Hard disk upgrade
Discussion
I'm fast running out of space on my 40gb internal h/d. I've seen some 160gb disks starting at £75 so I've decided to add another.
I am getting confused by all the terminology ATA/UDMA/SATA/rpm/2mb/8mb etc etc. What do I need to look for? I just want one that's compatible with my pc (Dell Dimension 4500).
I am getting confused by all the terminology ATA/UDMA/SATA/rpm/2mb/8mb etc etc. What do I need to look for? I just want one that's compatible with my pc (Dell Dimension 4500).
leosayer said:
I am getting confused by all the terminology ATA/UDMA/SATA/rpm/2mb/8mb etc etc. What do I need to look for? I just want one that's compatible with my pc (Dell Dimension 4500).
ATA is what you're after, S-ATA is "Serial ATA", a new standard that is incompatible with ATA (offers better performance but uses completely different cabling, amongst other things).
Once you've got ATA, you've then got various speeds - 33/66/100/133 being the main ones. Most new ones will be 133, or at least 100. It's backwardly compatible so a 133 drive will work in a 100 spec motherboard. I believe this is the case across all the speeds (ie. its backwardly compatible down the entire range of numbers). UDMA is pretty much the standard these days and is just another level of interface spec (Ultra DMA versus DMA - it's basically ATA/133)
You've then got cache and rotational speed - the other figures in your list. These are also the big decider on how fast the drive is.
cache is in megabytes - 2Mb is the industry 'minimum', really. 8Mb is better if you can get it...
rotational disk speed (rpm) normally comes in 5400 or 7200 (or 10,000 in the case of SCSI drives, some even quicker). 7200 is preferred but the develop more heat, so some times if performance is less favourable over longevity a 5400rpm drive can be a better choice - they tend to last longer IMHO.
Finally there is access/seek times, measured in milliseconds... normally always under 10ms, probably around the 8ms mark as a general norm. Again, the faster (smaller) the better.
You should be able to pick up a 7200rpm, 8Mb cache, 8ms ATA133 drive as the best overall deal. A 2Mb cache version might save you £5 - if you're really that fussed?!
Cheers,
Dan
>> Edited by brumster on Wednesday 25th February 22:10
Open the box, find the grey IDE cable (wide and thin) leading from the motherboard to the drive already in there.
There should (hopefully) be a second connector with nothing on - attach to new drive
You will probably have to change jumper settings on your drive. HDDs are either master or slave. The drive in there already should be the master. Set the new drive to either "cable select" or "slave".
Find a spare power socket for the drive in your PC - plug it in.
Switch on, go to bios (normally del key) - check the new drive is seen.
Don't forget to format the new drive before you can see it in Windows Explorer (format it in disk management).
Alternatively, read the manual
I think that's right
There should (hopefully) be a second connector with nothing on - attach to new drive
You will probably have to change jumper settings on your drive. HDDs are either master or slave. The drive in there already should be the master. Set the new drive to either "cable select" or "slave".
Find a spare power socket for the drive in your PC - plug it in.
Switch on, go to bios (normally del key) - check the new drive is seen.
Don't forget to format the new drive before you can see it in Windows Explorer (format it in disk management).
Alternatively, read the manual
I think that's right
leosayer said:
Western Digital Caviar
Quality kit. Never had one fail in all the time I've been messing around with PCs. Refuse to buy anything else these days.
Re: fitting. Download the WD DataLifeguard utilities, if they don't already come on a CD with the new drive. Run it up and there'll be an option to "view installation tutorial". The nice thing is, it'll produce a lovely step by step manual tailored for your hardware that you can print out and follow whilst the PC's in bits.
I'd recommend usign DL to migrate your existing disk to the new one (makes sense to have the newest, fastest, most reliable drive as the boot disk) - DL will do all this for you with pretty much no pain at all. You can then keep the old disk as extra storage. Again, DL will tell you exactly what you need to do (jumpers etc) in order to get this set up right.
>> Edited by pdV6 on Friday 27th February 17:33
Thanks for all the help guys
My new disk is installed and working as a slave at present
I used the DL tools as advised and it was completely painless, managed to copy the contents of my c: drive to the new e: drive
I then went and looked at the instructions for changing the new one to be the master and followed the jumper instructions for both drives but I'm having no luck and seem to have tried every combination of jumper setting and cable connection but still no luck
I now suspect that even though I've copied the contents, my e: drive is not set up as a boot disk. Any further hints gratefully received.
