USB external case repair ?

Hi,

That short forty-conductor jumper
in the back, has a loose wire. If I
jiggle it, I can get the drive to work,
briefly; but the slightest jar, will
disconnect it.
Does anyone know where to find
something as flexible, as the factory
ribbons ?

Thanks,
Ken .

Ribbon cable is readily availiable from any of the electronics components
suppliers. Here in the UK Maplin would be a good retail place to go or RS,
CPC or Farnell for more trade-orientated places. In the US I'd suggest
you try Radio Shack. However whilst soldering in a 40-wire ribbon cable
is by no means difficult it does require a good deal of patience and I'd
personally avoid it if at all possible.

My belief is that in any case, unless there are obvious and significant
creases or other damage to the cable then it's unlikely to be at fault.
I'd suspect the connector or just possibly the soldering to the pcb (or
the pcb connector if that is socketed). A good thorough eyeballing is
the best way to determine which conductor is likely to be dodgy - they
should all look _perfectly_ uniform - the slightest misalignment is an
indicator of trouble. Since you say the contact is intermittent it should
only require a little jiggle to establish contact and then a dab of epoxy
to secure it in place. It is possible to pull and replace damaged pins
with a small pair of pliers if need be but again I'd avoid this if possible.

--
Andrew Smallshaw
andrews@sdf.lonestar.org