How to Disable or Replace SSD Drive on HP 700-330qe

Question

Help for My 5-Month-Old HP! This is Killing Me! I bought an HP 700-330qe in 2014 from Amazon, and just started getting SMART hard drive errors from Windows whenever my computer restarts, telling me that hard disk failure is imminent. It also tells me to shut down the computer immediately, back it up, contact the manufacturer, etc. Never saw this in any PC I have owned before. I naturally freaked out and did some research on the internet, discovering it is relatively easy to clone and replace a hard drive. I ordered a new Western Digital 3 TB hard drive from Amazon, a Cable Matters brand hard drive docking station from Amazon, and downloaded Macrium Reflect free disk management software. Items from Amazon arrived in a couple of days and I got to work making a clone of my one and only hard drive. Clone was made with little problem. Shut down the computer, opened it up and replaced the old hard drive with the new one. Booted the computer back up, and got the same message about imminent hard drive failure!! So I paid more attention to it this time, and looked up the model number given in the warning message, which was: ScanDisk SDSA6DM-016G-1006. I Googled that and discovered it was the solid state drive (SSD) used as a cache to speed up certain operations. Arrgh. I stuck my old hard drive into the hard drive docking station and was prepared to clone both the SSD partition and all of the partitions from the main hard drive onto the one hard drive, and the remove or at least unplug the SSD to get rid of this issue. The software told me the SSD is formatted as MPR (or something like that) while the main hard drive is formatted as GPT, which are different types of hard drive formatting, so you can't copy those different types of partitions onto one hard drive. Okay, so here are my options as I see them: 1) I need to either disable the SSD, but I don't know how and I don't know if the computer will still even boot up. Is Windows partially installed on the SSD? I don't know.2) Clone and replace the SSD in much the same way as I did with the main hard drive. I can get the following SSD from Amazon for $49: Kingston Digital 60GB SSDNow V300 SATA 3 2.5 (7mm height) with Adapter Solid State Drive SV300S37A/60G. For option #2 above, the only problem is that I have no idea where the OEM ScanDisk SSD is currently installed in my computer!!?!?!? Is it in the hard drive cage?? I didn't see anything else installed in there. I thought it was in the cage directly above the hard drive cage, but I think what I was looking at was the front memory card reader/USB ports. I only have on CD drive installed and I can see where that is. Help!!! PS: I also downloaded EaseUS Partition Master 10.2 and used it to scan the SSD. While it was scanning it found 9 bad blocks (out of tens of thousands of blocks) but when it finished the scan it said there were no bad blocks. To have this happen on an SSD, which is supposed to be more reliable than regulard hard drives, make this situation so much more aggravating. At least I upgraded my hard drive from 2TB to 3TB, and now know that I can do it. Sigh.

Answer 1

Update. So I spent about 1 hour chatting with HP tech support. First we had to clarify the fact that the standard HP warranty runs longer than 4 months. The tech support person originally informed me that the warranty is only 1 year from date of purchase. I then told him I purchased the computer on 8-15-14. He looked up my records and stated my warranty period was 8-21-14 through 12-31-14. After I told him my math tells me that time period was only 4 months, he got it figured out and confirmed my PC was still under warranty.
Anyway, after remotely logging into my PC and running a test, he got a failure code he needed, and then had me open up my PC case and type in the HP part number on the label of the MSATA drive. He first typed that I would get a box with instructions on where to mail my PC so it could be repaired, which would take 2-3 weeks. As this is the main family home PC and has tons of personal information, I stated this was unnaceptable. Ok, so plan B was the replacement was going to be sent to my house so I could replace it myself, expected arrival within 7-12 days. Surprise, just 2 days later I come from work to find a small box waiting for me. I tear it open and get ready to install the replacement, but what do I find? Instead of sending an MSATA Sandisk 16GB SSD, they send me a Seagate 750GB laptop SSHD. The picture of what they sent is below. Got back online chatting with HP support tonight, and their records showed they sent me an MSATA Sandisk 16GB SSD. This has now been escalated to a supervisor, and I am supposed to be receiving a phone call within 24-48 hours. This is turning into a really bad customer service experience for me, and is making me think twice about buying another HP computer. We have 3 HP desktops in this house and are on the 3rd HP laptop now. I really hope they send me the correct part before the whole thing dies on me.