Korean Job Discussion Forums

[teatoast]

Hi everyone,

Apologies in advance for asking what is perhaps a stupid question, but I need some advice as I'm not too clever when it comes to techno-stuffs!

Sooooo, I bought a laptop a few years back (a Sony Vaio VGN-N38Z/W) wand this happened to it...

After a year or so the battery starting screwing up, eventually only holding charge for about 30 seconds when not plugged in. One day, I had it balanced on the sofa and my dog knocked it off onto the floor, which drove the charging cable into its port and knackered the whole thing up completely. It no longer switches on (which I'm guessing is because the battery won't hold charge and the port to hold the charger is totally broken).

Anyway, I got myself a new laptop this year and want to sell the Vaio for whatever I can as I'm trying to save money for travelling. As its knackered I can't imagine anyone wanting it for anything other than parts, but I'm concerned that I can't access anything on it to delete everything before its sold and I don't want someone to end up with all of my University work, photographs and personal details should it be able to be fixed!

Does anyone have any advice as to what I can do? Thanks in advance and sorry again if the answer is staring me in the face!

[Italy37612]

Go buy an external hard drive enclosure. Something like this will work just fine.
http://www.amazon.com/Adaptec-Enclosure-converts-internal-2188700/dp/B0009ZHF54

After that you will have to turn your old laptop upside down and unscrew the plastic panel that holds the hard drive. Usually this is somewhere near the front of the laptop. There really should only be two panels that you can remove from the bottom. One holds the RAM (memory) and the other holds the hard drive.

Once you have removed the hard drive you can insert it into the external enclosure.

Then plug the USB cable from the enclosure into your other laptop and boot it normally. The "new" hard drive should show up under my computer.

[teatoast]

Thank you very much, I didn't know those thingies existed! So if i'm understanding this right, I can delete/transfer all the stuff off the hard drive onto my new laptop then replace it and sell it as needing repair/to be sold for parts.

You, Sir or Madam, are a star!

[Italy37612]

Yep, you can copy/erase anything, just like a USB flash drive.

If you are just going to sell it for parts you might as well keep the old hard drive in the enclosure and use it for a backup. Just sell the old laptop without a hard drive.

[techgeekinkorea]

how much do you want for the broken laptop without the hard drive?

please email me at : techgeekinkorea <at> gmail.com

[Skippy]

Have you considered taking it to the Sony Service Center in Seoul. I think they could fix it for you and even likely sell you a new battery.

[teatoast]

Hey, sorry for the misunderstanding but I'm not actually in Korea yet...I'm trying to save some money before I leave the UK!

[Wad]

Not sure who would buy a used laptop when the cost to repair is unknown. Especially one without a hard drive. Better to do as another poster recommended and take it to a Sony dealer. At least get an estimate on repair costs!

[sheriffadam]

ebuyer.co.uk for a cheap external USB caddy.
The cheapest is this one, http://www.ebuyer.com/product/158386 maybe not the best quality (ease of fitting the HDD) but technically performance is all the same.

ebay.co.uk will have spare batteries and even a replacement power socket if you look hard enough, a friend/geeky brother? might want to fix it up and keep it. Notebook pwoer sockets getting damaged is common so replacements are usually cheap and easy to fix.