I don't know if your wife's computer is SATA 1, 2 or 3 but either way it looks like the drive is backward compatible. So I would expect it to work fine.

https://documents.westerndigital.com/content/dam/doc-library/en_us/assets/public/western-digital/product/internal-drives/wd-blue-ssd/data-sheet-wd-blue-3d-nand-sata-ssd-2879-800092.pdf

In the note section it says "Backward compatible to SATA II and I."

That's a good enough price I'm tempted to get one to add to my new bedroom computer to use as a backup drive.

"I used a zip tie to hold the one in my computer in place."

Which reminds me, I have a Windows boot drive hanging by the wires that I need to take time to secure. :-)

I purchase any computer hardware I can't get at the BigBox store from B&H (mail order).

Thanks for all the comments. I could not figure out how they would not be compatible but Amazon would not confirm that they were so I thought it prudent to check. I'll go ahead with it.

Elmer, that's a fair question. The main reason for replacing the hard drive is because the old one sometimes fails to boot, and since she would like the changeover to Linux anyway it would be easier for me to do a clean install of the new OS and copy her files over via a flash drive. But you're right: it isn't really necessary, but is a good chance for me to play a little.

I'll have a look at B&H too, while I'm at it. Always nice to have reliable alternatives.

B&H also has pre-sale tech support.

A little follow up if anyone is interested: I ended up sticking with a spare 500 gb WD spin drive I had leftover after I upgraded to a ss drive on my computer; I had already loaded Mint to it, so I just copied her files over, and for the most part it has worked well. Only glitch was that the Firefox I had on that drive didn't have all her saved passwords, so she had something of a struggle with a couple of those, but we are apparently through that now. And she thinks she likes it. Well, since most of what she does is on the browser, she won't notice too much difference.

I sure noticed how long it takes her drive to boot up compared to mine, though!

Thanks again for your help and comments.

"I sure noticed how long it takes her drive to boot up compared to mine"

We all have plenty of time these days!

She can leave it on, or turn it on and then go do something else. It'll be waiting for her when she comes back.

Yah, she usually turns on both computers and then goes about making coffee and boils a kettle of water. When the kettle whistles it's my signal to get out of bed - but until then the house is all hers, and I'd best not intrude!

If she already has her bookmarks, passwords, etc. straightened out it's probably too late but...

If you can locate her old Firefox profile on her Windows disk, you could probably copy her profile files to her new Firefox profile on her Linux disk.

When I mount my Windows installation from within Linux, I find mine here:

/media/chugger/Acer/Users/richard/Application Data/Mozilla/Firefox/Profiles

(chugger is my Linux username, Acer is the label of the Windows partition, richard is my Windows username)

If there's more than one profile directory, I would assume it to be the last created.

On the running Linux installation you can just go to "Help" -> "Troubleshooting information" and Firefox will point it out to you.

Alternately, you could just copy specific files from the old Windows Firefox profile to the new Linux Firefox profile.

Bookmarks and history are stored in places.sqlite.

Passwords requires two files: key4.db and logins.json

https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profiles-where-firefox-stores-user-data

On my main computer, I put Linux on an M.2. nvme and moved Windows from a one terrabyte spin drive to an inexpensive 120 gig Kingston SSD. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B01N6JQS8C (It was $19.99 when I bought it)

Windows boots quickly on the SSD. Probably as fast as my Linux does on the faster M.2. nvme. 120 gig is more than enough for a boot drive as long as you use another drive for data.

If at some point in the future you get restless and want to play, and possibly impress your wife, you might stick a small SSD in her machine to use as a boot drive. And use the 500 gig spin drive for data.

I just got a new bedroom computer. I had trouble getting remote desktop working. After a couple frustrating days I got it working and quickly backed it up. And... it felt good. Probably better than it would have if it had come easy.

The bedroom computer, shown in the window looks almost exactly like the main computer but... that's just me. I like simple. :-)

Thanks, Richard. I have to watch out that I don't overreach, and you tempt me.

Back in the 70's I was partners in a very small business, and my partner was into programming and really, really wanted to get computerized. So we spent $5000 on a machine, and he wrote the programs, and eventually it kinda worked. Amazes me how much the world has changed in the last 40 plus years. Now I can do things with free off-the-shelf programs that he never would have been able to do in any reasonable time frame. And at the time it was all just completely over my head and not something I was into at all - I wouldn't even listen when he tried to talk about Basic or Cobal or whatever.

It's more interesting to me now, but I get interested in too many things, and right now it's gardening season ...

:-)M

Linux is and always has been dead on arrival when it comes to home desktop use. Less than two percent of users find it to be of interest. It may soon be surpassed by even Chrome OS (yes, I know, a derivative of Linux).

Among all but the geekiest and youngest programmers and software engineers I know here in Silicon Valley, it's something few of them use outside of work.

You can also go into FFs tools -- options -- privacy and security -- Logins and passwords -- saved logins (and click on the little eye to see the password) and get your old passwords & user IDs there. You can also export bookmarks in FF (from the bookmark menu) as an html file and then import that file into another FF, tho that is somewhat a pain because it adds those bookmarks to the already existing ones in the other FF & you might get alot of duplicates that then require editing/deleting etc.