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    Help! need much more disk space for laptop

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by gooduser1, Dec 10, 2008.

  1. gooduser1

    gooduser1 Newbie

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    Hello again, group.

    I have a laptop (IBM thinkpad x31) that I just bought off a relative a few months ago. It's really great because it's *silent*(!!!). (1.4 gHz processor, and 768mb ram, running xp).

    Downside is - it only has 15.4 gig to its hard drive!!

    Question is,
    1) what are my options for getting more disk space - replacing the disk, getting an external disk, etc.
    2) what are the pros and cons?
    3) what would you guys recommend?

    (I'd heard that to open a laptop and start replacing things is bad for the laptop).

    Thanks so much,
    gooduser
     
    gooduser1, Dec 10, 2008
    #1
  2. Isend2C

    Isend2C Notebook Deity

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    It's not bad to open up a computer. It's bad to leave it open and get dust in it though. You could buy a new Hard Drive for it, but then you would have to install an operating system again. You could make recovery CDs or DVDs and then install them on the next Hard drive, I'm not positive if that'll work though because the computer may burn them to only work with what's on it's drive... ask a different person about that, I've never installed an operating system on a blank hard drive.

    You could buy an external hard drive, but then the portability of a laptop is severely compromised, effectively making it a desktop. You can buy either an internal laptop hard drive or external hard drive here at Newegg. That site will nearly always give you a better deal than Best Buy or Circuit City.

    You could put a linux operating system on the laptop, such as Fedora or Ubuntu. Those are very nice, take a little getting used to, but work fine for most everything but gaming. They take far less matinance than Windows or OSX also. Free to boot :) (haha a pun!)
     
    Isend2C, Dec 10, 2008
    #2
  3. pixelot

    pixelot Notebook Acolyte

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    Hmmm. Opening and replacing *can* be bad. Personally, I'd get a HD of matching specs but with more space....you could also get an external if you just need it for backup or occasional access. :rolleyes:
     
    pixelot, Dec 10, 2008
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  4. Erokitsune

    Erokitsune Notebook Consultant

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    Erokitsune, Dec 10, 2008
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  5. John Ratsey

    John Ratsey Moderately inquisitive Super Moderator

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    There's nothing wrong with opening up a computer as long as you don't break anything and put it back together properly. Often the inside will benefit from a good clean (see this thread as an example).

    The review here indicates that you can upgrade the X31 to at least 60GB. Older notebooks may have problems with HDDs greater than 137GB capacity. You may also find that a new HDD will use less power than the old one which would give a useful boost to the battery run time.

    John
     
    John Ratsey, Dec 10, 2008
    #5
  6. K-TRON

    K-TRON Hi, I'm Jimmy Diesel ^_^

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    Your best bet at getting the most performance from your system is using a Hitachi 7K100 60gb drive. That would be the fastest option for your system, since it can max out at 60Gb.

    Other than that just make sure that the drive you buy is IDE.
    SATA drives will not work in your laptop
    I have a 60gb Toshiba 5400rpm drive, send me a PM if you are intested.
    (I think you need 10 or 15 posts to send PM's)

    K-TRON
     
    K-TRON, Dec 10, 2008
    #6