PCG-K315S hard drive upgrade/ replacement

[RobbieH]

Hi all,
My PCG-K315S HD is coming to the end of its life and i need to upgrade. Due to it now being out of warrnty, Sony are being particularly unhelpful, so i'm hoping you guy's can help me out.
My original HD is 40gb. I have been looking a Western Digital ones 120-160gb. Most retailers are advising they should be ok. One has noted my original BIOS settings might not recognise anything over 128gb though.

Does anyone know what the BIOS limit would be on my laptop?

cheers
Rob

[Blencogo]

Hi Rob,

The BIOS should be OK.

You need an ATA-100 drive (NOT SATA).

Some people have had a problem using the Recovery Disc Set as I think your Recovery Software is probably pre the SP1 and SP2 service packs. The original version of XP can only 'see' 126GB of hard disc size.

You may be OK but just to be sure you can do one of the following two things: -

1. Limit the size of the new disc to 120GB
2. Make a 'mirror' of your existing system using something like Acronis True Image and use the Acronis CD to put the 'mirror' onto the new drive. This saves reloading your programs and data and having to update XP and the Vaio software. You will need to borrow an external USB hard disc drive or use an awful lot of DVDs!!

I'm sure you have found out that physically replacing the HDD is a simple 5 minute job on the K-Series.

[RobbieH]

Thanks for your reply, much appreciated.