Cowon Q5W Teardown & Hard Drive Upgrade
There’s already a good, in-depth review on gadgetaholic.com of Cowon’s new, wi-fi enabled, super-PMP (personal/portable media player), the Cowon Q5W, but I’m going to attempt to answer a burning question of current and would-be Q5W owners: “How can I get more storage than 60gb?”
The simple answer is, “Stick a bigger hard drive in it!”. Can it be done? The only answer I can give at this moment is, “I don’t know…yet. But I intend to find out!” First thing I need to do is figure out what’s going on inside of the Cowon. I’m looking to see what kind of hard drive it has, the hard drive connector type, general layout of the internals, available space, etc. That means I have to pull it apart.
Update: This upgrade is possible! Read on…
Beware!If you choose to follow along with the following steps, you WILL void your warranty. I’m accepting the risk for my own Q5W in the name of research and bragging rights, but you might want to think twice about messing with yours and wait to see if I blow mine up first!
Tools you’ll need:
1. A Torx head screwdriver, size T5 (I have no idea what T5 means, except that it’s pretty small). If you’re not familiar a Torx fastener, it’s sort of like an allen head fastener, except instead of a hexagon shape, its more of a star-like shape. I bought a T5 Torx head screwdriver at Radio Shack this afternoon.
That’s it.
Next,we’re going to remove the back cover of the Q5W. This is very easy.
1. There are six torx screws; three on top, and three on the bottom (see photos - the photo on the right shows the screws removed).
2. Gently wiggle the cover off. Be careful here because the battery is mounted to the back cover that you’re tugging on and there is a VERY short battery connector cable to the main circuit board. The connector cable is at the bottom of the unit, so as you’re wiggling off the back, once it’s free of the unit, swing it open as though it’s hinged at the bottom. This will ensure you don’t pull on the connector.
3. Once inside, the hard drive is immediately visible. Pull out the black rubber shock absorber around the drive. As previously noted, check out the short battery connector (left image below).
4. There are some springy mesh shock absorbers stuck on the drive. Gently pull them off and peel back the hard drive cover. It too is stuck on the drive. Pull it back from the direction where the ribbon cable connects to the drive. Once part of the ribbon is exposed, hold it with your thumb while you continue to pull the cover off so you don’t put undue stress on the ribbon.
5. Sit back and admire your accomplishment! Now put it back together exactly as you found it!!!
My observations so far is that the Q5W’s hard drive is a 1.8″ Samsung model number HS060HB. It has a ZIF ATA-100 connector, similiar to the 1st generation Zune 30gb (not sure about Zune 2), Creative Zen Vision W, and 5th generation video Ipods. It is a thin drive, thinner than the stock 60gb drive in the Zen, which I have, but there is no problem fitting athicker drive into the Q5W, there is ample room.
What’s next: I am going to attempt to stick ahigher capacityhard drive in the unit (a 100gb 1.8″ Toshiba MK1011GAH). The Q5W is a Windows CE device at its core, so it won’t be a simple matter of swapping out the old drive and putting in a new one. It’s a bit more complicated, so stay tuned!
Dec 18, 2007 Update: New drive has been shipped. Should be here by Friday, Dec 22nd, so I will be working on the upgrade, hopefully with an update by the next day.
Dec 24, 2007 Update: New drive has arrived! Once again the Q5W was on put onto the operating table for the hard drive transplant. Here are the steps I performed to do the upgrade.
- Copy ALL of content on your Cowon (not just your media files) to a folder on your PC. All folders, files, subfolders including the Windows system files. Make sure you keep all existing file and folder structures when you copy. I put them in a folder on my C: drive on my desktop computer.
- Follow the steps above, disassemble your Q5W and remove the hard drive. The ZIF ATA-100 connector can be tricky. On the 60gb drive, there is a black connector lock that needs to be flipped up. Use your fingernail to get under it, and flip it towards the ribbon. I’m sorry I can’t give a better description of this process. The photo below shows the black connector (the thin, black strip) in the up postion.
