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  1. #1
    Cynical Member
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    Help! My HDD just crashed!

    Okay, so might be a really stupid question, but I'm going to go and ask anyway. My hard drive crashed today. I have a Dell Notebook. It's my primary HDD, so the tech guy at my uni told me that I need to go and buy a new one. I don't know anything when it comes to this stuff, so here's my question. Will I need to reinstall Windows, photoshop, MS Office, etc.? Will a new HDD come with all that stuff or is it stored somewhere else on my computer? I know, stupid question probably. But I'm leaving work in an hour to go an buy a new one, so any help is appreciated. Thanks!
    "Fuck off. And take your stupid cult with you."

    -Scarlett Johansson to Tom Cruise

  2. #2

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    New ones are empty

  3. #3
    Cynical Member
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    Shit....I don't have any software with me....

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    They will load up windows for you, but the other stuff you might have to buy.

  5. #5
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    Just bring 500 baht and buy new software (the stuff you absolutely need). You will probably be able to recover a reasonable amount of data out of your old hard disk with the right tools once you hook it up to a functioning Windows machine.

  6. #6
    Khun Marmite
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    Quote Originally Posted by durianfan
    Okay, so might be a really stupid question, but I'm going to go and ask anyway. My hard drive crashed today. I have a Dell Notebook. It's my primary HDD, so the tech guy at my uni told me that I need to go and buy a new one. I don't know anything when it comes to this stuff, so here's my question. Will I need to reinstall Windows, photoshop, MS Office, etc.? Will a new HDD come with all that stuff or is it stored somewhere else on my computer? I know, stupid question probably. But I'm leaving work in an hour to go an buy a new one, so any help is appreciated. Thanks!
    This happened to me a year or so ago. I had a Dell latitude. So I got a new Acer lap top and used CD backups of the data files from my Dell to get my stuff back.

    But I didn't investigate ways of connecting my dodgy lap top HDD to my new PC. I do have a couple of external 3 1/2" drives connected by USB, but I haven't seen similar boxes for lap top drives.

    If they are available, I'll get one so I can check that my backup CDs didn't miss anything.

    Good luck Durianfan. It's a frustrating, time consuming process.

  7. #7
    Thailand Expat lom's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by RDN
    I do have a couple of external 3 1/2" drives connected by USB, but I haven't seen similar boxes for lap top drives.
    External 2.5" boxes are available. Be sure to get one with a power adaptor, the USB port can usually not power a hard disk even if the manufacturer says it can.

  8. #8
    A bladdy woman
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    We manufacture HDDs for DELL and DELL are the biggest customer!

    So, DELL are cool!

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    Quote Originally Posted by Goddess of Whatever
    So, DELL are cool!
    yeah, like samsung cameras, grrrrrrrrrr....

  10. #10
    Khun Marmite
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    Quote Originally Posted by lom
    Quote Originally Posted by RDN
    I do have a couple of external 3 1/2" drives connected by USB, but I haven't seen similar boxes for lap top drives.
    External 2.5" boxes are available. Be sure to get one with a power adaptor, the USB port can usually not power a hard disk even if the manufacturer says it can.
    Excellent! I'll have a look for one tomorrow. I'll have a quick look on the 'net first to see what's available.

  11. #11
    Khun Marmite
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    Quote Originally Posted by Goddess of Whatever
    We manufacture HDDs for DELL and DELL are the biggest customer!

    So, DELL are cool!
    Dell are very reliable. We used to buy all Dell PCs at my old company and they hardly ever had any failures.

    I remember my old Dell PC keyboard was made in Thailand. Can't remember if the rest of it was.

  12. #12
    Cynical Member
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    Fixed. Cost 2800 baht for a 40 gig HDD plus Windows. The guy even installed a bunch of software for free. Luckily I had recently backed up all my photos from the past 3 years of travelling, so everything is okay.

  13. #13
    I'm in Jail
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    DELL are fucking shit. They have a 30% DoA rate, which is outrageous. I order 2 DELL server and they all died within only a few years (4)

    The last one is acting strangely and will need to be replaced. Overpriced POS.

    The Generic Made Server have lasted longer and seems to be more reliable.

    The good thing about DELL was the service (3 years x 1 day intervention on site). When the servers broke they were there in no time and leave extra parts just in case. I have an extra server with all the extra parts they left. Still that didn't fix the server in the longer run. I am trying to avoid them. The HP servers seem to be more reliable.

    Maybe DELL is better for workstations.

  14. #14
    Khun Marmite
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    Quote Originally Posted by Butterfly
    DELL are fucking shit. They have a 30% DoA rate, which is outrageous. I order 2 DELL server and they all died within only a few years (4)

    The last one is acting strangely and will need to be replaced. Overpriced POS.

    The Generic Made Server have lasted longer and seems to be more reliable.

    The good thing about DELL was the service (3 years x 1 day intervention on site). When the servers broke they were there in no time and leave extra parts just in case. I have an extra server with all the extra parts they left. Still that didn't fix the server in the longer run. I am trying to avoid them. The HP servers seem to be more reliable.

