Pavillion PC 2026 Hard Drive Mounting Problem

Should be simple. Seems not.

That said - I inherited this HP Pavillion P6 2026 desktop - the large
SATA hard drive had been removed. I want to mount a spare 3.5" drive
I have, but it looks like some sort of a mounting bracket is missing,
I so far see no way to mount the drive.

I have searched Ebay & Google, but see no brackets to serve my need.

Anyone help?

Thanks

Alan

I think I found what I need.

Alan

On Tue, 27 Sep 2016 07:12:12 -0400, wrote:

Should be simple. Seems not.

That said - I inherited this HP Pavillion P6 2026 desktop - the large
SATA hard drive had been removed. I want to mount a spare 3.5" drive
I have, but it looks like some sort of a mounting bracket is missing,
I so far see no way to mount the drive.

I have searched Ebay & Google, but see no brackets to serve my need.

Anyone help?

Thanks

Alan

Turing wrote:

Turing wrote:

That said - I inherited this HP Pavillion P6 2026 desktop - the large
SATA hard drive had been removed. I want to mount a spare 3.5"
drive I have, but it looks like some sort of a mounting bracket is
missing, I so far see no way to mount the drive.

I have searched Ebay & Google, but see no brackets to serve my need.

I think I found what I need.

Oh, a secret fix. Cable ties maybe? No room in the 3.5" drive bays so
you needed a 3.5" drive to 5.25" bay adapter plate or brackets, like
https://goo.gl/images/Tu0DTs? Or the drive cage required custom snap-in
slider brackets that come with the case and you found them in a parts
drawer?

On Tue, 27 Sep 2016 12:13:47 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Turing wrote:

Turing wrote:

That said - I inherited this HP Pavillion P6 2026 desktop - the large
SATA hard drive had been removed. I want to mount a spare 3.5"
drive I have, but it looks like some sort of a mounting bracket is
missing, I so far see no way to mount the drive.

I have searched Ebay & Google, but see no brackets to serve my need.

I think I found what I need.

Oh, a secret fix. Cable ties maybe? No room in the 3.5" drive bays so
you needed a 3.5" drive to 5.25" bay adapter plate or brackets, like
https://goo.gl/images/Tu0DTs? Or the drive cage required custom snap-in
slider brackets that come with the case and you found them in a parts
drawer?


The first.
:(

Alan

wrote:
On Tue, 27 Sep 2016 12:13:47 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Turing wrote:

Turing wrote:

That said - I inherited this HP Pavillion P6 2026 desktop - the large
SATA hard drive had been removed. I want to mount a spare 3.5"
drive I have, but it looks like some sort of a mounting bracket is
missing, I so far see no way to mount the drive.

I have searched Ebay & Google, but see no brackets to serve my need.
I think I found what I need.
Oh, a secret fix. Cable ties maybe? No room in the 3.5" drive bays so
you needed a 3.5" drive to 5.25" bay adapter plate or brackets, like
https://goo.gl/images/Tu0DTs? Or the drive cage required custom snap-in
slider brackets that come with the case and you found them in a parts
drawer?


The first.
:(

Alan

The following file is a PDF. You'll need to change the filename
once the download finishes, and put ".pdf" on the end of the file.
This is the maintenance manual for P6 2026.

http://h10032.www1.hp.com/ctg/Manual/c03870877

If you go to Page 9, the optical drive slides in from
the front, and has no sliders on it. It uses two screws
on the side facing the user. There *must* be a rail on the
opposite side, to support the optical drive while it slides in.
But I cannot see it.

You can find a 3.5" to 5.25" tray, and use it to make
the dimensions of your 3.5" drive suitable for the job.

This one is plastic and will slide in from the front
of your PC. It has a bezel in the front, that prevents
other means of loading it.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16817994080

This is a more traditional solution, but this isn't going to work
quite as well as the plastic tray. The old U-rail kits used
to come in Maxtor retail hard drive boxes, and that's where
I got all of mine. The trouble with this form factor,
is it has the right side-to-side dimensions, but it won't
give you a good long support on the rail side of the mounting
scheme. So I'd have to recommend a tray with holes in the standard
places as a substitute.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16811993004

In terms of a top view of your PC, with the front of the PC on the left...

+------------------+---------+
| | --- rail or lip, for a 5.25" box to slide
+------------------+


+------------------+----------+ [ Top View ]
^ ^
screws hold the
tray on the side facing
the user during installation.
The screws might not even be included!
The tray might only have the screws
that affix the drive to the tray.

I don't see a lip on this side for
any drive or tray to slide.

And if the scheme has no lip of any kind inside
the chassis, you should *not* hold up a drive using
only the two outside screws. Since virtually all the
trays you can buy will be plastic, the screws will
strip the plastic, and your expensive drive will
fall down into the PC.

As for the hole pattern on trays, there are two options.

Traditional:

http://www.storagereview.com/images/...HDD-Bottom.jpg

Six platter drive, missing middle hole.
Causes a problem with U-rail kit...
Check tray has three holes to support both...

http://www.storagereview.com/images/...6TB-Bottom.jpg

Paul

Turing wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:

Turing wrote:

Turing wrote:

That said - I inherited this HP Pavillion P6 2026 desktop - the
large SATA hard drive had been removed. I want to mount a spare
3.5" drive I have, but it looks like some sort of a mounting
bracket is missing, I so far see no way to mount the drive.

I think I found what I need.

