Thread: computer help

so my hard drive crashed on my laptop, i took it to a shop and they said it would be 200 and some change to fix it... does this sound right for a 320 gig hard drive with parts and labor?

Well, the drive runs about $70-100, and the rest would be the labor. If you want to save it, I’d pay the labor as quoted.

I have built/assembled many a PC, it takes hours to re-install the OS and other software. Not to mention you kind of have to know what your doing.
　

The size of the hard drive may not totally reflect in the cost of repairing it - sometimes they can tell how badly you want your data recovered and they'll give you a quote accordingly. So, if you don't really NEED anything from your damaged hard drive, you're better off buying a new one since its cheaper and hard drives are relatively easy to replace.

What exactly is wrong with it? Is it making a clicking noise? Will it not boot up at all? Is it the primary hard drive on the laptop? Is there only a single hard drive with 2 partitions? If so, is only one partition messed up or not accessible? Describe the symptoms of your problem here because sometimes there could be an easier or cheaper solution.

One solution is to remove the hard drive and connect it to another computer using an IDE to USB adapter. This is especially useful since it is possible to examine what actually went wrong in the drive. It could just be a bad sector preventing it from booting up, and you might be able to recover all your data. On the other hand, if your hard drive is making a clicking noise, you may not be able to do much apart from giving it to the shop.

Good luck.

Too bad you don't live closer, can get you a new hard drive for about 30 bucks.

Do it yourself!

No seriously, i paid over $400 for a screen and instillation. I actually watched the person replace the screen. About 12-18 little screws, unplug old screen, plug in new screen put screws back. And i could have gotten a screen for under $200 with a warranty online.

I replaced my HD myself (dell inspiron 600M). Remove a screw, pull out HD, remove 4 screws holding it to the dock or w/e. Put new one in, replace screws, slide it back in, replace one screw. (make sure you have a windows CD to reinstall AND the drivers CD.

Moral of the story, allot of computer work is over priced because people are afraid to work on their own comp. Depending on what comp you have you might be able to find a DIY video on youtube.

First figure out which kind of drive you have, get one with the EXACT same specifications (except it can be a larger size) and maybe a higher speed. Go to newegg.com, find the HD. Install it yourself.

Originally Posted by DnaProdigy

Do it yourself!

No seriously, i paid over $400 for a screen and instillation. I actually watched the person replace the screen. About 12-18 little screws, unplug old screen, plug in new screen put screws back. And i could have gotten a screen for under $200 with a warranty online.

I replaced my HD myself (dell inspiron 600M). Remove a screw, pull out HD, remove 4 screws holding it to the dock or w/e. Put new one in, replace screws, slide it back in, replace one screw. (make sure you have a windows CD to reinstall AND the drivers CD.

Moral of the story, allot of computer work is over priced because people are afraid to work on their own comp. Depending on what comp you have you might be able to find a DIY video on youtube.

First figure out which kind of drive you have, get one with the EXACT same specifications (except it can be a larger size) and maybe a higher speed. Go to newegg.com, find the HD. Install it yourself.

This man speaks the truth.

Originally Posted by DnaProdigy

Do it yourself!

No seriously, i paid over $400 for a screen and instillation. I actually watched the person replace the screen. About 12-18 little screws, unplug old screen, plug in new screen put screws back. And i could have gotten a screen for under $200 with a warranty online.

I replaced my HD myself (dell inspiron 600M). Remove a screw, pull out HD, remove 4 screws holding it to the dock or w/e. Put new one in, replace screws, slide it back in, replace one screw. (make sure you have a windows CD to reinstall AND the drivers CD.

Moral of the story, allot of computer work is over priced because people are afraid to work on their own comp. Depending on what comp you have you might be able to find a DIY video on youtube.

First figure out which kind of drive you have, get one with the EXACT same specifications (except it can be a larger size) and maybe a higher speed. Go to newegg.com, find the HD. Install it yourself.

Yeah it's really simple. No need to pay install costs.

Do you have a backup of your old one?

i just got it back today... i paid 150 bucks and they saved all of my pictures, music , etc etc...