Crappy 30 to Awesome 80

I upgraded my Mac today. I only had 2GB left on my drive. Yes, I know, "only" is relative. Especially considering that was the entire drive in my old laptop. Two gigs however is only three movies. So I popped on up to Akihabara (the electronic district) in search of a new drive.

I went to several stores and for some reason they all told me that an 80GB hard drive was too big to fit in my laptop - which didn't make sense to me because I thought they were a standard size. Turns out they are a standard size, so I could get the 80GB drive, but no one would install it for me. Finally I found a very helpful store that directed my to a repair shop that would install it. So I bought the drive, bought a case to turn my old drive into a portable one and wandered over.
I asked the guy how much it would cost and he said 10,000 yen and my job basically dropped. How much??? (That's like 100 bucks US). At this point I don't really have a choice, so I forked over the dough, and spent the next 45 minutes watching the guy disassemble and reassemble my baby. And, know what? It was worth every penny of the fee. There is no way I could have done it myself. By the time he actually got to the hard drive, my Mac was in literally 20 different pieces. (Note to do-it-yourselfers: an ice cube tray is a convenient place to organize and hold screws when you are taking things apart). The case was also on really tight - he had a hard time getting it off... even with the right tools (which I don't have). So all in all, it was money well spent in my opinion.

So now I have a whopping 80GB drive - yippee! And another 30GB as a backup / portable drive. I'm in drive space heaven!