- Install the new drive. You will need to flip the connector lock up on the new drive in order to insert the ribbon connector.
- Once the new drive is in place, stick the large, sticky cover back on the ribbon cable. In my situation with the new Toshiba drive, I did not need to install the springy spacers because the Toshiba drive is thicker than the stock 60gb drive (see photo below - the stock 60gb drive is on the left, the Toshiba drive on the right).
- Boot your Cowon in Recovery Mode. Do this by first pressing the ‘+’ volume button, then sliding the power switch to the on position and holding. The device should boot up and the screen will go into recovery mode.
- Once in Recovery Mode, connect your Q5W to your computer. Here’s where it gets a little weird. The new drive needs to be formatted, and formatted with the FAT32 file system. Yup, you heard right. The stock 60gb drive is FAT32. My new 100gb drive came formatted with the NTFS file system, and although the Q5Wcould read the drive contents, it would not boot. There is an option to format the drive in the Q5’s Recovery Mode menu, but it won’t work. The Q5W will generate an error message “Dismount Partition Failed”.
I’m running Windows XP, so there is no option for formatting a drive with the FAT32 file system. I downloaded a free utility called “fat32format.exe” from here (direct link to the utility here). Copy this utility to your PC. - Take note of your Q5’s drive letter in Windows Explorer. On my PC, it was listed as the G drive.
- Open a Command Prompt window on your PC (Start -> Run, type “cmd”, and press enter). Change the directory to the root of C (or wherever you placed the fat32format.exe file).
- Type “fat32format.exe g” (replace g with whatever your Q5’s drive letter is on your PC). The program will ask if your sure you want to format, respond with ‘y’. The format only takes a few seconds.
- Once the format is complete, copy all of the content you copied back in step 1 in this list back onto the Q5.
- Shut down your Q5 and restart normally. That’s it!
If all goes well for you, go into your Q5’s system stats and marvel at the additional 40gb of storage.
Some of you are probably already thinking bigger, like the new crop of 160gb drives from the iPod classic. Beware! I examined one of these drives and it does not have the same type of connector as the Cowon’s stock drive. The iPod classic uses a CE-ATA connector which is smaller than the Cowon’s ATA-100 connector.
Firmware upgrades: Yup, they work too:
Hope you enjoyed this article. I found the upgrade easy to do once I figured a few things out. I didn’t immediately discover that the file system on the Cowon’s stock drive was FAT32, but using the Disk Manager in Windows XP allowed me to determine the file system. You can format disks with Disk Manager, but the only formatting option is NTFS.
If you would like me to perform this upgrade for you, I’ll charge you a modest fee of $50 (plus postage) to do the work. But you should really try it yourself! It really is easy. If you still feel unsure of yourself, and want me to do the upgrade, you’ll need to send me your Q5 and the Toshiba drive. Important: Performing this work WILL void your Q5’swarranty. I cannot beheld responsible for any repercussions related to a voided warranty. Do this at your own risk!!!
If you’re still interested, leave me a post at the bottom of this page (I won’t publish it for public viewing) with an email address forcontacting you, and I’ll send you a shipping address.
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December 14th, 2007 at 11:03 pm
cool stuff. after this mission i dare u 2 dissect the cowon a3
December 14th, 2007 at 11:50 pm
You’ve got balls, my friend.
-Luck (Gadgetaholic)
December 15th, 2007 at 12:28 am
Another burning question: does it blend?
December 15th, 2007 at 12:01 pm
good luck! I always wondered why Cowon did not decide to offer larger disk spaces when there are drives like the Toshiba 1.8 HDD that will obviously fit. cheers,
T
December 15th, 2007 at 12:18 pm
Wow. You must have brass cojones! I figured having the Q5W in the first place was enough for bragging rights…
December 15th, 2007 at 4:23 pm
Good work, look forward to your update. By the way I added a post to your article at the iaudiophiles forum(http://iaudiophile.net/forums/showthread.php?p=156654). Hope it’s fine.
December 16th, 2007 at 6:31 am
The Q5 has an extendable antenna for the wifi but the FM radio uses the headphone wire for it’s signal. Maybe you can route these together from the inside?
