1-3 of 3 Answers
HDDs or hard disk drives that are sold retail come basically blank and have no operating system. This is because they are intended to go into ANY computer and work, and part of the computer the operating system interfaces with is the hardware devices contained within the computer. The operating system has to have specific driver files to run all the parts inside the computer and when you install an operating system it finds and recognizes what is there and loads the appropriate drivers to run everything you don't see that is inside that makes your computer work. There are literally thousands of different devices that can be in any given computer, so there really isn't a way to install an operating system on the disk until you put in in the computer. There is also the fact that there are dozens of different hard drives available and two main types that they all are categorized by. First is the traditional spinning platter type of electromechanical hard disk assembly (or HDA) and second is the all electronic solid state drive (SSD). As a general rule SSDs are much faster to access information to and from the "drive" (it is really a collection of memory chips in a case) and they are more pricey that the traditional kind. Traditional HDAs are still pretty fast, some spin up to 10,000 rpm and their main drawback is they tend to fail at some point. The plus is you will pay less than half the cost of an SSD for the regular old hard drive, but many disk drives have been known to last for years with proper maintenance. SO - you will have to install an operating system on them, regardless of type - but - you can clone the old drive if it is working and doesn't have bad sectors in the wrong places. If you have a crashed drive you can't transfer the contents to a new one, so you will need an operating system anyway.
Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.If you buy your own Hard Drive (HD) and it's your primary HD in the computer system, then yes it will need an installation of the Operating System (OS). However, if this HD is replaced with an existing one that is already working on the system, there is a technical way to "copy" the contents of the existing HD to the new one, eliminating the need to reinstall the entire system. But, this is important, since it's an SSD HD which is 1000 times faster than a Spinning HD (Nano Second Vs Mili Second) then installation is rather quick. I'm always for a FRESH install of an OS then to "drag" along the old OS and bring all of the "junk" that accumulated over the eons.
Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.New hard drives do not come with preinstalled software. You have to buy the software for it,
Sorry, there was a problem. Please try again later.
