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#16
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Change to a larger hard disk
"Shenan Stanley" ¦b¶l¥ó
¤¤¼¶¼g... Scott wrote: The existing hard disk of my notebook pc becomes low level and I would like to change to a larger one. I am looking for guidance to accomplish this task. Can someone provide the pointer to where such guidance locates. Laptop manufacturer/user manual/FAQs on their web page, etc. Essentially you need to be sure to get the right type of drive (and one the BIOS of the laptop supports), you need to clone/image the old drive and then you should be up and going. -- Shenan Stanley MS-MVP -- How To Ask Questions The Smart Way http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html Shenan, Will check it out! Thanks! Scott |
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#17
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Change to a larger hard disk
"Shenan Stanley" ¦b¶l¥ó
¤¤¼¶¼g... Scott wrote: The existing hard disk of my notebook pc becomes low level and I would like to change to a larger one. I am looking for guidance to accomplish this task. Can someone provide the pointer to where such guidance locates. Laptop manufacturer/user manual/FAQs on their web page, etc. Essentially you need to be sure to get the right type of drive (and one the BIOS of the laptop supports), you need to clone/image the old drive and then you should be up and going. -- Shenan Stanley MS-MVP -- How To Ask Questions The Smart Way http://www.catb.org/~esr/faqs/smart-questions.html Shenan, Will check it out! Thanks! Scott |
#18
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Change to a larger hard disk
Scott wrote:
"Paul" 在郵件 ä¸*撰寫... Scott wrote: The existing hard disk of my notebook pc becomes low level and I would like to change to a larger one. I am looking for guidance to accomplish this task. Can someone provide the pointer to where such guidance locates. Thanks, Scott To copy the old drive to the new drive, you need a way to connect an additional drive. One way to do this, is with USB. Your internal drive is some kind of 2.5" hard drive. Depending on vintage, it could be IDE ribbon cable or SATA. This device, for example, allows connecting a 2.5" IDE, a 3.5" IDE, or a SATA drive. The output is a USB plug, that connects to the computer. The product includes a power supply to operate the drive. No power should be drawn from the USB. This one is $21. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16812195005 Basically, that is a USB enclosure, without the enclosure. It contains the adapter electronics and power source. And it allows a drive to be temporarily connected while copying files. If you had a desktop computer, you could save a few dollars, by getting a 40 pin 3.5" to 44 pin 2.5" adapter plug, then plug the laptop drive into a desktop ribbon cable. That is another way to gain access to a disk. Some disk drive makers, provide copying utilities. Data Lifeguard Tools http://support.wdc.com/product/downl...&sid=1&lang=en Manual http://www.wdc.com/en/library/eide/2779-001005.pdf For other advice, you should give the make and model number of the laptop. It could be, that there are other considerations when doing the upgrade. (For example, you'd probably want to copy the hidden partition on the old disk, as that has your backup copy of Windows on it. I don't know if the Data Lifeguard can see that partition or not. If the computer is from before 2003, the BIOS may not support large disks.) If the web.archive.org site starts working again, you could try to download the old Seagate document, about the 137GB barrier. The document is 398,893 bytes. Seagate appears to have removed this, but this site should have an archived copy of the PDF. http://web.archive.org/*/http://www....c/tp/137gb.pdf If you replaced a 40GB with a 120GB, you'd have (almost) nothing to worry about. (Again, if the computer is *really* old, there are other barriers at lower capacity levels.) So sticking with something below 137GB, has its advantages. I own a few disks bigger than that, but I'm always careful what OS I allow to access them. Paul Paul, Many thanks for your detail info. The computer is about 4 yrs old and would like to replace the existing 60 GB hdd with a 250 GB one if possible. Is there any way to know if the computer can support upto 250 GB? The copying utility is great and if it is suitable for all hard disks or their brand only. Regards, Scott There is actually one web site, which will sell you a small utility to check the level of support. But I have no idea how legitimate their algorithm is. (If they're just checking BIOS dates for example, that would suck.) The transition point for 48 bit LBA (137GB), is sometime in the first part of 2003. At least, Asus motherboards claimed to all support 48 bit LBA after that date. (Since the BIOS is written in large part, by Award/AMI/Phoenix, the support stems from them, and not from Asus.) Since now it is 2009, and your laptop is 4 years old, that would be 2005. So I don't see a reason for concern there. There is the capacity aspect of the new drive. But there is also the power dissipation of the new drive. In some cases, people find that the replacement drive runs hotter than the old one. If the old drive supports SMART, you can use the temperature display on this program, to view the hard drive operating temperature. (The temperature display is in the upper center of the window.) The purpose of monitoring this, is so you have a "baseline" for evaluating the condition of the new drive. For example, use a program that visits a lot of the disk, as a means to "heat up" the drive. You want both the idle temperature, and the busy temperature, as a means to verify you're not "cooking" the new drive. (There are no guarantees about this temperature monitoring capability, the results might not bear any resemblance to the truth. But it is worth a shot.) (Version 2.55 is free) http://www.hdtune.com/download.html This one uses 2.5W peak, as an example. This is a 5400RPM IDE drive. (Some spec pages, include startup current, which can mean double the power for the first few seconds. That is only an issue, for bus powered 2.5" USB enclosures. It is the seek and read/write numbers, that if applied over an extended time, would tend to heat up the drive.) http://www.wdc.com/en/products/produ...46&language=en You can also check the mechanical dimensions of the drive in that table. The thickness is what I'd be verifying. If you get the drive model number of the existing drive (using HDTune, Everest, or some other free utility), you may be able to look up the particulars of the old drive, without removing it. (I'm mentioning this, because for some computer hardware upgrades, dimensions are an issue. So no matter what it is, I always ask the question, "are the dimensions the same".) Paul |
