(very carefully)
Step 0
– read all these instructions before trying this yourself.
In particular, you can probably get away with removing the top cover only.
Step 1
– using a BLUNT object, such as a thin screwdriver, slide it along the gap between the “metal” top and white case “filler”.
(the observant amongst you lot will have noticed the bottom is already removed. With the benefit of hindsight, I probably didn’t need to do that.)
Step 2
– Pry the case apart.
When taking the top off, be careful of the cable which connects to the drive light.
Step 3
– After removing the top, Lift the drive out of the case, it is just sitting in the white plastic surround.
Be careful with the attached cable.
Step 4
- Un-screw the screws holding the drive in the drive “cradle”.
Step 5
- Once you have undone the screws, you now remove the drive by grasping the end of the drive (see the two red circles on the left), and the drive connector (on the right of the photo, circled). Now gently pull the drive out of the cradle.
Step 6
- Drive is removed, and you are left with these bits:
Things I learnt:
- You probably do not need to remove the bottom.
- The glue holding the pieces together is strong.
- This is a “cheaper” design than the FreeAgent Classic drive I opened previously, and I don’t like it.
(Cheap feel / not designed to be re-assembled because of the glue.)
Thanks for the info. Can you tell me whether the drive inside this newer Freeagent Go is SATA or IDE? Thanks!
Yes, it's SATA. In particular it's 5400 rpm Seagate Momentus 5400 drive.
I was wondering if the USB adapter circuit board is attached in any way to the metal frame, or could you use that for the drive outside of the enclosure? I’m currently using the WD Passport for my custom enclosures ( http://www.8bitmemory.etsy.com ), and I was wondering if these drives would be suitable as well. WD recently redesigned their hard drives, and they have moved away from the traditional Mini-USB port to a proprietary cable. NOT GOOD.
Yes, Guest, you can detach it from the frame.
can you replace the hdd with another to place into the free agent
Yes, I think you can. Admittedly, I replaced my drive with another Seagate SATA drive. It’s been going strong for the last six months.
thanks for the how to..I swaped out a Hitachi (IBM) sata, 160 GB and it works fine so there
is no issue with using it this way…now to put the 500 GB into my laptop.
I used my fingernails to peel apart the top lid, and you do NOT have to remove the bottom at all, there is NO reason to.
Thanks Seagate that the glue is strong enough to keep the parts together even after re-assembling. I put WD Scorpio Blue inside with no problems. I put the original FreeAgent drive (Seagate Momentus 5400.5) into laptop as 2nd HDD. With data still on it, the laptop was unable to detect the drive. So back to start, copy data, format drive, put to laptop again… Now it works. What a pity it’s too thin to carry thicker drives (750/1000GB).