Need help upgrading hard drive (Dell e1705)

I just received my e1705 which I configured with the minimum sized hard drive, and want to upgrade it to a Hitachi or Seagate 100 gb 7200 rpm drive. I've never upgraded a hard drive before, and don't have a way to transfer files (other computer). Are these the steps?

1. Remove battery
2. Take out existing hard drive
3. Remove cover from existing hard drive
4. Mount cover on new hard drive
5. Insert new hard drive
6. Insert Windows XP re-installation CD

???

Thanks, this is foreign territory for me.

 

honestly i am not familiar with the dell e1701. but i have tweaked a couple of dell notebooks before and lots of other brand name and no name notebooks. i can fairly say that i have an incling that they share many similar things when it comes to changing hds. you have identified correctly the steps. but i have to add that you also have to be sure that (1) the AC power is not connected to your machine, (2) that you are properly grounded with all body static electricity released. this you can do by touching a grounded metal object like a faucet or room heater. note that if your work area is in a carpeted room everytime you move your feet with or without shoes/socks your body gets charged by static electricity so you would need an anti-static wrist band to protect yourself. moreover, if you are wearing woolen clothing or synthetic material, and/or your air is dry, you definitely get charged most of the time. static electricity is a pernicious culprit for destroying computer hardware even before you get to enjoy using it. hds are pretty sensitive to static electricity discharge.

having said that warning and you have observed the necessary precautions you are set to install your hd.

btw, if you have a bootable backup of the contents of your original hd, you can save a lot of time reinstalling from scratch if you use that bootable backup instead. and it saves you also the annoying requirement of having WinXP re-activated. gone are the days when one needs to install an OS on a virgin hd that it must be manually partitioned and formatted. now with bootable WinXP installers, everything gets done during installation including initial partitioning of the hard drive and formatting.

oops i forgot to mention, that you may want to have multiple partitions in your 100gb hd. having multiple partitions where your documents and critical data are stored in a different partition from the OS is definitely a wise step to take. i could not emphasize much how important this option is. but because you are new to this kind of thing it would be better that you ask for help on how to add logical partitions to your new hd. you would definitely need an hd management utility (e.g. partition magic, hd manager pro) to go over this process. another possibility of course is to make your original hd (now your old hd) into an external hd. which can serve as either an archive drive or a backup drive. the only thing you need is a USB powered 2.5" hd enclosure to make your hd into an external hd. after installing/setting it up you can then format it and your are all set.

 

I followed your link and noticed that your Dell comes with a 5400rpm SATA hard drive. You will/may have to load the drivers for a SATA drive when using the Hitachi Travelstar. You have to buy a SATA drive as well.

If you haven't bought your new drive consider Seagate instead of Hitachi. I have 2 Hitachi 7200 SATA's and they work great but the driver support isn't very good. Dell should have the SATA driver's for your new drive, and I'm thinking you are going to have to have an external floppy to load the drivers.

You should call Dell support and ask for help on installing the drivers for your hard drive. Then it should be straightforward after that.

Best of luck, and don't be surprised if it turns into a big mess until you figure everything out. SATA drives are new and the support doesn't seem that good yet.

JM