Limit WD10TPVT to 1.5GB PHY (SATA-1)?

[franzzup]

I am looking for a way to limit the Western Digital WD10TPVT (2.5" 1 TB, 12.5 mm high) hard drive to SATA-1, i. e. 1.5 Gbps data transfer.

The drive fits well in all the Unibody MacBook Pro notebooks from Apple, but there have been issues with data corruption on the SATA interface when it is running at 3.0 Gbps.

Perhaps there is an inofficial WD firmware utility that can disable SATA-2 negotiations?

Thanks for any suggestions.

[zebong]

in some internal drives you can use jumpers to limited that, in external i think theres no way.

[franzzup]

Thanks ZeBong, the WD10TPVT is a bare (internal) SATA 2.5" drive. According to WD tech support, there is no jumper setting that will force SATA-1 negotiation.

I can't find specific documentation on the WD10TPVT jumper settings on the WD website, but other recent model WD 2.5" drives have two jumper positions, one for SSC (spread spectrum clocking) and one for RPS (reduced power spinup). There is no space for additional jumpers.

If anything, I think a (possibly inofficial) firmware utility could help. (Similar to the WDIDLE3.EXE utility that fixes the problem with high Load Cycle Counts in Linux/NAS/RAID situations on the WD20EARS.)

I'm hoping to find such a firmware utility, or a way to set an appropriate custom firmware parameter.

[BlackST]

There are NO "unofficial" firmwares. Some parameters can be modified in configuration, but honestly I didn't had the need for downgrading SATA. On other drive series
I would try something else, instead : it is easier maybe to work with the computer's SATA subsystem....