Dell Inspiron 1545 - Hard Drive Replacement problem

[jenglish724]

Hello,

I was given an Inspiron 1545 with a faulty hard drive. I ordered a new hard drive to replace the faulty one.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822236240

This one to be exact. I ordered the exact same one. (WD Scorpio Blue.) The newer model of this HDD is slimmer than the one that was shipped with the Dell.

Replacing the hard drive, I noticed that the computer booted and noted that there was no hard drive connected to the laptop. I took it out looked around and noticed that the SATA/Power ports were not making a good connection.

The problem lies with the plastic/thin metal tray that the hard drive uses to house the drive. If i do not use the housing and just push the hard drive into the slot I am getting a good connection and the computer will boot fine.

You can see how this would be a problem leaving it this way seeing there would be an open area on the side of the laptop.

Here is a picture of the hard drive slot partially out.

http://www.blog.parts-people.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/IMG_0103.jpg

Thanks in advance for the responses.

 

[RealBeast]

I've had to do it a few times, what you can do is make a shim out of plastic or cardboard that has no central portion -- like a picture frame and put holes in it where the HDD screws go through into the tray. This will lift the drive to the correct height in the drive carrier. Just make the shim the thickness equal to the difference in thickness between the new and old drive, which should be 2.5mm.

 

[jenglish724]

I've had to do it a few times, what you can do is make a shim out of plastic or cardboard that has no central portion -- like a picture frame and put holes in it where the HDD screws go through into the tray. This will lift the drive to the correct height in the drive carrier. Just make the shim the thickness equal to the difference in thickness between the new and old drive, which should be 2.5mm.

This helped tons. I still couldn't get the computer to get good connectivity though on the SATA/Power.

I ended up taking all the screws off the bottom of the housing of the laptop and cracking open the case just enough to see the SATA/Power ports. I plugged it in and voila, it worked.

Thanks.

 

[PaulHfromEMU]

This seems too simple but I replaced the hard drive in my Insprion 1545 and got the message "try reseating hard drive". After taking the hard drive out and putting it back in several times with no success I turned the computer over (I had been pushing the hard drive in with the computer "lid down"). When I slid the hard drive in the the computer right side up it seated and worked.