Dick, thank you for the compliment. I'll say when I wrote this up, and finished it, I thought to myself, "You are an idiot, you spent way too much time on this, and like 5 people will read it". Guess what! I was wrong! Hundreds of people have read this, and it's become a focal area for for the whole internet for people swapping tips about how to fix these things, so it was worth it in the end. I wish I could help you with the banging. I too have a cube that was noisy and acting up, luckily, I stopped using the other half, so I can use the second cube. I starting using much higher percentages of hydrogen peroxide, and don't forget that they recommend turning the temperature all the way up, and running is hot for an hour every once in a while, presumably to cook the growth in the unit. Make sure you put a cookie sheet under it when doing all of this, the peroxide will "boil over" and come out of the filler hole a little when doing this.

I believe that both fans are sucking the same way (and I have forgotten which way, but I would presume they are just like fans in computers: suck air in, and force it through the heat sink.)

You have got several choices:

o Close up the laptop with the SSD loose. Whatever kind of shock would damage that would most certainly demolish your laptop before it hurt the SSD. Problem with this is that it might rattle a bit. It also might move around enough to loosen the cable connector, requiring you to open again and re-attach.

o If you have got some non-conductive tape, like electrical tape, you could tape the SSD down, either by creating 1-2 tiny loops of inside-out (sticky side out) tape to make the SSD stay in it’s location. You might also just tape over the SSD to anchor it to nearby stuff.

o Do the “right” thing and get some screws. They are standard HDD screws, I’m not sure the size it might be this metric size M3 screw of this size 2.0 x 3mm (CM2x3-3.3) you can probably get some at your local hardware store, or you could order this screw kit https://www.amazon.com/CO-RODE-Notebook-...

I want to thank my readers for their feedback. When I spent such a ridiculous amount of time two years ago creating these guides, I really thought my OCDness that caused me to spend so much time on this project was bad, and would never get “repaided” by anybody actually reading the guides. I was wrong!

ifixIt sends its guide-writers a report every month telling us how many folks have looked at or used our guides, and I’ve been astonished by the numbers! I even had one reader figure out how to call me and we had a long chat about his project (which he is in the process of writing right now.) This has been a wonderful reward for me.

When I wrote this guide, I was a bit frustrated by Chilicube, but this was based on a single Amazon review. I myself have always found them helpful (if not a little bit slow and erratic.) When I have called them, I have found their support useful & upstanding. It does not hurt to tell them you will soon be writing an Amazon review yourself (not negatively, they’ll get the point.)

This Dave F. here (the original author), I have not had problems with my connectors, but it is clearly a problem based on the replies I’ve gotten.

That said, it would be great if Dave Pruner or CWCMindStormer or Shawn Johnson could add some guidance. (I’m willing to do the heavy lifting of writing and posting if you give me the photos.)

I recommend that anyone having trouble with the connectors call ChiliCube even if your system is out of warrantee. Secondly, for the hardware hackers, ask ChiliCube to mail you a free adapter they make to empty the pad for storage. This adapter lets you plug the tube from the pad in to and it has most of the parts in it for the cube side of the connection. With this you should be able to replace/repair the cube-side of the connection. If anyone makes photos of this repair, I would be happy to help create a fixit guide for that repair.

I would disagree. This is already an overly expensive and overly complicated device with reliability problems. No where is any owner claiming that it does not keep them cold enough, if you owned one, you would understand why you do not need anymore cooling than what is already provided. Why make an expensive complicated device more expensive and more complicated?

Kert,

I would try calling Chili Technology first (even if your warranty is up, they might give you advice) failing that, if you have not tried resetting the thermal breaker as I describe in step 3 above, give that a go. I had to do it several times to get it to "take". When you are fishing around with a pencil or whatever, its sorta hard to tell if you have found the button or not, and then it requires more pressure than I expected, as it is NOT a tiny micro-switch.

If you have not run the thing through the hydrogen peroxide 6-hour on high treatment, give that a go, its probably just gunked up with growth.

Good luck!

-Dave

Awesome! Sometimes I think it stupid that I spend too much time writing up this stuff, but its great to be able to help. Best of luck working on your laptop.

-Dave

This sounds like it might work, but there is one really big IF....

IF you can find the right cable for the hard drive. Now it is always possible that Toshiba might have pre-installed the proper cable for the empty drive bay, and it is also possible that I may walk on the moon, but I would not plan on it.

I did a quick google, and could not find anything, but maybe if you called Toshiba, they could tell you the part number and how to order it. Look through any online manuals for this, that might have the part number listed.

Maybe there is a standard laptop SATA connector, and I just have not noticed, but I think most laptop manufacturers go the proprietary route.

If you get the part number, please pay it forward and post the part number here to help your fellow Toshiba owners, this one fixit has gotten a surprising number of hits since I wrote it (like over 400.)

I don't think there is a bay for a second hard drive, but so many variations of this model have been reported since I posted this, that I can't be sure for yours. It is also possible that there is a M.2 connector, you'll have to google what that looks like. Your best bet is to either install a hybrid drive, or to stick the HDD in an external enclosure, and attach it with a USB cable.