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#151372 - 06/24/03 10:00 PM hard drive
TERRYC Offline
Member

Registered: 05/15/01
Posts: 80
Loc: St, Petersburg. Florida. u.s.a
I went to purchase a bigger hard drive for my laptop today,and was astonished to find out that of virtually all of the Compaq laptops,mine was the only model that could not upgrade.I have a ten gig drive,but am fast running out of space.The tech told me that an external hard drive would cause glitches when I tried to play mp3 files stored on an external drive.Has any body had any experience with this.I have usb 1.1 and was hoping that a forthy gig external drive would work.
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terryc

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#151373 - 06/25/03 12:14 AM Re: hard drive
PaulD Offline
Member

Registered: 01/25/03
Posts: 258
Loc: Eugene, OR
Terry,
Do you have Firewire? If you don't, I think you can get a card to add Firewire to your computer and you shouldn't have any problems.
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Generalmusic
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#151374 - 06/25/03 03:00 AM Re: hard drive
trtjazz Offline
Member

Registered: 08/01/02
Posts: 2683
Terry, I have read on a few occasions "they" suggest storing the music on external drive away from the music program. I have usb and it works fine. Sometimes you may have to tweek your read ahead cache or check DMA (direct memory access) in the control panel, but it works well, even with 1.1 USB.
Terry

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jam on,
Terry http://imjazzed.homestead.com/Index.html
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jam on,
Terry
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#151375 - 06/25/03 03:59 AM Re: hard drive
Anonymous
Unregistered


Terry, I'm using USB 1.1 as means to communicate with a 40 GB external hard disk. Works fine for data and music, and I haven't had any problems with glitches. I sometimes do a little DJ job with mp3 files stored in the external disk in the end of my parties, and I never had problems. If you need higher transfer rates you can always purchase (in alternative to a firewire connection) a PCMCIA card with USB2 ports, if your external hard disk box supports USB2: it's rather inexpensive.

-- José.

[This message has been edited by matias (edited 06-25-2003).]

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#151376 - 06/25/03 05:43 AM Re: hard drive
MacAllcock Offline
Senior Member

Registered: 03/02/02
Posts: 1221
Loc: Preston, Lancashire, England
Terry

Its a bit of a surprise that you have a 10 gig disc and can't update; I always though if your bios got you past 9.1 gig then you were OK for quite a few more gig!

The hard disc is encased is a plastic carrier but usually if you can get the carrier apart (small torx-head screws usually) you will find a normal 2.5" hard disc either 9 or 12mm (approx) thick. Assuming your bios is OK you can then do the upgrade yourself. Of course the problem then is backing up your existing hard disc and getting it onto the new hard disc; if you have a CD burner on the laptop you can use Norton Ghost or suchlike to burn a set of CDs with which to transfer a disc image. I've found this very good if a bit strange to use at first sight! Alternatively you can get adapters that let you put a 2.5" drive into a standard desktop PC, so if you have a friend with a suitable machine this might be easier from a data save/restore viewpoint. I'd still use GHOST to transfer the data, just copying data back and forward does not usually get you a new disc which will boot in my experience!

HP/Compaqs web site can be useful regarding ability to upgrade although it can be a bit of a pig to get around sometimes.

Start here and have your model number handy: http://wwss1pro.compaq.com/support/home/selectproduct.asp?destination=contact

If its too much like treacle, post your model number here (or send me an e-mail) and I'll have a dig for you.

[This message has been edited by MacAllcock (edited 06-25-2003).]
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#151377 - 06/25/03 10:03 AM Re: hard drive
TERRYC Offline
Member

Registered: 05/15/01
Posts: 80
Loc: St, Petersburg. Florida. u.s.a
Many thanks.I appreciate the help.I will check out all of these options today.I had thought that I could just install a new hard drive as my existing one is over 9.5 gig.I will try the compaq site again,although as macsays it is like wading through treacle.Thanks again to all of you.Terry
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