I'm looking at a retro laptop for a friend, I've just opened the case, and this harddrive is not a normal 2.5" ide... its like twice the height, and has a longer IO port with more pins... In the photo its still got the laptops hdd holder on though, its basically a normal 2.5" drive but twice as high, and with a longer port, does anyone know what it is?

44 pin IDC? That's a standard 2.5" IDE plug.

That's it beside my 2.5"->3.5" adapter o.O

Looks like a 44 pin IDC but with a 0.1" pitch. Still can't see it be anything else than IDE. SCSI doesn't use 44 pins (rather 50, 68 or 80), and even the older "retro" stuff (ESDI/ST-506) doesn't use 44 pins either. Just how old is this thing anyways?

I dunno, laptop its from has a b&w screen, less than 1mb RAM, no mouse... I cant get a model though

Link to picture
I've taken the cover off, its got a model number
JVC brand
Model: JDE2825P1 0-1

Yep. IDE. 20MB.

That's retro alright!