DIY USB "Hard Drive"

Using a dead Hard Drive, a 4-port USB hub, and a few Flash Drives, we will kill some time and get a few laughs from anyone seeing you use this.

**NOTE**
You guys can see MAKE magazine's rip-off article of my project at:
http://blog.makezine.com/archive/2009/03/weekend_project_flash_memory_hard_d_1.html

Thanks for the credit MAKE, I really appreciate it....

Any Hard Drive should do..

Take the Hard Drive apart...

Make sure your USB hub will fit, either with the plastic case on, or not...

For this purpose, I removed the plastic case.

I placed the "nekkid" USB hub into the area where the platter used to be.

Note: I was only placing this temporarily, if I was going to keep this mod permanent, I would glue the hub in either using epoxy or hot glue.

Edit: I forgot to mention, if this was going to be used permanently, I would coat the circuit board with epoxy, just like I do with Flash Drives.

Now add your Flash Drives, you may have to remove the casing for some to fit well.

Replace the cover to the Hard Drive, and plug in!

Now you will have a "new" Flash Drive that will be sure to get some comments.

Also, there is a way, I haven't done it, but with a certain flavor of Linux, you can install Linux onto all 4 of the Flash drives in a RAID configuration, assuming you have all the same capacities.

Have fun!