need a replacement computer... now a question about hdd drivers and Win7

[Pete M]

So my baby died on me last week while on vacation.  won't turn on at all.    I've swapped around batteries and power bricks (my dad has an identical netbook so that part was easy) and I've done a few more of the easier repair steps to try and coax life back into her to no avail.  But as I was doing all that I started to realize that she wasn't up to my current needs anyway and it was probably time to step up to a fullsize laptop with a processor that can push past her measly 1.5 ghz.  

so I've been doing research and I think I've narrowed it down to the HP EliteBook (8470,8570,8770) preferably with the i7 chip but a later i5 is also acceptable.  Acer makes a 4820tg that also sounds good (runs an i5).  they are mild factory "gaming computers" from a few years back that should handle anything I throw at it (especially since I don't game on a laptop).  my budget is around 200, maybe 250.  this is literally stealing money that I was saving for the Liberty so I need to keep the costs down.  I don't need a touch screen.  I don't need to run apps.  Windows 7 is a must.  Just need a computer that will surf the interwebs without choking on firefox.

 

I'm open to other ideas though.   

[DirtyComanche]

I'm on my third or fourth Acer in a row.  This is an Aspire Nitro, basically it's sold as a gaming rig, but I bought it just to be able to render video.

 

It will be the last Acer I own.  Build quality is terrible compared with the earlier ones.  When I bought this one, the first one I was shipped was NFG, bad battery or charge controller and would only charge to random amounts, Acer wanted to take it for a couple weeks to fix it, so I just exchanged it with Amazon instead (they overnighted another one and let me return the first one at my leisure).  Since then I've had keys hanging up and the backlight on the screen has done odd things.  All in all it isn't as sturdy of a case as the earlier Aspires were either, you can feel it flex and creak all the time.  I do not anticipate it will last anywhere near as long as the other ones did.

 

My very first Acer was purchased in a Walmart in the middle of the night for $220.  I broke my other laptop and needed one for that morning to print plane tickets.  I took it all over the US, Canada, Afghanistan, etc for 4 or 5 years.  The battery eventually was totally toast on it, but it still worked fine otherwise, but it simply isn't economical to buy a battery for a $220 laptop.

[davidh190]

Sounds like a Chromebook might be a very good choice.


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[Dzimm]

DO NOT buy into the i3 < i5 < i7 crap.  The model of the processor determines what its capable of, the i number doesn't mean much.  There are a ton of i5s that are better than the i7s.   Do your research on the processor model number so you know what it actually is. 

 

I got out of the IT world a couple years ago but HP was at the top at that time and still seems to be.  The big question is what do you want it for?  What do you use it for?   At $200 - $250 you are basically buying a paperweight, computers these days are garbage unless you spend around the $500 mark.  Unfortunately cheap technology is only getting cheaper in quality. 

 

I would say for a generic, run of the mill laptop that you want at least 8gb of DDR4 RAM, 1TB HDD if you want storage or 250GB SSD if you want speed and not storage, and a U series Intel (7200ish) or Mobile 5 series AMD Processor. 

[shrapneltyphoon]

Last time I was in the IT world the A+ exam was a lifetime certification and I'm still running the same windows XP.  I think I need a new computer too lol

[Pete M]

10 hours ago, Dzimm said:

DO NOT buy into the i3 < i5 < i7 crap.  The model of the processor determines what its capable of, the i number doesn't mean much.  There are a ton of i5s that are better than the i7s.   Do your research on the processor model number so you know what it actually is. 

 

I got out of the IT world a couple years ago but HP was at the top at that time and still seems to be.  The big question is what do you want it for?  What do you use it for?   At $200 - $250 you are basically buying a paperweight, computers these days are garbage unless you spend around the $500 mark.  Unfortunately cheap technology is only getting cheaper in quality. 

 

I would say for a generic, run of the mill laptop that you want at least 8gb of DDR4 RAM, 1TB HDD if you want storage or 250GB SSD if you want speed and not storage, and a U series Intel (7200ish) or Mobile 5 series AMD Processor. 

 

that's what my research has shown.  the 'i' number matter a lot less than the actual ghz of the chip.    found me a couple handy-dandy webpages showing the specs on each and every i chip so I can reference and compare.

