Replacing HDD on Refurbished Dell Latitude

Many thanks in advance for the help. I've been an idle reader for a long time, but just registered because I couldn't quite find help specific to my current issue.

I've just bought a Dell Latitute 6430 refurbished off Amazon -- this one in particular. The "Benny Bookman" review is from me and repeats some of the info I'll be detailing here. If anything in that review is erroneous I'll update.

I feel like the issue is complicated, but it breaks down to two primary issues:

1. I'm not 100% sure that the Windows included on the machine is legit in terms of being for a refurb. I tried to google for details and have bought quite a few refurbs before. The issue here is that there is only one Product ID label on the machine and it's labeled Dell, not "Refurbished". I've never seen this before. But Windows activated on my second attempt without any call to Microsoft, so that was comforting. What's the likelihood that this will be a problem down the road? I've run the MGADT tool and included its results below, but don't know what I'm looking at there.

When I initially booted, I got the "choose your language ... this is permanent" choice with English/Spanish and a 3rd language (maybe French). It seemed legit. But it wouldn't activate at first. I emailed the seller and they asked me double check that I typed it right and then it worked. I'm 99% sure I typed it right the first time, but in the meantime I made some BIOS changes -- in particular the drive was set in BIOS as a RAID drive instead of AHCI so I changed it. I hope that was the right move, but my confidence in all this is not strong. I also upgrade BIOS version to the latest from the Dell website.

2. I've got a 480GB PNY SSD that I'd like to use in the laptop. It currently has a no-name 240GB SSD that is working fine. I don't have any install media for a refurb Windows license (but then again, I'm not sure that a refurb windows license is really what I'm using...). I do happen to have a Windows 7 Dell install disk from an older Latitude that I own (it is pre SP1 however).

I've tried cloning the drive over using EASEUS and a USB-SATA cable but got "corrupted partition table" upon boot. Reinserted my old drive and Windows is working fine again.

I've done google searches and searches of these forums but haven't found explicit help for my issue. I very well may not be using good search terms, since I've found a lot of related issues but not quite mine.

Thank you for any help or advice. I'm within my return period, but would rather keep the machine than fight with seller over a return if at all possible. At $600 I feel like it was a good value. I've got USB drives, other PCs (both W10 and W7) and the laptop has a DVD drive FWIW.

Welcome to the forum. When you cloned it did you clone all the drive as there will be more than one partition and did you boot from a cd as you cant clone while windows is running

Almost all OEM laptops has a Factory Recover Partition to create the Factory Recover disks or to reinstall (from Windows or from BIOS). I would look for it and make the disks. Better to be safe than sorry.
- I didn't understand your question or issue nº 1, but Yes, I think is a legal Windows copy.
- To clone the actual disk to the new one, use Macrium (Macrium Reflect Free)

The best way to clone the disk is to attach both to a desktop so when cloning both disks aren't in use.

When an ad says "certified refurbished", the question you have to ask yourself is "certified by who?" The term "certified" means absolutely nothing if you can't figure out who is standing behind the certification. In this case, clearly not Dell, nor is it even refurbished by Dell. Perhaps you were misled into thinking it meant "factory refurbished"?

The photos you posted on your Amazon review show it's definitely not a factory refurb, and even the SSD appears to be refurbished as well. As for who made the SSD, my guess is this. I wouldn't worry about the SSD capacity, but I would be concerned about its reliability if it was refurbished.

If the SSD was indeed refurbished, its contents would also have to have been reinstalled, in which case you can't count on it having the factory partitions or an OEM recovery partition anymore. Those are often dropped on third-party refurbs because they don't know how to recreate the special Dell partitions. (In contrast, most Dell factory refurbs *do* include the OEM partitions because they usually go through the same factory build process as a new machine.)

As for SSD capacity, 240GB and 256GB are essentially the same thing, except the 240GB is more conservatively overprovisioned. (See paragraph re: "third source" here.) You can't really fill the entire capacity of a SSD or else TRIM won't work, so overprovisioning is just a way of reserving some of its space to prevent you from trying to fill the entire capacity.

From your MGADT report it does appear to be a valid Windows product key, so theoretically there shouldn't be issues down the road. But it's not an OEM product key; a Dell OEM version of Win7 Pro wouldn't have needed online activation, and the product key should end in "733WD", not "H8DKK".

I can't tell from the fuzzy photo on your Amazon review, but it appears the Service Tag and Express Service Code have been obliterated. Did you do that to the photo before uploading it, or did the refurbisher do that to the actual sticker? If one or both codes are really there, it can be helpful to go to support.dell.com and put the code in to see what the original configuration was (including Windows version) when the machine originally shipped.

If it were mine, I would pull the 240GB and do a clean install on the 480GB SSD instead. It will take longer than simply cloning what the refurbisher sent you, but you'll be sure what you've got and will probably feel better about it in the long run.

First visit the downloads section of support.dell.com and download any drivers you'll need, and download the SP1 update from MS. Put those all on a USB stick. Do a clean install from your old Win7 DVD, then install the Dell drivers and SP1 update. Windows should not require online activation, and you'll have a legit Dell installation.

(Note: you'll have a ton of post-SP1 updates to install as well, but that will be the case regardless of whether you clone or clean install.)

binf

If you are happy with the laptop, then keep and use it. (if i am you)

The windows is license, but may not be the same license on the laptop from Dell.
Do take note to check.

Refurbished is not a brand, just like Trade-in, buyer, seller, etc.
Some dealers who took in the laptop do not do repair.
Or the dealers repair and let the Refurbished seller to sell.
Hence, Refurbished seller do repair and this is where they earn.