Replacing Hard Drive

Discussion in 'hardware' started by LenC, Jan 30, 2014.

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  1. LenC

    LenC Registered Member

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    I have an HP laptop - DV9653CL. It's about 6 years old and I think the hard drive is dying. I can't be too specific because it's my wife's computer and I'm never around when it acts up on her. The SMART info from crystaldiskinfo indicates there are problems with the drive, and it continued to show problems after chdsk /r.

    I'd like to replace the drive and continue to use the computer as an extra. (I've never replaced a drive before.) I have Shadow Protect images that I can restore. Recently, SP has been crashing on overnight backups saying the source drive is corrupt - this is another indication to me there is a problem with hard drive.

    Specs for the computer state it is a sata drive (160gig). If I go somewhere like newegg, they give a choice between sata 3Gb/sec and 6Gb/sec. Can I use either one? I'm not concerned about maxing out on speed - would rather just have a basic no-frills hard drive that doesn't create any heat problems.

    Any recommendations as to what kind of drive I should use?

    Thanks,
    Len

    P.S. I looked at a youtube video showing replacement of the harddrive in this computer - it looks pretty straightforward or I wouldn't even try it.
     
  2. DX2

    DX2 Guest

    I believe you need the 3g because your laptop sata ports are older. Maybe someone else can help..
     
  3. zfactor

    zfactor Registered Member

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    either one should work fine. you just will not get the 6gb speeds on a slower controller. i have yet to see any system have a direct issue in doing so (we replace a LOT of drives each week)
     
  4. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    Len,

    It is very simple. Usually one screen in the laptop case and maybe a few screws in the caddy holding the HD. Replace the drive and restore a good image. Done.
     
  5. zapjb

    zapjb Registered Member

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    Something simple. Take out the battery before any hardware diddling.
     
  6. LenC

    LenC Registered Member

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    Thanks everyone - I'll give it a shot with a 3 g replacement.

    In the past, I have occasionally restored an image when the system became corrupted for whatever the reason. Shadow Protect worked just fine. I just restored the C drive. I also have an image of a recovery partition, which I've never used. Should I also restore that? I don't think I'll ever have any use for it - in fact, I still have some recovery disks from when I initially set up the computer if I ever wanted to reinitialize the computer. I'm just wondering if I'll have some kind of bootup problem if I restore 1 partition and the system (MBR is it?) expects 2 partitions. Also, if I restore 2 partitions, does it matter what order I do it in?

    Maybe my questions will be answered when I actually fire up Shadow Protect and see options available to me on the screen.

    Keep your fingers crossed for me - I'm breaking new ground here - hope to learn something from this. Never underestimate my ability to foul up what you think is a simple hardware issue:cautious:
     
  7. Bill_Bright

    Bill_Bright Registered Member

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    Because this is a notebook and notebooks tend to be anti-consumer by being proprietary. Therefore, I would recommend you visit the notebook maker's site and download the latest drivers, and save them in a safe place. You may want to do the same thing with your security programs.
     
  8. MisterB

    MisterB Registered Member

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    You have everything you need to clone the disk to another. I would recommend a 250gb or 320gb 7200 rpm Sata drive. If you have 2 partitions, clone both to the new drive from the backup images in the exact same order they are in on the original disk. You would only need to use the system restore partition or recovery media in an extreme case or if you wanted to sell the laptop and clean out your data. If it doesn't work the first time, don't give up, just try a slightly different approach. I had a disk clone fail recently when I used the software option(Aomei Backupper) of cloning the entire disk but it worked when I did it partition by partition.
     
  9. LenC

    LenC Registered Member

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    Bill -

    I don't understand - why would I be concerned about drivers if I am restoring an image?

    Mr. B -

    Thanks. Since the current drive is 160gig, can I increase the size? If yes, is there an upper limit on the size I can go to? Just curious about the size issue - I don't need a lot of disk space - not on this computer - so even 160 would suffice. This computer has an unusual configuration - 2 separate hard drives 2 x 160gig.


    P.S. Looks like this drive would work for me...

    http://www.bestbuy.com/site/250gb-i...mcat270900050001&cp=1&lp=1#tab=specifications
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 31, 2014
  10. Bill_Bright

    Bill_Bright Registered Member

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    In case restoring from the image does not work and you need to do a fresh OS install from scratch.
     
  11. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    Len,

    Can you post a screenshot of Disk Management? We'll be able to give you better advice on restoring the partitions.

    Is the OS WinXP?
     
  12. MisterB

    MisterB Registered Member

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    Yes and I would recommend a bigger disk. A 320gb disk probably costs much less than the 160gb disk did originally. In a partition by partition clone, I would clone the partitions to the original size on the new disk, test it to make sure everything is working and, if so, you can either resize the partitions or turn the free space into a big data partition. You can go has high as 2tb in an mbr system but my preference is 250gb to 320gb for a main disk in a laptop unless you plan on using it for video. The 250gb drive in your link would work fine but I would recommend a 7200rpm drive which will give you a performance boost. Or a SSD drive if you really want to speed up an old laptop.

    And I agree with Brian K, it would be better to see what the current partition scheme looks like to give more specific advice.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 31, 2014
  13. LenC

    LenC Registered Member

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    Here it is...
     

