Travel Technology - Replacing IBM X21 Hard Disk

The time has come to finally replace my good old hard disk on my IBM X21 laptop.

It has a 20 GB disk, which only 17 are usable, the other one is a hidden partition with the recovery software.

Now, I want to go 40GB or bigger, but I saw once some software out there that would copy all the contents of your disk to the new one, so when you replace it, it is working as if nothing had happened, you just have space available for another partition.

Anyone has used software similar to this? Did it work as promised?

And of course, if you know of a place that sells it for $1, and you get 1,000,000 miles with the purchase, I would appreciate the link http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/wink.gif

And no, I am not getting rid of my porn http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/tongue.gif

The problem with replacing a notebook HDD is that you can't connect 2 of them at the same time, what you'll need is a 2.5" HDD adapter so you can hook the old one up to your desktop, or a PCcard to 2.5" adapter OR a way to connect the new drive to USB or Firewire so you can transfer all the stuff.

Other options are making a "ghost" copy of the drive and saving that image on your desktop. In other words, making a full copy of the drive is going to be pretty hard...

This guy from work, bought PC Relocator, and never used it. He bought another laptop instead.

He gave me the software along with the cables.

I might give it a try

eisenworld PC Relocator (http://www.eisenworld.com/PCRelocatorProOverview.asp?sub=1)

FWIW, the external cases Scott talks about are quite cheap. You can pick one up at your local CompUSA for about $40 - or if your in the region of HKG, for about $12.

I picked up a couple in HKG and use them all the time. It's great to be able to simply plug the USB (or firewire) straight into the laptop even after Windows has started and be able to see all my files within 3-5 seconds. Makes for a really quick and easy backup of stuff.

Pick out the new drive you want.

(I strongly recommend the new Hitachi 60gb 7200rpm drive)

Make a ghost image of your current machine.

Pull old HD out and replace with the new drive.

Put ghost image back onto laptop with new drive installed.

Instant drive space.....

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by Quattro:
Pick out the new drive you want.

(I strongly recommend the new Hitachi 60gb 7200rpm drive)

Make a ghost image of your current machine.

Pull old HD out and replace with the new drive.

Put ghost image back onto laptop with new drive installed.

Instant drive space.....</font>

While the faster rotational speed will make for a better performing machine, what effect does it have on battery life?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by winkydink:
While the faster rotational speed will make for a better performing machine, what effect does it have on battery life?

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Pretty much nihil, as the X21's original drive is pretty old and newer drives use much less power the new one will probably use even less than the current one.

Best device EVER I've used for hard drive copying is called an EZgig kit from Apricorn. It comes with a floppy and a PCMCIA-IDE adapter with all the necessary cables. Pop the floppy in, and boot from it. It'll recognize both hard drives and copy all the data over from one to the other. Out of four years and countless upgrades and laptop swaps it's only ever failed once (on a Toshiba 5205-S704). It's OS agnostic and is just about the only program I've used that handles XP without a problem. You should be able to find it at Apricorn (http://www.apricorn.com/product_details.php?ID=228) . I know CDW (http://www.cdw.com) in the US carries the kits.

[This message has been edited by kanebear (edited 10-01-2003).]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by kanebear:
Best device EVER I've used for hard drive copying is called an EZgig kit from Apricorn. It comes with a floppy and a PCMCIA-IDE adapter with all the necessary cables. Pop the floppy in, and boot from it. It'll recognize both hard drives and copy all the data over from one to the other. Out of four years and countless upgrades and laptop swaps it's only ever failed once (on a Toshiba 5205-S704). It's OS agnostic and is just about the only program I've used that handles XP without a problem. You should be able to find it at HTTP://www.apricorn.com . I know CDW (http://www.cdw.com) in the US carries the kits.</font>

SWEET! That is exactly what I knew had to exist but couldn't find!!! http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/thumbsup.gif http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/thumbsup.gif

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by ScottC:
[B] SWEET! That is exactly what I knew had to exist but couldn't find!!! [B]</font>

Even better... it works great for desktops too... so if you're upgrading from one HDD to a larger one and don't want to muck about with XP, connect up both drives, pop in the diskette and you're away. I LOVE this program. Looks like it's on a CD now but it should work the same way.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by kanebear:
Best device EVER I've used for hard drive copying is called an EZgig kit from Apricorn. It comes with a floppy and a PCMCIA-IDE adapter with all the necessary cables. Pop the floppy in, and boot from it. It'll recognize both hard drives and copy all the data over from one to the other. Out of four years and countless upgrades and laptop swaps it's only ever failed once (on a Toshiba 5205-S704). It's OS agnostic and is just about the only program I've used that handles XP without a problem. You should be able to find it at Apricorn (http://www.apricorn.com/product_details.php?ID=228) . I know CDW (http://www.cdw.com) in the US carries the kits.

[This message has been edited by kanebear (edited 10-01-2003).]</font>

That is very cool, and exactly what I was looking for http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/thumbsup.gif

I am going to order it, and see if my wife doesn't give me a hard time.

