Hard Drive upgrade problems

[sr1312]

Hi all,

I've had my pcg-k315s for little over a year now. I decided to treat myself to a new larger and faster hard drive. It arrived today, Hitachi travelstar 60g 7200rpm.

I've built and upgraded loads of desktop machines but never a laptop. Removing the old drive was easy, 1 screw on the underside for the cover and then 4 screws to remove the drive.

This is where my problems started. I fitted the new one and my machine wouldn't boot, I mean the powe button did nothing. I put the old one back in and same problem.

After a fair bit of removal and replacement I started to boot but I got " no operating system found" This was on the original drive that I had put back in.

On checking the bios, the primary ide is "none" so obviously the drive is now not detected but I can't understand why.

Same issue with the new drive. Do I need to do something in this extremely annoying locked bios to register the drive ?

My suspicions are that I have either not plugged the drive in correctly or I have blown the ide channel.

I can't see how I can't have plugged the drive in correctly but one thing worries me, I can't get the cover back on over the drive which makes me think it's not in right but I can't see whats wrong with the **** thing

Can anyone help please, it's driving me crazy !!

[William]

Can't help much but when I replaced my HDD in my laptop I just put in my recovery disk and it came back to life.

Its very worrying that you cannot reboot using the original drive.

As it was only one screw I assume you mean your drive is in a caddy?

For the size of currently avaiable laptop drives I would think going to the bios is unnecessary and you putiing your original HDD back in sort of negates that issue.

[sr1312]

Thanks William.

There is a small bracket that screws into each side of the drive which then screws into the case. It helps to align the drive with the connector. I just can't see why it isn't working

[William]

I assume that the new drive was the same physical size and also IDE?

So why will it not now boot from the original drive?

[sr1312]

I assume that the new drive was the same physical size and also IDE?

Yep.

I can only think I haven't got the pins in the right slots on the ide connector but when you attach the brackets to the side of the drive it then determines where it's going to go if you follow. there is no room for sideways movement so that you could miss a pin.

There are no jumpers on the new or old drive either. Also, I assume the power comes through the ide connector as there is no power supply connector as you would see on a desktop machine. It is acting as if the drive is not powering up. It's also tight to get the cover back on so I'm not convinced it's in right but I can't see how else it would go, thanks to the brackets.

[William]

I really don't know whats wrong, my new hard drive was as simple as plugging in a new PCMCIA card when it was in the caddy.

Could any pins have got bent? clutching at straws now!

[sr1312]

Thanks for your help William.

I think I'll need to visit a repair centre.:smileycry:

[GBS]

I have not done this upgrade yet, but I plan to do so soon. (K115Z)

I suspect that something is wrong with the connector, possibly damaged when you removed the old HD. I know Sony have had issues with weak soldering in some models, not the K-series as far as I know.
If you have a multimeter check the plug/cables for continuity - if that is possible in this location.

I hope you get the problem sorted out soon. Good Luck.

[seb21__]

Hmmm, no idea.

check this link:

http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm

Download the Feature Tool and creat a bootable CD.
You will see whether drive is recognized or not. You can set the diskspace too (happen to the controller). Just try it. and check the jumpers. Maybe it helps. I can't help your there.