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  14. MisterB

    MisterB Registered Member

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    The recovery partition is after the system partition so it can be left out of the new disk with no boot problems. I would keep the image of it just in case you ever wanted to pass the laptop onto someone else. The 140gb system partition is more than big enough for all practical purposes. I would try to clone it from the original disk to the new disk first and if the original disk showed problems that prevented a successful cloning, then restore the image of the system partition onto the new disk. In either case, keep its current size. Remove the old disk and put in the new one. If it boots, then you're good to go and the simplest thing to do would be to create a data partition from the unused space on the new disk.

    If it doesn't boot, it looks like you're using Windows 7 from the screen shot and a Windows 7 recovery CD made with the built in imaging program can fix the boot files so it will boot on the new disk.
     
  15. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    Len, thanks. How much Free Space is in the C: drive? The sliders in the upper part of Disk Management have cut off the info.

    Which OS are you using?
     
  16. LenC

    LenC Registered Member

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    It's Vista.

    100 Gb free out of 141Gb.

    Shadow Protect doesn't have a clone feature. So I can either do a restore from within SP or (I guess) do a clone using another program. Your suggestion?

    Thanks - really appreciate the help.
     
  17. MisterB

    MisterB Registered Member

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    I'm not familiar with Shadow Protect but without a clone feature, I would just restore the image to the new drive. I'm currently using Aomei Partition Assistant and Backupper for imaging and cloning. Partition Assistant has worked better for cloning a system onto a bigger disk than backupper. They are both free programs.

    Vista doesn't have the make recovery boot CD feature but I think it can repair the boot sector from an install CD in the case of putting the system partition on the new disk and it not booting. That is worst case scenario anyway.
     
  18. LenC

    LenC Registered Member

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    Placing an order for the new drive today - I anticipate no problems thanks to Brian and MisterB. I'll post an update in several days.

    One more question: Since I am restoring to a new drive, I assume I should copy the MBR from the image? If I remember correctly, that is an available option, but I never used it when I was just restoring a partition to same hard drive.
     
  19. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    Len,

    Your HD probably has bad sectors so you don't really want to copy a bad partition to a a new HD. You should restore an image of the Vista partition which was taken prior to seeing the SMART warnings. I assume you have one.

    When the new HD arrives, remove the old HD and install the new HD. Leave it unpartitioned. Boot from a Shadow Protect CD and restore your image to unallocated space on the new HD. It should restore as a 141 GB partition. For restore Options, choose Set Active, Restore Disk Signature, Restore MBR and First Track.

    You can decide later (after Vista is running on the new HD) what to do with the remaining unallocated space.
     
  20. zfactor

    zfactor Registered Member

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    imo best thing to do is get all your data off the drive quickly and do a fresh install on the new drive and them move all the data back onto the new drive.
     
  21. MisterB

    MisterB Registered Member

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    I would do pretty much what Brian K recommends except restoring the MBR form the old disk to the new one. I usually create a new MBR and then clone or restore the system partition to the new disk. But I'm not familiar with Shadow Protect either and I would take advice from someone who knows the program.
     
  22. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    MisterB,

    I'm curious as to how you create the new MBR?
     
  23. MisterB

    MisterB Registered Member

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    There are several ways of doing it. If the disk partition table and MBR is completely wiped with a Diskpart clean command, the Windows Disk Managment will ask to initialize the disk with a new MBR and partition table before it will create partitions. I'm currently using Aomei Partition Assistant which has a nice feature called "rebuild mbr". This has several options for different versions of windows. I've used this feature to make systems boot that wouldn't boot before. In the old days of DOS, fdisk had a /mbr option that would replace the MBR with a new clean one. Useful for MBR viruses and MBRs messed up by Linux installations that wouldn't boot Windows anymore.
     
    Last edited: Feb 2, 2014
  24. Brian K

    Brian K Imaging Specialist

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    Depending on one's imaging app, bootstrap code may or may not be needed prior to restoring an image. Ghost 15 for example will offer to "Initialize" a HD prior to a restore and you must select "Yes" or you can't proceed. TeraByte apps will restore an image to a HD without bootstrap code.

    But the generic MBR code you create on a new HD may not be the code that you really need for your system. Many computer manufacturers use custom code to perform several functions. In addition to booting the active partition the code can be used to initiate diagnostics, run a recovery, etc. Here is an example (from a 2007 thread) of a custom Dell MBR which was used to open MediaDirect. Without this code you couldn't use MediaDirect.

    If you have installed the OS yourself then you will have a generic MBR and it's not so important to select Restore MBR and First Track when you restore an image to a new HD. But if you have a custom MBR and you want the new HD to function like the old, then restoring the MBR and First Track shouldn't be omitted. It's as simple as putting a tick in a box.
     
  25. MisterB

    MisterB Registered Member

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    True enough but there are times when the original MBR doesn't work in the new disk. I've had this happen moving to a bigger disk with a different geometry. I use multi boot systems and things work much better with a standard MBR. If the recovery partition isn't wanted or used, the custom MBR that can boot to it is not needed. How recovery partitions work varies a lot from manufacturer to manufacturer but I've usually been able to do a system recovery by manually setting the recovery partition active if the restore key sequence didn't work. MBRs can get altered inadvertently by a variety of software including Windows system recovery disks and a lot of disk utilities.

    Paragon Backup and Recovery can save and restore the MBR apart from the disk partitions. That is about all I use it for.

    Back to Len and the original post, I don't want to get this too complicated for him so I won't diverge any further into the complicated world of disk imaging and cloning.
     
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