The hard drive in the laptop stores the operating system and important files, so replacing that requires you to either do a backup and restore onto the new drive, or completely reinstall from scratch. I do computer consulting on the side, so if you need help please contact me offlist. On Dec 29, 2011 8:36 AM, "Libby Morehead" <gmalibby@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote: > ** > If I replace the hard drive in my laptop and then connect it to the backup > hard drive, will I need to reload anything? Should it be good to go? > > Libby >