December 17th, 2007 at 2:44 pm
It is a mystery why Cowon only offers a max of 60gb storage with iPods and the like topping out at 160gb. I would have liked to purchased a 160gb drive, but I can’t find them anywhere for sale. Maybe Apple and Archos are bogartting them all. Also, the latest gen Ipod 160gb drives have a different type of connector than the Q5W’s drive, so I couldn’t use one of those anyway. Not sure about the Archos’ drive, but I suspect it’s the same story.
December 19th, 2007 at 2:01 pm
Hello,
Can you tell us what sound/video chip the Q5W have?
Many thanks!
December 19th, 2007 at 4:17 pm
There is material stuck to the chip that I don’t want to pull off because it may be some sort of thermal barrier. There is a website (it may be Cowon’s) that lists the processor specs. From what I recall, it’s an AMD processor. When I get home later tonight I’ll see if I can track it down.
December 20th, 2007 at 5:40 pm
Here are specs on Cowon’s website:
http://www.cowonamerica.com/products/cowon/q5w/tech_specs.html
The processor is actually an Alchemy 1250. I’m not sure about any other applicable chips. Hope that helps.
December 22nd, 2007 at 1:17 pm
Hi rcgrabbag
I think it should be quite easy to do the swap because the Win ce programmes are installed on the Rom and not an the Harddrive itself. If you change the harddrive just try do enter into the Recovery Mode of the Q5. Just check the manual and somewhere near the end it is written how to do that. After that it should easily work. Please let us know if it worked as I want to do the same but I’m just not sure if there is enough room for a 8mm drive.
December 23rd, 2007 at 12:24 am
Hi Flam,
I think you’re right. I didn’t see a recovery mode in the manual, but I didn’t look that hard either. My plan is to either find the recovery mode (if not in the manual, perhaps a call to Cowon’s tech support), or, ghost the drive. I was hoping to get to it today, the hard drive was delivered, but I wasn’t at home to sign for it. Oh well, it’s being re-delivered on Monday, so I take a stab at it then. As far as room for the drive, I can’t imagine that would be a problem. If you look at the photos of the teardown and read my commentary, there are springy spacers that take up a good portion of the available drive space (thickness).
December 23rd, 2007 at 12:53 pm
Flam,
The Cowon does have a recovery mode. It is done by pressing the Power On button and the Volume ‘+’ button at the same time for a few seconds. After a short wait, the recovery mode menu is displayed. I should be getting the hard drive tomorrow (Dec 24th), so we’ll see how it goes then. I’ll add my steps and findings to the article above.
January 2nd, 2008 at 9:41 pm
Do you know if the Toshiba 120gb drive, MK1214GAH, is compatible? Seems to have the same interface as the MK1011GAH.
January 3rd, 2008 at 8:41 am
As long as it has the Zif ATA interface connector as pictured above, it will work.
January 4th, 2008 at 7:42 am
Maybe this will shame cowon into offering a larger capacity drive version… or perhaps a trade-in upgrade path.
January 4th, 2008 at 8:02 am
Yeah, I hope so. Hard to believe Cowon came out with only 40 and 60gb versions in this day and age when other devices are hitting 160gb. This is especially strange when you consider the kind of money they’re charging for either model.
January 22nd, 2008 at 9:50 am
Nice!!! Can u tell me if there is any hard disk that fit with cowon q5w with more than 100gb?
January 22nd, 2008 at 11:07 am
Toshiba now makes a 120gb hard drive that will fit (Model No. MK1214GAH) . The 160’s are available, but they use a different interface. Maybe they’ll make the older interface available.
January 23rd, 2008 at 2:29 pm
Hi,
How about cowon A3 ?
How can I upgrade the HD ?
tnx
Peter
January 23rd, 2008 at 5:33 pm
If it’s got a hard drive, there should be no reason you couldn’t upgrade it. The Cowon was the second device I upgraded. The first was a Creative Zen Vision W that I upgraded from 60 to 100gb. The important thing is to ensure the drive you are replacing has the same interface as the one in your A3. The new crop of 160gb drives, like those used in the iPod Classic, use the ZIF CE-ATA interface, which is relatively new. Devices like the Q5W, and probably your A3, use the older ZIF ATA-100 interface, so they are incompatible.
