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Old 06-30-2005, 11:24 AM   #1
mich43L
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Cool USB Port Mod (for 600m/D600)

First off: This mod does not give me an additional USB port which can be used in conjunction with the other USB ports. It only "moves" one of the USB ports from the back to the side. mmkay? Then let's a go:

I love my 600m but one of the things that irks me about it is the lack of a side USB port (it has only a stacked pair at the back). I have to hunt for one or turn the notebook around whenever I want to plug in my thumb drive. And if the thumb drive is plugged into the bottom port while the notebook is on my lap, it hits my thigh.

So when I opened up my notebook I noticed that there is an opening inside the motherboard brace that looks like it'd fit another USB port:



And there is also space for it on the chassis itself:



Perhaps original design plans had an adddional USB port there (read: Delli being cheap here), 600m shares its brace with another notebook that has the extra USB port on the side, or maybe there are plans to add one in the future. Whatever, I decided to add one on myself.

First, I built my own bare female ( ) USB "cable" which consists of wires soldered to the 4 pins and covered with some epoxy for protection:



The toughest part was the mounting of this module to the motherboard brace. The port has to be very sturdy to withstand the forces of plugging in and out of the USB devices. I've considered a few ways to do the mount, but epoxy seemed like the best choice because of the complexity of the mount:



Next I routed the wires through the top and bottom of the motherboard:





And soldered the wires to the pins of the bottom USB port:



Finally, I cut out a hole for the port in the plastic chassis and voila...like you never knew it wasn't there before:







As I said at the beggining, this extra port can't be used with the bottom USB port at the same time because they're on the same bus. You can use both just not at the same time. It does not affect the top port in any way.

I can't imagine anyone doing the same mod - it's much more difficult than outlined here. But it may give you an idea for a similar mod - say an internal USB bluetooth or a hard drive. You will have to sacrifice a USB port however - not a problem if you have 4. If anyone needs the details (parts, specific procedures, resources) ask it here.
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Dell i600m: in a d600 chassis|1.6 Dothan => undervolted (Min vid: .7V, Max: .988V) => USB Modded => Bluetooth Modded

How-to: Wireless Dial-up

Last edited by mich43L; 06-30-2005 at 11:28 AM.
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