Laptop Question

[BAR_Daddy]

I have a computer question for the hardware guys out there.

I know that this is a rocketry forum, but let’s face it we have, amongst the membership, an extremely wide variety of professions represented. I have seen a lot of sound advice given to those with computer issues.

So, here is my situation.

My oldest son has a Compaq Presario (V6000 series) and I believe the hard drive has died. Does anyone know if there are any gotcha’s when replacing the hard drive in a Compaq laptop? I have been told that Compaq uses some proprietary components, but the hard drive shouldn’t be one of them, should it?

I did help him create the restore CD’s when he first purchased the laptop.

[sandman]

I am probably the most computer illiterate member of this forum. I changed the hardrive in my Compac Persario and it took me anout 15 minutes. I reloaded the OS and it works fine.

Of course mine is an older one and uses windows 98 but I needed it for some old software programs for work.

[BAR_Daddy]

I am probably the most computer illiterate member of this forum. I changed the hardrive in my Compac Persario and it took me anout 15 minutes. I reloaded the OS and it works fine.

Of course mine is an older one and uses windows 98 but I needed it for some old software programs for work.


Where did you purchase your hard drive?

[sandman]

Where did you purchase your hard drive?

I got it online. This was a few years ago so I forget...sorry.

[o1d_dude]

Back when I was building PCs a few years back I had good luck mail ordering parts from NewEgg. My DVD burner has just gone south on me so I'll be ordering one from them pretty quickly.

[DaveR]

Where did you purchase your hard drive?
Personally I like Tiger Direct:

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/category/category_slc.asp?Recs=10&Nav=|c:1277|&Sort=4

Internal drives starting at $49.99

[CoachJT]

Bar_Daddy,

There should be no issues swapping out hard drives on his laptop. The only thing you have to watch out for is an adapter on the hard drive pins that connect to the motherboard. This adapter adapts a Parallel ATA (PATA) hard drive to a Serial ATA (SATA) connection on the motherboard.

Some laptop hard drives have this adapter and some don't. If his hard drive has this adapter, carefully take it off the old drive and very carefully place it on the pins of the new drive. The pins can be bent very easily so be gentle.

That is about all there is to it.

[tbzep]

I have always liked Newegg. I've returned a couple of defective items with zero hassle. The only thing I don't like about them is they added a warehouse in Memphis a few years ago, so now I pay sales tax on my purchases from them. :rolleyes:

As for swapping the drives, the only problem you are likely to encounter might be in the reinstallation of all the software.

[BAR_Daddy]

Thanks for the info.

I am perfectly comfortable working on the towers that we have, it's just the lap tops all seem to be very different from each other.

I have the old drive out and will probably order one from tigerdirect.com today. I have been pleased with their service in the past.

Again, thanks.