harddrive compatible?

[po4dun]

Hi
I want to buy a new harddrive for my IBM thinkpad R32 Notebook. Will there be any problem interchanging those 2 disks? the measurements are the same, but what about the interfaces? Could there be a prob with the controller on the notebook that it doesn't dig the 160gb?

thanks!


the old one is:
hitachi travelstar 2.5inch 08K1089:
# latform: Not Machine Specific
# Formatted Capacity: 40GB
# Mfr P/N: 07N8327 07N9319 08K1089
# Fluid Dynamic Bearing (FDB) Spindle Motor
# Interface: 44-pin ATA-5
# Data Transfer Rates: 100MB/s (UDMA)
# Average Seek Times: 12ms
# Buffer Size: 2MB
# Rotational Speed: 4200rpm
# Height (mm): *9.5mm


the probable new one:
Samsung 2.5 inch: HM160HC

Spinpoint M5
capacity : 160 GB
interface : PATA

Buffer DRAM Size 8 MB
Byte per Sector 512 ytes
Rotational Speed 5,400 RPM
Height 9.5mm

 

[vacunita]

Its fine, ATA and PATA are pretty much the same thing. You might need to remove the adapter from the current one and plug it into the new one, since sometimes laptops have special adapters to allow them to connect in weird ways. Since they have to fit in a certain space inside the laptops.

Otherwise it looks like its o.k.



----------------------------------
Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.

 

[po4dun]

but I know that some IDE controllers can't handle disks larger than 128Gb - how do I find out, if my controller is able to handle 160Gb?

 

[vacunita]

Its not a matter of the controller, but of the BIOS. and seeing the specifications of the Laptop I see its limited to 40GB. so while it may be able to detect 80Gb and 100GB, 160GB is unlikely that's not to say it won't pick up the drive, but it will just not have a correct size. It will still work and be usable, but the size will be wrong.. You'll also find that Windows XP cannot view drives larger than 132GB unless you have SP2 installed.

You might want to look for a BIOS update, that might allow it to see bigger hard drives.

Otherwise it might be better to look into a smaller drive 100Gb or 120GB. instead.

----------------------------------
Ignorance is not necessarily Bliss, case in point:
Unknown has caused an Unknown Error on Unknown and must be shutdown to prevent damage to Unknown.