Cowon X7 Hard Drive failure. Fix? Gulp.

afterlife2

afterlife2

Audioholic Warlord
I hope I can post this here. If not please move to where this belongs. I've had this player for 9 years and love the SQ. A couple of months ago files started disappearing, Still had music files. Then recently I tried to plug in the player to my computer to see if I could access the files, but it would not show up. Slowly I guess the HD started dying. It still does boot up fine and can play the radio, but gets stuck if I try to open a Flac/Mp3 file. It barely has any music files nowadays. I think I dropped it once, but it was not a hard fall. I was wondering if I could replace the hard drive? All I need is a new hard drive and firmware software and maybe it will work? I've never tried this before and want to save it. Yes I have other players that are working, but I really like this player. I remember back in the day there was a firmware(made by some guy can't remember his name) to make it look and function better and he even added some games on it on a cowon(iaudiophile.net I think it was) type forum. Can I save it?
Firmware:
http://www.cowonglobal.com/zeroboard/zboard.php?id=C08&category=&no=541&bmenu=support&category=34
Here is the hard drive. Suppose to be the same for the ipod:
https://www.ebay.com/itm/Toshiba-16...134662&hash=item3408e1d463:g:wZYAAOSwlE5cuP0E
Can I get one that works better and fits the same, but faster than 4200 RPM or should I stick to the ebay one?

Not my pic found online.

Thank you!​
 
panteragstk

panteragstk

Audioholic Warlord
You could take it one step further and go SSD. Then the shock of being dropped is much less likely to ever be an issue. IMHO it'd be more reliable in general as there are no moving parts.

Your options with that ZIF PATA interface are very few.

https://www.newegg.com/p/0D9-004B-00009?Description=zif pata&cm_re=zif_pata-_-9SIA1K69132704-_-Product
 
BoredSysAdmin

BoredSysAdmin

Audioholic Slumlord
You could take it one step further and go SSD. Then the shock of being dropped is much less likely to ever be an issue. IMHO it'd be more reliable in general as there are no moving parts.

Your options with that ZIF PATA interface are very few.
yeah, I agree on all points. Unfortunately, PATA ZIF 1.8 SSD in decent sizes/prices are very few and between
 
afterlife2

afterlife2

Audioholic Warlord
You could take it one step further and go SSD. Then the shock of being dropped is much less likely to ever be an issue. IMHO it'd be more reliable in general as there are no moving parts.

Your options with that ZIF PATA interface are very few.

https://www.newegg.com/p/0D9-004B-00009?Description=zif pata&cm_re=zif_pata-_-9SIA1K69132704-_-Product
Thanks that would be great in case of a drop. Are those faster than the one I posted? Is that the lowest price and highest gb? Quite pricey yikes.
 
panteragstk

panteragstk

Audioholic Warlord
Thanks that would be great in case of a drop. Are those faster than the one I posted? Is that the lowest price and highest gb? Quite pricey yikes.
With the specific connector you need your options are VERY limited. That would be a whole different world of speed compared to a 4200RPM drive unless the interface has a speed limit, which it probably does.
 
panteragstk

panteragstk

Audioholic Warlord
slipperybidness

slipperybidness

Audioholic Warlord
afterlife2

afterlife2

Audioholic Warlord
That won't work. He needs a 1.8" drive with a PATA ZIF connection that I've personally never seen in person. I wish it would be as easy as grabbing a normal SATA drive. He could get tons of space super cheap.
Thanks man. I'll be on the look out for a black Friday sale. There's no rush. I'm just glad I can use it again via firmware, which I better download before they take it down. Does the SSD PATA ZIF come already formatted or do I have to partition it? I've never used one.
 
panteragstk

panteragstk

Audioholic Warlord
Thanks man. I'll be on the look out for a black Friday sale. There's no rush. I'm just glad I can use it again via firmware, which I better download before they take it down. Does the SSD PATA ZIF come already formatted or do I have to partition it? I've never used one.
I would imagine the firmware tool you're going to use will take care of all that. You'll probably have a difficult time finding a PATA ZIF to usb/sata adapter to use your pc to format so I wouldn't worry about it.
 
D

DefKnoL

Audiophyte
I came across this thread while attempting to install the Quad flash microSD card zif pata on my Cowon X7 (link here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07538C6PX/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1). I used this adapter to partition it and format it to FAT32 before connecting it to the COWON (link here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07FW9WC1F/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1).

The COWON can see that it is there in the disk usage widget (with an exaggerated bar)) but is not detected by the player software to choose music. Also, the new X7 HDD does not show up as a USB drive when connected. The firmware version installed is 2.14.

I matched the geometry of the partition to match the original start at sector 63 instead of 2048 with the same drive size as the original and matched the disk label to X7_HDD. When I use the built-in format function of the X7, it generally just fouls up the disk and loses the entire partition requiring me to create it again with the computer. It would seem that this Quad Flash will not work with the X7 (at least not with my limited disk skills) - I'll just use it for my iPod classic (which it is proven to work for). Preferably, I will figure out a way to use it in the X7.
 
afterlife2

afterlife2

Audioholic Warlord
I came across this thread while attempting to install the Quad flash microSD card zif pata on my Cowon X7 (link here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07538C6PX/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o07_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1). I used this adapter to partition it and format it to FAT32 before connecting it to the COWON (link here: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B07FW9WC1F/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o09_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1).

The COWON can see that it is there in the disk usage widget (with an exaggerated bar)) but is not detected by the player software to choose music. Also, the new X7 HDD does not show up as a USB drive when connected. The firmware version installed is 2.14.

I matched the geometry of the partition to match the original start at sector 63 instead of 2048 with the same drive size as the original and matched the disk label to X7_HDD. When I use the built-in format function of the X7, it generally just fouls up the disk and loses the entire partition requiring me to create it again with the computer. It would seem that this Quad Flash will not work with the X7 (at least not with my limited disk skills) - I'll just use it for my iPod classic (which it is proven to work for). Preferably, I will figure out a way to use it in the X7.
Thanks yeah mine can't see the HD either. I'll hold on to it and see if one day I can get it to work. When it worked the SQ was so good. I did drop it by accident and I think it messed up the drive, although it wasn't a very hard fall.
 
evelyco

evelyco

Audiophyte
If your problem is due to an incorrectly formatted hard drive, that's half the problem. I was more nervous when I discovered that MIxxx did not want to start because of hard drive problems. I had to contact SalvageData for data recovery services on the advice of a friend. The error could have been due to a hardware defect in the device or disk. They explained to me how to avoid such mishaps in the future. In addition to a wrongly formatted drive, formatting to an incompatible file system is also a common and serious cause of data loss.
 
afterlife2

afterlife2

Audioholic Warlord
I still have it and recently saw it in my drawer. Maybe I'll play with it and see if the drive is working. Ya never know. Not worried as I have 4-5 flac/Mp3 players that sound just as good after eq.
 
panteragstk

panteragstk

Audioholic Warlord
I still have it and recently saw it in my drawer. Maybe I'll play with it and see if the drive is working. Ya never know. Not worried as I have 4-5 flac/Mp3 players that sound just as good after eq.
Check this out if you haven't seen it. If you already have a good player it's maybe pointless, but it's pretty cool.

I hooked up my SMSL DAC to my phone and played DSD and such without issue. I'm looking for a small headphone amp/DAC I can use with USB C on my phone. I'm getting tired of wireless earbuds.
 
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