How can I find out what SATA my new laptop supports?

Hello. I just bought an ASUS A53z-NB61. Nothing in the user manual or in control panel gives the answer. Even the specifications page on the ASUS support site is unavailable. The device listed as the hdd (I think) is designated as "ST932032 5a sata disk device." I haven't had any luck finding any specs on that even. Thanks in advance.

I'm going to jump out on a limb and guess due to it's price bracket and general configuration that its sata 2. If it was 3, they would generally bother to make a marketing point out of it.

I can find no specific information on the motherboard or chipset in use though.
All the spec sheets on that particular laptop are intentionally vague only saying it comes with a 320 gig ssd.
I suppose shutting it down and just pulling the ssd out and seeing what it is would be your easiest clue.
should be easy to yank out just power down remove the battery and they're usually only held in by one or two tiny screws.

Keep in mind that's all just educated guess.
There are software packs like speccy and cpu-z that might help shed light on it for you as well.

As Maguscreed said, the SATA version capability of your laptop will be determined by the motherboard chipset. If you can determine the version of chipset in your machine then you can do a search to find the specs for that chipset from AMD.

An easy way to find the chipset version is to look in Device Manager under "IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers".

Thanks for the replies guys.

@TVeblen; They don't want to be too cooperative. All it shows is "IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers." Even the manufacturer tab only gives "AMD." Needless to say Asus' specification page is still missing. Oh well. Thanks anyway.

@Maguscreed; Yeah, that was kind of my thinking too but I wanted conformation before trying to decide to/choosing a new hdd or maybe an ssd. Preferably before opening it up if I could, since it may not be informative. Guess I'll try the software.

Could it be just SATA I? (Not even a II?) They aren't that dodgy at ASUS now are they?

Tell you the truth I may return this, aside from the SATA question I can't seem to get it to go online except to it's default Msn homepage (with "asus" in front of "msn" in that url???) or to the yahoo homepage. Pretty much any other just hangs. Nada. I had to jump through hoops just to put firefox on it and that didn't solve anything.

It's weird, while I only tried ethernet (not the wireless) I know my older cheapo single-core laptop worked straight away on the same exact cable in the exact same router port...

Sorry I realize this probably isn't the sub-forum for that problem.

If you just bought the laptop, you should be aware of the internal hardware. How else would you know if it was a good deal/price or not? That being said, you should be able to easily find the chipset info in your documentation or on the company's website.

The branded IE isn't an issue, but it is a sign that you are running the installed OS out of the box. The first thing most of us do when buying a new laptop is to wipe it out and do a clean install using a basic Windows 7 disc...not a restore disc. The laptop will run faster and more efficient, without the added, bloated software.

Oh. Well if I had a base win7 disc...I don't suppose it's possible to edit the iso of the recovery disc like slipstreaming an xp install? If you can't tell I haven't messed with 7 before.

As for the internals I knew It's got a quad core, a usb 3.0 port and the closest matching model with any reviews had a great response. That one was only sataII (as per the reviewers) but this model cost slightly more than that had.

At $380 it didn't seem like a bad deal and should do all I need. More with a few tweaks. Neweeg hasn't screwed me previously. Or not yet rather.

Just download the .iso file that matches your version and platform.

Windows 7 Digital River direct links: Multiple Languages; X86 & X64 - Page 60

The price doesn't tell you much of anything about a laptop...in terms of if it's worth it or not. I'm not saying you made a mistake with the purchase...I'm just saying that you should always know everything you are getting for your money, especially in the computer world.