Question about Western Digital External Hard Drives

[jjmIII]

I have a Western Digital 80GB External Hard Drive.

Can I upgrade the drive in the case??
I want to put a 200gb in there. Anyone done this?
How do you get the case open??

Thanks for any help -Jim

 

[jjmIII]

Hmmm, no one has done this ????

 

[duckdown]

while I've never actually used one of these EXACT enclosures in real life, there should be no harm at all in upgrading the drive..

as far as disassembling it, there aren't screws in the back or something? don't be afraid to take it apart, unless you're still counting on the warranty

 

[gfngfgf]

I have that exact same drive, and honestly, I've never thought about upgrading the disk inside. I'm guessing to open it, you first have to remove the faceplate. On mine, it came as gray, and you can just slide it off towards the front. From there, you're on your own :-/ Frankly, I don't think that you'll find it to be upgradable.

 

[jjmIII]

On the back of the external case is a hole with an icon of a padlock above it.

Has anyone upgraded/opened one of these cases???

 

[V00D00]

You might want to be careful. If the old drive wasn't over 137gb, then there's a SMALL chance that it couldn't support the new 200gb drive. If the chipset can support 48-bit LBA then there shouldn't be a problem.

Worst case scenario, you put the new drive in, and it doesn't work, or it only recognizes the first 137gb. In which case, you put the old drive in, and go to newegg.com and buy yourself a $30 hard drive enclosure.

I never understood why anyone would buy an external drive that costs WAY WAY WAY more than a bare drive, and then $30 for some type of enclosure.

 

[forumposter32]

I believe you can buy an enclosure for it.

 

[jjmIII]

I never understood why anyone would buy an external drive that costs WAY WAY WAY more than a bare drive, and then $30 for some type of enclosure.

It was a HOT DEAL at Omax.
$50 and I had a $10 off card.
But the real question is.....

Has anyone opened one of these up???

 

[jjmIII]

Has anyone opened one of these up???