Smallest HDD in a XBox?

[scumball]

I'm playing with modifying the case on an XBox with Xecuter 2 chip.

I am planning on removing the DVD drive - which I think is okay if the console is chipped.

However I was also planning on using a Compact Flash (to IDE) as the HDD to reduce the size of the new case needed.

So -
a. any reason why this wouldn't work?
b. what is the smallest size HDD you can put in a XBox - is it just enough for the dashboard (XBMC) or do you need the X/Y/Z drives at 750Mb each?

[Samstag]

You do need the XYZ and all other stock partitions unless someone's worked out a firmware hack to get around that.  You'll need an 8 gig drive.  You can remove the DVD drive but you'll get a blinky status light unless you short the tray closed status pin (assuming you use the status light).

I used a laptop drive mounted on short standoffs (1/2" I think?) and it sits lower than the CPU heatsink:

[ChadTower]

The stock HD has something like 5g free... 3g+ even with XBMC on it.  You definitely do need all of the logical drives, but given how much empty space there is on a stock Xbox with just XBMC on board, I wonder if one really could get away with a 5g drive.

[scumball]

Damn it.  CF out the window then.  An 8Gb CF is pricey...

[ChadTower]

Laptop drives are at least smaller than standard IDE...

[scumball]

True.  I just wanted to boot direct to XBMC for streaming media etc. so didn't think I needed much space.  Thought CF would be smaller, quieter and run cooler....

[ChadTower]

You still need everything the stock Xbox drive has on it.  XBMC sits next to the Xbox software, it doesn't replace anything.

[scumball]

Shame...why is that BTW?

[Samstag]

Actually you can get away with missing a lot of the stock files if you don't need the MS dashboard for anything.  I found that out accidentally when I used an installer disk on a blank drive and forgot to install the MS stuff and it worked for months before I realized it.  I was using it strictly for XBMC.

I thought I remembered reading that you couldn't run with any of the partitions smaller than stock, but I'm not sure if any serious effort was made in that direction.

I was looking into running from CF a while back and decided that after adding the CF/IDE adaptor you can't really get the package much smaller than I did with the laptop drive.  CF is also really slow compared to a hard drive, even using the CF microdrives.  You'll probably have double the initial boot times, but after that it should run fine.

[scumball]

Well I've got the XBox and 2GB CF card - I ordered a IDE adaptor for £3 so I guess it's worth a punt...

[ark_ader]

Those CF-> IDE converters usually have over and under slots for 2 CFs, but the weight factor against using a laptop drive and the CF converter is very marginal. 

What are trying to accomplish here?

Have you found a really cool way to house the xbox in a smaller case?

If so I would be really interested.

[scumball]

Well personally I have scrapped the project - but it was going to be a small cased XBox - search for slimbox on xbox-scene...