laptop HP Laptop 17-ca0064cl teardowns/upgrade assistance

[ennuigamer]

I bought this laptop earlier this year and there is a strange noise coming from inside the chassis. I'm suspecting the HDD needs to be replaced (faulty drive motor or actuator) or it could be the fan but I have no idea how to access the internals. From what I've searched, there are no teardown guides anywhere on this model as of now. I've even tried looking up similar models but had no luck.

From what I can see, the back cover has 4 visible screws and two rubber strips. Four screws are under the rubber strip near the hinge and there are two under the other strip. One screw allows me to remove the optical drive unit and there are two flat screws exposed when that is removed. Even after all these are removed, I can't get the back panel off. There has to be something I'm still missing.

From what I can tell, the laptop has an integrated battery that can't be removed separately. I take it that it has to come off along with the back panel? I'm enclosing photos of the back panel, the screw mounts in the optical drive area, and the keyboard so you can see what I'm working with. I can provide other photos of the laptop upon request if more clarification is needed.

[Juicecop]

Does this laptop allow you to install an additional SSD? My mom has this and it's ridiculously slow.

[ennuigamer]

I don't know. I can't access the internals where the mass storage is yet.