[lug] Laptop hard drives

[llornkcor]

On 11/25/2000 19:57:11, Chris Riddoch spoketh thusly:
>So, just a quick question to anybody who's dealt with upgrading the
>hard drive in a laptop (Toshiba Satellite Pro 435CDS):
>
>The hard drive I've got is a Toshiba MK1301MAV, 1.3 gigs, "Slimline
>12mm" and 2.5 inches long.  2633c, 16h, 63s.
>
>A lot of the hard drives I'm finding are either slightly larger, or
>slightly smaller.  12.5 and 12.7mm are common, as is 9.5mm.  What's
>the likelihood of being screwed if I go with a slightly different
>size?

I have hot swapped a couple really old ('93) IDE laptop harddrives on old laptops, different sizes 
completely not supported by the BIOS (hang when I tried to boot with with one in the connector.- hence 
the hot swap!!)

I think as long as it fits and the connector is the same or have an adapter.
But for booting I think its best to have one that the BIOS recognizes. :)


>
>The other thing, what're the chances I'll have bios issues with hard
>drives of particular sizes?  I remember the 8 gig limit for booting a
>kernel, and I'm worried about needing a bios updates.  Toshiba's
>website doesn't even *mention* my laptop, anywhere.  The only
>references I could find to my laptop anywhere are laptop sales sites.

I don't know about that BIOS, but the old Packard-Bell 386 laptop's had 2 settings- 40 MB, and 80 MB.
Of course, it didn't see or like the 120 MB hdd I was trying to put some info onto (formatted with one file- 
command.com)
I don't know about linux on that particular machine, but on this one (as I remember) I could turn off the 
HDD's in the bios, and still get lilo to boot.

>
>What's my safest bet, when looking for a hard drive to replace one
>that's going to die any week now?  (Just before finals, whee.)
>
>--
>Chris Riddoch
>socket at peakpeak.com
>
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