newegg.com or zipzoomfly.com

bless you!!

(and baby is now napping -- I might actually survive this day!)

 

But now I have 2 more questions now that I am shopping; (and I've looked at the compatible replacement drives as listed on Dell.com)

What rpms are compatible?  there are drives listed with both 4200 and 5400 -- is one preferable?

Interface -- EIDE -- is that compatible with ATA-5, ATA-6 -- but not serial ATA150? 

I looked up EIDE but I'm mostly finding stores, not definitions and Webopedia wasn't very helpful.

And is it possible to hook up my old dead drive and try to resuscitate any of my old data?  or should I find a Guru-for-hire to try to do that for me?

Message Edited by lisahoo on 11-15-2005 01:50 PM

Any speed you choose will work. As long as it's not a SATA drive, it will likewise work.

If the drive is as you describe - totally unrecognized by the system - home recovery is pretty much hopeless. If you need the data back, you will need to send the drive to a recovery service firm. Such services are not inexpensive - from upward of $1,000+ - but if the system doesn't recognize the drive at all, there's nothing you can do outside of hiring one of these companies.

lisahoo

When I call with a hard drive problem on a desk (not portable) system, the first thing the support tech requests that I do (after diagnostics) is FIRST remove power cord (in the case of notebook, it would be both power cord AND remove battery as well) and then to unplug the signal cable from the hard drive, also to remove the other end from the main board, then reconnect the main board and reconnect to the hard drive. I may have to do this more than once (to clear up corroded connector).

It is (in my mind) possible that someone might be able to get a sign of life from the notebook hard drive by doing the same -- remove power connection to the notebook PC, remove the battery and leave it out -- then try to see if drive shows up. If not, remove the hard drive (entire case of the hard drive). When you re-insert the hard drive (make sure the connection is solid) then to try the hard drive again, you would LEAVE the battery out but connect the AC power cord to give it another try. I know that on desk systems, this method frequently makes the drive appear long enough (sometimes) to get data copied off of it. In the case of a specific notebook, I am not certain. The best.

Thanks for the tip, BBraxton!

I was able to rescue my Outlook and Quicken files from the old hard drive so I can (eventually) reinstall everything...  Lots of work ahead, but at least all my data isn't completely gone.

I had a new drive overnighted, but now I can't get beyond "Primary hard disk drive 0 not found".  More fun for me....

Message Edited by lisahoo on 11-16-2005 05:24 PM

Good! To me that was not at all self-evident. Also, I found the most difficult part to be getting all the drivers right after setting up Windows (XP?). Remember -- chipset drivers first. I usually follow by audio, then network, and eventually the video driver(s).

I have a 5150 laptop and installed a brand new HD. I also had No Drive Detected. Ran the diag and also stated DST Short Test Fail 1000-0141 No Drive Detected.

Does that mean I got a bad brand new HD? Need another new HD?

Check the back of the old drive. Make sure you removed the edge connector from it and placed it over the pins on the new one. If you did not, the drive is not connected to the mainboard, and you will get that error.

Did that several times--even bent a couple of my old HD pins but old HD still works just fine.

You can try a third drive, but I suspect you're going to find the issue is with the mainboard.