February 11th, 2008 at 12:23 pm
Very nice sir! Hopefully someone will try this with their A3.
February 22nd, 2008 at 1:03 pm
Great mod! I’m curious though - what online vendor did you use to order your replacement hard drive?
February 22nd, 2008 at 1:46 pm
I bought it off ebay. My drive is 100gb, although Toshiba makes a 120gb drive that is compatible for around $200. It is the TOSHIBA MK1214GAH.
Here is a link: http://www.monstronix.com/mk1214gah-p-454132.html
February 24th, 2008 at 2:20 am
Does anyone know why they used such an old os?
February 24th, 2008 at 11:52 pm
Nope, yet another mystery surrounding this device.
February 27th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
I will definitely upgrade when my 1 year extended warrantly expires. Thanks for an excellent guide!
March 25th, 2008 at 10:57 am
Samsung has a 160GB HDD with a compatible connector. Can’t seem to find a US distributor yet though:
http://www.samsung.com/global/business/hdd/productmodel.do?group=72&type=60&subtype=68&model_cd=344&ppmi=1160#
March 28th, 2008 at 8:19 am
Hey Ned, thanks for the info. I noticed it took a while before the 120gb Toshiba to become available to consumers after it was announced.
March 31st, 2008 at 10:07 pm
I’ll keep you in mind for the upgrade, The 60gb limit at this time is what is keeping me from buying one, plus the fact I need to pay off some bills first.
You remind me of an old friend of mine, he would modify anything.
May 8th, 2008 at 7:51 am
Do you think changing drive can fix the ‘dead harddisk’ symptoms ? FYI it freezes at the end of cowon loading screen and not recognized when plugged in usb during a recovery mode (Linux kernel log keeps telling me that it ‘resets every 15 seconds).
Any Ideas ?
Anyway, nice try and you were the first
(well you succeded first)
May 8th, 2008 at 10:01 am
Funny thing you should mention that. I popped my Q5 in the GPS cradle, and the screen went black and the device froze. I hit the reset button and now it does what you described. It freezes at the end of the loading screen. I got another Q5 and put the dead Q5’s 100gb drive in it. I took the 60gb out of the new and put it in the old Q5, but no luck. Still freezes after loading screen. I think I fried a chip or something when I put it in the GPS cradle. The Q5 was powered on when I did it, so maybe I shorted something out when I put it in the cradle. In your case, it could be the hard drive, but maybe it’s something else. Difficult to say since I’m not an expert in electronic repair. I can break stuff easily enough…
May 14th, 2008 at 10:50 am
And if you put it back on the cradle and try to power on ? I met my first troubles with q5w when I started playing with the cradle, but on my side, I had problems if I switch it on in the cradle: no power on and no more power on after taking back from cradle luckily, I had to plug AC power for 5 mins and the LED went red again !?
Will still buy the MK1214GAH, change it and supposing that you’re also stuck with a dead device I’ll keep you in touch with further experimentation.
As you opened the unit, can you tell me if there’s à JTAG port available ?
May 16th, 2008 at 5:09 pm
Just like to say thanks to rcgrabbag–you maverick (warranty, me arse)–and other contributors. Was able to upgrade to the Toshiba 120gb.
May 17th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
Zillium, yes, it acts strangely with the GPS cradle in the way that you described.
WildMS, thanx for the props. Yeah, I agree, warranties are nice, but I’d rather have more storage space. I’ll take the risk.
May 21st, 2008 at 8:45 am
As you may have already read in forum, I managed to fix my device, It was the zif connector that was slightly unplugged -> re-plug and power on.
Now for those who sent it back to germany or corea just for that: grrr !
