We went in, told the salesperson that greeted us that we were looking for laptop hard drives, gave him our old hard drive for comparison. He went into laptop hard drive section and began comparing for one that match. While he was doing that, the manager glanced over from half a room away, and told us that they don't carry PATA drives, and only SATA drives. So we told her, thanks, and she offered to order one for us. The salesperson couldn't see a difference. We asked the manager about ram, and various other things. She responded quite well. Manager told us it would take a few days to order a new drive, we declined, we thanked her, and we left. Turns out she would be the only person that actually knows what they were talking about.
Now study this chart carefully. It's not that complicated of a chart (courtesy of wikipedia)
OK. If you don't understand the chart, it's basically a list of interfaces for hard drives from oldest to most current. Left column is the official name, right column is the other names for the same thing. Feel free to refer to the above chart for any confusion caused by below text.So I go up to the salesperson, saying, "Hi, I'm looking for a laptop hard drive."
*He go to the shelf, and grabs one based on the dead one I showed him*
me: Do you have any with the ATA-6 interface?
him: ATA-6? You mean ATA/66? That's old and slow, we don't carry anything that old.
me: No no, ATA-6
him: We don't carry ATA/66
me: ..... OK. Can you get me one with ATA-7 interface then?
him: What's that? We only carry ATA/133 and ATA/100
me: Why does the hard drive you just handed to me say ATA-7 then.
him: where does it say that?
me: here *points* (see below picture)
him: uhhh. Oh that ATA/133me: Yes, and it's also known as ATA-7 as the box says, now do you carry ATA-6 interface hard drives?
him: No we don't carry ATA/66
me: ........... fine then, can you get me an ATA/100 drive then?
him: Why would you want that?
me: Because my old drive was an ATA/100 and I want to replace it with an ATA/100 drive
him: Let me see your old hard drive
me: *hands him old hard drive*
him (after closely examing drive): It doesn't say anything on there.
me: google the part number, here *points* hdd2181 and you'll get hundreds of links telling you this is a ATA-6 drive
him: But it doesn't say anything on the actual drive, so you can't tell.
me: ........................ nevermind.
Turns out they didn't carry ATA-6. Most ATA-7 drives are backwards compatible with ATA-6. This one happened to be part of that majority. Drive worked perfectly.
So what do I think about Fry's? It's a fun place to look around, or shop for simple things, such as blank DVDs or power surges. My mom wonders why I never ask for help in Fry's. Well, I know where everything is, and I'm better off without their help most of the time. Oh, and I like their $10 wireless card that caused me so much trouble because I can't find my drivers disk. Card works super well, it's just a pain in the ass to find the correct drivers. (current frustration)
The dead hard drive makes a cute paperweight though.
