Removing the old hard drive
Ok now before we dig in check to make sure the computer is unplugged from the wall outlet and make sure you do not have any static electricity in you from walking on carpet or anything else. You can touch the outside the metal case of the computer that will not hurt the computer but if you touch any of the circuit boards on the inside the computer with static electricity in you that will damage the components inside.
Now take off the cover there will be screws on the back just have to look to see which screw you have to undo to get the cover off. Once the cover is off look at how the hard drive is connected there will be a power cable and a wide ribbon cable attached to the back. Be careful if you have a CD-ROM or a CD burner it will have the same power and ribbon cable attached to it. If you already bought your hard drive take it out of the box so you know what your old one looks like. Next unplug the power connector to the hard drive and then unplug the ribbon cable. There should be four screws holding the drive in place. So computer manufactures have slide rails holding the drive in place you will have to look and see how it is fastened in. Remove the old drive and replace it with the new one. But before you do that on the back of your old drive there should be a small jumper pin see what location the jumper is in it will be set to master, slave or cable select and then set your new drive to the same setting. Install the new drive and plug the ribbon cable in first there should be a red or black strip on one edge of the ribbon cable that stripe needs to face the power connector. Then plug the power cable in and put the cover back on. Ok we are half way there the next part is a little more difficult but we will get you though it.
Formatting the hard drive
Once you have the cover on take the start up disk you made and put it in the drive. Before you turn your computer on you will have to enter the cmos setup so your computer will recognize the new drive. To do this there should be at the bottom of the screen when you turn the computer on it will say press del, f1 or something to that effect to enter setup. Once in the setup menu look for auto detect hard drive you will have to move around the menus with the arrow keys on your keyboard your mouse may not work in the cmos setup screens. Highlight the auto detect hard drive and press enter a screen will popup with your new hard drive listed it will ask you to press y for yes or n for no. your hard drive is listed go ahead and press y then it will popup three more times just press y for all three times then it will go back to the main screen. At the bottom it will have a navigation menu it should say to press f10 to save and exit.
So now you can turn your computer on and go though the steps above when you press f10 to save and exit it will ask your to press y if you want to save your new setting go ahead and press y then press enter then your computer will restart so make sure you have the startup disk in the drive. When your computer restarts it will go though a series of tests then it will ask you if you want to start your computer to a dos prompt or start with CD ROM support. Use your arrow keys to select with CD ROM support and press enter. The computer will go though another set of test then you will see a dos prompt (A:\) at the dos prompt type fdisk and press enter. A message screen will come up and at the bottom it will ask you do you want to enable large disk support y/n y should be in parentheses you can press enter at this screen. Now a menu screen will come up it will have four choices in the middle of the screen it will ask you which number you want to select number one is the default.
You can press enter then another screen will come up asking you if you want all the space in one partition y should be in parentheses press enter at this screen. Once that is done it will take you back to the menu screen with the four choices at the bottom of the screen it will say press esc (escape) to exit go ahead and press the esc key. This will take you back to the a prompt now just type format C:\ it will warn you that all data on the drive will be erased but since this is a new drive there is no data on the drive it will ask you if you want to continue, press y and the enter key. Now depending on the size of the drive and the speed of your computer this could take 15 min. Up to an hour. When it reaches 100% then it will ask you to label the drive you can enter a name or you can just press enter then you will see the dos prompt at this point leave the startup disk in the drive and turn your computer off. You are almost done all we have left is to install the operating system then copy your files from the old hard drive to the new drive so lets get started.
