Ultrabay
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IBM UltraBayUltraBay is IBM's name for the swapable drive slot. Introduced back in the times of the 770 Thinkpads, this technology has gone through redesigns with almost every new generation of Thinkpad models, possibly leading to some confusion that is hopefully cleared up here. The following table gives an overview of the different UltraBay types, in which models they occurred and what drives are available for them. Note that the optical drive bay in G series Thinkpads is not an UltraBay in that the drives are fixed and not removable. On the media side different UltraBays relate to the form factor of the drives they accept, e.g early A, T and X series models can accept UltraBay devices up to 12.5mm in thickness, whereas current T and X series machines are limited to devices no more than 9.5mm thick. |
| UltraBay Type | featured in | available drives |
|---|---|---|
 UltraBay II |
770, 770E, 770ED, 770X, 770Z |      , ZIP-100, ZIP-250
|
 UltraBay FX |
390, 390E, 390X | 
|
 UltraSlimBay |
570, 570E, 600, 600E, 600X | , ZIP-100, ZIP-250, LS-120
|
 UltraBay 2000 |
A20, A21, A22, A30, T20, T21, T22, T23, X20, X21, X22, X23, X24 |   , ZIP-100, ZIP-250, LS-120, LS-240
|
 UltraBay Plus |
A30, A30p, A31, A31p, R30, R31, R32, R40, T23, T30, X30, X31, X32 | , ZIP-100, ZIP-250, WorkPad Cradle, Numpad
|
 UltraBay Slim |
T40, T40p, T41, T41p, T42, T42p, T43, T43p, X40, X41 |
|
 UltraBay Enhanced |
R50, R50p, R51, R51p, R52 |
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Mechanical Characteristics
- UltraBay FX: The combined floppy drive and CD-ROM, DVD or CDRW mechanism found in the 390/390E/390X.
- UltraSlimBay: Frame, rectangle like blending
- UltraBay 2000: Frame, blending has cut out egde on the right
- UltraBay Slim: notably thinner than UltraBay 2000, cut out right edge in blending
- UltraBay Enhanced: Accepts UltraBay Slim devices
Linux Support
Since the UltraBay interface is merely an IDE controller, all drives are supported by the IDE driver in the linux kernel. Hotswapping is supposed to be supported as well, using hdparm to (un)register devices. NOTE: This seems to be broken with 2.6 kernels. If UltraBay Plus devices are supported is not known.