She complains that I have way too much crap on my computer anyway.

I replaced some old 6GB and 10GB 2.5 HDD with the nice quiet Hitachi (former IBM) 40GB fluid coupling 4200rpm units (Hitachi Part No 07N8327) bought new for about $100. I tested the 5400 rpm units and they were only marginally faster but noisier by far. I didnt realize 7200 rpm 2.5" are available, but I would be concerned with heat and noise problems.

MisterNice

So how does it work with the 2nd hard drive? Does the PCMCIA-IDE adapter power the 2nd drive as well? http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/confused.gif


<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by kanebear:
Best device EVER I've used for hard drive copying is called an EZgig kit from Apricorn. It comes with a floppy and a PCMCIA-IDE adapter with all the necessary cables. Pop the floppy in, and boot from it. It'll recognize both hard drives and copy all the data over from one to the other. Out of four years and countless upgrades and laptop swaps it's only ever failed once (on a Toshiba 5205-S704). It's OS agnostic and is just about the only program I've used that handles XP without a problem. You should be able to find it at Apricorn (http://www.apricorn.com/product_details.php?ID=228) . I know CDW (http://www.cdw.com) in the US carries the kits.

[This message has been edited by kanebear (edited 10-01-2003).]</font>

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by UALOneKPlus:
So how does it work with the 2nd hard drive? Does the PCMCIA-IDE adapter power the 2nd drive as well? http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/confused.gif


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Yep, basically you slot the PCMCIA card in, plug one end of the cable into the PCMCIA card, attach the other end to your bouncing baby big HDD (or old HDD you wish to clone from as the case may be), boot the EZgig software and it should show both drives. Couldn't be more simple. It can take a while to copy but it's always been dead reliable and upon finishing the copy I've been able to boot immediately off the new drive and have immediately seen the extra space.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by jfe:
...I am going to order it, and see if my wife doesn't give me a hard time.</font>

If you find it creates too much marital discord, you can send it to me. Anything to help out a marriage.

Why not take the opportunity for a full system reinstall?

Back up all your data files - and heaven knows you'll probably have stuff on there you don't need any more (excluding the porn http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/smile.gif) - and do a clean install with Win XP Pro. Think of it as a spring clean?

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by willyroo:
Why not take the opportunity for a full system reinstall?

Back up all your data files - and heaven knows you'll probably have stuff on there you don't need any more (excluding the porn http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/smile.gif) - and do a clean install with Win XP Pro. Think of it as a spring clean?</font>

I did that re-installation a couple of months ago, and my computer is working, beautifully.

The problem is the lack of space http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/frown.gif

And I still use Win2K http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/eek.gif, it still supports all my favorite applications http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/wink.gif

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by cblaisd:
If you find it creates too much marital discord, you can send it to me. Anything to help out a marriage.</font>


Well, the problem is not the extra Hard Disk, is the $$$$ that I need to buy it.

But since you are so willing to help, let me email you my Amazon.com WishList, so you can get it for me, that would really help http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/biggrin.gif

All you hard disk are belong to me!!!

Thanks Kanebear for the clarification. Seems like a very neato tool.

I use Ghost for imaging desktop drives, and this solution will be great to back up laptops.

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by UALOneKPlus:
...I use Ghost for imaging desktop drives, and this solution will be great to back up laptops.</font>

Any way to use Ghost on XP (since you have to boot to a command prompt and you can't do that in XP. Or did I miss something above http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/smile.gif )

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by cblaisd:
Any way to use Ghost on XP (since you have to boot to a command prompt and you can't do that in XP. Or did I miss something above http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/smile.gif )

</font>

I use a Win ME start up disk to boot to DOS, and run ghost.exe. If you don't have a floppy drive, just boot up from a CD-Rom disk with Dos & Ghost on it...

Norton Ghost 2003 sez it will run on either XP out of the box http://www.symantec.com/sabu/ghost/ghost_personal/ .

Drive Image 7 http://www.powerquest.com/driveimage/ will also make an nice image of your drive with either XP. I have used it with both XP Pro and XP Home as I could not get an older version of Ghost to work with XP.

MisterNice

[This message has been edited by MisterNice (edited 10-06-2003).]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif" size="2">Originally posted by cblaisd:
Any way to use Ghost on XP (since you have to boot to a command prompt and you can't do that in XP. Or did I miss something above http://www.flyertalk.com/travel/fttravel_forum/smile.gif )

</font>
Ghost creates a PC-DOS boot disk. This disk boots the computer with the Ghost "console", which you use to create your images.

If you create an image on CD, you can make the CD bootable for the purposes of transferring your image back to the HDD.

Ghost will put about 1,200 Mb of data on a 700Mb CD-R using "fast" compression.

I (once) used "no name" CD-Rs, and the write process failed - so use the good ones.

Apart from Ghost (initially) being non-intuitive, it works very well, especially the Ghost Explorer (in Windows) which allows you to select individual files in an image and copy them to wherever you want them (eg from CD to a network drive).

Tools for getting a USB drive running under DOS:

http://www.bootdisk.com/usb.htm