The Notebook Review forums were hosted by TechTarget, who shut down them down on January 31, 2022. This static read-only archive was pulled by NBR forum users between January 20 and January 31, 2022, in an effort to make sure that the valuable technical information that had been posted on the forums is preserved. For current discussions, many NBR forum users moved over to NotebookTalk.net after the shutdown.
Problems? See this thread at archive.org.

    hard drive size limit on laptop

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by munesu, Apr 15, 2008.

  1. munesu

    munesu Newbie

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    5
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    I recently bought a new laptop, Philips X72 and it came with a 80gb hard drive. I have decided to upgrade the hard drive and l was reading the manual and it says that the maximum supported hard drive is only 100gb.l wanted a larger capacity drive, 120gb or 160gb. l don't understand why they would be this limit. The laptop has a Core 2 Duo T5500 processor with 2gb ram running Vista Business. Does anyone know what would happen if l bought a 120gb drive and try to install it? Also is is going to be a problem trying to reinstall Vista as l only have the recovery DVD that l was prompted to create when l first used the laptop. I would greatly appreciate any help.
     
    munesu, Apr 15, 2008
    #1
  2. kuncheesh

    kuncheesh Notebook Evangelist

    Reputations:
    82
    Messages:
    656
    Likes Received:
    1
    Trophy Points:
    31
    i couldnt locate your laptop in our notebook database. is it an ultraportable ??. in that case the hdd would be of very small formfactor and may even be soldered. however in an IBM PC architecture its possible to connect a larger volume hdd without any problem
     
    kuncheesh, Apr 15, 2008
    #2
  3. munesu

    munesu Newbie

    Reputations:
    0
    Messages:
    5
    Likes Received:
    0
    Trophy Points:
    5
    Thanks for the quick reply. The laptop is actually a 15.4" and it uses the normal 2.5 inch SATA hard drives which you can remove as it is not soldered. I didn't understand what you meant by the last statement about the IBM PC architecture.
     
    munesu, Apr 15, 2008
    #3
  4. kuncheesh

    kuncheesh Notebook Evangelist

    Reputations:
    82
    Messages:
    656
    Likes Received:
    1
    Trophy Points:
    31
    all the laptops except macs use the IBM PC architectures. ie they have all evolved from the IBM PC (the same hardware assembly as your desktop but miniaturized). this is a design that specifies the various relationships and dependencies within the hardware and how the software should address each hardware part.

    well my best recommendation for u is to try connecting a larger 2.5" hdd and see whether its working. i havent seen any manufacturer limiting the capacity of hdd before
     
    kuncheesh, Apr 15, 2008
    #4
  5. John Ratsey

    John Ratsey Moderately inquisitive Super Moderator

    Reputations:
    7,197
    Messages:
    28,841
    Likes Received:
    2,166
    Trophy Points:
    581
    I think there's a 99% chance that there is no restriction on the support for bigger HDDs and the "limit" is whatever they sold it with. This is a modern notebook with a current hardware so it would also have an-up-to-date BIOS. Older (> 3 years?) notebooks didn't have LBA support and couldn't address more than 137GB.

    There's a 1% chance that someone has been deliberately awkward and modified the BIOS to limit the maximum HDD size.

    John
     
    John Ratsey, Apr 15, 2008
    #5