Sata DOM hardware mod to Canvio NAS

hi guys, just sharing a little hardware mod to the Toshiba Canvio Home NAS that may also apply to some other embedded systems out there.

Basically I was looking for an alternative boot option rather than the internal 2TB 3.5" hard drive. I was having trouble getting the drive to sleep consistently while it was set up with the OS as well as storage.

This unit has just one USB port currently with a TV tuner installed and I preferred something internal rather than a USB hub and flash drive hanging off it.

When checking out the PCB I noticed the 2nd SATA port was actually wired up to an empty external header pad. Wondering how I could use this lead me to look into the Sata DOM. It is basically somewhere between a USB flash drive and an SSD. At $20 delivered for an 8GB I thought it was worth a try.

Here are some pictures of the Canvio NAS PCB before and after. The SATA connector and capacitors are just salvaged from an old PC motherboard.
PCB Before
PCB After

Here is a picture of the disk I used although there are many other size and shapes available.
8GB Hyperdisk Sata DOM

And here it is all connected.
Sata DOM Installed

Once powered on the new drive was detected in u-boot ok and then I had to update the DTS to enable the 2nd Sata port in Linux.

I have just installed Bodhi's latest 4.12.1 Kirkwood package and it is running great. The new drive is totally enclosed in the case, it boots up quick and now the main 3.5" storage drive can sleep even while the NAS is streaming or time-shifting live TV.


Robert

nice job!!

Excellent job Robert!

I'll add this to the Wiki.

-bodhi
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Nice hack. Can you provide the source for the 8GB Hyperdisk Sata DOM?

Thanks,
Ray

To say this is inspiring is an understatement! Damn you're good.

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