PiDrive with greater than 1TB capacity?

Hi,

I’m considering building a media player and using the PiDrive enclosure, but would like more than 1 TB of storage.
If I purchase the piDrive power supply and cable etc seperately, could I use a standard WD internal HDD with it in order to increase capacity?

Thanks

You’d need a suitable enclosure or adapter cable to convert the drive’s connector (SATA or IDE etc) to USB, as a standard HDD won’t have that connection. The adaptor cables aren’t expensive, but would be something to remember to get.

The PiDrive has that built-in, which is part of its selling point. All you need do is connect a suitable USB-microUSB cable to it and off you go.

Hey there @Richard_Cumberbatch

You could go this way, but just as @DarrenHill explained you’ll need some type of convertor (enclosure or adapter), however note that if you decide to go for a 3.5" drive you should have an enclosure or a SATA to USB adapter with an external power source since you won’t be able to power it up via the USB ports alone.

Hope that helps.
CK_WD

Thanks for the info folks. Would a 6" x 6" PiDrive enclosure suffice?

The currently offered PiDrive enclosures are meant to work with a specific setup and I don’t think you’ll be able to fit a 2.5" drive with a SATA to USB adapter in there, but you can always try it out if you want.
As for a 3.5" drive, it will definitely not fit in any of the PiDrive enclosures and I was talking about an external enclosure for the drive itself, so that you can use it with a USB interface and connect it just as any other external HDD.

Thats a real shame.
Any chance that a larger capacity PiDrive is going to be offered anytime soon?

Unfortunately I have no info on that. In any case even if I did, I’m not at liberty to discuss any products that haven’t been officially announced yet. :pensive:

A post was split to a new topic: PiDrive with Greater than

I’m using a Raspberry Pi 3 (OpenELEC) + 2.5A PSU

and a Raspberry Pi 2 (LibreELEC) + 2.0A PSU

both have in the config.txt
safe_mode_gpio=4
max_usb_current=1

and my 4TB My Passport Ultra works fine on both :slight_smile:

USB Voltage Test of 2TB Elements (4TB Passport uses a little more … but not much)

https://sea2.discourse-cdn.com/wd/uploads/default/optimized/3X/e/6/e6f703dbe9d268f4b57f4dfa46051c94530cfa5e_1_690x349.jpg

Excellent stuff ! Thanks very much. Time to get ordering…

I can second @JoeySmyth 's experience. I routinely use a MyPassport 4TB with a Pi Zero and Kodi (LibreElec) and it works beautifully. That is using a powered hub board connected directly to the zero, and it’s more than enough to power everything (the load is very borderline for a direct connection, but a powered set-up works).

It also works fine via a PiDrive cable, as he says (using an adaptor for USB to micro-USB for the input of course).

Keep in mind, removing any drive from its external case voids the drive’s warranty.

Understood - thank you.