 

I'm not buying new, but rather a used 'puter that's around 200-250 that was once over 500.    I use it for internet browsing but with my particular brain issues I need a coupe browsers and sometimes 50 tabs open for days at a time.  Just looking for something that can handle that comfortably.  honestly I'm probably putting waaaay too much energy into this, but the engineer in my wants to make sure I'm getting the best for my money. 

 

I think I'm going to get a run of the mill 8470p, either i-5/7 with at least 2.6ghz, and an SSD (plus a caddy to have a second hard drive for photo/movie storage to keep the ssd from filling up).  I already have a couple 4 gig ram cards from the old laptop.  that should handle all my needs and then some.   

[Dzimm]

53 minutes ago, Pete M said:

 

that's what my research has shown.  the 'i' number matter a lot less than the actual ghz of the chip.    found me a couple handy-dandy webpages showing the specs on each and every i chip so I can reference and compare.

 

I'm not buying new, but rather a used 'puter that's around 200-250 that was once over 500.    I use it for internet browsing but with my particular brain issues I need a coupe browsers and sometimes 50 tabs open for days at a time.  Just looking for something that can handle that comfortably.  honestly I'm probably putting waaaay too much energy into this, but the engineer in my wants to make sure I'm getting the best for my money. 

 

I think I'm going to get a run of the mill 8470p, either i-5/7 with at least 2.6ghz, and an SSD (plus a caddy to have a second hard drive for photo/movie storage to keep the ssd from filling up).  I already have a couple 4 gig ram cards from the old laptop.  that should handle all my needs and then some.   

Sounds like you are doing the proper research and are on the right track.  Used is a good way to get a decent computer for cheap. 

 

I cringe when I see people looking for the cheapest brand new computers and going by the i numbers.   

[Pete M]

my new(to-me) baby has arrived!    it is lightning fast! (at double the ghz it better be )   plus I bought a caddy to put a harddrive in place of the DVD drive.  my desire is to have the SSD that came with the computer as my primary and then my old HDD as a second storage area, but I've encountered a glitch.  seems my old HDD takes over the computer?   This is a plus because it has allowed me to pick up where I left off with my desktop and browsers, but a negative since it doesn't recognize any internet signals of any kind, not even an ethernet cable (I think dialup was the only choice).   The wifi and internet works fine if I fire it up sans the HDD.  the other issue is that I don't want the HDD as the primary, only storage.  I get the feeling that it still thinks it's in an Acer netbook.  but why would it just take over being Drive C?

[Dzimm]

37 minutes ago, Pete M said:

my new(to-me) baby has arrived!    it is lightning fast! (at double the ghz it better be )   plus I bought a caddy to put a harddrive in place of the DVD drive.  my desire is to have the SSD that came with the computer as my primary and then my old HDD as a second storage area, but I've encountered a glitch.  seems my old HDD takes over the computer?   This is a plus because it has allowed me to pick up where I left off with my desktop and browsers, but a negative since it doesn't recognize any internet signals of any kind, not even an ethernet cable (I think dialup was the only choice).   The wifi and internet works fine if I fire it up sans the HDD.  the other issue is that I don't want the HDD as the primary, only storage.  I get the feeling that it still thinks it's in an Acer netbook.  but why would it just take over being Drive C?

Wow I'm surprised it boots into windows being that the motherboard is different.  Usually they are locked to the board.  Older OS use a master/slave system so that hdd may be considered the master.

 

When you boot the computer, hit whatever key it says to get to the boot menu, usually f10 or delete.  Then boot your ssd.  This will allow the hdd to show up like a flash drive in file explorer. Pull the files you want to keep onto the new ssd temporarily, then format the hdd.  After formatting it, it will act like a secondary hdd.  

 

Unless the laptop or the old hdd has some weird boot priorities this should work. 

[Pete M]

so my big plan is to "retire" my old computer's hdd as a storage device and put it into the fire safe (it's full of family photos and such).  this is made easier because my new computer came with an extra 500gb hdd.  but I'm having a problem getting the new computer to recognize the 500g as a storage device.  I can see the 500g in device manager, but when I scan for driver updates I get both "best driver is already installed" and when I scan for hardware changes I get a "could not find drivers" alert. 

