Motherboard died put HD in another computer??

[Sillycat41]

My brother and I both have Toshiba Satellite laptops although different models. His motherboard must have died because it no longer powers up... no lights, no action. Is there any chance I can put his HD into my laptop... would that work? Please advise. Thanks!

 

[mdd1963]

Depends on how different the models are, some manufacturers' models look for very specific hardware matches before proceeding with bootup. (Certainly can't hurt to try, however)

If you just need some data off of it, it's hard drive could be connected as a 2nd/3rd drive inside any other desktop with an available SATA port....

 

[terry4536]

I would think that you could. Certainly the SATA data and power connections are going to be standard. But there is the possibility that it will not fit. And as above it can't hurt to try it.

Here is a selection of laptop hard drives.

https://www.newegg.com/Laptop-Internal-Hard-Drives/SubCategory/ID-380?Tid=7637&Order=BESTSELLING

 

[Sillycat41]

Depends on how different the models are, some manufacturers' models look for very specific hardware matches before proceeding with bootup. (Certainly can't hurt to try, however)

If you just need some data off of it, it's hard drive could be connected as a 2nd/3rd drive inside any other desktop with an available SATA port....

 

[Sillycat41]

Wow! Thanks for all the quick answers! I should have explained that I would like to put his HD in my laptop as I have another one I can use. His is a Satellite L505D-S5983 and mine is a Satellite L505D-GS6000. I would think since they are both L505Ds that it might work. Are there any settings in the BIOS that would need changing? Thanks again.

 

[terry4536]

Wow! Thanks for all the quick answers! I should have explained that I would like to put his HD in my laptop as I have another one I can use. His is a Satellite L505D-S5983 and mine is a Satellite L505D-GS6000. I would think since they are both L505Ds that it might work. Are there any settings in the BIOS that would need changing? Thanks again.

No, It should be just plug and play. The only issue I can see is if it has the operating system on it. Then it would need to formatted, and a fresh operating system installed.

 

[Sillycat41]

Wow! Thanks for all the quick answers! I should have explained that I would like to put his HD in my laptop as I have another one I can use. His is a Satellite L505D-S5983 and mine is a Satellite L505D-GS6000. I would think since they are both L505Ds that it might work. Are there any settings in the BIOS that would need changing? Thanks again.

No, It should be just plug and play. The only issue I can see is if it has the operating system on it. Then it would need to formatted, and a fresh operating system installed.

 

[Sillycat41]

Hmm... both HDs have Windows 7 Home Premium on them. I want to save all his data... not format... so was hoping the other laptop would accept his HD and run normally.

 

[terry4536]

Hmm... both HDs have Windows 7 Home Premium on them. I want to save all his data... not format... so was hoping the other laptop would accept his HD and run normally.

The problem is that the other operating system would include all of the drivers from the other lap top.

A better solution would be to copy the data in a another PC (where it wouldn't be a system drive).

 

[Sillycat41]

Hmm... both HDs have Windows 7 Home Premium on them. I want to save all his data... not format... so was hoping the other laptop would accept his HD and run normally.

The problem is that the other operating system would include all of the drivers from the other lap top.

A better solution would be to copy the data in a another PC (where it wouldn't be a system drive).

 

[Sillycat41]

That's what I was afraid of. So there isn't a way to get Windows 7 to run and then be able to put in the correct drivers and other tweaks?

 

[terry4536]

I'm not sure that you would even get it to boot up. If it did boot up, then maybe you could update all of the drivers. But I doubt that it would work.

If the data is all that you are after, just hook the SATA data and power to another system and copy the data (unless the data is encrypted).

 

[canadianvice]

Hmm... both HDs have Windows 7 Home Premium on them. I want to save all his data... not format... so was hoping the other laptop would accept his HD and run normally.

The problem is that the other operating system would include all of the drivers from the other lap top.

A better solution would be to copy the data in a another PC (where it wouldn't be a system drive).

I feel like you're forgetting a pretty simple fix here:

If you are willing to spend a minimal amount of currency ($12 cad), get a SATA-USB adapter. Then you can treat his old hard drive like a USB stick and pull off his data that way. (You may wish to use ROBOCOPY to do this, as it can be set to ignore file permissions. Don't take ownership, it takes forever)

If you want free, take a local USB stick and install any flavour of linux on it. Remove the HDD from your system (temporary) and plug his in; then boot from the USB. Hook in some sort of storage like a portable HDD, and copy the files off.

You can't boot tit for tat on the drives because there's all sorts of drivers that will not be compatible installed on the systems and no easy way to purge them. So the easiest solution to retaining his files is just treating the HDD like a USB stick.

 

[Sillycat41]

I'm not sure that you would even get it to boot up. If it did boot up, then maybe you could update all of the drivers. But I doubt that it would work.

If the data is all that you are after, just hook the SATA data and power to another system and copy the data (unless the data is encrypted).

 

[Sillycat41]

Okay, thanks for all the answers. Guess I'll put the HD in and if it doesn't boot up then scrap this idea. Oh well.