ASUS Eee - deal you may know of

Lennart Sorensen lsorense-1wCw9BSqJbv44Nm34jS7GywD8/FfD2ys at public.gmane.org
Wed Nov 26 14:09:43 UTC 2008


On Tue, Nov 25, 2008 at 11:56:37PM -0500, William Muriithi wrote:
> I am  a little bit in a fix. I am just through a 20 minute fsck fixing
> a file system that was badly corrupt. This has been a norm for a
> while, but has become so frequent of late I am feeling really relieved
> after the laptop comes up again. The logs are full of hard disk errors
> and the file system remounted read only one too many a time. In a
> another word, this hard disk is in its last days.
> 
> That leave me with two options. Go out there and buy a new hard disk
> and somehow have it installed in the laptop. I messed my last laptop
> doing such repairs, though that time it was LCD which had failed. The
> experience however make me feel I would rather someone do it. That
> mean, by the time I am done with repair, $500 may be done.

Changing harddrives on a laptop only requires knowledge of how to
operate a small phillips screw driver.

Either the harddrive tray has a quick release, or sometimes it needs 1
or 2 screws removed.  It should then slide out.  You then have to remove
4 screws (usually) from the tray holding the drive, and then the drive
comes out of the tray.  You then get another drive the same size
(usually 2.5" wide x 9mm as far as I remember, although I think some
were 12mm thick).  Make sure to get the right IDE or SATA depending on
what is there.  If you bring the old drive to the computer store it
should be simple to get something the same interface and size.  You then
install the new drive in the tray the same way the old one was removed,
and put it back in the system and do a fresh install of everything, or
restore from backup, or whatever you like.

Some systems may not support IDE drives larger than 137GB, although SATA
never has that problem.  Canada computers has 120GB IDE laptop drives
for $72, so it isn't hugely expensive.  If the machine supports larger
than 137GB, then a 250GB is $102 and a 160GB is $78.

> That open up the second option, instead of repairing the current
> system, how about picking one of those inexpensive laptop? I am sure
> the life of this hard disk would be lengthened if its not switched on
> every evening, so I would still have access to my data. This option is
> looking really appealing and therefore the purpose of the post.

Replacing a harddrive does not qualify as a repair job.  More of an
upgrade.

If you got an external drive enclosure to put the old drive in, you
could copy your data over to the new driver that way.

> The way economy is going, one has to try and get as much value for
> every dollar as possible. I have noticed people posting really good
> computer deals in the past. Would anyone be aware of a current deal
> involving ASUS EEE? Which model offer the best value for the money? I
> am leaning toward the solid state disk to avoid my current pains in
> the future.

Solid state disks can fail too.  They do eventually wear out.  They
don't mind vibrations and such though, which might help.

-- 
Len Sorensen
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