Hard Drives Compatible?

[Dorkiss]

Hey Everybody!
Sorry, in advance for the long post.
Last week our 2 year old tripped over our Dell Laptop Ac Adapter and yanked the conduit connecter out of the motherboard. (She aint extremely fat, it was loose before.) The laptop isn't worth the trouble so we just threw it away. We found a dell Optiplex gx620 ultra compact for $60.00 and bought it. (It'll get us through school.)
I was wondering the best way to get some papers and pictures off the Laptop HD.
Here's the questions:
The Dell Tower has a 80GB Hd with Windows Pro and a second 300 GB HD.
The Dell Laptop has a 60GB HD with Windows Home.
Are Hardrives interchangeable? Do I just unplug one and plug in the other?
If they are, what is the easiest way to get some stuff off the Laptop HD?

Another unrelated and also unimportant question: The Optiplex has an integrated Intel graphic....some Intel 9xxx Express Chipset. Is there any way I could upgrade the Video Chip to ANYTHING else?
If you say no, I'll survive

Sorry, I know this is basic stuff, but I have just dealt with laptops before....just open lid and turn on Also, I am really busy the next couple of weeks with school (you may call it Procrastination...i call it weeks of Prioritization) so I really don't have the time to Google through this. Asking all you on the Forum is much, much, easier.

Thank you for your help.

p.s. these new little smilies are really little

[hellnoire]

I'm actually posting something up on RIP Linux today so if you've like to wait a little bit, I'll have a guide up on the blog. If you'd like an instant response, you can always put it into a hard drive enclosure and connect a USB cable to it.

[Dorkiss]

Thanks Hellnoire for your reply.
I'll shop around for a usb harddrive enclosure that i need
thx

[Lenogris]

incase you still need some more advice on this. the laptop hard drive depending upon what kind it is. could go in an external case, some you can plug into desktops though it is perty rare. my suggestion for the pictures is to take the old hard drive put it in your new laptop( pending it fits) then just burn the files you want to a cd or dvd. then you can put back in you old hard drive and copy the file from the cd to the hard drive.

as for you graphics card issue it can not be upgrade in laptops.

[tangomouse]

laptop is fixable just a case of soldering the connector back on the mobo ,if your competent in soldering then i would fix it