What's Included with a Laptop Drive?

I've never changed out or added a laptop hard drive so forgive my ignorance...FWIW, I think this is a dumb question but I don't want to buy something I won't end up needing.

Anyway, I've got the ability to add a secondary drive on my Vostro 1700 but there's just an empty slot, no caddy or interposer. I ordered the new Hitachi 5K320 320GB drive and I have no idea what laptop drives look like when they arrive.

I'm assuming I'll need to buy the caddy, interposer and connector screws. None of this stuff comes with the hard drive, right?

Thanks in advance!

 

You will just get the harddrive, and maybe a manual, if you bought the drive in a retail box.

You would have to contact dell for the caddy, screws and drive adaptor.

K-TRON

 

That's what I thought but I wanted to make sure before I plunked down more money. I've gathered the Dell part #'s from around here but I didn't know what exactly would come in the hard drive box.

As usual, K-Tron, you've answered my endless questions very well. In fact, you're the reason I went with the 320GB drive!

 

Sorry to post again but I wanted to ask a quick question. Everything I've read says that I need 4 M3 x 3 mm screws. The only pics I've been able to find online so far are these but they don't look quite right:

http://www.eastendmachining.com/zsetscm3x3mm.html

Am I missing something (again!) or are these screws the right ones?

 

Thank you for your appreciation

This is pretty much what you are looking for:
http://cgi.ebay.com/4-Screws-fit-HP-BUSINESS-NOTEBOOK-NX9010-Hard-Drive_W0QQitemZ350053852860QQcmdZViewItem

You are looking for M2 or M3 x 3.5mm (length) screws. Go down to a local hardware store, and you can pick them up, for like 5 cents a screw. A good hardware store will have them, not home depot.

Can you take a picture of your secondary drive bay, so we can tell you if you need a harddrive caddy/adaptor or not.
EDIT:
Actually you can just buy the caddy, adaptor and screws from one site: (unfortuntately its out of stock now, but it says that it will be back in stock on the 8th of May) i cannot find another site which has it
http://newmodeus.com/shop/index.php?main_page=product_info&products_id=144

K-TRON

 

no, that's definitely not the ones you need.

Unfortunately i can't take a picture of real ones, batteries in my camera are dead and my phone camera is not picking up such a small size.

But i tried to google some pictures for you, to give the idea of how they should look.

1. Here are the closest spec ones, M3x6 (you can actually use longer screws than 3mm, but with care). But the head here is different. And while these would perfectly serve my laptop, I'm not sure about yours.


2. These are different screws, but they feature the head type you are looking for. So have a look for screws from the pic above but with heads like here.

 

ooops, i was typing my reply too long lol)))

 

No, thank you! I always appreciate the help.

I found that site you mentioned (newmodeus.com) a few days ago and went mad when I couldn't find it again. Thanks for the link. I couldn't find it in my browser history because I was looking on the wrong computer. Duh.

I wasn't sure if the kit they have there would work on my secondary bay. I saw in some other threads that people were saying the caddies are slightly different between the first and second bays on the Vostro 1700. A few minutes ago, I pulled the drive out of my primary bay and tried to put it in the secondary bay and sure enough the caddy wouldn't line up right and the adapter wasn't lining up right either. I couldn't get it to go in at all.

I saw this from another thread about the Vostro's 2nd HDD:

"make sure to get 4 M3 x 3-mm (holds HD to caddy) and 3 M2.5 x 5-mm screws (holds caddy to laptop)."

The full thread is here:
http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=155052&page=2

Will the M2 or M3 x 3.5mm work for all the holes that person says above? That would be great if I could find those screws locally for sure.

As for my secondary bay, it is competely empty. There's no caddy or adapter at all, unfortunately, and no extra goodies like screws hiding in there. Too bad.

I do hold on to the high hope that all this hassle will be worth it when I've got a 320 GB primary and a 120 GB secondary for backing up files!


Oops. I was typing my reply too long too NJoy! I didn't think the ones I was finding looked right. Thanks for the pics!

 

Keep in mind of the screw type (countersunk, buttonhead, etc)

5c a screw lol where?!

 

It's done!

I traipsed all over town this afternoon with a baby on one arm and a Ziploc bag with both types of screws in the other.

On my fourth stop, success! It was a computer repair shop. I rattled off the sizes I need and lengths but he said he couldn't go by numbers so I showed him the screws. He found an Altoids tin of little screws for one size and then grabbed a dead drive out of a bucket of them that still had the screws attached to a caddy.

Total cost for 8 screws: $5

I think it was a bit of a rip off in a way but the other side of me says, "Hooray!" My 320GB drive arrives tomorrow and my caddy and adapter arrive Friday.

 

Congratulations!

 

Well thats good that you have all of the appropriate hardware.
If I was in the store, I would have just given the screws to you for free, but some people are not that nice.

K-TRON

 

Tell me about it, K-TRON! I thought about you saying they should be 5 cents or so when he said it would be $5 and knew I was getting, well, you know! I'll just look at this from the optimistic side of things and know (maybe I should say "hope") I won't be in search of these screws ever again.

I don't mean this sexist (because I laugh stuff like that off) but maybe it's because I'm a female. I guess I looked gullible and desperate!

I told the guy (who is the owner of the computer shop):

"I need these screws because I'm installing a second hard drive."

Him: "What kind of laptop does he have?"

Me: I have a Vostro 1700.

Him: How many does he need?

Oh well.

Unless he was talking about my one year old son who was with me, I'm not sure how "he" entered the equation. I never mentioned anything about my husband because the only thing he knows about computers is how to turn them on and off.

Anyway, I appreciate the help as always! I wouldn't have thought I could find them in town and was just going to buy them off Ebay (for more money than I paid today, fwiw!).