CF-to-SATA hardware interface for RAW recording (fork)

[Walter Schulz]

Those wires are coated with an insulating layer. Nothing to worry about.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiring_pencil

[Aperture Science]

Those wires are coated with an insulating layer. Nothing to worry about.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wiring_pencil

The truth 

[Aperture Science]

I think I should just connect every pins to pins instead of doing resister tricks. But I need to get some rest before doing it for the next time.
This one I spend two half days on flying wires. Really stabbing my eyes (each wires only have 0.1mm) lololol. But good to see LED are flashing. The red LED flashing means there are signals trying to read and write.

[DeafEyeJedi]

Digging the progress so far. It's definitely feeling warmer as far as becoming a true hack. SSD's are so cheap those days and is easily expendable/replaceable.

Would it be worth to consider to try and push this project towards into the M.2 slot if we ever get the SSD's phase to work? 

[names_are_hard]

SATA should be fast enough to saturate the camera bus (I assume?  Didn't check).  There are M.2 drives that are logically SATA, and SATA-M.2 physical adapters so you can connect them direct with a SATA cable.  So if this works for SATA SSD it likely works for M.2 as well.  But not PCIe M.2, that's a whole other problem.

[Walter Schulz]

Slowest SATA mode spec: 150 MByte/s net transfer rate.
As written above: I seriously doubt the existence of any PATA-to-SATA device able to handle UDMA-7. And UDMA-6 spec is up to 133 MByte/s.

[ArcziPL]

Maybe it is time to make a PCB board for this? I only used one resister instead of four.

Unfortunately, I have no idea about CF and no time to go into the topic, but just quickly checked the pins with pull-ups.

https://www.syslogic.de/ProductDocuments/deu/Product-Manual---503-CF.pdf

-PDIAG
(True IDE Mode)
In the True IDE Mode, this input/output is the Pass Diagnostic signal
in the Master/Slave handshake protocol.

Others (/WE, /CS1, /DMACK) should be plain inputs. Try at least to add a second, separate resistor for PDIAG. No idea what and when this pin does, if it's used in both directions in True IDE (sorry, really no time) but as a quick check it might be worth trying...

[Aperture Science]

Unfortunately, I have no idea about CF and no time to go into the topic, but just quickly checked the pins with pull-ups.

https://www.syslogic.de/ProductDocuments/deu/Product-Manual---503-CF.pdf

Others (/WE, /CS1, /DMACK) should be plain inputs. Try at least to add a second, separate resistor for PDIAG. No idea what and when this pin does, if it's used in both directions in True IDE (sorry, really no time) but as a quick check it might be worth trying...

Sure

[Aperture Science]

Okay, new plan.
I decide to learn how to use altium designer and make a PCB board for this.
No more stupid fly wires.

[71m363nd3r]

Okay, new plan.
I decide to learn how to use altium designer and make a PCB board for this.
No more stupid fly wires.

https://kicad-pcb.org/

https://www.tinycad.net/

https://easyeda.com/

good luck

[Aperture Science]

https://kicad-pcb.org/

https://www.tinycad.net/

https://easyeda.com/

good luck

Thank you XD

[gzillarocks]

Hey Aperture Science- I'm really hoping that you can find a way to adapt from CF to SATA, or CF to MSATA, for cameras with Magic Lantern. I will definitely be following this forum to see how you progress! I did find this product online that works with a Canon c200, but I'm not sure if this device can work on a DSLR with Magic Lantern or not. Either way, I wanted to send you the product link so you can check it out and maybe it can be helpful to you: https://store.n.ki/products/solidpod  - The product is called SolidPod

CF cards are so much more expensive than SSD's, and I've found forums on here going back to 2013 with people trying to find a way to adapt from CF to SATA, but without a lot of luck. Hopefully with the newer MSATA, or NVME devices it might be easier to create an adapter that works for Canon cameras with magic lantern.

I would also check out what RED did with their MAG recording devices. It looks like they are using some type of adapter inside the housing- that might be useful to you too.

Let me know if there is anything I can help with, I will be following along for sure.

[gzillarocks]

Here is a really cool video breaking down the interior of a RED MAG storage device. I'm not entirely sure if this will be helpful, but I think it could be insightful for how they work. Maybe the idea can be applied in it's own way using MSATA for Canon cameras with Magic Lantern. 

[Aperture Science]

Hey Aperture Science- I'm really hoping that you can find a way to adapt from CF to SATA, or CF to MSATA, for cameras with Magic Lantern. I will definitely be following this forum to see how you progress! I did find this product online that works with a Canon c200, but I'm not sure if this device can work on a DSLR with Magic Lantern or not. Either way, I wanted to send you the product link so you can check it out and maybe it can be helpful to you: https://store.n.ki/products/solidpod  - The product is called SolidPod

CF cards are so much more expensive than SSD's, and I've found forums on here going back to 2013 with people trying to find a way to adapt from CF to SATA, but without a lot of luck. Hopefully with the newer MSATA, or NVME devices it might be easier to create an adapter that works for Canon cameras with magic lantern.

