Good fortune on Macbook hard drive

[01jamcon]

Today, I went shopping for a replacement hard drive on Tottenham Court Road for my Macbook. I was looking to get the most GB for the money, and found that either a 250gb or 320gb was best. Having bargained deals with a few different shops, I finally returned to the first shop who sold me a 250gb 5400rpm drive for £65. Not too bad a deal I thought. I got home to find to my amazement, that he had actually sold me a 320gb 7200rpm drive instead which had been marked incorrectly! Sooo glad I bought this drive just by luck.

Just as an extra question; I had a windows xp partition on my old hard drive, and I'd like to be able to transfer it over to my new drive, what's the best way to transfer the data over (hopefully without buying any extra stuff or having to reactivate windows, but reactivation isn't the end of the world if needed)

 

[California]

Today, I went shopping for a replacement hard drive on Tottenham Court Road for my Macbook. I was looking to get the most GB for the money, and found that either a 250gb or 320gb was best. Having bargained deals with a few different shops, I finally returned to the first shop who sold me a 250gb 5400rpm drive for £65. Not too bad a deal I thought. I got home to find to my amazement, that he had actually sold me a 320gb 7200rpm drive instead which had been marked incorrectly! Sooo glad I bought this drive just by luck.

Just as an extra question; I had a windows xp partition on my old hard drive, and I'd like to be able to transfer it over to my new drive, what's the best way to transfer the data over (hopefully without buying any extra stuff or having to reactivate windows, but reactivation isn't the end of the world if needed)

I am so sad for my Mac pals across the pond. How come you get so overcharged for things there? Here I got a 3200 gig Travelstar 7200rpm for 95 USD.

I don't get it. Why are things so expensive over there? Is it the EU or is it because everything is imported or VAT or what?

Anyway, enjoy your fast big hard drive.

 

[StuBeck]

Its because 17.5% VAT is added to the price. When I'm in NY a hard drive "costs" me $99, but actually costs me $108. Here the drive costs me £58.

And look at the current conversion rates, even without tax, that $95 is £62.

 

[01jamcon]

I am so sad for my Mac pals across the pond. How come you get so overcharged for things there? Here I got a 3200 gig Travelstar 7200rpm for 95 USD.

I don't get it. Why are things so expensive over there? Is it the EU or is it because everything is imported or VAT or what?

Anyway, enjoy your fast big hard drive.

Hahaha, trust me, that's a deal around these parts. You yanks have all the luck.

 

[Big-TDI-Guy]

Hahaha, trust me, that's a deal around these parts. You yanks have all the luck.

Hey, look at the bright side. If the economy completely tanks, you can buy my imac, car, house and some military hardware for pence on the dollar.

 

[velocityg4]

If you have an external SATA enclosure stick it in that. And drag and drop the data over.

If not but you have a desktop with SATA stick the old drive in that and network them together. Then transfer over the network. Unless that desktop is a Mac you will have to either get Macdrive 7 or transfer data from the Mac partition to the Windows partition.

You could back up to DVD and transfer the data that way though it can take a long time.

If you do not have a desktop with SATA nor an external SATA enclosure the cheapest solution would be to get a USB to SATA adapter. These things are great to have I can connect any SATA or IDE hard drive to my computer easily for grabbing data.

 

[California]

Its because 17.5% VAT is added to the price. When I'm in NY a hard drive "costs" me $99, but actually costs me $108. Here the drive costs me £58.

And look at the current conversion rates, even without tax, that $95 is £62.

That makes me feel better for the OP. It was a good deal, then, even if the seller thought it was a 250 gigger.

Let us know about the speed improvement...

 

[silverblack]

Good for you. Let's hope the next guy buying the 320GB drive doesn't get your 250GB.

 

[J4M4L]

320gb drives can be had for £50, thats cheap than the one in the US

http://www.play.com/PC/PCs/-/2144/1...ible/Product.html?searchtype=genre&P36=B26WLE

 

[California]

320gb drives can be had for £50, thats cheap than the one in the US

http://www.play.com/PC/PCs/-/2144/1...ible/Product.html?searchtype=genre&P36=B26WLE

Western Digital hard drives are problematic with their motion sensor tech that conflicts with Apple's sudden motion technology in their laptops.

Travelstars by Hitachi are much better product. I only get Seagate and Travelstars if I can help it for SATA drives. The UK OP got the fastest biggest hard drive out there for his UK cash.

 

[dubhe]

Western Digital hard drives are problematic with their motion sensor tech that conflicts with Apple's sudden motion technology in their laptops.

Travelstars by Hitachi are much better product. I only get Seagate and Travelstars if I can help it for SATA drives

I have always used Western Digital (albeit w/o motion technology) and have found them very reliable, quiet, better battery life than apple's standard choice.

 

[01jamcon]

Travelstars by Hitachi are much better product. I only get Seagate and Travelstars if I can help it for SATA drives. The UK OP got the fastest biggest hard drive out there for his UK cash.

Glad you say that cause I did end up with a Travelstar 7k320, which having looked it up has really good specs. You were also correct about the speed improvement, it was brilliant to have completely re-installed leopard fresh and transfered about 30gb of data in just over an hour. Only issue I've had so far is it is noticeably noisier than the old drive, and I am a bit picky seeing as I tend to work in silence. Although this won't be a problem till a bit later when I need to start working on essays instead of just watching films on the laptop. Overall, I'm satisfied with the drive.