Two hard drive questions!

[throdgrain]

First, my HDD is getting a bit clonky but I dont want to reinstall yet again, is it possible to fit another then transfer all the information onto it?

Second, will someone please explain how to fit a sata hard drive ? Sounds obvious but there you go

 

[inactionman]

Yeah, there's software that will move stuff from drive to drive, TrueImage is the one I used last, worked ok, but only the bootdisk version. The windows install one didn't work.

Sata drives? Piece of piss. Connect the power to the drive, connect the sata cable to the mobo, connect the other end to the drive, job done.

 

[Craft]

need to sort master and slave too? think people think!

 

[TdC]

not really. SATAs all show up in your BIOS as disks, but BIOS will allow you to tell it which drive is the boss. iow, just connect the drive to any SATA port, and tell the BIOS that that particular drive is boot drive and you're done.

 

[inactionman]

Master, Slave? That's IDE, not SATA! SATA cables only have two identical ends, one goes in the motherboard, the other to the drive! If you are talking about boot order, that's set in the BIOS.

 

[throdgrain]

SO, would anyone care to explain properly?

 

[SheepCow]

To get the hard drives accessible in Windows just plug it in. You need to plug in the power cable (already inside your computer, find a free one). You then need to plug in the SATA cable, this won't be in your computer, you will need to buy one. It may come with the boxed retail hard drive but don't count your lesbians.

That's it. It will now be accessible in Windows. You will likely need to format it though.

 

[throdgrain]

To get the hard drives accessible in Windows just plug it in. You need to plug in the power cable (already inside your computer, find a free one). You then need to plug in the SATA cable, this won't be in your computer, you will need to buy one. It may come with the boxed retail hard drive but don't count your lesbians.

That's it. It will now be accessible in Windows. You will likely need to format it though.

Sorry darlin, was more meaning the copying question

 

[inactionman]

Here you go. Linky:

http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/

 

[throdgrain]

Ahh cheers Now of course the problem is, if I buy a SATA hard drive I wont be able to use that, as I'll have to format anyway. Hmm !
Not sure what to do. All my investigations tell me that SATA wont actually increase FPS in games or anything, which is about all I use a PC for.

 

[SheepCow]

You will only need to format the new one, then you can copy stuff onto it.

 

[inactionman]

Eh? If you use a product like trueimage, you won't need to do any formatting, it will just copy your old drive across and even extend if the new drive is bigger.

No, it won't really increase you FPS, not unless you get a really fast drive like a Raptor, and that will only really decrease loading times.

 

[throdgrain]

You have to format a drive before you use it I would have thought.
Pain in the arse all this, Ive had the same 90gig haed drive since about 2000 believe it or not. Since then Ive had around 5 video cards 4 cpus 3 mobos and god only knows what else

 

[RandomBastard]

You have to format a drive before you use it I would have thought.
Pain in the arse all this, Ive had the same 90gig haed drive since about 2000 believe it or not. Since then Ive had around 5 video cards 4 cpus 3 mobos and god only knows what else

Adding a harddrive is the simplist operation to any pc. Especially sata.

Step 1) Screw harddrive into case
Step 2) Plug sata cable into motherboard
Step 3) Plug sata cable into harddrive
Step 4) Plug in molex or sata power connector.
Step 5) Turn on pc.

If the drive is preformatted, thats it (unlikly) else

Step 6) Format *new* drive you won't loose any data. (because thats all on the old drive)
Step 7) At this stage you could either a) Install windows to the new drive
b) Copy your old drive across
c) Carry on as normal.

 

[throdgrain]

Yeah I know physically how to do it of course, its the little bits having not done it before, like the order of it
So basically I need to install my new sata hdd, in tandom with the old ide one, then format E or whatever it is, then copy everything from C to E or whatever.
What I didnt know was what you have helped my with, IE a program to copy everything (although do I need it now, not sure but cheers anyway), and wether you can run an IDE and a SATA simultaneously. (Still dont know, but I expect you can, or you'll tell me otherwise )

 

[Ch3tan]

Get a lovely 150gb raptor drive. They are sexy.

 

[Trem]

and wether you can run an IDE and a SATA simultaneously. (Still dont know, but I expect you can, or you'll tell me otherwise )

Yes you can luv.

Norton Ghost ftw as well.

 

[inactionman]

If you are using a program like trueimage or ghost to copy across, no formatting is necessary, it deals with all of that for you. Makes things a bit simpler.

Wouldn't recommend ghost for home installs though, it's a bit pricey.

 

[Bob007]

Grab yaself a copy of Ultimate Boot CD and burn a copy off to cd.

Install ya new HDD as desired/required. When starting up, pop into BIOS and not some info.

HDD numbers and sizes.
HDD numbers look something like. IC34L120AVV207-0 or ST3160023AS, These are my numbers for mine in atm.

While you in there, set ya boot order to CD rom and 2nd boot device to ya new HDD.
This can differ between BIOS. Some say "Harddrive" and below boot order allow you to change primary HDD, Others let you pick which HDD.

Armed with info and UBC you rdy to go.

Let PC boot of CD and navigate round UBC to find HDClone From this you need to "clone" the old booting, windows installed HDD on to ya shiney, new, none clicking hdd.
As long as new drive is the same size or larger then old 1 everything should be fine. If its smaller, you will have to play about with settings, surgest reading HDClones site for this

Let it clone over.
Be sure to clone OLD hdd over NEW hdd. Straight copy won't work as you need to copy over stuff you can't see, MBR for 1.

Once clonings finished, reboot and shutdown pc. Unplug power molex for old HDD (this does nowt but make life easier ) and let the system boot. If and when it boots into windows, let it install any new drivers it requires and do its reboots.

Resizing for large new drive.
Warez yaself a copy of Partition Magic (i wouldn't request such actions as a rule, but you need it once, so be sure to delete it and scald yaself with boiling water after you've finished) and use that to resize new HDD to full space required and let it finish.
partition magic can take anything from 5 mins to a whole day depending on size of drive and layout of files. Chill and let it finish.

What you should have now, is a new HDD booting into windows and nice and happy, and an old, unpowered HDD doing nowt.

Plug in old HDD and boot PC, Making sure windows is booting from the NEW HDD as surgested earlier. When windows loads. format it, worship it, sacrifice it to the PC gods. its now a spare drive.


Hope this helps, If not. it killed 5 mins anyway