Nortel BCM50 Copy Hard Drive to SD Card

[darthvader167]

Hi everyone.
I have many clients with good old Nortel BCM50's, and the hard drives on the systems tend to fail after around 15 years of being constantly spinning.
I have seen someone on YouTube transfer the hard drive information on a Panasonic voicemail system expansion box onto an SD card, but that is not Nortel and the guy didn't provide much detail about that.
So, I'm wondering if anyone out there knows how I could copy the Nortel BCM50 hard drive to an SD card without losing any data at all? I would like to do this seamlessly overnight and not lose any keycode files, etc.
The BCM50 I would like to perform this on is running system software release 2.0.2.05e.

It would be great if someone could help me with this, as I'm sure there are many others around that this would help (after a lot of scrolling in the comments of YouTube telecom videos...), and having an SD card completely run the system would reduce the risk of failure and would be substantially quieter than having an old, loud hard drive spinning every day (something solid state would be great here).

Would this work with an SD/Micro SD to SATA/IDE adapter? I've done that with old computers to replace the loud hard drives.

I haven't opened the BCM50 yet, so I'm wondering if the BCM50s have hard drives connected via SATA or IDE. I would like to know this so that I can know what adapter to purchase for the SD/Micro SD card.

Also, if copying a BCM50 hard disk onto an SD card is not possible, is there any way to create a copy of the original hard drive with all the same programming and keycode files to have laying around as a backup to replace original if it goes out (by just swapping the two)?

Thanks everyone.

 

[Firebird Scrambler]

The BCM can be used with certain SSD drives.

Firebird Scrambler

Nortel & Avaya Meridian 1 / Succession & BCM / Norstar Programmer

Website =

http://somertel.myfreesites.net

linkedin

 

[darthvader167]

+Firebird Scrambler - thanks for your reply. I now understand that the system will be more reliable and run faster with the SD card.
I am still wondering how I would be able to copy/clone the hard drive onto the SD card without losing any data.

In the Word Document you attached to your reply, you said that you implemented this on your BCM400 with an IDE to SD card adapter. Wondering if the BCM50 uses IDE or SATA connection for the original hard disk.

Thank you

 

[ucxguy]

Look at the FAQ - specifically at the section "Imaging a BCM 50 Hard Disk".

 

[darthvader167]

+ucxguy, where did you find that "Imaging a BCM50 Hard Disk" section?
Thanks

 

[ucxguy]

Scroll up and press the button FAQs.

 

[darthvader167]

+ucxguy
Thanks. I will look more into that post now. Still not sure it my SD card will run the system the same way as a new hard disk/SSD.

 

[ucxguy]

If you have plenty of time on your hands, you can certainly try. If your SD -> SATA adapter is an old SATA I adapter, you could get lucky and it might even work. That said, you will get much better performance and endurance from an SSD vs. an SD card.