Upgrading Your Laptops Hard Drive, If your laptop's a few years old, you might be nearing victimization of inadequate hard drive space. This is no laughing matter, I promise. As technology progresses, more storage space is packed into smaller spaces, but that also means more space is needed for growing technology. So if your laptop is 3-5 years old it may be time to perform a hard drive swap.
Fortunately, for the consumer, laptops are built in such a way that allows for easy access to the main internal components. Of course, for the timid and light-hearted tech users out there, utilizing a professional's services can ease your apprehensive nature toward tinkering with your beloved PC. For the others - those with the guts! - I'll attempt to give you an easy step-by-step process that will guide you to gigabyte heaven.
Step 1: Find a compatible hard drive for your laptop
You will need to first determine if your laptop utilizes a SATA hard drive, or an IDE hard drive. The easiest approach is to look at the drive itself. This will generally involve removing the back plate of the laptop by removing any necessary screws. Note: look for any indication on the back as to where the hard drive might be located; this could save you a little time and trouble. Also, don't worry about voiding any warranties as your aging laptop's manufacturer's guarantees are probably long gone. More than likely you'll verify your hard drive is SATA.
With your new-found knowledge of the type of drive your laptop will accept, now choose a replacement. Ideally, you'll want to increase your RPMs and your GBs. Do your homework and figure out what will best suit your needs.
Step 2: Transfer the data
There are several options to move your precious data from the old hard drive to the new hard drive but I will only feature one option here. In my opinion, the quickest and most beneficial option for you will be to spend $29 on CMS' Data Transfer Kit (www.cmsproducts.com). This kit will utilize a USB drive in your laptop, an empty external drive case (comes with kit), and your new hard drive to transfer the contents of your old drive to the new drive. Once complete, you swap the drives and the added bonus is you now can use your old drive as an external backup.
Upgrading Your Laptops Hard Drive
