**Installing 2nd hard drive**

  • Thread starter Thread starter Supersonic
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Supersonic

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After reading about Slackmaster losing his hard drive on an installation, I have a few questions on adding a second drive.
BIG PROJECT THIS WEEKEND is installing a second hard drive(Maxtor 20.5G) and an internal IDE CD burner. My currrnt drive is 8.4 G and almost full capacity and I plan on keeping it and using the two physical drives. Question #1, should I install my new CD burner first, and then use it to backup all my stuff on my current hard drive just in case something goes terribly wrong? Question #2, any ideas on how I should partition the new 20.4G hard drive?(10G and 2 x 5G maybe).
Thanks.
 
I'm sure some here might disagree with my 2 cents, so read all opinions before you act,
but how you go about it depends on a couple of things. First are you keeping one operating system ? Your existing one ? If you're running Windows 98, are you going to keep using it. Fresh install ? If you are worried about losing data, the safest thing to do is disconnect your existing drive while you install the new one. Install the new drive with the Master jumper enabled, insert a boot disk and run FDisk when booted . . . . partition, format and load your OS.
Then configure your old drive as a slave. Your new drive will be C: , your old drive D:, your main CD will be E: ,and your CDRW will be F:. It really doesn't matter when you install the CDRW.
One thing I did with my new 7200 RPM drive to help corral my recording wavs was to add an extended partition to it that is 4 GB or 15% of my drive space. You can do this in FDisk, and it must be done during your initial partitioning. It became another drive to my system, E:, meaning my CD & CDR became G: & H: I then set my audio preferences in Cakewalk to write the wav & picture cache to this new partion. It keeps all the data right there in that 4 GB space instead of fragging up the whole drive. Works for me . . . haven't had any problems. Good Luck !

Regards,
PAPicker
 
PA is correct in pretty much everything... all I will add is taht if you don't feel like taking your old HD out first and then setting the new one up as a master and the old one up as a slave, you should definitely install the CDR first and do a complete backup before installing the second hd.

-stranger233
 
Weird. When I installed my new hard drive, it went right in and worked fine. No issues concerning the OS's ability to see it and use it at all. Whether it is the master or slave on the same ide bus, the master on either ide bus, or the slave on the ide busses is really impertinent really. You bios should have little problem seeing the new drive during bootup. Yes, you will need to fdisk the new drive, not a problem. fdisk will give you a new option to change which physical drive you want to work on. Your new drive will be easy to identify because it will have no partition information at all in fdisk.

By the drive and install it. Installing a new drive is not going to magically erase or render any info on your current drive useless. Backup is not really an issue here.

Now, if you are looking to optimize the system to use the two drives to it's fullest potential, there are many variables involved. Way too many to discuss. But if you are just getting another drive that is similar to your old one, there is little to consider. If you are just looking to have another drive for storage, no big deal, it will install usually just fine and your old drive will be just fine too. Go for it.

Concerning the CDR drive. Just about the same issue there too. Just put it in. You bios will see it and deal with it. Your OS will see it and deal with it too. No big deal here. You are just adding a couple new drives. You are not going to corrupt data on your old hard drive.

If you are having troubles getting to new devices to work properly, then post a question about it. At that point, you will have real issues to report and more specific help can be given. But just adding in two devices is not going to hurt anything unless you do something stupid like fdisk your current drive instead of the new one. When in doubt, don't do anything and ask a question to those that can help you. Tech support for Maxtor is at least competent enough to help you install the new drive and get it working without messing anything up on your current configuration. Really, this is to big deal.

Ed
 
If you are going to physically move the drive in any way, BACKUP. Sure it's anal, but you should probably have a backup anyway.

I'd install the CDRW and do a backup. But, as Ed says, the chances of you losing data are minimal.

Oh, and NO MARGARITAS.

Slackmaster 2000
 
You, if anyone, Slackmaster should know about the chances of loosing your data... :D

I back up ghost images of my disks regularly and I find it to be the easiest. Ghosting is also great if you want to fiddle with oyur computer setup as it's so easy to get back to square one when (not if) the system gets screwed up. Also, take sonusmans advice and make sure that you fdisk the right disk.

/Ola
 
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