My new disk is installed and working as a slave at present
I used the DL tools as advised and it was completely painless, managed to copy the contents of my c: drive to the new e: drive
I then went and looked at the instructions for changing the new one to be the master and followed the jumper instructions for both drives but I'm having no luck and seem to have tried every combination of jumper setting and cable connection but still no luck
I now suspect that even though I've copied the contents, my e: drive is not set up as a boot disk. Any further hints gratefully received.
There are many options to choose from in DL - can't remember them all offhand, but did you pick the one that migrated your existing drive en masse to the new one, as if you were going to do a straight swap?
Try taking your old drive out of the equation completely, so that you are left with just the new drive on the primary IDE channel, jumpers set to 'master' and see if you can boot then.
Try taking your old drive out of the equation completely, so that you are left with just the new drive on the primary IDE channel, jumpers set to 'master' and see if you can boot then.
All working now thanks guys, the new HD is now my boot disk. Can definetely recommend DL, it was just me not using the application correctly that caused the problems.
The only thing that didn't copy properly was Call of Duty, so I re-installed it and is fine now.
Next to do: Install a DVD writer!
The only thing that didn't copy properly was Call of Duty, so I re-installed it and is fine now.
Next to do: Install a DVD writer!
Hi
heres a little something we used to do in my shop when we transferring information from one drive to another (complete image)when we changing drives, in win 9X
install yer new drive as slave to the existing drive-
use fdisk and format to prepare the new drive, dont make the partition active yet -
create a (rescue) boot disk if you havent already, >
Use the SYS command to transfer system files to the new drive, open a DOS window and type - sys d: -
close the DOS window and double click on " my computer"
double click control panel and then system
click on performance tab and virtual memory button and disable virtual memory ( done this without this option)
restart windows ,click start ,select run,and type
xcopy C:*.* /e /h /k /r /c d:
click ok, this command copies all the files to the new drive.
shut down PC when completed, change jumpers on drives,
use the floppy from earlier and type fdisk, select option to make primary active, exit, reboot.
re-enable virtual memory settings if you altered them.
not that detailed but if you cant make sense of this then I suggest you get someone to do it for you!
sbarks
heres a little something we used to do in my shop when we transferring information from one drive to another (complete image)when we changing drives, in win 9X
install yer new drive as slave to the existing drive-
use fdisk and format to prepare the new drive, dont make the partition active yet -
create a (rescue) boot disk if you havent already, >
Use the SYS command to transfer system files to the new drive, open a DOS window and type - sys d: -
close the DOS window and double click on " my computer"
double click control panel and then system
click on performance tab and virtual memory button and disable virtual memory ( done this without this option)
restart windows ,click start ,select run,and type
xcopy C:*.* /e /h /k /r /c d:
click ok, this command copies all the files to the new drive.
shut down PC when completed, change jumpers on drives,
use the floppy from earlier and type fdisk, select option to make primary active, exit, reboot.
re-enable virtual memory settings if you altered them.
not that detailed but if you cant make sense of this then I suggest you get someone to do it for you!
sbarks
Im buying a new harddrive very shortly and some advice would be appreciated.
My motherboard is SATA compatible and Im after a 120gig 7200rpm 8m cache hard drive. This seems simple but when I went to my site I buy from I was inundated with makes. There are Western Digital drives,IBM, Maxtor DiamondMax and Seagate barracuda drives. I dont know which to buy but see that the IBM is so much cheaper. I would like a fairly silenty drive too - ANY IDEAS??!!
>> Edited by anarchystorm on Wednesday 10th March 22:03
My motherboard is SATA compatible and Im after a 120gig 7200rpm 8m cache hard drive. This seems simple but when I went to my site I buy from I was inundated with makes. There are Western Digital drives,IBM, Maxtor DiamondMax and Seagate barracuda drives. I dont know which to buy but see that the IBM is so much cheaper. I would like a fairly silenty drive too - ANY IDEAS??!!
>> Edited by anarchystorm on Wednesday 10th March 22:03
anarchystorm said:
Im buying a new harddrive very shortly and some advice would be appreciated.
My motherboard is SATA compatible and Im after a 120gig 7200rpm 8m cache hard drive. This seems simple but when I went to my site I buy from I was inundated with makes. There are Western Digital drives,IBM, Maxtor DiamondMax and Seagate barracuda drives. I dont know which to buy but see that the IBM is so much cheaper. I would like a fairly silenty drive too - ANY IDEAS??!!
>> Edited by anarchystorm on Wednesday 10th March 22:03
I can recommend Maxtor SATA drives - we recently built a new machine for work use and it has 2 120 GB SATA drives configured as RAID 0 and not only does it really fly (3GHz HT processer with 2GB RAM) but it's really quiet.
overclockers.co.uk were the cheapest supplier.
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