Replacing HDD in Dell D620, can't load windows, get blue screen

I'm a retired Telecom guy and part time PC fixer for family and friends. But maybe I'm in over my head on this one.

In the wife's Dell D620 laptop, SATA drive, trying to replace a 40gb Hitachi with a 250gb Seagate. The 40gb is good, we just ran out of space. I did a fresh backup to an external USB 160gb HDD. I put the new drive in then set the bios to boot from the CD using the "Reinstall Windows XP" CD that came with the PC. I get the standard driver loads then the blue screen error. I do NOT have a floppy drive available so can't create an auto recovery disk. I do have all the original software to reload and have a fresh backup on an external HDD (USB) - once the PC will recognize the new HDD and load windows.

Do I need to format the new HDD? How to get there?
Do I need to download and install some new drivers? Which ones?

Any assistance will be appreciated.
 
Version is "Dell A07, 12/18/2006". I've downloaded "D620_A10.exe" but am just a bit nervous about installing it as the laptop is currently working. Would updating the BIOS affect the current 40gb HDD?

I wondered if it was a driver for the Seagate Momentus drive? The new drive is ST9250410AS, 250gb, 7200 rpm, SATA.
 
Find out if your Dell can accept a 250 gig harddrive. I replaced a 40 gig Hitachi in a laptop once but the maximum that I could replace it with was 120 gigs due to BIOS limitations.
 
Here's an excerpt from Notebook Review - "The hard drive technology used is SATA and you can configure up to a 100GB storage size hard drive."

BIOS update is usually straight forward, but things do happen. So here's a relatively save option. Boot the laptop w/ something like G-Parted and partition your laptop into 3 parts. C drive will be for the OS and programs, maybe 50GB? Then divide what's left into 2 for data.

Once you're done w/ partitioning the drive, boot the laptop w/ the XP install disc.

G-Parted - http://gparted.sourceforge.net/download.php

p.s. Just found this - DiscWizard from Seagate - http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.j...toid=d9fd4a3cdde5c010VgnVCM100000dd04090aRCRD
 
Searched my "Service Tag" on Dell and they show this unit supporting a Western Digital 500gb SATA drive. Seagate lists the ST9250410AS for the D620.

I also found a newer FW update for the Seagate drive - but gotta get it working first!

I'll try the BIOS update tomorrow and let you guys know.

Thanks for the help. We'll get there, I'm sure.

Just finished a chat w/Dell and they advise the D620 will accept up to 500gb. We'll see. Hmm.
 
Dell Parts says 500gb, Seagate says 500gb, BUT Dell Tech Support says 120gb.

So, I'm sending the 250gb back and will go for a 120gb.

Thanks to all and I will be using Seagate's DiskWizard to clone the new drive. Thanks Rabbit01! :)
 
Back