I'm planning to swap out my Compaq Presario laptop hard drive. So far, i see it going like this, however, on each step I have questions, so if you could correct my thinking, I'd be thrilled. Else, this puppy's going to the rifle range.
1. Make boot disk for laptop A)I see I can make an msdos boot disk, but will that be sufficient to complete the process? If not what should I do and how?
2. Borrow external hard drive to clone current onboard hard drive. A)Can I clone my hard drive to an external without destroying the data currently on the external drive, or do I need to copy that to CDROM, and then do the clone process to the external hard drive?
3. Which function button allows me to set the bios so that the computer looks to other sources from which to boot, so that when I swap out the onboard drive, the computer will boot from the external hard drive?
4. Clone from the external hard drive to the new onboard hard drive? A)When I boot from the external, do I use the same F key to go into the bios and identify the new hard drive? What will be the process so the computer will recognize the new drive?
5.I've seen the post on recommended cloning software. After I install that software on the onboard drive and clone to the external drive, will I then have to install the cloning software on the external drive, or will the cloned installation from the original hard drive function?
That's about what I've come up with, besides drinking when it's over. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.
1. Make boot disk for laptop A)I see I can make an msdos boot disk, but will that be sufficient to complete the process? If not what should I do and how?
2. Borrow external hard drive to clone current onboard hard drive. A)Can I clone my hard drive to an external without destroying the data currently on the external drive, or do I need to copy that to CDROM, and then do the clone process to the external hard drive?
3. Which function button allows me to set the bios so that the computer looks to other sources from which to boot, so that when I swap out the onboard drive, the computer will boot from the external hard drive?
4. Clone from the external hard drive to the new onboard hard drive? A)When I boot from the external, do I use the same F key to go into the bios and identify the new hard drive? What will be the process so the computer will recognize the new drive?
5.I've seen the post on recommended cloning software. After I install that software on the onboard drive and clone to the external drive, will I then have to install the cloning software on the external drive, or will the cloned installation from the original hard drive function?
That's about what I've come up with, besides drinking when it's over. Any suggestions are greatly appreciated.