Need a little portable storage from IBM Thinkpad 380D

[ChefJoe]

Help! I need ideas people. I have been noticing hot deals for USB pen drives and was thinking about picking up one for my ailing laptop and other things.

I want a way to cart around larger types of files and stuff. The ability to carry a powerpoint presentation without it running over the floppy disk size, maybe the occasional MP3 album I wanted to bring in... I dunno.

Problem is this is a 2 gig HD, P150, 48 MB RAM, 16 Bit PCMCIA/Non-Cardbus supporting beast of a laptop. No USB ports on it and all the PCMCIA adapters I see want CardBus. I looked at CompactFlash or SmartMedia to PCMCIA adapters, but realize that my two home computers would need adapters to make full use of it and I don't want to get all the extra hardware for just this puropse. Any other ideas or fairly cheap ways to steer me? If you say PCMCIA zip I'll scream... no way I want to pay that much for a slow "Floppy2.0"

I'm about to give up on all this, enable a password protected sharing folder on a dell in the room and simply xfer all my files from laptop to dell with a USB pen drive plugged in. Adds another level to getting my stuff, but about the only thing I can think of at this point.

 

[kd7fhd]

about the only way i can think of to get usb ports on your laptop is to get a pcmcia to usb adapter such as this one at newegg

it adds to your tco, but you would be able to use any usb (1.1 or 2.0 version) devices with your laptop.

sorry, but i DID have to mention that p***** word.

check around the fourm... newegg gets excellent reviews.

edited:

sorry, but after looking at the manufacturers website, that one is a cardbus version also. i don't know why your tp won't use cardbus cards as my tp 560x used any card i put in it... the 560x is pretty much like yours except for a 233MHz pentium chip.

 

[ChefJoe]

Things like this listing of compatability <a href="http://www.usbtown.com/nav/item.asp?item=950">

http://www.usbtown.com/nav/item.asp?item=950</A>

this horror story
http://zurich.ai.mit.edu/hypermail/thinkpad/2002-05/0423.html



And this chipset info make me think Cardbus is a no go

http://www.pc.ibm.com/qtechinfo/YAST-3JZU4X.html?selectarea=SUPPORT&brand=IBM+ThinkPad%7CThinkPad+755C%2FCS%7C9545&x=12&y=3

<FONT face=Helvetica>380series
The 380/E - 385/E seriesdo not have card bus support directly on the machine, however, these machinescan be used with the Enhanced Port Replicator 11J8997 which does provideCardBus support. Be sure to check the version of 95 installed for CardBussupport (see next section)

Yep, maybe Network Neighborhood is the way to go.</FONT>

 

[PCMarine]

Maybe it's time to buy a new laptop

 

[ChefJoe]

Lol. Thanks. Yep, this puppy is the third computer in my fleet. Only one I didn't build. New Laptop, nah, I use this at the desk as an e-mail/AT terminal and I had occasion to xfer files back and forth from work and home and found the floppy to be a PITA. If I've gone through all the convenient options for portable storage and get nothing back, well, at least I asked.

Sorry to bug everyone, been racking my brain over this for a while and wanted to be sure I've not left options out.