May 21st, 2008 at 4:22 pm
Grrr is right!!! I just pulled open my Q5 for laughs, thinking it couldn’t be a loose connector. Lo and behold, the connector wasn’t loose at the hard drive end, but it was loose at the OTHER end where it connects to the system board. DOH!!! Plugged it in proper like and she works like a charm.
May 30th, 2008 at 7:38 pm
Are teh screws T-4? my t6 is a bit too big so I am guessing they are but before I go buy a t-4 I thought I’d ask.
May 31st, 2008 at 8:35 am
The screws are T-5. See my list of tools needed at the top of this article. Cheers and good luck!
June 17th, 2008 at 4:00 pm
nowdirect.com has the samsung 1.8 160gb hard drive, the Samsung SpinPoint N2 HS160JB - hard drive - 160 GB - ATA-100 for 165.00 free shipping. I thought those considering upgrading their Cowon Q5W would be glad to here this.
July 6th, 2008 at 5:55 pm
When you say ZIF ATA, is that the same thing as PATA (I see this more commonly when looking at the spec sheets/pages). I looked at the toshiba site and they had two categories, PATA and SATA. Which one is the ZIF ATA?
Thanks for this guide. Very informative.
July 6th, 2008 at 10:01 pm
ZIF ATA is also known as ATA-100. I’m not sure what PATA and SATA are.
July 7th, 2008 at 12:51 am
I guess what I mean is the hard drive you installed is this: Toshiba MK1011GAH
Which is listed on toshiba’s website here: http://sdd.toshiba.com/main.aspx?Path=StorageSolutions/1.8-inchHardDiskDrives/
On that website there are two categories for the HDD, “SATA” and “PATA”. So I was wondering if the ZIF ATA is also under PATA. (obviously it is, but I want to make sure it matches what you have anyway)
Also, the hard drive you got has an added “CE PMR” compared to the 120GB they have right above the MK1011GAH. I heard SATA is more modern than PATA, but i’m guessing it wont work. Would you happen to know if the CE PMR is better than the ones without it?
Thanks.
July 7th, 2008 at 2:10 pm
It’s a little over my head. I simply focused on the connector type that I needed. I’m unfamiliar with CE PMR. SATA I believe is Serial ATA vs. PATA which is probably parallel. Most hard drives today are SATA, at least in the computers I use.
July 7th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Do you think the 120 gb toshiba drive from the link I posted will work? the MK1214GAH?
Sorry for your troubles, it just seems that when i’m looking for these hard drives, the connectors you mentioned just don’t match what i’m looking at.
How did you know that the MK1011GAH had ZIF ATA, because the toshiba site I just linked to, does not even have “ZIF.” I am curious how you identified the toshiba hard drive to have ZIF ATA.
If you are interested, I came across this interesting post: http://www.mail-archive.com/rockbox-dev@cool.haxx.se/msg03339.html
Thanks again.
July 8th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
ZIF ATA was what it was called on another website of some guy who upgraded his Creative ZEN to 100gb. At that time, CE-ATA hadn’t hit the mainstream yet, so ZIF was just a generic term for Zero Insertion Force and ATA was a generic term for the interface. I think the correct interface type is ATA-100, but I can’t really be sure. Everyone seems to call it something different. If you go further up this page to post #41 from revmike, you will see the 160gb drive that I ordered. On two different sites, one lists the interface as PATA/ZIF (nowdirect.com), the other site lists it as ATA-100 (cdw.com). As far as the 120gb drive you mention, it has an interface listed as ATA-7 so again, I have no idea. If I were you, I’d go with any 1.8″ drive that does not have a CE-ATA interface from a reputable retailer (one that accepts returns) and return it if it is not the right interface.
July 11th, 2008 at 5:28 pm
I just received an e-mail from nowdirect that they are unable to fill my order for the 160gb hard drive due to problems with the manufacturer. They have the samsung 120gb for 180.00 shipped and offered that instead. I declined I’ll wait until the 160’s are available.
July 13th, 2008 at 10:44 am
Yeah, I got the same email. Not sure why the 120gb would be more expensive though. The price on the 160gb was $164 when I ordered.