I would also check out what RED did with their MAG recording devices. It looks like they are using some type of adapter inside the housing- that might be useful to you too.

Let me know if there is anything I can help with, I will be following along for sure.

Sure Sure, I checked this one long time ago. Thanks for reviewing.

[Aperture Science]

Few things need to clarify.
First, Canon 5Dmk3 (also include 5DS,5DSR,7D,5D2) are all using "Compact Flash" which is a type of SSD based on the IDE interface.
However Canon C200 uses "CFast 2.0" which is a type of SSD based on the SATA interface (which we used a lot on our computer nowadays)
In the same time, the socket they developed is also based on the SATA. As in the video send by gzillarocks, there is no chip set in between the socket and the mSATA.
The highest speed IDE socket can go is around 133m/s while SATA2.0 can support around 300m/s. Not to mention SATA3.0. SATA and IDE conversion need a chip set, not simply putting wires together. That is the reason why no one makes the adapter on the market since there is only a little demand on this. (Hey, professional cinema cameras are all have CF2.0 or even USB type-C installed

There is no Adapter on the market have the function we need, so we have to make our own
I am only an undergraduate freshman majors on EE, no experience on making the PCB.   But lets see how far we can get on this since I think it will work theoretically.


PS:Compact Flash can also being known as IDE 50(since there are 50 pins on it), I saw these kind of SSD before when my father was still using floppy. They have the exactly the same socket as compact flash do, just little bit longer and wider on the body. But people are not manufacture these drives anymore and because of the high selling price at that time, these kind of dives didn't sold a lot. So it is also hard to be finding in the second-hand market.

[70MM13]

interesting!

if both card slots on the 5d3 share the same "IDE" bus, that perfectly explains the 131 MB/S "hard limit" on card-spanning recording!

nice!

and not so nice 

[rinski]

Hello, I with the 5d3 and the 2 cards at the same time (Danne's version) I have recorded with 165 mb / s maintained 6k 15 fps 14 bits, more than 7 minutes at continuous speed, I think the 5d4 and other canon with connector mini usb 3.0 could dump the rawvideo into a ssd with its dual female usb 3.0 adapter and this one to usb male to usb-c external ssd with 500 MB / s theoretical. Thank you.

[gzillarocks]

Few things need to clarify.
First, Canon 5Dmk3 (also include 5DS,5DSR,7D,5D2) are all using "Compact Flash" which is a type of SSD based on the IDE interface.
However Canon C200 uses "CFast 2.0" which is a type of SSD based on the SATA interface (which we used a lot on our computer nowadays)
In the same time, the socket they developed is also based on the SATA. As in the video send by gzillarocks, there is no chip set in between the socket and the mSATA.
The highest speed IDE socket can go is around 133m/s while SATA2.0 can support around 300m/s. Not to mention SATA3.0. SATA and IDE conversion need a chip set, not simply putting wires together. That is the reason why no one makes the adapter on the market since there is only a little demand on this. (Hey, professional cinema cameras are all have CF2.0 or even USB type-C installed

There is no Adapter on the market have the function we need, so we have to make our own
I am only an undergraduate freshman majors on EE, no experience on making the PCB.   But lets see how far we can get on this since I think it will work theoretically.


PS:Compact Flash can also being known as IDE 50(since there are 50 pins on it), I saw these kind of SSD before when my father was still using floppy. They have the exactly the same socket as compact flash do, just little bit longer and wider on the body. But people are not manufacture these drives anymore and because of the high selling price at that time, these kind of dives didn't sold a lot. So it is also hard to be finding in the second-hand market.

This is really great information to have! Aperture Science your work is incredible.

 I have a question for everyone- I'm trying to help find a way to make an adapter work, but can someone confirm if Magic Lantern firmware bypasses any Canon specific recording (writing) protocols? I am talking to someone who has tried building one before for commerical use, but he believes that Canon has protocols that might prevent the adapter from working. Do we know if these protocols exist or what they are, and do we know if they are being bypassed or overrided by ML firmware?

  It makes sense to me that once a dummy CF card is put within the camera, even if it has an adapter leading to an external SSD, it should essentially 'trick' the camera into believing that it is recording to a normal CF card. Therefore, any protocols put in place to prevent recording to anything other than a CF Card should be bypassed anyway. But does someone have some insight into this issue, because if so I think we all might be getting close to finding a solution to external recording.

