Got an Aspire L100 compact desktop. It stopped working months ago and shop diagnosed that motherboard had gone; quoted some ridiculous price to replace (out of warranty). Just collected it from them – I'm thinking of removing the hard drive and using it as an external drive with out laptop.

Is this easy and what bits would I need?

Screwdriver at most, sometimes they have tool-less caddies. Easy-peasy 🙂

Easy – usually just a cross bladed screwdriver is needed

Easy to remove – open computer case, probably undo a couple of clips (should be obvious) and unplug the cable(s). To attach it to a laptop you will need a USB external hard drive case – you need to make sure it is the same type as the hard drive you remove e.g. SATA. It will say on the hard drive. Should only cost you a tenner for the case from ebay etc.

Right I'll have a go..

How do I know if its 2.5" or 3.5"? – is that the diameter of the disk within the drive?

Don't quote me on this, but I thought that 3.5" drives were desktop size & 2.5" were laptop.

stumpy is correct, in *almost* all cases (sic) desktops will have 3.5" in.

"How do I know if its 2.5" or 3.5"? "

traditionally with a ruler 🙂

The size relates to the width of the drive casing.

Clink – If its IDE, I have an external caddy that you can have.

Removal of the actual drive will be 4 (or less) screws and unplugging the data and power cables.

Slimline desktops can be a right pig to work on sometimes though – components stacked in difficult and tight spaces etc…

No reply in two hours. I reckon the razor sharp casing edges have struck and Clink is currently bleeding out all over the PC internals. 🙂

All done! Thanks for the offer Colin, but hadn't checked back (was SATA) on here – silly me! Case arrived yesterday and was very straightforward (as everyone said!). All working swimingly 😀