various DOS drivers that allow access to USB storage devices as regular drives. (Let me know if you need help with those.)

The problem is that a USB mass storage device uses SCSI commands.

Universal Serial Bus Mass Storage Class UFI Command Specification:


These SCSI commands are translated as near as possible to equivalent ATA commands. For example, the SCSI READ CAPACITY command has no direct ATA equivalent, so the bridge would use the ATA Identify Device command instead. The drive then returns a 512-byte block of information to the bridge. This block includes such info as model number, serial number, firmware version, feature set, and capacity. The bridge firmware extracts the capacity words from this block, converts them into the requisite SCSI format, and then transmits this information to the host. This is called SCSI/ATA Translation (SAT).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SCSI_/_ATA_Translation

SCSI / ATA Translation (SAT) is a set of standards developed by the T10 subcommittee, defining how to communicate with ATA devices through a SCSI application layer. The standard attempts to be consistent with the SCSI architectural model, the SCSI Primary Commands, and the SCSI Block Commands standards.

Unfortunately there is no way to access SMART data via standard SCSI commands. Instead the standard introduces two new commands which allow the host to send an embedded ATA command packet containing the actual ATA taskfile registers that define the desired ATA command. This is the way that SMART data are retrieved from a HDD located behind a USB-SATA/IDE bridge. (Some earlier bridges which did not support ATA PASS THROUGH, eg Cypress, had their own proprietary SCSI commands for accessing SMART data.)

The standard also provides the ability to control exactly what ATA operations are executed on a target device by defining two new SCSI operation codes:

ATA PASS THROUGH (12)
ATA PASS THROUGH (16)

The standard also defines a new data structure returned in the sense data known as the ATA Return Descriptor which contains the ATA taskfile registers.

In short, you need to find a DOS SMART tool that implements SAT and ATA PASS THROUGH. I'm not aware of any, but then I haven't looked for one.


Edit:

This page give some clues as to possible SMART support:
https://www.smartmontools.org/wiki/S...ed_USB-Devices

The "usbprolific" parameter would suggest that Prolific uses proprietary commands. :-(

The KU3IDE3 device looks even less promising. :-(

JMicron bridges appear to be a mixed bunch. Some support SAT SMART access while others appear to require proprietary methods (usbjmicron).

Prolific PL2773 -d usbprolific

PremiumCord KU3IDE3 Prolific PL2773 + JMD330

no S.M.A.R.T. information, aside from that SATA port works, IDE only sometimes

[Per Hansson]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

Thank you for your detailed reply fzabkar!
Yes as I mentioned my main need is for this adapter to allow me to retrofit modern drives on legacy systems.
(Without having to carry with me three separate computers )
So even if shovenose thinks IDE harddrives have no use, in the industrial world they are very much alive.
Floppies are too, I have a stack of floppies in my company car for that need as well

Now just to be clear the adapter I have it does work in DOS, that is I can Ghost a drive etc without issues.
And DOS is able to see it without loading any drivers, so it does present itself in a quite compatible way, for example if the filesystem is FAT32 DOS can read it.
The only issue is with direct SMART access as I wrote, that seems to require a special tool from Prolific.
I just installed it: iSMART and it did read some SMART data from both a IDE & SATA HDD, of course it's Windows only, a tool like Crystaldiskinfo can't access it at all for example.

But now in my search I found the following ticket where support was added for the PL2773 bridge chip to smartmontools by reverse-engineering Prolific's iSMART tool.
My CentOS7 system came with smartmontools v6.2 which was too old so I compiled the latest version and then it's actually able to read SMART status.
Of course that does not help me to set the HPA area using HDAT2 since that is a DOS program but it's a step on the way.

[root@precision smartmontools-6.5]# ./smartctl --info /dev/sde
smartctl 6.5 2016-05-07 r4318 [x86_64-linux-3.10.0-327.22.2.el7.x86_64] (local build)
Copyright (C) 2002-16, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF INFORMATION SECTION ===
Model Family:   SAMSUNG SpinPoint M40/60/80
Device Model:   SAMSUNG HM060HC
Serial Number:  S09XJ10L718200
Firmware Version: YJ100-13
User Capacity:  60,022,480,896 bytes [60.0 GB]
Sector Size:   512 bytes logical/physical
Device is:    In smartctl database [for details use: -P show]
ATA Version is:  ATA/ATAPI-7 T13/1532D revision 0
Local Time is:  Tue Jul 19 12:41:26 2016 CEST
SMART support is: Available - device has SMART capability.
SMART support is: Enabled

