Calling all computer savvy members!

[ddt0725]

Well, my computer has been giving me the "click of death" sound! "CLICK, CLICK, CLICK" is all I hear from the hard drive! Doing ANYTHING takes 15 minutes longer than it should! It is begging for me to put it out of its misery ...and mine!

So, last night I bought a new hard drive online and Windows 7 (again) since my current Windows 7 is only an upgrade from Vista version.

If anyone has any words of wisdom or encouragement for my daughter & I before we tackle this project Friday night, it would be extremely appreciated! She starts IT classes in the fall and I sure have been giving her alot of hands on experience before then since she recently installed RAM, a new graphics card and helped me with the upgrade to Windows 7.


She is blaming this latest disaster on the fact that I do not defragment regularly and that I store way to many photos on my computer! [:$]

A few people have told me installing the hard drive is easy and we will do fineso I hate to say it but I have my reservations about this! [:|]

Denise

[HDNitehawk]

Denise


You didn't have to buy a new copy of windows. But if you didn't have the Vista Disc it could be problematic.


Also, for what you are spending, I don't know how old your computer is but I would think you could buy a new machine for not to many more dollars than what you just spent. The last full copy of windows I bought was $199 and for a few hundred more I could have gotten the whole computer at best buy and it would be much better than a three or four year old machine.

[DavidEccleston]

Hard drives are very cheaply made these days, and a good chunk of them will fail. Defragmenting won't stop hardware faults, and the clicking is an indication of a fault.


Copy everything off the clicking drive, and then dispose of it. Don't wait for it to fail entirely. If it's under warranty (Seagate is typically 5 years, everyone else 1 year), see if you can get an RMA # to ship it off for a replacement.


edit, re Windows purchase: I think if you install on a fresh drive, and not over top of Vista, it will ask you to enter your Vista key during installation. I don't think you need to buy another copy.

[ddt0725]

The computer is about 4-1/2 yrs. old. I spent less than $200 for the 2 TB hard drive and Windows 7 so it seemed like the best way to go. I figured it would save me about $400 at least. I am wondering if doing it this way will buy me another couple years out of this machine though.


I do have the Windows 7 upgrade disk I believe but thought it would be less headaches doing the switch.


I don

[Sheiky]

Ai...yet another probem...that must be aweful! If it's of any help, a month ago my brother upgraded his pc and we installed it together. Untill last week it was running fine, but last week it got slower and he experienced the famous Blue Screens of Death. Crashes... After some checks we saw(memtest86) that one of the 2 memory sticks wa corrupt. It was not the cheapest memory and it was even a reliable brand, but it still broke down after just a month. Things like that happen. (even with Mac's[])

A few people have told me installing the hard drive is easy and we will do fineso I hate to say it but I have my reservations about this! [img]/emoticons/emotion-8.gif[/img]

If it's just installing the disk and reinstalling windows, you should be fine. That's fairly easy to do. Remove both connections from your old hard drive. Deassemble the HDD from your casing(by either screws or some sort of srewless design). Reassemble the new one and connect the two cables. One is for power and the other is for the Data-communication.


What could go wrong? (apart from deinstalling and reinstalling the HDD's)


1 - Your old HDD might be using an older interface type called IDE. Your new HDD is most likely a Sata disk. The connectors for both disks are different. Both power and data cable are different.


solution: use the other type of connectors.


2 - Your power supply might not have enough suitable connectors. Solution: use some converters.


3 - Your mainboard lacks enough Sata-connectors. Solution: you need a PCI or PCI-E sata card.


4 - You don't have place for a PCI or PCI-E expansion card.... you need to buy a different mainboard.


5 - Worse case scenario...If all 4 points appear, you might as well buy a new pc, since that's a lot easier[:P]

She is blaming this latest disaster on the fact that I do not defragment regularly and that I store way to many photos on my computer! [img]/emoticons/emotion-10.gif[/img]

Your pc will slow down when your hard drives are getting fuller. When it reaches over about 75% you will start to notice this more and more. Also if the information is fragmented over your disk, it will slow your pc down a bit. But the problem you describe souds like a true hardware issue. Something that isn't going to be solved by defragging or cleaning up your disk.





If it is the only disk you use, make sure you backup good. Don't forget all your photo, videos, Lightroom catalogue(s), your browserfavorites and what I tend to forget...if you use a mailing program like microsoft outlook, don't forget to back up your emails [A]





Good luck [:$] You can always send me a message(for morale support[]) if your getting into more trouble than anticipated.

