Disassembling a N56VZ-DS71?

Hi guys, haven't had a reason to post yet but I've seemed to hit a snag.
I bought a N56VZ a few weeks back, stuck an SSD onto it and loved it.
Now I'm trying to replace the optical drive with an HDD. Already have the caddy ready to go but this is my first time trying to take apart a laptop and I'm a little worried, especially since there doesn't seem to be a guide to follow along.

I unscrewed everything that I saw but the backplate seems to still be firmly attached, aside from the battery area.

Would anyone know if I handled all the screws or do I simply have to use some muscle?

 

never mind, I'm completely stupid. All I had to do was pull out the optical drive with tweezers, sorry!

 

What? you replace the optical drive with HDD. Could you please show me how to do that? Thanks in advance.

 

Sure, you'll need a 12.7mm hdd caddy like this one
The screw in the middle has a CD icon next to it, you'll want to take out the little foam plug and unscrew it.
From there, you can slide the optical drive out to replace it with the hdd-loaded caddy, but make sure you unscrew the little bracket attached to the optical drive and screw it on the caddy
I bought a different caddy which holes were too small for the screws but since it was mostly plastic, I just dug into the holes until they were just big enough
You can also detach the faceplate from the ODD onto the caddy, slide it back in, put the screw back in place, and you should be set

 

Sorry for the complete noob question, but how difficult/easy is it to replace the HDD with a SSD?

What is the process?

Also, once you replaced it, was it easy enough to load the new OS including drivers etc? Were they all found by MS, or did you need an install disc? (was there an install disc?)

Thanks for any help you can give. I am seriously thinking about getting this laptop, but if I do, I definitely want to replace the standard HDD with a SSD

 

Did you remove the back plate finally? Attach some photo of it.

 

hey how did you remove the cd drive mine doesn't budge - i have removed the screw that holds it in but i can't move it -it only moves for the first 0.5 cm after that its stuck - i have even tried it with mini pliers.
From what i understand its just supposed to slide out.

Thanks
Paul

 

Hi Paul
I've put 2x SSDS in mine and like you, I had trouble removing the optical drive.

The issue was the casing of the optical drive was getting stuck against the "slot" in the PC - the drive would pull out a few mm then stick.

I tried (reasonabl) brute force without success.

My fix was to slide a very thin piece of plastic around the edge of the optical drive, while jiggling the drive forward & back (I opened the drive tray with a paper clip in the hole, and held that), until the plastic "unhooked" the optical drive from the edge of the slot.

The thin plastic acted as a slide, to get the drive over the edge - I think mine was jammimg on the right hand side as you look into at the drive bay .

Good luck

 

PS - I found the easist way to remove the faceplate from the optical drive and fit it to the SSD carrier, was using a smallish flat blade screwdriver-about 6mm.

Slide the blade vertically down between the drive and faceplate just off centre, and twist the blade gently, while pressing the larger flat right hand plastic tab gently with another tool.

Faceplate eases off with no damaged tabs

 

Lol well congrats on your new [successful] installation.

There are a number of guides - both on the forum and courtesy of a Google search - providing step-by-step instructions. You can try this one:

Part 1: Best of both worlds: putting an SSD in your optical bay « Super User Blog

Part 2: Best of both Worlds Part II: Installing the Optical Bay HDD Caddy « Super User Blog

As far as drivers, they're pretty easy to acquire. You can get some through the Windows Update tool; what you can't find there, you can get through the manufacturer's website (or just back up your current drivers if they're up to date and use the wizard built into Windows to install them).

 

Thank you for the links.

 

You're very welcome. Don't hesitate to ask the community any questions if you try the installation! Better safe than sorry.

 

Can someone tell me what screws the n56vz holds? are they any special ones.. am i going to need a special screw driver for opening them?

And did anyone got any foolproof way of opening the ODD drive?

I am going to purchase the n56VJ model of this series.. as n56vz arent available now.. so are the screws going to be the same as they are in the n56vz? I think that only the internals are different.

Thanks.

 

Generally the only variance in the screws is the thread. Other than that, nearly all of them are Philips screws, with the exception in some cases for internal components that might use hex nuts.