Swapping Harddrive on 15" T43.

[thinkpadnewby]

Hi everyone. I recently purchased a used T43 15". I decided to upgrade the harddrive to a 100gb drive. So last night I copied the existing 40gb drive over to the 100gb drive using a usb adaptaer and Easus partition master. That all went well, so I went to swap the drives. I removed the drive cover screw, pulled expecting to remove the caddy and drive. Instead just the cover came off and there was a big chunck of foam behind the cover. I took the foam out, and can see the hard drive back there. Looks like its on a caddy of some sort. My fingers aren't nearly small enough to get in there and pull out the drive. I'm wondering if the previous owner installed this with a 14" caddy and cover. Or is this actually the way it's supposed to be? Also, any ideas on how to get that drive outta there now?

[sjthinkpader]

It is probably a 1.8 inch drive they used from a X40/X41. You will need to remove the palm rest and push it out via the small holes on the drive cage.

But likely your cloning would not work. The SATA-PATA converter make it necessary for the new drive be in the HDD slot and old drive connected by USB or drive tray during the cloning process.

[91011]

Long, thin needle nose pliers. With AC disconnected & battery removed, try to grab a corner of the HDD where a screw would be and gently pull. I've done it many times without damage and the fact yours is in a caddy makes it even safer.

You could remove the keyboard & keyboard/palmrest bezel and try to push it out from the inside but I don't have a 15" T4x open at the moment to check. Looks like that might work on a T30 I have ripped apart.

Your problem may be a 1.8" drive but I would bet on the wrong caddy door. A door for a 15" model has metal arms that extend about 20mm out from the black plastic. A 14" caddy's arms extend about 14mm from the plastic.

Also, when you got your new 100gb drive were you aware of the 2010 error from a non-IBM firmware HDD? If not, better look at the sticky on the main T4x page.

Once you do get it out, reclone it using sjthinkpader's instructions.

John

[thinkpadnewby]

Thanks for the suggestions. I was out of town last week, so I haven't had a chance to try anything yet. But I did get a replacement 15" caddy & door so I can at least check that part out.

[thinkpadnewby]

John, thanks for the heads up on the 2010 error. I purchased that Fujitsu MVH2100AH drive off ebay you had recommeded on a previous post so that I wouldn't have to deal with the 2010 error mess. Do I still need to upgrade the firmware? It is a brand new drive.

Josh

[sjthinkpader]

It should work without firmware update in most of the cases. If you have an Ultrabay drive tray, it is easy enough to do the firmware update.

[thinkpadnewby]

How will I know if a firmware update is needed?
Can I do the firmware update using my USB to 2.5" IDE adapter? I don't have an Ultrabay drive tray, althought I was thinking about getting one. But then I thought I'd just be better off getting a usb harddrive for extra storage, and use the USB to IDE adapter to do any drive cloning I need to do.

[sjthinkpader]

Since these are normally a ISO or floppy image, you can place the drive in the HDD slot.

In most of the cases I tried, either the drive firmware is already upto date or not eligible for update.