Compatibility of K50IJ models for disk image transfer

I've had a K50IJ (no model number listed on label) for two or three years. Recently it has started randomly rebooting after a few hours. No problem with heat, so I think it cold be a bad capacitor or cracked trace on the MOB.

I would like to pick up a refurbishd K50IJ so that I could make an image backup of my hard drive and put it on the refurbished computer and keep going with exactly what I have now.

My question is whether the BIOS on a K50IJ-BBZ5 would be compatible with my current computer labeled simply K50IJ, and more generally, are there any models that would be compatible and allow me to simply transfer the disk image?

 

A call or email to Asus support would better answer that, I think (maybe).

As long as they use the same BIOS developer/manufacturer (either AMI or Phoenix Technologies), then it may work. Unfortunately, that info isn't widely publicized, so you may be stuck needing to contact Asus support for that information, and then reference it (or just ask them, but depending on who you get on the phone/email response, there's a chance they won't know).

Emailing them may take longer, but it will give them time to do their own research and give you a surefire answer if the rep doesn't know off hand. If you do it over the phone, they MAY research it, or they may give you a best guess.

 

The K50IJ variants aren't so far apart, some shipped with vista and some with win7. There was one variant, the BNC5 that had a backlit keyboard, but besides that the hardware is extremely similar. So you should be able to transplant the HDD or image it without needing to do anything special.

There is only one K50IJ BIOS which covers all submodels, but I am not sure why you are concerned with BIOS compatibility, as it affects neither the OS nor the software you would be imaging.