using a laptop HDD on a desktop...

[uberandy]

 ???
I need to do a backup of my thinkpads HDD and the only method I have is a 2.5" adaptor installed in my desktop (I dont have any network cables etc)

I have installed it all and the desktop BIOS recognises the HDD by model number but it gets the CHS info all wrong (I think) and it wont show up at all in windows.

Ive tried manually changing the CHS info in the BIOS - still nothing.

Anyone done this? Any ideas?

IBM TravelStar DBCA-204860 HDD
Desktop BIOS is award

[query]

Unfortunately, different BIOSes often use slightly different translation parameters for drives.  Was the drive by chance partitioned and formatted with a disc manager?

[Sliderule]

Anyone done this? Any ideas?

IBM TravelStar DBCA-204860 HDD
Desktop BIOS is award

I do this all the time on my PC "test bed" (an old Compaq Presario PII-150), mostly with IBM Travelstars and a Seagate here and there.  Download IBM's Disk Manager v9.55 which creates a boot floppy disk capable of complete testing of all IBM drives.

If all you are trying to do is backups, there are several ways of doing this on a notebook.  Do you want do do image backups of the boot drive, which is essentailly a sector by sector backup contained in a single file or multiple files? Or do you want to do a file by file backup of data, etc.  For image backups, use Symantec Ghost which can backup directly to an internal CD-R/RW or to an external drive connected to the parallel port.  The version I use works from DOS and boots from a DOS disk.  For data backups, I use a Travelstar 8E external harddrive connected to the PCMCIA port, this only works under Windows.  Also for data backups, I use a portable hard drive that connects to USB 2.0 or 1.1 or IEEE1394 (FireWire).  It's a hard drive case only, you supply any notebook drive.  The case with cables is currently $44.

[uberandy]

 ::)
I spent most of a day trying to get this to work. I do think that the drive is in a different format that my desktop's BIOS just doesn't get.

I ended up getting hold of a network crossed cable and a PCMCIA network card. Spent most of today trying to get that to work.

AAAAARRRRGGGHHH!

LOL I guess I'm just not suposed to backup all my files.

Thanks for your suggestions.