 

am I just screwed?    the seller claims it worked fine with windows 10.  I only have windows 7 here at the house.

[HOrnbrod]

Does it show the new hdd under device manager's disk drives section? If so, right click on it and see if there is an option to "update driver software". This will load Windows 7 generic drivers for that hdd.

 

If not, sometimes you can directly to the hdd's manufacturer (like Seagate), and download the correct drivers for the hdd part number.

[Pete M]

it does appear there, but I get a "windows has determined that your drivers are up to date" message if I try to update.   

[HOrnbrod]

Download the drivers from the mfg. and try to load them.

[Dzimm]

3 minutes ago, HOrnbrod said:

Download the drivers from the mfg. and try to load them. Windows 7 is seeing the existing Win 10 drivers and of course they won't play on Win 7.

Do this, windows is dumb when it comes to drivers.  

 

If you can easily get the hdd out to see the manufacturer and model numbers do that.  You can find this in software as well, right click on the drive, click properties, click hardware id's, and it will display the ID numbers for the manufacturer.  Plug the number into a database website like PCI Lookup and it will spit out the manufacturer info. 

[Pete M]

https://www.cnet.com/products/toshiba-mq01acf050-hard-drive-500-gb-sata-6gb-s/specs/

 

Toshiba's website doesn't recognize my model number  https://support.toshiba.com/drivers

[HOrnbrod]

Not a Toshiba site, but here are the drivers for it:

 

http://www.pcpitstop.com/libraries/driver/detail.asp?driver=TOSHIBA~MQ01ACF050.html

[Pete M]

I saw that too.  but under download it says "none" on my screen.   

 

 

[HOrnbrod]

Yes, went further and saw the same thing. Sure that's a legit model number? 

[Pete M]

yup.  cnet tells me all about it.  https://www.cnet.com/products/toshiba-mq01acf050-hard-drive-500-gb-sata-6gb-s/specs/

[Dzimm]

6 hours ago, Pete M said:

https://www.cnet.com/products/toshiba-mq01acf050-hard-drive-500-gb-sata-6gb-s/specs/

 

Toshiba's website doesn't recognize my model number  https://support.toshiba.com/drivers

Are you putting the hard drive model number into Toshiba's site or the laptop model number? 

[Pete M]

my laptop is an HP 8470. 

 

the hdd didn't come inside the laptop originally and is:

 

 

[Dzimm]

4 hours ago, Pete M said:

my laptop is an HP 8470. 

 

the hdd didn't come inside the laptop originally and is:

 

 

Ok this is making more sense now.  Have you tried contacting Toshiba customer support? 

 

 

[Eagle]

On 10/17/2018 at 4:16 PM, Dzimm said:

Wow I'm surprised it boots into windows being that the motherboard is different.  Usually they are locked to the board.  Older OS use a master/slave system so that hdd may be considered the master.

 

When you boot the computer, hit whatever key it says to get to the boot menu, usually f10 or delete.  Then boot your ssd.  This will allow the hdd to show up like a flash drive in file explorer. Pull the files you want to keep onto the new ssd temporarily, then format the hdd.  After formatting it, it will act like a secondary hdd.  

 

Unless the laptop or the old hdd has some weird boot priorities this should work. 

 

Another possibility is that the computer thinks the old HDD is a DVD with a disk in the drawer, and it's set to boot from the CD/DVD if a disk is present. Checking the boot configuration in Setup should tell you that.

[Pete M]

it does the same thing if I use my hdd adapter cord and plug it into a usb drive.  

 

I think the next step is going to be contacting Toshiba. 

[Dzimm]

20 minutes ago, Pete M said:

it does the same thing if I use my hdd adapter cord and plug it into a usb drive.  

 

I think the next step is going to be contacting Toshiba. 

Try going to HPs website, put in the laptop model number, and search for a SATA controller driver for the laptop.  This may allow Windows to recognize the drive properly.   

 

HDDs themselves don't have a dedicated driver to operate, its actually a driver for the SATA controller that does it even tho almost all manufacturers list it as a separate HDD driver.  I'm wondering if updating your HP SATA controller may cause it to be recognized properly.