Update: This afternoon I installed the new internal hard drive, and then my
old software. All's great. The only thing that was persnickety was the
Seagate installation documentation.

Seagate's software had the option to do some sort of diagnosis and check of
my old hard drive, along the lines maybe of what Marslee mentioned, I think.
The documentation said 40% of hard drives brought to Seagate ostensibly for
repair were actually fine. I gave the diagnosis software a shot thrice, but
the diskettes it told me to make for this never got to working. It's
possible my old hard drive wouldn't cooperate, either. I lost about an hour
playing with this.

The Seagate steps for putting in the new hard drive are not presented
perfectly straightforwardly. I almost would have been better off winging it,
because the old hard drive looks almost exactly the same as the new one, and
I'd been in the casing before and, with tips from here, knew what to seek.
But there are some startup diskettes that have to be made. They may be vital
to getting the new hard drive going, too. So one has to slog through some
confusion with the Seagate documentation.

I did not have to mess with BIOS or CMOS. The Seagate documentation did have
some cautions and troubleshooting steps for this, were one to have problems.

My computer sounds better. It was making some odd cyclic noises which I
thought were either the power supply fan cycling somehow, or maybe the hard
drive. Also, installation seemed to go somewhat faster this time than when I
did a re-install a few weeks ago. (I timed installation of all the software
then
and kinda kept watch on it today.) Maybe this new hard drive is giving me a
bit more speed compared to my old one?

I'll wait a day or so, and if all remains well, send in my rebate request.

Thanks again James, Marslee, Dave, and Puck. My first efforts at maintaining
or repairing my computer a few years ago were excruciatingly laborious and
rarely successful. Now, cause folks like you donate some time, I have some
hope I can "take command" and keep building on my database, saving my
hard-earned money for charities and skiing.

I will try to return your favor to others with the skills I have in other
areas.