[Jeff1954]

My daughter's Ibook died.. sob.. HOWEVER! I bought her a new Powerbook! Yeah, she loves it.. However, however,, she needs the information from her old Ibook's hardrive. So, ever the clevor fellow that I am, I bought a USB harddrive external box with drivers and stuff. Took out her old Ibook drive and so-posedly there's nothing to it. The new powerbook 15" 1.5 mhz, all's you're so-post-to do is, just plug it in and wa-la, two drives! But, Nope, that didn't do it. I guess,.. as the seller's say; you might have to plug it into two USB ports to give the drive enough power. Would be no problem with the older Powerbooks, because, the USB ports are on one side of them. But alas the new ones? there's one on one side, and one on the other. Of course, the cord on the USB external hard drive, (there's two for more power) it is only 8 inches long, and her new powerbook is a 15 incher. So, there's no way to give this thing more power without aditional tasks.

Perhaps I can get an extention USB cord and plug it in. Or, I perfer windows and have discovered, if I plug this into two USB ports on my windows computer, the drive spins. But as I guess, winxp, it is not going to read this drive. My computer sees it, it says it is there but I can not open it. So, I was wondering if there is a way I can read this drive in windows and copy the stuff she needs on a CD from my winxp system? Then she can get her homework off this drive and copy it on her new mac..

[Mithras]

Use the iBook in Firewire Target Disk Mode. You'll need a Firewire cable if you don't have one.

[ghporter]

Originally posted by Mithras:
Use the iBook in Firewire Target Disk Mode. You'll need a Firewire cable if you don't have one.

You forgot to tell him that you're not talking about the external drive.

Get a Firewire cable to match the Firewire ports on both the PowerBook and the iBook, plug it between the two, then use the instructions in the link to set up Target Disk Mode.

[tooki]

Uhh, first line of the post: "My daughter's Ibook died". I'm going to hazard a guess that Target Disk Mode doesn't work on broken Macs.

As for the problem: I'd just spend the $10 for a USB extension (try pccables.com to get em cheap).

Alternatively, there are software products like MacDrive that will let a PC read a Mac disk, but they cost more than the USB extension, and besides, your daughter probably wants her files on her PowerBook, not your PC!

tooki

P.S. It's spelled "supposedly", "supposed to", and "voilà!", not "so-posedly", "so-post-to" and "wa-la".

[ghporter]

Originally posted by tooki:
Uhh, first line of the post: "My daughter's Ibook died". I'm going to hazard a guess that Target Disk Mode doesn't work on broken Macs.

DOH!! I wasn't staying on task, was I? Of course you're right about a broken Mac probably not being able to play nice with Target Disk Mode.

Now for the $6400 question for Jeff (it's not THAT big a question!): What's wrong with the iBook? And a follow up-how would you get the drive to help you out when the iBook is broken?

It is not the typically simple thing you run into with PC laptops to remove an iBook drive!!!! You need the right size Torx screwdrivers, a lot of patience, and TRUE GRIT to just get to the drive. In other words, if you're planning to remove the drive from the iBook and put it in an external USB case, you have a LOT of work ahead of you!

[henrytaylor]

It sounds like you have already removed the iBook HD and placed it into the USB external drive. If that isthe case, I too support the USB cable extension. A direct form of communication between iBook & Powerbook will make for fewer hasseles.

[Jeff1954]

[He, he, Yes Tooki, I thought I was not understanding, what they were saying,. Bad spelling and poor grammer maybe. Yes, 10 bucks, yes she might like her privacy and yes, to the spelling part. LOL

Yeah I know porter, my bad? I already took it out, did not need a torx although there is a gazillion screws in the thing!! $64,000 question? It has some kind of short, I've scanned it with a 40x magnifying glass and for the life of me I can not find it. It will start up once and a while, and if you just touch it, parts of the logic board or in the right spot on the drive (which just barely bends the board apparently) it will start up and look just perfect. However, just touch it again, and, for-get-a-about-it. There's a teeny, tiny short and I give up trying to find the darned thing. I already re-soldered every thing that looked remotely close to maybe not good contact on the board. So like I said, It's dead, not gonna be starting it in target drive. If you can't find a short (disconnected or hardly touching contact/soldered spot), with a 40x mag, you'll never find it. Or I'll never find it!

So, seeing as I was the one who dropped it, (yeah, nice move ex-lax) it only dropped a few feet, from the table to the floor, and landed bottom flat side down, I got her a new one, LOL. Search E-bay for a "completed auctions" dream price on a new 15" 1.5 mhz, fully loaded, stock, actually four months old, Powerbook, then search again because, I got one for 1125 bucks, yeah baby! Otherwise she'd be sporting a used one.

And after a Mac tech told me he wanted 75 bucks to recover her information, with the drive already out, I might add, it dawned on me, there might be another way. Sure enough in minutes, at E-bay, I found one of those Hardrive cases with two USB plugs 12 bucks delivered, . The rest is history. That is, I did not think about the distance needed on the new powerbooks and of course, "my luck" the two plugs will not reach across it. . Although I've learned now, those cases and USB plugs for harddrives, they are pretty cool, especially for a few bucks. . Next time, which I hope never happens! I'll get one with firewire, LOL.

After we get the info off the harddrive, "I figure" we'll be selling off the parts at the bay. I wonder how much I'll get for a logic board that you need to barely, ever so slightly touch/bend to get contact? LOL.