Post by PaulPost by HBSorry to be so late getting back to let you all know what happened
Thanks for coming back anyway!
Post by PaulPost by HBwith the Toshiba. The connector came and the HD could not be seen in
Window's explorer. I tried on 2 other W7 computers here. Nothing.
Agreed, pretty definite that the drive is dead. Hang on to the "cable"
though. (Depending on your level of paranoia, you can always wonder if
the "cable" is a dud - it was cheap, after all; have you tried other
drives on it? Could you hear/feel the drive spin up on it? But let's
assume it is the drive that was dud. Doesn't matter anyway; what follows
is assuming that.)
Post by PaulPost by HBI made a Rescue CD from the old W7 desktop and it loaded in the Tosh
Excellent, so you've now made two bootable optical discs - the FatDog
Linux one, and that one - that boot on the laptop. (Though I think both
CDs; I presume the drive can actually read DVDs. But I think that's
likely; I don't think a W7-era laptop would have a drive that couldn't
at least _read_ DVDs.)
Post by PaulPost by HBbut there was nothing from the HD.
Not surprising. And does tend to support that it is the HD that's gone,
rather than the cable being dud.
Post by PaulPost by HBSo the Tosh sits here until I decide what to do with it. We're
thinking of taking it to a tech' to replace the HD and OS with W7. Is
that possible does anyone know, or does MS control what they can
install? Forcing the sale of W10? My youngest doesn't want this
I'd say, whatever M$ order, you should be able to find someone who will
do it - but I'd do it yourself, as otherwise the cost will still be a
lot. Now we've more or less decided that you're not going to get
_anything_ off the old drive, the decision has been made for us - it's
going to be a clean install of W7. Now that Paul says the Heidoc site it
working again, which will enable you to get a legal install DVD for free
(other than the price of the DVD blank) from Microsoft, I'd go that way;
installing Windows from a CD to "bare metal" - i. e. a new drive - is
pretty trivial (though takes a while), and then activating it is again
trivial.
Post by PaulPost by HBNotebook with W10 because her favorite game will not run properly on
it. It runs for about 5 minutes then freezes. We tried all the
compatibility settings and none worked.
(Care to tell us what the game is?)
Post by PaulPost by HBNow we know for sure what the Toshiba's problem was. That scrutch
sound I heard that night was the dying gasp of it's HD.
Heidoc has Win7 downloads working again, but the rate of URL
generation is throttled, due to the new method being used.
The "requirements" are the modernity of the runtime environment
when using the downloader. It "needs" IE8 because the TechBench
site the Heidoc downloader visits, uses ActiveX.
What this means is you basically get the Heidoc downloader, on one of
your W7 machines with IE8, and run it, specify which sort of Windows the
sticker is for, type in the code from your Microsoft sticker, and it
will download an ISO of the W7 install DVD from Microsoft for you. You
then burn that, and you have a DVD which will boot on the affected PC,
and would install W7 onto a new HD you buy for it. (I wouldn't try
messing with a USB stick - just go straight to DVD.) [Remember, use the
burn-from-ISO-image method in whichever burn software you use, not just
a plain burn; when you look as the DVD you've made afterwards, in
Explorer, you should see lots of files on it - if you just see one .iso
file, you've done it wrong.]
Post by Paulhttps://www.heidoc.net/joomla/technology-science/microsoft/67-microsoft-
windows-iso-download-tool
Download: Windows ISO Downloader.exe
Version: 6.01
Release Date: 15 April 2018
Requirements: Windows 7 or newer, .NET Framework 4.x,
Internet Explorer 8 or newer.
Make sure you know what SKU of Windows 7 you've got, before
getting your download. For example, a typical home user
receives a laptop with "Windows 7 Home Premium x64".
That's what I'd expect to see too. A _few_ machines were sold with Pro
instead of Home Premium, but not many. (From the spec. of the machine,
it won't be Basic.)
Post by PaulMake sure you know what the laptop COA sticker is good
for, before you start a download.
[]
Post by PaulOnce you have the 3.5GB downloaded ISO and made a DVD of it,
you can purchase a new blank hard drive, to do the
install, and install the OS yourself. The OS will request
phone activation, which is an automated service with no
human. You need a touch tone phone to work it. The laptop
screen will present a 56 digit number. You type that
number on the touch tone phone pad. The activation server
will "speak" a 56 digit number in response. Type the returned
number into the laptop, and it should activate.
