ACER ASPIRE 3 (A315-51-388U) HARD DISK PROBLEM

Greetings All.

I bought an ACER Laptop from Saturn.de (online german shopping site) around 3 years ago and i have used it til now without any major problems.

I can be considered a tech geek who takes care of his IT equipment very seriously and carefully so i have used the laptop with care and there are no damages or problems with the laptop. I am great at upkeeping my IT equipment and they usually last for long periods.

Here is the Technical Details of the laptop that i Bought from Saturn.

Manufacturer - ACER

Brand - ASPIRE 3

Model - A315-51-388U

CPU - Intel core i3-7020U (2.3 GHz, 3MB L3 Cache)

GPU - Intergrated, Intel HD620 Graphics

RAM - 8GB DDR4 Memory

HARD DISK - Toshiba MQ04ABF100 (1000GB)

I have been having problems running my laptop smoothly lately and after some research on many online tech support forums i have found to suspect that my hard drive may be failing.

I can not use my laptop for even the simplest tasks as it gets stuck or freezes for some time.

Examples are: when ever i try to switch between windows, when ever i right click on files, doing work on office apps(WPS Office), opening windows explorer etc... And during such time where pauses and freezes happen, the task manager always shows 100% disk usage with no read and write speed recorded. (I have attached pictures)

When i check to hear the sound of the hard drive it gives a click, click sound like it has found bad sectors, and when it finally finishes clicking and starts running again the windows that were frozen start to become usable again.

Just to be sure and rule out if the problem was with the hard drive i have made memory test to check RAM and they are ok with no errors. CPU is also fine, not even used most of the time. GPU is also great. But regarding the hard drive i have even encountered BSOD that have error names of "Kernel data in page error" which is related to the Hard Disk. That happened when i was copying large amounts of file (10+ GB) from a USB to the laptop. So thats why i suspect the problem to be with the hard drive.

This problem has been going on for around a month now.

I am hoping to change the hard drive to an SSD with same size (1TeraByte SSD) from a reliable manufacturer and warranty included.

I am hoping that the ACER community can guide me through this problem.

With the information that i provided, i want to ask the community assistance in facilitating me with the information to buy the right size SSD that could fit my laptop and also is compatible with my laptops other hardware like Motherboard etc.

Looking forward to your great discussions and solving the problem.

Sincerely

Yafet T.

Accepted answers

brummyfan2

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/comment/1182019#Comment_1182019

Yes, you can install 2.5" SSD in the bracket you already have, all you have to do is to align the screw holes in the bracket with the holes in the SATA SSD to fix the bracket to the SSD, as I said earlier, you have two choices, you can buy a M.2 NVMe SSD and install in the slot, install the OS and forget about 2.5" SSD or you can replace the current HDD with a 2.5" SSD.

All comments

brummyfan2

Hi,

I would suggest you download and install CrystalDiskInfo free program and check the health of the HDD, you have a choice of getting a 2.5" SATA SSD and clone your HDD to the new SSD or getting a 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD and clone the HDD to it, before deciding check the health of the HDD as I said and make sure that you transfer all important data to another external HDD to be on the safe side.

CrystalDiskInfo - Crystal Dew World [en] (crystalmark.info)

Acer Aspire A315-51 Performance Results - UserBenchmark

Acer Aspire A315-51 | Memory RAM & SSD Upgrades | Crucial UK

Commodore_1995#

In addition to checking the health of the hdd with the crystaldiskinfo program, defragment the hard drive.

Yafet

@brummyfan2 @egydiocoelho

Thank you for your prompt response.

I installed Crystaldiskinfo and this is the result i got when i first launched the app. I didnt do anything further, i just took a screenshot.

About cloning the hard disk, i have already made a backup of my essential files that i need so i basically can throw away the disk if i do change it with an SSD. but i dont plan on literally disposing the hard disk.

About defragmenting the disk, windows maintenance schedule has already defragmented the disk on multiple occasions. Even today it ran automatically defragmenting the disk. I have also done hard disk related commands in hopes of improving the disk performance like chkdsk, sfc, etc... with no avail.

So what would you advise our next move should be? Shall we proceed to choose the best and compatible SSD for my system or are there any other fixes that anyone could recommend?

I am all ears and thank you all once again.

Sincerely

Yafet T.

brummyfan2

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/comment/1182011#Comment_1182011

Yes, you need a new drive, you can install a M.2 NVMe SSD or a 2.5" SATA SSD and perform a clean install, but you may lose some original programs in the process, if you want to keep original programs with which the laptop came, you can clone the HDD to the new drive.

These are few suggestions:

Samsung 970 EVO Plus 1 TB PCIe NVMe M.2 (2280) Internal Solid State Drive (SSD) (MMZ-V7S1T0BW ), Black : Amazon.co.uk: Computers & Accessories

WD Blue SN550 1TB M.2 PCIe NVMe SSD/Solid State Drive LN101870 - WDS100T2B0C | SCAN UK

Kingston NV1 1TB M.2 NVMe 3D NAND SSD/Solid State Drive LN116381 - SNVS/1000G | SCAN UK

Yafet

@brummyfan2

The WDBlue says end of life, the other options are available. But i have some questions.