July 15th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
I know, I was really looking forward to the upgrade. At least I still have plenty of space available. Hopefully the 160’s will be out within the next few months.
July 20th, 2008 at 5:54 am
Here is the link for the Samsung 160 gig.
Too much $ for my taste.
http://www.upgradebay.com/c1_itemdetail.asp?rid=gg&itemid=168760047&gclid=CPXArL6mzpQCFQ4RnQodqE95rA
July 20th, 2008 at 8:10 am
Yeah, I called upgradebay earlier in the week and they didn’t have it in stock. It was around $250 then, now they jacked it up over $300. A bit much for me too.
July 21st, 2008 at 10:50 am
EXCELLENT! Cheers to you my friend!
Ive had major internal dialog for some time now deciding weather to splurge the cash on a 60GB/80GB q5. Now i know i can save my ££ and upgrade a much cheaper 40GB version later on. Thanks for braving the front line and showing us this is possible.
July 25th, 2008 at 10:09 am
Hi just changed mine to the 120gb drive, thanks to your article. Went without hitch and very quick. A useful note: I tried installing it in an external 1.8 enclosure, intending to add external storage to the q5w, but it wasn’t too happy - maybe a power issue - not even with the ac adapter in, although worked OK in a regular laptop. So had to go for the swap, but far more convenient in the end. Have the 40gb in the external enclosure now.
BTW I have flacs of all my collection, hence the size. But anyone wanting for audiophile use it’s not so good as spdif is upsampled to 48khz, not bitperfect and the sound is a tad rounded and flat as a result. Great for portable quality headphone use though with a Monica dac and quality class a opamp headphone amp.
August 1st, 2008 at 3:04 am
I’m definitely gonna try this ^^ Just a quick question, does the Cowon have unicode support? Specifically, I’m wondering if it can display Japanese characters…
And, is it possible to buy a 40GB model and upgrade it in the way you’re discussing, or do you need to buy the 60GB model?
August 1st, 2008 at 11:05 am
It can be either the 40gb or 60gb model. I chose the 60gb originally just in case the hard drive swap didn’t work and I had to go back to the original hard drive. In that case, I would want the larger 60gb drive. But since the swap DID work, save yourself some cash and get the 40gb model.
August 1st, 2008 at 2:45 pm
I’m having a problem with the harddrive upgrade. I’m at the point to where I’ve in recovery mode, but my computer does not recognize the new drive. I’ve left it on the first recovery screen and I’ve selected backup and format, when I select that it goes to the next screen where it lists 01 connect adapter, 02 connect USB, 03 Move Hard disk, 04 Harddrive format. It will not let me select either. can you offer any help, Thanks. I can hear xp give it’s beep when I connect the q5 with the usb cord, but nothing shows up in explorer.
August 1st, 2008 at 3:16 pm
I know this sounds overly simplistic, but it sounds like you may have dislodged the drive’s ribbon cable from either the drive itself, or, where it connects to Cowon’s “motherboard” (under a piece of adhesive covering). This can happen quite easily when you’re monkeying around with the hard drive replacement and I’ve done it myself. Upon powering up the Cowon, put your ear to the device and you should hear the hard drive spool up. If not, the hard drive ribbon became dislodged. Even if you do hear it spool up, check the ribbon anyway, and on both ends.
August 4th, 2008 at 4:16 pm
A computer friend of mine checked both cables and still the computer recognizes with a beep, but no drive letter. Even when it was connected to his computer it recognizes the new drive, it even listed it as cowon q5 as new hardware found, but still no drive letter in explorer.
August 5th, 2008 at 6:45 am
Can you hear the hard drive spinning on boot-up of the Q5?
August 5th, 2008 at 10:20 am
No, I’ve listened and my friend Alan has listened, nothing.
August 5th, 2008 at 3:35 pm
Hmmm, that’s a tough one. It could be a defective hard drive, defective Q5 firmware, or a defective Q5. It could also be that although the drive is connected, that the ribbon cable is connected backwards. That is, pin 1 is lined up with pin 16 (I think its 16) and vice versa. Have you tried putting the old drive back in and seeing if that works?
