I finally got a chance to try the Silicon Valley Computer ADP50L (an
8-bit ISA IDE controller) in my IBM 5160 and I have to say, I love the
thing and want to put it to full active use. My problem is, how do I
properly mount a "modern" (3.5" half-height) hard drive into the case?
Looking at the existing ST-225 that's currently in there, it has much
larger dimensions so that it not only reaches the screw holes on the
side of the case, but for additional stability has the front faceplate
directly screwed onto it as well. It's in there pretty tight. I can
remove it, but how do I put my 340MB smaller drive in it's place?
Untill not too long ago (and maybe still if you hunt for them) you could
get adapter kits to mount 3.5" devices in 5.25" (half height) bays.
You either got a chassis or 2 U-shapped channels to fit the device onto
and which would then have tapped holes to line up with the original
mouting holse in the case. The kits for floppy drives also included a
front bezel, a signal cable adapter (fitted on the 34 pin header plug of
the drive, took the edge connector on the cable) and a power cable adapter.
If oyou can find such a kit, you could use it to fix the drive in place
with the original screws. As regards the front panel, either make
something from scratch, or take the panel off the old hard drive (a
couple of screws) and make up brackets to fix it to the adapter chassis.
-tony