Sounds scary, but isn't. It will repeat things for you. Do have a pen
and paper to hand, obviously!
Post by PaulIf for some reason, you buy the replacement laptop hard
drive, and are unable to install the OS, a place like Geek Squad
will "charge $200" for an OS installation procedure. There is
money to be saved by doing it yourself.
Plus great satisfaction, and experience to be gained.
Post by PaulIf you take the laptop to a computer store, tell them
the drive is dead, and you'd like to buy a new one,
they can help you with selecting a SATA or IDE. On my
[snip]
I'm pretty sure he has already got the drive out, and established that
it's a SATA, since he's been trying it - on his other computers - using
the "cable" that he bought.
Post by PaulWhen they ask "what size do you want", tell them "small one".
Today, a 500GB uses one side of a single platter, and
(Wow, I hadn't realised that!)
Post by Paulit just might be marginally more reliable than a 7mm high
2TB drive. Your drive is probably 9.5mm and should be
replaced with a 9.5mm drive. Historically, 9.5mm is the
go-to size in the last ten years or so, and should still be
available. Don't fall for any "for $10 more, we can give
you a 2TB drive" bullshit. Stick with a small one.
When I bought a new one recently, I went for a 1 TB, but then it was for
this my main machine; I'd about half filled the 250G drive on the XP
machine that died (taking several years to do so), and was thinking of
getting 500G, but the price difference to a 1 TB wasn't great; to a 2 TB
was getting out of the sweet spot pricewise, plus like Paul I thought it
might be _slightly_ less reliable. You might do fine with a 500G.
Although I hope that you end up with a machine that's much more usable
(i. e. faster) than it was - the slowness probably having been due to
the drive - so you might actually use it more. (Though unless you
download a lot of video, even 500G will take a while to fill!)
Post by PaulOn my laptop, it's pretty easy to get the drive out.
Two screws removes the drive bay cover. I can use
jewelers Philips for that, or use my smallest
hex driver Philips (which has a sharp enough point).
The SATA drive tray slides backwards, and once the
connector is clear, you can lift the drive tray out.
As I said above, I think he's already got it out, as he's been using it
(or trying to) on his other computers via the USB-to-SATA "cable" he
bought. (One with two USB plugs,)
Post by PaulUsing your jewelers screwdrivers (definitely jewelers
for these screws), you remove the four drive retainer
screws to get it out of the tray. Don't over-tighten
the screws. Make them finger tight, but don't strip
the aluminum drive body by "cranking".
Paul
Once you've got the machine back up and running (and, perhaps, split the
drive into two partitions - shrink C: to say 100G, then make a new
partition D: in the released space) - MAKE A BOOT CD AND AN IMAGE so you
don't have to go through this palaver again if the new drive dies in the
future! I think Paul, and certainly I, would use Macrium boot CD and
image, but anything is better than nothing, even the facility built into
Windows. The image should fit onto your Seagate drive, and probably
leave room for images of some other machines too.
AND DO THE SAME FOR YOUR OTHER COMPUTERS TOO! (If you use Macrium, one
boot CD will do for all of them [though having two copies wouldn't
hurt]; I _think_ the same is true of the Microsoft imager.)
Others may disagree with me, but I'd say don't stop making System
Restore points - but that (as you've found!) is NOT a substitute for a
proper boot-CD-plus-image! (You should make a new image from time to
time - you can overwrite old ones when you run out of space. Though it
might be worth buying a bigger empty drive, maybe at the same time as
you buy this one; you just need a bare drive, not one made up into a box
like the Seagate, as you can use your "cable" with it.) System Restore
is a quick and rather opaque way (meaning you don't quite know what it
is doing) of undoing changes you've recently made, such as a software
install or Windows "up"grade, when you find something's not working as
it was and you're fairly sure what you did that caused it; it still
relies on Windows booting to the point where you can _do_ a restore,
which won't boot at all if the HD has died.
--
J. P. Gilliver. UMRA: 1960/<1985 MB++G()AL-IS-Ch++(p)***@T+H+Sh0!:`)DNAf
Anyone can do any amount of work provided it isn't the work he is supposed to
be doing at the moment. -Robert Benchley, humorist, drama critic, and actor
(1889-1945)