August 5th, 2008 at 3:59 pm
Yes I have and it does the same as the new one, the computer recognizes, but no drive letter.
August 5th, 2008 at 4:22 pm
That’s strange. You did mention you broke the connectors on both drives, so that could be it. Other than that, I’m at a loss. It might need Cowon tech support to repair. Otherwise, you could chance getting a new drive, and letting me have a look at it.
August 5th, 2008 at 5:08 pm
I’ve already ordered a new drive, it should be here today or tomorrow, I’ll e-mail you when it does. Thanks for all your help.
August 5th, 2008 at 6:04 pm
Hi there
Rg revmike and disk detection problem.
Some new disks need to be ‘initialized’ when new - it may also need a drive letter to be manually assigned. Any road your first port of call should be disk manager. right click my computer icon>select ‘manage’>choose ‘disk manager’ snapin on the left, near the bottom.
If the disk is working [and the xp beep you mention tells me it is] it will be listed in disk manager - it may require action to get it going, uninitialized disks and volumes without drive letters assigned will not show in explorer…
good luck
August 5th, 2008 at 8:50 pm
DIGITALDEVIANCE
Thanks for the suggestion, but I tried that last night and although it beeps, it does not show in disk manager either. There is a listing for it under device manager for usb controllers and clicking on properties shows that it is the cowon q5, but there is an exclaimation point and clicking on properties for the q5 it takes you to the general page where it says, This device cannot start. (Code 10). I tried to install new driver by letting the computer seach and I’ve tried deleting the driver, but nothing at this time works.
August 7th, 2008 at 3:16 pm
Hello.
Attempted to upgrade my 40gb unit today with a 80gb drive, also failed with the same problem as revmike. Im sure this can be overcome by preparing the disk before installing it into the Q5 - i think its due to the disk file system and cluster size, the Q5 just wont play ball with it. Unfortunately i cant test any further until my 1.8″ ZIF USB caddy arrives sometime next week!
During my adventure around my Q5 inards i didnt notice any warranty seals/stickers or chasis intrusion mechanisms - im confident cowon will still honor my warranty should i need it. I sugest upgraders just keep the original Q5 disk to be re-fitted in the event they need the warranty.
I request rcgrabbag share further info on the Q5 upgraded. Hardware revision (stamped on internal PCB) bootloader and firmware versions in user during upgrade.
thanks, ill let ya know how i get on next week.
August 7th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
The drive I purchased was already pre-formatted with the NTFS file system. I’m wondering if the drives you purchased were not pre-formatted and have no file system. If that’s the case, maybe that’s why your computers don’t see the Q5 as a drive. revmike is sending me his Q5 and new drive so I can attempt the upgrade. We’ll see how that goes. I have a 1.8 inch hard drive enclosure that I’ll put his new drive in first and see if it has a file system. If not, I can pre-format it before doing the upgrade. I’ll keep you posted…
August 8th, 2008 at 12:55 pm
DIGITALDEVIANCE,
Did you try putting your old drive back in and did it work? revmike tried to put his old drive back in and had the same problem as with the new drive (Q5 booted in recovery mode but no drive letter assigned in Windows when connected to Q5 via USB). That is especially troubling and leads me to believe that it is more of a drive initializing or formatting issue.
August 12th, 2008 at 9:11 am
Hi,
Yes i re-installed the original disk and it was fully working again.
I cant vouch for the origin of this disk im using, it was just one we had floating around the office. I think it maybe from an IPDOD gen 5 - perhaps they are somehow different.
August 12th, 2008 at 1:40 pm
Yeah, I fixed revmike’s Q5 after he sent it to me. Turns out it was a bad hard drive ribbon cable in the Q5. I made this determination after putting his drive in my Q5 and booting up successfully. I inspected his Q5’s hard drive cable and found some of the connectors at the end were damaged. I trimmed off a tiny amount of the end of the cable and was able to get it to seat more deeply in the drive’s connector, past the damaged part on the cable. Once I did this, his Q5 booted successfully with the new drive.