    Maybe DELL is better for workstations.
    Yeah, Dell are sooooo bad. Strange how companies that are really bad are also really big and popular and number 1 market leaders.

    My old company had about 40 Dell PCs. Very, very reliable, and the few times we had to call them out they came the next business day. Actually, it was always a problem calling them out for service because no one could remember the number.

  15. #15
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    Up to about 5 years ago I would have recommended Compaq over dell. Not any more. Nicest thing about Compaq they had that Digital service in place. Had mother boards die during upgrades, called the service dept. (3:00 AM) moved on to another server, dude was there within 4 hours with motherboard in hand, sorted.
    Poor lan admin was shittin his pants...
    When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty -- T. Jefferson


  16. #16
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    Quote Originally Posted by RDN
    eah, Dell are sooooo bad. Strange how companies that are really bad are also really big and popular and number 1 market leaders.
    Well AOL used to be also the #1 ISP if that gives you a clue. People are stupid and will follow the company with the best marketing techniques.

    MS is another stellar company at the number one spot and we all know about the quality of their product

    Yeah, DIGITAL was great for Servers (the ALPHA fad) and then the COMPAQ/HP deal fucked up everything

  17. #17
    A bladdy woman
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    Quote Originally Posted by dirtydog
    Quote Originally Posted by Goddess of Whatever
    So, DELL are cool!
    yeah, like samsung cameras, grrrrrrrrrr....
    Oh.. well..

  18. #18
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    Quote Originally Posted by Butterfly
    Quote Originally Posted by RDN
    eah, Dell are sooooo bad. Strange how companies that are really bad are also really big and popular and number 1 market leaders.
    Well AOL used to be also the #1 ISP if that gives you a clue. People are stupid and will follow the company with the best marketing techniques.
    Their marketing is indeed superb.

  19. #19
    Khun Marmite
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    Quote Originally Posted by Butterfly
    Quote Originally Posted by RDN
    yeah, Dell are sooooo bad. Strange how companies that are really bad are also really big and popular and number 1 market leaders.
    Well AOL used to be also the #1 ISP if that gives you a clue. People are stupid and will follow the company with the best marketing techniques.

    MS is another stellar company at the number one spot and we all know about the quality of their product

    Yeah, DIGITAL was great for Servers (the ALPHA fad) and then the COMPAQ/HP deal fucked up everything
    You think I bought Dell because of their marketing? Their monthly magazine, perhaps? You clearly don't know me. I bought Dell because the other brands of PCs we bought - Compaq and HP - were not as reliable and/or not as good value for money. Simple really.

    As for Digital's (DEC's) Alphas - what's wrong with them? We used Alpha 3000's for years without any problems. Brilliant machines!

  20. #20
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    ^ That's not what I was saying. But you seemed to imply that them being #1 meant quality. I disagree. A number of studies have been made on computer manuacturers and DELL always come as one of the worst in terms of hardware reliability. Maybe you got lucky.

    HP has been getting better in the last 24 months. Maybe because of their COMPAQ buyout

  21. #21
    Khun Marmite
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    Quote Originally Posted by Butterfly
    ^ That's not what I was saying. But you seemed to imply that them being #1 meant quality. I disagree. A number of studies have been made on computer manuacturers and DELL always come as one of the worst in terms of hardware reliability. Maybe you got lucky.

    HP has been getting better in the last 24 months. Maybe because of their COMPAQ buyout
    I do find it difficult to believe that Dell come out as one of the worst, but I quit work about 4 years ago, so maybe things have changed for the worse.

    But I would still buy Dell in Thailand if only they sold the same versions as they do in the UK. Although my Acer's pretty good!

    (As for AOL, I went with Compuserve until we got broadband at work. )

  22. #22
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    ^ The only "good" thing with DELL was their laptop. Workstations are OK (even though their failure rate has been above the generic ones) but their servers are fucking crap. I had a 50% failure rate on those expensive things and apparently I am not alone. I guess 50% is still better than 100%

  23. #23
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    When i left the business, a long time ago, I had designed, built and maintained 3 nationwie networks. I always prefered Compaq servers, HP workstations and IBM laptops. I left the rat race shortly after HP bought Compaq out. Dunno about after that but the networks i worked with had hundreds of servers ad thousands of Workstations. Never did like Dell. They were just high-priced clones. Hp Workstations were a breeze to work on tool-less tear down and assembly. Rock solid.
    Compaq had great service in place even before the digital buy-out (worked for Digital in their heyday). after they had industrial strength disk-array technology, their SAN technology was excellent. I installed insight boards in all of the servers on one small (abt 50 servers) network. power 'em down, upgrade firmware, boot from image located on my local machine. all from a across the street or across the country.
    They were good machines. if I had to build another network I'd look at others; but I'd start with compaq. Or'd they lay all them midnight techs off?

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