Apple Internal SD Card Slot. Working

[BigDubbe]

I am trying to wire up a internal SD card slot reader from a 27inch iMac but I can't get the pinout right. (or it might not even use USB).

Here is the SD card cable
Light Green, Grey, Blue, Black, Black, Black(Last black is the cable sleeving ground)
IMAG0073.jpg

I already tried with a USB header cable.

Red ----- Green
White ----- Grey
Green ----- Blue
Black ----- Black's

Didn't work. Was going to ask you guys if its even possible before I waste hours.

Thanks

 

[BigDubbe]

Re: Apple Internal SD Card Slot. Need Pinout Help

Figured it out. Here is the pinout if anyone else wants it. Reads it in About This Mac under card reader.


USB SD card
Red ------------ Blue
White --------- Light Green
Green --------- Grey
Black ---------- Black

IMAG0075.jpg

PS - Only reason I did this mod is my daughter loves to hide my usb adapter and the wife takes hundreds of pictures a week.

 

[cnrtechhead]

I purchased the SD slot from a 21.5" iMac, but its wire colors are different. See the attached photo. I have Purple-White-Orange-Grey-Brown-Black. Should I just modify the working pinout from this page, substituting my wire colors?

 

[BigDubbe]

I purchased the SD slot from a 21.5" iMac, but its wire colors are different. See the attached photo. I have Purple-White-Orange-Grey-Brown-Black. Should I just modify the working pinout from this page, substituting my wire colors?

Ya I would start there. Just make a twist connection and test till you get it. You don't have to restart when plugging it in of fit no read it. So it shouldn't take you to long.

 

[gts_215i]

That's a great idea, any problems - Sleep / wake etc.. ?

Any pics of the final install ?

What sort of transfer speeds are you achieving ?

 

[loginfailed]

I'm bringing this thread back from the dead to add that I also got this working.

I found an internal card reader on eBay for $6.99 shipped. The part is from a mid-2010 iMac 21.5". The iMac model # is A1311. The card reader part number is 820-2531-B. If you order one from eBay or any other source, be sure to get one that comes with the cable.

I took the 3.5" blank opening from my Silverstone TJ08B-E case and filed out an opening for the card reader and glued it in from the back.

I soldered an old motherboard header cable to the iMac card reader cable and added some sleeving and heat shrink.

There are only 4 wires used. On the iMac cable, 2 of the wires are in a blue foil sheath (data +/-). There are 3 other wires, two of which are black. Only one of the black wires is used. Looking at the 2 black wires, one of them is actually a really dark grey color. The dark grey wire is not used.

iMac Cable on the left  -- USB cable on the right
GREEN -------------------- WHITE
GREY --------------------- GREEN
BLUE --------------------- RED
BLACK -------------------- BLACK
DARK GREY (NOT USED)
CABLE SHIELDS (NOT USED)

Everything works as expected. Here are some screen grabs from the System Information utility...

Card Reader tab:

USB tab:

I know a lot of people who have generic card readers installed are getting an EBIOS READ ERROR when booting. Using a real Apple card reader like this, eliminates that problem without needing to change UEFI settings to treat card readers as a CDROM.

I hope this helps others in the future. It was an easy mod and a lot of fun. It only cost about $10 total including a tube of epoxy.

 

[cdstang]

I got mine some what working. I have the 820-2531-B card reader. The only way it works is if I switch the card reader over to windows then back to mac os in vmware or if I unplug the usb header and plug it back in once in the Mac OS. I'm at a loss at this one. If any one has any thoughts on this it would be great..

 

[Jiojimbo]

Hi guys, got one working too, using loginfailed's pinout shceme I got the 820-2531-B from the imac 21.5" the exact same wire colors and the wiring was perfect following your advise. I have some pictures here of the card on my macpro case mod. This was a great idea, and your research on the connections is perfect. Thank you

 

[negatv]

I scavenged one of these readers from a dead iMac, and it shows up in System Information under USB and actually works, but does not show up under Card Reader. I suppose I can live with that, but would be nice if it did show up as it is an Apple device.

Going to test it out a bit more before committing to cutting a slot in my case for it.

Here are the details under USB, looks like the same Product Id as the examples above. Not sure why it wouldn't appear in Card Reader as a native device.

Card Reader:

  Product ID:    0x8403
  Vendor ID:    0x05ac  (Apple Inc.)
  Version:    98.33
  Serial Number:    000000009833
  Speed:    Up to 480 Mb/sec
  Manufacturer:    Apple
  Location ID:    0x14b00000 / 8
  Current Available (mA):    500
  Current Required (mA):    500
  Extra Operating Current (mA):    0
  Media:
...

 

[jfbryant]

Re: Apple Internal SD Card Slot. Need Pinout Help

Figured it out. Here is the pinout if anyone else wants it. Reads it in About This Mac under card reader.


USB SD card
Red ------------ Blue
White --------- Light Green
Green --------- Grey
Black ---------- Black

IMAG0075.jpg

PS - Only reason I did this mod is my daughter loves to hide my usb adapter and the wife takes hundreds of pictures a week.

If anyone stumbles across this thread searching for pin-out on the iSight FaceTime Camera on the iMac 27" Mid 2010, it has the same cable colouring for the pin-out as the SD Card reader in this thread and is detected on my Hackintosh as:

Model ID: UVC Camera VendorID_1452 ProductID_34050
Unique ID: 0x1d15000005ac8502

Works nicely! Thanks to this thread