Is it that easy to just replace the hard drive. I mean just buy the SSD and install it? Will it fit on my laptop for sure? I reckon there are some differences between a hard disks size and a SSD. SSD being smaller, doesnt it need additional casings and such? If it doesnt its great and easy to replace but i just want to make sure i buy a SSD that will fit my laptop.

And i am also concerned about the SSD being compatible with my motherboard and bios? If compatability doesnt matter its great. It will be an easy swap.

Concerning the SSD itself what should i watch out before buying? I can only buy from Amazon as i hope original manufacturers will distribute using amazon and i want to get a legitimate product and not something that will be a problem in a few years.

So i just hope to make a selection of SSD from amazon that will be compatible for my laptop, so if you could so kindly fetch me SSDs from amazon with stores from original manufacturers that will be great.

With utmost respect for your support

Yafet T.

brummyfan2

https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/comment/1182019#Comment_1182019

Yes, you can install 2.5" SSD in the bracket you already have, all you have to do is to align the screw holes in the bracket with the holes in the SATA SSD to fix the bracket to the SSD, as I said earlier, you have two choices, you can buy a M.2 NVMe SSD and install in the slot, install the OS and forget about 2.5" SSD or you can replace the current HDD with a 2.5" SSD.

Commodore_1995#

I would first try disconnecting the hard drive and sata cable from the motherboard:

Then I would connect everything again and check if the error remains:

Yafet

Greetings. @brummyfan2 @egydiocoelho

Thank you both for your support.

I have been researching the problem alongside and here is where I am at currently.

About disconnecting the hard drive and SATA cable from the motherboard, I tried that fix to no avail. The problem is still there and crystal disk info still shows "BAD" hard drive as posted above.

So if you both have no more troubleshooting tips left, I think the only course of action left is to change it to a SSD. And that is what I want to discuss further in this thread. After all the problem is not completely fixed without a proper working hardware replacement.

As such, my plan is to install a M.2 SSD with a size of 1 TB which I hope to use it both for installing the OS and also store some files and do some video and graphics editing.

As we all know, there are two types of M.2 SSD according to their communications interface. SATA and NVMe. Since an NVMe is much faster than SATA, I would like to assess the probabilities of my laptop successfully accepting an NVMe SSD and using it as intended as I outlined above.

So to check once and for all before I purchase any hardware, I ask you kindly to look at the data presented below and advise me if my computer 100% supports a 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD.

As I didn't find any service manual specific for my ACER ASPIRE 3 A315-51-388U Model, I used an application called "HWinfo" to get my computers hardware data.

Details of the Motherboard

PCI Express Root Port #1
One of the PCI Express Port look like this

PCI Express Root Port #5 & #6
Two of the PCI Express ports look like this

I posted the PCI Express Root Port pictures since some of related questions about upgrading to SSD in the ACER Community was answered after identifying the Maximum Link Width of the PCI Express Root Ports (https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/497241/acer-aspire-e5-575-52jf-m-2-nvme-support/p1).

I have found in some cases brummyfan acknowledging that installing an M.2 NVMe SSD will work (https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/665965/aspire-3-a315-51-33ts-can-i-install-m-2-ssd-or-any-other-ssd-in-my-laptop) and in some cases acknowledging that an M.2 NVMe SSD will not work and recommending the M.2 SATA SSD (https://community.acer.com/en/discussion/549569/does-aspire-a315-51-5393-variant-support-nvme-and-is-the-ram-upgradeable).

The laptop models that the comment was given for are different from each other (Aspire A315-51-33TS & Aspire A315-51-5393) and also different from my laptop model in question (Aspire A315-51-388U). So I am not questioning your support, but I want to be 100% sure that an M.2 NVMe SSD will work on my model and I really want it to work too. I hope you don't take that as an accusation.

Finally if you can confirm for sure that an M.2 NVMe SSD will work, I am hoping to buy this M.2 NVMe SSD. (https://www.lexar.com/en/product/lexar-nm620-m-2-2280-nvme-ssd/)
Check it out and confirm that if I have chosen the right specifications.

With utmost respect for your support

Yafet T.

Yafet

This is what the expanded view looks like.

Commodore_1995#

Your model supports optane memory. Therefore, it will support an nvme ssd as well, as they use the same pcie bus.

Yafet

Thank you both for your support.

I finally bought a 1TB M.2 NVMe SSD which you can see from this link in the brackets. (https://www.lexar.com/en/product/lexar-nm620-m-2-2280-nvme-ssd/)

I installed it myself, i disassembled the laptop step by step.

I first removed the old hard drive then removed the back cover of the memory card, then fully removed the whole back cover.

Then i proceeded to disconnect the internal battery connection and after i grounded myself by touching my hands on the laptop bare metal chassis since i didnt have a wrist band to ground myself with, i carefully installed the SSD into the slot.

Then after replacing everything back in except the old hard drive with its connection cable, i then installed windows from USB drive to the SSD and now everything works like a charm.