[root@precision smartmontools-6.5]# ./smartctl --attributes /dev/sde
smartctl 6.5 2016-05-07 r4318 [x86_64-linux-3.10.0-327.22.2.el7.x86_64] (local build)
Copyright (C) 2002-16, Bruce Allen, Christian Franke, www.smartmontools.org

=== START OF READ SMART DATA SECTION ===
SMART Attributes Data Structure revision number: 16
Vendor Specific SMART Attributes with Thresholds:
ID# ATTRIBUTE_NAME     FLAG   VALUE WORST THRESH TYPE   UPDATED WHEN_FAILED RAW_VALUE
 1 Raw_Read_Error_Rate   0x000f  253  100  051  Pre-fail Always    -    0
 3 Spin_Up_Time      0x0007  100  100  025  Pre-fail Always    -    3008
 4 Start_Stop_Count    0x0032  098  098  000  Old_age  Always    -    2358
 5 Reallocated_Sector_Ct  0x0033  253  253  010  Pre-fail Always    -    0
 7 Seek_Error_Rate     0x000e  253  253  000  Old_age  Always    -    0
 8 Seek_Time_Performance  0x0024  253  253  000  Old_age  Offline   -    0
 9 Power_On_Half_Minutes  0x0032  100  100  000  Old_age  Always    -    1902h+11m
 10 Spin_Retry_Count    0x0032  253  253  000  Old_age  Always    -    0
 12 Power_Cycle_Count    0x0032  099  099  000  Old_age  Always    -    1237
191 G-Sense_Error_Rate   0x0012  076  076  000  Old_age  Always    -    249073
192 Power-Off_Retract_Count 0x0012  253  253  000  Old_age  Always    -    0
194 Temperature_Celsius   0x0022  151  046  000  Old_age  Always    -    29
195 Hardware_ECC_Recovered 0x001a  100  100  000  Old_age  Always    -    2232
196 Reallocated_Event_Count 0x0032  253  253  000  Old_age  Always    -    0
197 Current_Pending_Sector 0x0012  253  253  000  Old_age  Always    -    0
198 Offline_Uncorrectable  0x0030  253  253  000  Old_age  Offline   -    0
199 UDMA_CRC_Error_Count  0x003e  200  200  000  Old_age  Always    -    0
200 Multi_Zone_Error_Rate  0x000a  253  100  000  Old_age  Always    -    0
201 Soft_Read_Error_Rate  0x0012  253  253  000  Old_age  Always    -    0
223 Load_Retry_Count    0x0012  100  100  000  Old_age  Always    -    58
225 Load_Cycle_Count    0x0012  052  052  000  Old_age  Always    -    489387
255 Unknown_Attribute    0x000a  253  100  000  Old_age  Always    -    0

[fzabkar]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

Very nice! It appears that your BIOS provides the necessary support for USB mass storage devices.

In my case the "legacy" motherboard had no such support (or buggy support?), so I had to use Panasonic's USBASPI.SYS driver for USB 2.0 host controllers, plus the "Motto Hairu" USB driver for USB mass storage devices. IIRC, the way that DOS (or Windows) dealt with the storage device (eg flash drive or external HDD) depended on whether it was configured as a "super floppy" (no partition table, just a boot sector) or as an HDD with an MBR and partition table. BTW, I was using Win9x DOS and MSDOS 6.22. I don't recall playing with FreeDOS.

I wrote up my experiences at HDD Guru:

http://forum.hddguru.com/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=29144

The following thread is very informative:

USB 2.0 drivers for DOS:
http://web.archive.org/web/200805011...dos/13447.html
http://www.computing.net/answers/dos...dos/13447.html

When I was playing with USB drives under DOS, I found that version 2.15 of Panasonic's USPASPI.SYS driver in conjunction with the "Motto Hairu" DOS Driver, Di1000dd.SYS, enabled me to access an external USB 2.0 HD from within DOS.

My config.sys file had these two lines:

device=USBASPI.SYS
device=DI1000DD.SYS

The relevant files were extracted from these archives:
http://panasonic.co.jp/pcc/products/...er/f2h_usb.exe
http://web.archive.org/web/200306100...er/f2h_usb.exe
http://www.stefan2000.com/darkehorse...USB/mhairu.zip
http://web.archive.org/web/201306142...USB/mhairu.zip

My motherboard had an SiS 7002 USB 2.0 Enhanced Host Controller.

The CONFIG.SYS file is a text file that is placed in the root directory.