August 14th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
Hi there
I successfully upgraded my Q5 today using a 60GB disk, i guess the 80 i had was faulty. I couldnt just copy the files accross from the old disk to the new, the Q5 would fail to boot for some reason. I tried using a snapshot util to clone the disk over, it then booted but weirdly i ended up with a 40GB patition on a 60GB disk, even though the util should have expanded it. I had to install the disk, and use th Q5 recovery menu to restore and get it going again. Still, it worked and was quite easy.
Just waiting for cheap 120GB disks now, 60GB will suffice till then.
cheers
August 16th, 2008 at 10:57 am
Nice work!
I’m currently picking between a q5w and an Archos 605 160gb. I was about to rule out the q5w but this has ruled it straight back in. How do you find the interface? I might in the future, when I have enough money, email you about you upgrading the q5w to 100gb.
Thanks,
Andy
September 21st, 2008 at 2:59 pm
Hello,
since my teacher lets me take a lot of crap from the class. Anyhow, would a 160gb drive actually work, cause I though that the FAT32 file system would only go to 120gb? Or would you be able to have two partitions? Also, a couple of other things: How does this affect the battery life and is it possible to also upgrade the battery?
I think I might try this out when I have enough cash for the player and drive, or if I can get a drive from my computer class
Thank you.
November 10th, 2008 at 12:21 pm
Hi All,
This is a great walk-through and thread. I am looking at buying either the Archos 5 or the Cowon Q5W. The storage size is a large determining factor in my decision. Chris, you should be able to format a large drive over 160GB. I have a 160GB 2.5″ drive and formatted it with FAT32 in Mac OS X. Has anyone tried the 160GB Samsung drive?
PATA type drives are the ones you need. 40 pin ATA connector. Not sure whether the connector is ATA-100 or ATA-133. Drive should still work I beleive. Toshiba have released a 240GB two platten drive MK2431GAH but I can’t find it on any sites yet. Anyone had any luck with their upgrades?
December 14th, 2008 at 5:43 pm
Is there any way to stick windows 2000 or XP on this? Preferably keeping the original OS on there two I was just looking for a way to run some games like Rollar Coster Tycoon or an N64 emulator…
December 14th, 2008 at 5:57 pm
Nope, this is a mobile device and won’t run 2K or XP.
December 14th, 2008 at 6:29 pm
Is there any chance you know of a device that you can modify to run 2k or XP that is roughly the size of the cowon? Looking at the stats most of these pmps have the power to do it
December 14th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
Not that I know of. These mobile devices may have the power, but they lack the memory and/or the processor chips have an improper instruction set to run an OS like XP.
December 14th, 2008 at 6:52 pm
Thanks for your help its a pity no one has thought to build a pmp system around 2000 instead of CE its alot easier to use apps on 2000 then CE…
December 14th, 2008 at 7:03 pm
One device that’s probably the closest to what you describe is the iPhone. It runs a pretty robust version of OS X.
January 2nd, 2009 at 3:11 pm
hi i have a COWON Q5W I FORMATED THE HDD BY MISTAKE , TWO WEEKS AGO AND I HAVE BEEN TRYING TO ALL KIND OF THINGS TO GET IT BACK ON TRACK . WHAT IS HAPPENGING IS THIS , ONE THE UNIT CAN NOT BE POWERED OFF WITH THE SWITCH .TWO WHEN I TAP ON COWON LAUNCHER THIS THING POP UP AND SAY [CANNOT FIND COWON Q5 MAIN OR ONE OF ITS COMPONENTS MAKE SURE THE PATH FILE NAME ARE CORRECT AND ALL THE REQUREDS LIBRARIES ARE AVALABLE .I HOPE YOU CAN HELP ME . I AM NOT SO GOOD WITH COMPUTERS THANKS YOUR FREIND LINCOLN THANKS
January 2nd, 2009 at 3:42 pm
Can you still access the Cowon via USB from your computer? If so, download the latest firmware and Applications from the Cowon website here. Follow the upgrade instructions and that should restore everything that was missing.