[kitor]

PS:Compact Flash can also being known as IDE 50(since there are 50 pins on it), I saw these kind of SSD before when my father was still using floppy. They have the exactly the same socket as compact flash do, just little bit longer and wider on the body. But people are not manufacture these drives anymore and because of the high selling price at that time, these kind of dives didn't sold a lot. So it is also hard to be finding in the second-hand market.

Sorry, but you are wrong. Those SSDs depicted on photo have completely different pinout than CF, it's called 1.8 IDE. I had one of those on OQO 01+, and still own adapter that converts CF pinout so you can plug it to replace this kind of "CF connector" drive. Their connector is also slightly different so you can't just force CF card into 1.8 IDE (and 1.8 IDE drive is wider so you can't force it into CF)



Also, let me remind you all that CF standard has three types of operation, one of them is IDE emulation. There are cards that don't support IDE mode, CF readers/controllers also need to support this mode / talk ATA to card.

[gzillarocks]

Sorry, but you are wrong. Those SSDs depicted on photo have completely different pinout than CF, it's called 1.8 IDE. I had one of those on OQO 01+, and still own adapter that converts CF pinout so you can plug it to replace this kind of "CF connector" drive. Their connector is also slightly different so you can't just force CF card into 1.8 IDE (and 1.8 IDE drive is wider so you can't force it into CF)



Also, let me remind you all that CF standard has three types of operation, one of them is IDE emulation. There are cards that don't support IDE mode, CF readers/controllers also need to support this mode / talk ATA to card.

I think that Aperture Science still has the right idea, and I'm excited to see what he comes up with. I'm not an expert in electrical engineering or how these cards work, but I am asking a couple of people that I know about them so that maybe I can be of assistance.

Is there something you think can work, in terms of a device or adapter mechanism? If the camera believes that it is writing to a CF card and it's able to communicate with it, and then that data is processed back to an mSata or other interface SSD, it should theoretically work. It just has to be compatible with the process. Would you have an idea of how it could work? I can have a device made, but I'm not currently sure the best way to do it because of my own lack of knowledge about cards and the exact process in which they work.

p.s: I was talking to a person about the current CFast to mSATA drives that work on newer Canon cinema cameras, and he said the reason they struggled to find out how to get the CF to SSD drives working was because of writing protocols. - Couldn't that be remedied by having an adapting device that is actually supporting the proper IDE writing protocols and then sending the written data back on external storage?

[names_are_hard]

There's two broad approaches.

1) Pin-to-pin adapter, no logic, just wires.  With this approach the target drive must use the same interface as origin drive.  So if it's PATA CF in the cam, it has to be PATA something at the other end of your adapter.  If it's SATA, SATA at both ends, etc.  This is simpler, cheaper, may have problems with lengths of wires involved making the communication protocols fail.

2) Active logic.  Here you have some chip in the middle that understands whatever protocol the target and origin drive speak.  It translates.  This is more flexible - you could have PATA at one end and NVMe at the other...  but, it's much harder.  You will need a fast chip to keep up, and since you're not dumbly passing through the information, but actively processing it, you must have code that speaks both protocols.  Those protocols may have patents involved, may not have freely available code, etc.

[71m363nd3r]

Do you know that 99% all the cameras have a max limit of card storage that they accept.

[Walter Schulz]

Do you know that 99% all the cameras have a max limit of card storage that they accept.

Source?
And why should 1% (which one?) accept *all* sizes? CF 4.0 is defined for up to 512 GByte. CF 5.0 up to 128 PiByte (128 x 1024 TiByte).

[71m363nd3r]

Source?
And why should 1% (which one?) accept *all* sizes? CF 4.0 is defined for up to 512 GByte. CF 5.0 up to 128 PiByte (128 x 1024 TiByte).

https://support.usa.canon.com/kb/index?page=content&id=FAQ100307&actp=search&viewlocale=en_US&searchid=1556162102084

https://canoncanada.custhelp.com/app/answers/answer_view/a_id/1002948/~/what-memory-cards-have-been-verified-to-work-with-this-camera%3F-%28eos-5d-mark-ii%29

https://id.canon/id/support/8201558700

look at compatibility size @ canon

https://store.canon.co.uk/canon-sandisk-extreme-pro-compactflash-memory-card-160-mb-s-256gb/0210W812/

[Walter Schulz]

Sorry, your conclusion is not based on facts. You named no source backing up your claim about 99%. You used outdated sources (first 256 GB CF was introduced late 2013).
Canon's statement about guaranteed compatibilty says nothing about incompatibility.
You didn't come up with a single source about CF 5.0 compatibilty.
Compatibilty issues with ExFAT are not based on size. For example: Digic 4 cams can't deal with ExFAT. Size doesn't matter in this case.
To put it together: Your statement is worthless.

This is a technically oriented forum. Facts rules.