#19
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Change to a larger hard disk
Scott wrote:
"Paul" 在郵件 ä¸*撰寫... Scott wrote: The existing hard disk of my notebook pc becomes low level and I would like to change to a larger one. I am looking for guidance to accomplish this task. Can someone provide the pointer to where such guidance locates. Thanks, Scott To copy the old drive to the new drive, you need a way to connect an additional drive. One way to do this, is with USB. Your internal drive is some kind of 2.5" hard drive. Depending on vintage, it could be IDE ribbon cable or SATA. This device, for example, allows connecting a 2.5" IDE, a 3.5" IDE, or a SATA drive. The output is a USB plug, that connects to the computer. The product includes a power supply to operate the drive. No power should be drawn from the USB. This one is $21. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16812195005 Basically, that is a USB enclosure, without the enclosure. It contains the adapter electronics and power source. And it allows a drive to be temporarily connected while copying files. If you had a desktop computer, you could save a few dollars, by getting a 40 pin 3.5" to 44 pin 2.5" adapter plug, then plug the laptop drive into a desktop ribbon cable. That is another way to gain access to a disk. Some disk drive makers, provide copying utilities. Data Lifeguard Tools http://support.wdc.com/product/downl...&sid=1&lang=en Manual http://www.wdc.com/en/library/eide/2779-001005.pdf For other advice, you should give the make and model number of the laptop. It could be, that there are other considerations when doing the upgrade. (For example, you'd probably want to copy the hidden partition on the old disk, as that has your backup copy of Windows on it. I don't know if the Data Lifeguard can see that partition or not. If the computer is from before 2003, the BIOS may not support large disks.) If the web.archive.org site starts working again, you could try to download the old Seagate document, about the 137GB barrier. The document is 398,893 bytes. Seagate appears to have removed this, but this site should have an archived copy of the PDF. http://web.archive.org/*/http://www....c/tp/137gb.pdf If you replaced a 40GB with a 120GB, you'd have (almost) nothing to worry about. (Again, if the computer is *really* old, there are other barriers at lower capacity levels.) So sticking with something below 137GB, has its advantages. I own a few disks bigger than that, but I'm always careful what OS I allow to access them. Paul Paul, Many thanks for your detail info. The computer is about 4 yrs old and would like to replace the existing 60 GB hdd with a 250 GB one if possible. Is there any way to know if the computer can support upto 250 GB? The copying utility is great and if it is suitable for all hard disks or their brand only. Regards, Scott There is actually one web site, which will sell you a small utility to check the level of support. But I have no idea how legitimate their algorithm is. (If they're just checking BIOS dates for example, that would suck.) The transition point for 48 bit LBA (137GB), is sometime in the first part of 2003. At least, Asus motherboards claimed to all support 48 bit LBA after that date. (Since the BIOS is written in large part, by Award/AMI/Phoenix, the support stems from them, and not from Asus.) Since now it is 2009, and your laptop is 4 years old, that would be 2005. So I don't see a reason for concern there. There is the capacity aspect of the new drive. But there is also the power dissipation of the new drive. In some cases, people find that the replacement drive runs hotter than the old one. If the old drive supports SMART, you can use the temperature display on this program, to view the hard drive operating temperature. (The temperature display is in the upper center of the window.) The purpose of monitoring this, is so you have a "baseline" for evaluating the condition of the new drive. For example, use a program that visits a lot of the disk, as a means to "heat up" the drive. You want both the idle temperature, and the busy temperature, as a means to verify you're not "cooking" the new drive. (There are no guarantees about this temperature monitoring capability, the results might not bear any resemblance to the truth. But it is worth a shot.) (Version 2.55 is free) http://www.hdtune.com/download.html This one uses 2.5W peak, as an example. This is a 5400RPM IDE drive. (Some spec pages, include startup current, which can mean double the power for the first few seconds. That is only an issue, for bus powered 2.5" USB enclosures. It is the seek and read/write numbers, that if applied over an extended time, would tend to heat up the drive.) http://www.wdc.com/en/products/produ...46&language=en You can also check the mechanical dimensions of the drive in that table. The thickness is what I'd be verifying. If you get the drive model number of the existing drive (using HDTune, Everest, or some other free utility), you may be able to look up the particulars of the old drive, without removing it. (I'm mentioning this, because for some computer hardware upgrades, dimensions are an issue. So no matter what it is, I always ask the question, "are the dimensions the same".) Paul |
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