TOMTOM Hard drive faulty . What type is it , do you know ?

messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

Hello and thanks for reading this. My HD has gone AWOL in my TomTom 910 , I havn't opened it up yet so does anyone know what type it is and if I can fit something standard , maybe from a laptop or something ?

Thanks for any help

Darren · Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 6:38 pm Post subject:

It's a CompactFlash Hard Disk so not the type you get in laptops. SatNav Shop do repairs though, give them a call:

http://www.satnav-shop.com/
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Darren Griffin

messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

Thanks Darren. I live very near to satnav-shop. I sent them an email before making my first post on here, but £90 +VAT seems expensive to me. Surely I can buy one and fit it myself ?

Darren · Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 7:08 pm Post subject:

You could but it wouldn't cost much less for the part alone and the Guy who runs it knows his stuff and will guarantee the work, so is it really worth the risk?
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Darren Griffin

messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

Darren, OK , well maybe I kneejerked at the price and on reflection perhaps I should't have. Im'e sure he's one of the good guys and everyones allowed to make a living.......... Now then , a stroke of luck came my way. After you told me it was a "microdrive" I had mentioned to a friend I needed one and he turned up about half an hour ago with one. He says it came out of a music player he had from when he used to do Disco's, Its badged Hitachi Travelstar model HTC426020G7CEOO AND ... knock me down with a feather ... its a 20gb. I measured it and its 68mm x 53mm x 6.5mm. I havn't opened my tomtom 910 yet. Please Please Please tell me it will fit ? .
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messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

Right, its 9pm and I'me going inside the 910 !

Andy_P · Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 8:54 pm Post subject:

Shame about that TWO year guarantee you used to have! :x

Darren · Posted: Tue Jul 03, 2007 8:55 pm Post subject:

Strange, I thought I'd posted a reply earlier and now I can't see it Confused

Anyway I couldn't find that Part Number in a search and Hitachi don't currently list a CF Hard Disk in their Travelstar range, does the disk you have look like this in shape and form factor?

And before taking the 910 apart (if you haven't already!) read this.
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Darren Griffin

messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

Darren, Im inside now. I have took some photo's of it all. I have the HD out and have took photos of the 2 side by side. Strange they both have the same model number on but the replacement is about 1mm thicker. other than that they look almost the same. Im have trouble fitting the mutiway ribbon to the drive , its very fiddly , but i am being real carefull. I haven't marked or busted anything yet. by the way , I am an avionics engineer "by proxy" . hehehe so not too unused to fiddly electronics.

messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

OK, unfiortunatly its not the same drive. The ribbon connector socket on the drive is offset from centre on the drive I took out. On this other drive im'e trying to fit it's also offset from centre but but the other way. Shame that, I thought I had cracked it. Never mind eh. I think a cuppa's called for and then i'll list it on ebay perhaps and get shut.

messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

Right, Its fitted. I managed to roll up the ribbon cable a little besides the battery and repositioned it and it fits OK. I still have it in bits but clipped onto the dock and I am now uploading what files I managed to salvage off the old drive. It appears to be transferring OK. Fingers crossed.

messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

All sorted , thanks for your help Darren. It went in OK behind the screen but as it was 1mm thicker , I couldn't get the holding clips on. Having said that , it's very solid anyway and I dont think it will be a problem. Unfortunatly , my backup was done to my PC as the tomtom drive was failing and some of the backup files are corrupted but certainly nothing I can't sort out now I have a working drive in it.
If anyones interested , I can email the photo's I took as it might help anyone else taking a 910 to bits.
Thanks again

EricWB · Frequent Visitor Joined: Jan 31, 2007 Posts: 310

It seems you may have missed the post about your TWO year warranty as supplied with your 910 by TT. There cannot be many if any 910's around that are older then 2 years yet. But as you have now opened it up that warranty would now be null & void.

messyworkbench · Occasional Visitor Joined: Jul 03, 2007 Posts: 9

Thanks for that. I didn't miss the post re warantee. From that , I contacted Tomtom by phone. I already knew I had a problem as this Tomtom was bought for my wife by her uncle sometime before Christmas 2006 and he died Feb this year. Of course there was some paperwork in his flat but not for the tomtom. Also , he never used credit cards so it's likely he bought it from a large high street store , cash. We can't be sure but we think my wife didn't get the receipt off him as it was wrapped a present for christmas. Anyway, explaining that to the Tomtom rep produced the result we expected before we phoned. Alas no retail receipt no guarantee repair. Of course we did have the serial number on the bottom of the Tomtom and we hoped that from that they could check where it had been bought from or at least check to confirm it wasn't a stolen one. I gave them the number but they only wanted that to book in for a repair. I think I would have sent it back to tomtom but my friend turned up wuth the microdrive , so of course I took the risk and it worked out OK. Happy ending .... not my usual unlucky result.

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