Oh, a secret fix. Cable ties maybe? No room in the 3.5" drive bays
so you needed a 3.5" drive to 5.25" bay adapter plate or brackets,
like https://goo.gl/images/Tu0DTs? Or the drive cage required
custom snap-in slider brackets that come with the case and you found
them in a parts drawer?

The first.

I've used nylon cable ties before but wide ones so there are good sized
teeth to grab to prevent gradual bite loss. If it's a desktop, it
likely moves very little and then only when powered off. So even
double-stick velcro or foam tape or even good ol' duck tape would work.
You really only need the disk to not walk around when it vibrates on
spin up. Wait for it to spin down before you move the case around.

On Tue, 27 Sep 2016 19:25:12 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Turing wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:

Turing wrote:

Turing wrote:

That said - I inherited this HP Pavillion P6 2026 desktop - the
large SATA hard drive had been removed. I want to mount a spare
3.5" drive I have, but it looks like some sort of a mounting
bracket is missing, I so far see no way to mount the drive.

I think I found what I need.

Oh, a secret fix. Cable ties maybe? No room in the 3.5" drive bays
so you needed a 3.5" drive to 5.25" bay adapter plate or brackets,
like https://goo.gl/images/Tu0DTs? Or the drive cage required
custom snap-in slider brackets that come with the case and you found
them in a parts drawer?

The first.

I've used nylon cable ties before but wide ones so there are good sized
teeth to grab to prevent gradual bite loss. If it's a desktop, it
likely moves very little and then only when powered off. So even
double-stick velcro or foam tape or even good ol' duck tape would work.
You really only need the disk to not walk around when it vibrates on
spin up. Wait for it to spin down before you move the case around.

Thanks for all the response guys. I have the Pavillion running good
now. Seems like a nice machine - handles W7 nicely. And seems fast.
Too bad someone removed the large 3.5 HD that came with it. I only
had a 150GB spare.

:)

Alan

wrote:
On Tue, 27 Sep 2016 19:25:12 -0500, VanguardLH wrote:

Turing wrote:

VanguardLH wrote:

Turing wrote:

Turing wrote:

That said - I inherited this HP Pavillion P6 2026 desktop - the
large SATA hard drive had been removed. I want to mount a spare
3.5" drive I have, but it looks like some sort of a mounting
bracket is missing, I so far see no way to mount the drive.
I think I found what I need.
Oh, a secret fix. Cable ties maybe? No room in the 3.5" drive bays
so you needed a 3.5" drive to 5.25" bay adapter plate or brackets,
like https://goo.gl/images/Tu0DTs? Or the drive cage required
custom snap-in slider brackets that come with the case and you found
them in a parts drawer?
The first.
I've used nylon cable ties before but wide ones so there are good sized
teeth to grab to prevent gradual bite loss. If it's a desktop, it
likely moves very little and then only when powered off. So even
double-stick velcro or foam tape or even good ol' duck tape would work.
You really only need the disk to not walk around when it vibrates on
spin up. Wait for it to spin down before you move the case around.

Thanks for all the response guys. I have the Pavillion running good
now. Seems like a nice machine - handles W7 nicely. And seems fast.
Too bad someone removed the large 3.5 HD that came with it. I only
had a 150GB spare.

:)

Alan

I think I have one Windows 7 installation here, that
C: is a 40GB partition. You don't need a lot of room
to get it to work. Even a bargain SSD (one at around
128GB) would be sufficient.

If you have a huge movie collection though, you'll have
to store that somewhere else.

After my usual set of tuning operations done today
on a Win7 test install, C: was 11GB worth of files.
I turn off hibernation (so there is no hiberfil.sys).
I set the pagefile to 1GB. The installer dialog
"recommended" something like 80GB for C: to be
fully functional. But I was able to trim it down
quite a bit. Setting it to 40GB would leave
lots of room.

One of the reasons I replace drives here, is speed.
While I undoubtedly have a 160GB like you've got,
sitting around, the moment I installed it and it
delivered a blistering 65MB/sec transfer rate,
I'd be gunning to replace it with a new 200MB/sec
replacement. The seek time of new drives is no
faster than the old 7200 RPM drives. But the
sustained transfer rate is higher. 200MB/sec
is getting more common. And soon, the smallest
(new) hard drive for sale, will be 1TB. A single
platter holds 1TB now, so when they sell a 500GB
disk drive, it's being half used.

Paul

Turing wrote:

Thanks for all the response guys. I have the Pavillion running good
now. Seems like a nice machine - handles W7 nicely. And seems fast.
Too bad someone removed the large 3.5 HD that came with it. I only
had a 150GB spare.

But you got this box for free (inherited). The prior owner removed the
big disk just before they died? Sounds more likely a hand-me-down
situation: someone else inherited the box and then kept the big disk
before sloughing the box onto someone else.

You got the box for free but you can't spend $50 to get a 1TB HDD
(http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...E16822236339)? You
might find something at Craigslist but I've found sellers there are way
too attached or overrate the value of their used goods but sometimes you
find someone that upgraded and simply wants to dispose of old hardware.
Saw a 1TB WDC HDD for $20 at Craigslist in my area; however, you won't
know the condition of the item. Computers really aren't for the dirt
poor folks.

150GB is more than enough to run any version of Windows. However, how
fast you consume the rest of the disk depends on how gluttonous you are
for software and how messy you are in keeping data files on the disk
instead of on removable media.