[Per Hansson]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

Thanks fzakbar, I actually used the very same to get USB support on this old machine:
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/showthread.php?t=37091

It's floppy drive was not working 100% but it was due to the interface PCB between the PC104 board and the floppy, and I didn't want to muck with that.
So I added a USB port and the required files for activating it, it was not stable though so I made it just as a separate batch file the customer can launch to make backups of the system...
Works much better that way vs backup to floppies that can't fit the whole system on one floppy

I looked through my parts bin now and found three different IDE/SATA > USB adapters.
But none of them worked in DOS though for direct SMART access
And one had bad caps and let out over 14v on the 12v, good thing I used a broken HDD for testing LOL!
I gave it some old replacement caps and then the 12v was stable, and 5v too which was low before.
Still didn't work in DOS though

[fzabkar]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

The smartctl patches allude to official documentation from Prolific in respect of the "Prolific ATA pass through" command (0xD8).

cdb[ 0] = 0xD8;     // Operation Code (D8 = Prolific ATA pass through)
cdb[ 1] = cmd_rw|0x5;  // Read(0x10)/Write(0x0) | NORMAL(0x5)/PREFIX(0x0)(?)
cdb[ 2] = 0x0;     // Reserved
cdb[ 3] = in.in_regs.features;    // Feature register (SMART command)
cdb[ 4] = 0x06;     // Check Word (VendorID magic, Prolific: 0x067B)
cdb[ 5] = 0x7B;     // Check Word (VendorID magic, Prolific: 0x067B)
cdb[ 6] = (unsigned char)(io_hdr.dxfer_len >> 24); // Length MSB
cdb[ 7] = (unsigned char)(io_hdr.dxfer_len >> 16); // Length ...
cdb[ 8] = (unsigned char)(io_hdr.dxfer_len >> 8); // Length ...
cdb[ 9] = (unsigned char)(io_hdr.dxfer_len   ); // Length LSB
cdb[10] = in.in_regs.sector_count;  // Sector Count
cdb[11] = in.in_regs.lba_low;     // LBA Low (7:0)
cdb[12] = in.in_regs.lba_mid;     // LBA Mid (15:8)
cdb[13] = in.in_regs.lba_high;    // LBA High (23:16)
cdb[14] = in.in_regs.device | 0xA0;  // Device/Head
cdb[15] = in.in_regs.command;     // ATA Command Register (only PIO supported)

AFAICT, one can send any ATA command, including vendor specific ones, to the HDD using this method. The "in_regs" bytes are the ATA taskfile registers corresponding to the specific ATA command.

In the past I asked the author of HDAT2 if he would add support for a particular ATA feature (error recovery control, ERC) and he graciously provided same. Perhaps you could ask him to add Prolific support.

[ChaosLegionnaire]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

4 Start_Stop_Count    0x0032  098  098  000  Old_age  Always    -    2358
12 Power_Cycle_Count    0x0032  099  099  000  Old_age  Always    -    1237
225 Load_Cycle_Count    0x0012  052  052  000  Old_age  Always    -    489387

uh oh, your hard drive appears to have an overly aggressive head parking set for its APM parameters. u might wanna disable that!

[Per Hansson]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

uh oh, your hard drive appears to have an overly aggressive head parking set for its APM parameters. u might wanna disable that!

The drives tested are from clients PC's or industrial machines.
This is what remains of them after data recovery so don't worry, they are not used for anything bar testing

[fzabkar]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

Why not use HDAT2's "supported bridge chips: Cypress, JMicron and Oxford"?

[Per Hansson]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

Well it's no easy to know before buying, most don't advertise what controller is used and when you ask either they don't know or don't want to tell you...

[diif]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

I've just opened up my Magic Gate 2, it is however USB2 not USB3.

[Per Hansson]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

Had some problems with intermittent connection and opened the switch up for the power adapter.
Found the wires just tipped with some solder on their ends.
And pushed in under some crimp connections not even firmly on the wires so they can move around freely.
Fantastic QC

[mockingbird]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

Will they ever make a good SATA to USB3 chipset that can support all the different GPT scenarios?

There's a small writeup about it here:

http://goughlui.com/2013/10/02/exper...nd-2tb-drives/

[Drack]

Re: Recommend good external IDE & SATA to USB3 converter? (To replace Conrad 976534)

I like this SATA-USB Cavalry from Amazon for $35. Had it since 2013 with no problems, and a friend just got one too and is happy with it. It's not IDE, but who the heck still uses that? Even at work we barely ever have to break out the IDE-USB caddy!

I still have one 40 GB IDE HDD in use