[HDNitehawk]

I am wondering if doing it this way will buy me another couple years out of this machine though.

Maybe. I have a Dell that is just a little newer than yours. I put some money in it then the mother board failed. Its not worth fixing compared to what I can get a new one for that is equal to it.


I have a 7 year old Sony that is still going strong. In the 7 years I have had the Sony the wife and I have went through2 Dells, 2 Gateways and a HP.We have twoSony's we bought years ago, a lap top and the stand alone are being used by the kids and still kicking.


The other part of the questions is did the machine perform well enough before. If it handled photoshop and your other editing software programs fine then it should continue to do so. The biggest gripe I have with windows is bugs. My work machine has had to be wiped twice in two years because of bugs, and I do not go any where risky. On an older machine, if it is marginal in performance for what you are doing at its best, it gets intolerable if it gets a few unwanted pests on it.

[Sheiky]

I spent less than $200 for the 2 TB hard drive and Windows 7 so it seemed like the best way to go

What brand and type of HDD did you buy? A lot of the 2TB hard drives(not all) are build to be backup- and storage-disks and are therefor often slower spinning disks and therefor more powerfriendly.(5400RPM vs 7200RPM normal disks) I have one as a backup disk as well (Samsung F4EG) and it's definitely not slow, but it is slower than the regular hard drives that I use and that are spinning at the regular 7200RPM.


If it would be your primairy disk, you might want to have a look at that. If you're having it as a second disk or backup disk, you're ok. The best thing is to have your operating system and programs separated from your files. If for some reason your operating system fails, you always have the files on a safe disk. Oviously in your case where it is a hardware problem, you'd have the same odds.


PS: I forgot one point in my previous message. If your old drive is indeed an IDE disk and the new drive is a SATA disk, you might need a Sata data cable. They're usually delivered with your mainboard and usually not included with a hard drive. They're easy to get though. The same thing for he Sata power connector: If you don't have one, the converter cable is easily obtainable.

[ddt0725]

This is the hard drive I bought ...


www.tigerdirect.com/.../item-details.asp


This is my computer ...


h10025.www1.hp.com/.../product


Hopefully, I have all that I will need! You're starting to scare me, Jan!

[ddt0725]

One of my other concerns is if the Photoshop & Lightroom I just bought will be able to be transferred onto the new hard drive or if it will think I am trying to put it on a second computer and not allow it!

[Sheiky]

Hopefully, I have all that I will need! You're starting to scare me, Jan!

Sorry Denise [A] I'll try to make it sound better next time []


According to the prouct specifications on the HP site, this should be your main board:





You're lucky! It has a lot of colors and I like colors []


Whoops, I have also made a big mistake. I talked about IDE connectors, but they are actually called PATA connectors. (Parallel Ata) I should have known that.


Most important for you is that I mentioned Sata and <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"]IDE Pata disks. This mainboard has 3<span style="text-decoration: line-through;"] IDE Pata data connections and 4 Sata data connections. The <span style="text-decoration: line-through;"]IDE Pata connections are the blue(floppy disk) and black connections in the bottom right corner and the connection on the middle right edge (next to the 24pin main board power connector). You can easily check if your current hard drive is connectred to either one of these connections.


The Sata connectors are the yellow, blue, black and white connector next to the two IDE connectors on the bottom right corner.


In short, first check if your current hard drive is connected by either Pata or Sata. <span style="font-size: large;"]Good news: if you still have the 400GB drive that was installed originally(according to the website), you're having a Sata disk, so this will all be very easy!


Since the HP website doesn't give any info on your power supply. I cannot tell you much about that, but since it powers this one, it should be able to power the new drive.

This is the hard drive I bought ...


www.tigerdirect.com/.../item-details.asp

It's not a 5400RPM drive which I was talking about, but it's still a slower running hard drive than the regular ones(7200RPM).


It is a Sata drive, so it has to be connected in one of the four Sata connections. The hard drive will not be delivered with any cable. (and it might not even contain some screws). This isn't a problem if your old drive is also Sata as the website shows.


While it isn't the fastest driver there is, it does have a nice big buffer and it features Sata 6-Gbs(or Sata3) which is futureproof and if I'm not mistaken suitable for sata 3Gbs(or Sata 2) as well(which is on your ain board).


I don't have experience with installing Windows on this kind of drive so I don't know what performance you can expect. I'll do a little Googling, perhaps I can tell you more later.


Bottom line is that installing this hard drive shouldn't be too difficult []