Harddrive Upgrade help!

Ive ordered a T61 and its currently being built and shipping. I ordered it with the stock 80gig HDD, planning to upgrade it to a 320gig 5.4k.

Whats the best way of upgrading to make sure that everything works correctly with all of the drivers and bios and stuff.

Will i need to make an image of the drive and copy that first, or can i just swap out the drives and reinstall windows.

Ive never done this on a laptop before and was talking to a friend who was saying that i may have problems doing this as there may be conflicts with the sata drivers or something.

Any direction would be appreciated on how to do this correctly so i dont end up with a bricked computer. Thanks!

 

I don't think you'll encounter any problems in terms of getting the drive recognized. Before swapping out the drive, I would just burn the recovery discs, install the drive, and then reinstall everything from the recovery discs. Unless of course you want to do a fresh install of Windows.

Here's a guide that will show you what you need to do inorder to make recovery discs, as well as doing a fresh install of Windows Vista: http://forum.notebookreview.com/showthread.php?t=144783

If you plan on swapping out the drive right when you receive the laptop then you won't need to make an image of things, because the recovery discs will just restore to factory state.

Instructions for replacing the hard drive can be found in the Hardware Maintenance Manuals:
-15.4" Screen: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/document.do?sitestyle=lenovo&lndocid=MIGR-67980
-14.1" Screen: http://www-307.ibm.com/pc/support/site.wss/MIGR-67760.html

 

Heres the harddrive i was looking to buy to replace the stock one with if it makes any difference

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136280R

 

HITACHI's harddrive is much +++++ better,
much cooler and quiter

but the price.....