Vaio Laptop PCG-FX405 upgrade

[BrianLawrence]

Hi there,
I have had a Vaio for a few years now and am (still) very happy with it. However, I would like to upgrade the hard drive (20gb currently) and RAM (256mb currently), if possible. Any idea about a) compatible parts and b) doability? I live in the UK. Any thoughts, greatly appreciated.

[rich912]

Morning Brian.

This is probably a glitch in the Sony recovery disks only being able to cope with the largest hard drive fitted to your model as standard, but don’t panic as a re-install is not necessary. You will however need Partition Magic or similar third party software to reclaim the unallocated space.

Have a look
here for guidance.

[BrianLawrence]

Hi Rich,

Thanks m8, will give it a go, probably tomorrow as I have been barred from laptop 'dancing' today following the whole day spent mucking about yesterday. Oh well.:smileywink:

[BrianLawrence]

Hello - well here we go again - me, laptop and problem. Looks like PartitionMagic and PartitionExpert are fine works of software art but neither appear to give the one-off user the opportunity to save changes unless to pay for the full versions. As Stella wants to go out soon (and she's not cheap) any recommendations as to a freeware substitute (not Stella, of course, but partition software)? I don't want t undo the good work done thus far by installing some cr*p application due to my inexperience in such matters. Any thoughts?

[BrianLawrence]

Has anyone used Diskpart (Microsoft utility) to reclaim lost disk space? I did a lot of research yesterday and only found this:

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=309000

Before heading off to PC World, does anyone have an idea if it would it work, ideally extending the size of an existing partition into the unallocated space or creating another partition equal to the unallocated space.

Grateful to hear your views.

[kee-lo_]

It won't do what you want it to do Brian, as it doesn't have partition resizing or merging.

[BrianLawrence]

Hi Kee-lo,

Well, I guess you must be right on both counts, Kee-lo but I created a new volume thereby claiming the unallocated space back! Of course it may cause my chips to fry or my RAM to escape but at the moment I have a C, D and now F drive. Looks OK to me and the new F drive (equiv. to the unallocated space I used to have) appears to work like the proverbial charm. Please don't tell me I have scr*w-up...........:smileycry:

[rich912]

What you have done is fine Brian and will not cause any problems. Pleased to hear that you have it sorted:smileyhappy:

[kee-lo_]

Ahhh I see, why the heck was I thinking of merging....?
Time for a holiday?!

[BrianLawrence]

Thanks Rich (and Kee-lo). Saved me huge amounts of time and aggro which I appreciate. Think I will be glad of a rest after all this s*dding about.

Different topic - defragging a 160 gb hard drive - 1.5 hours later seems 'stuck' on 23% complete leave it to 'cook' some more or start again/do something else (not related to tins/glasses of Stella)?

[rich912]

Different topic - defragging a 160 gb hard drive - 1.5 hours later seems 'stuck' on 23% complete leave it to 'cook' some more or start again/do something else (not related to tins/glasses of Stella)?

Depending on the degree of fragmentation a drive of this size can take a few hours to defragment. You may just have one very large file that needs to complete before the % complete moves on.

I would give it at least another hour then check the % complete, if this has still not moved then maybe cancel and start again.