Curtis Johnson wrote in a message to Roy J. Tellason:

 WC> not too hard to find however. I really hate Compaq.
 WC> P.B. is annoying sometimes but there are workarounds,
 WC> Compaq is certainly not for hardware tinkerers or power users.
 CJ>  
 CJ>    I have a Compaq that was given to me, HD dead but everything
 CJ> else seems OK.  Great, I think, all I have to do is swap in a new
 CJ> HD.  Pop the box, and there's about half an inch or so of space
 CJ> between  the HD and the CD-ROM, and I've been unable to find a
 CJ> screwdriver with an offset that small.  Anyone here have
 CJ> suggestions as to where to get one?

 RJT> What model Compaq is it?

 CJ>    Presario 7180.

I'm not all that familiar with those models,  unfortunately.

 RJT> And why is it that you refer to the space between the drives as a 
 RJT> way to get the HD out of there?  Or am I misunderstanding some 
 RJT> aspect of this? 

 CJ> AFAICT, I have to reach into that very wide, very deep valley 
 CJ> between the two housings and remove that friggin' screw.  Hence my 
 CJ> unsuccessful search for an offset screwdriver with such a small 
 CJ> offset.

 RJT> The one desktop system I have here,  a "Deskpro XL 586",  has the 
 RJT> drives coming out the front after you remove the outer case. 

 CJ> That's the situation in another computer I have, a "bare bones." 
 CJ> That's good design.  I'm suspicious that Compaq was not interested 
 CJ> in good design, but in forcing users into their repair centers.

Not necessarily.  To get at most stuff in the one I have here you need to
take out the cpu fan,  which includes a bit of ductwork,  and one plug-in
connector.  The ductwork part of it is sort of triangular shaped,  and
comes out after you take out one screw.  That's after you get the case
open,  which is another matter entirely,  needing a torx driver and then
sliding the outer case off,  a situation where I find that using the weight
of the innards to help me along is usually the best way to go.

The drive bays in there were another thing,  there are these smallish
brackets at the front that hold a drive in place sort of like what you used
to see in cases that needed drive rails.  I can't recall much more than
that offhand.  There is a floppy,  HD,  and cdrom drive in that order,  and
I have the second drive under that,  essentially just laying there in a
5-1/4" bay where I *should* have a mounting kit -- it's on the bottom
of the case so it's not going anywhere though it may tend to slide around a
bit if you moved the machine.

As I recall (it's been some months since I had that one open),  the whole
drive bay assembly came out with one screw.  Or maybe two,  at most. 
Similar setups I can recall from other machines also had a spot to mount a
HD on the side of the bay assembly.  I don't see too many desktop machines
any more these days.

You may just possibly need a *long* screwdriver,  maybe a torx driver,  but
I can't quite picture anything that would need an offset like what you're
saying here.

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