building a hard drive without the PC

[marcplante]

I support my mother's computer which is a couple hundred miles from here. I can perform most software and light technical support by using logmein and working over the net.

I wanted to give her a 60 or 120G SSD for her birthday to speed up her computer's performance and make it a more compelling experience, but I realize that if I build a HD in my computer then ship it to her, it will have issues with hardware recognition, etc.

Is there a way to build a drive outside of a computer for installation into that computer?

The box in question is a Dell E521. It is currently running a 100G SATA drive, but she really doesn't store any files locally as it is primarily a web surfing station for her.

Is there anything I can grab remotely and ship to myself to support configuring the hard drive? She's 83 and not really capable of doing even modestly technical work in support of herself.

Thoughts? Ideas?

Thanks

 

[Zap]

She's 83 and not really capable of doing even modestly technical work in support of herself.

Who would be installing the drive? If they are capable of that, then they are capable of cloning the drive.

 

[Ken g6]

Or you could go the cheap route: get a small, cheap SSD ($45AR), which comes with caching software. Edit: This being an addition to the existing drive, not a replacement.

 

[JackMDS]

If you send a drive someone has to put it in.

The same person can first take out the old drive and sent it to you.

You can use software like Acronis True Image to do CD Boot cloning.

Then send the new drive to Mom, it should work after the installtion like the old drive.

 

[8steve8]

send her the drive and a bootable usb installer for windows 8 or 7

and walk her through the installation process on the phone, then she'll have a fresh new pc experience.