Hard Drive upgrade help

[Fidgits]

I was hoping you could help with my hard drive upgrade.


I saw a thread a while ago with decent priced 80Gig drives - and im going to go off and hunt for that in a tic.


My bigger issue is my PC.

I currently have 2 hard drives, something like 8 & 12 gig.

Ideally I want to get the new drive and use it as the primary, with the 12G (current primary) as the second HDD.

However, I have things like iTunes installed - now i have a maxtor, so I can backup the entire HDD's onto this, but the primary is currently F: where 1/2 the iTunes music is, with the backup C: having the other half.

Now, I'm pretty sure if I install the new as the primary, this becomes C: with F: as the backup - which will mess up iTunes, and anything else with relative paths.

So, my questions are as follows:
1. Is there anyway to define the drive letter of a new drive (going to install XP) during first boot?
2. Is there anyway to 'mirror' a harddrive onto a new one - so say, copy current Pri to the new one and everything work as before? Or is a new install required?
3. Any help or tips?

[Fidgits]

cheers.

Not confused, that pretty much confirms the two ways I could see to do it, though i was wondering if there was anything easier...

any link to the samsung drive anywhere? (I need EIDE I think)

[Fidgits]

i cant find the link - i think i need an IDE or something, the motherboard is a couple of years old..

infact, the PC itself is coming up a decade, i upgraded the PSU, motherboard and CPU a couple of years ago, then the RAM, the HDD.. (cost about £300)

And then last year I had to upgrade the graphics card because of SP2 (20 quid)..

Now i'm considering £40 on another HDD..


part of me is thinking I should just shell out and get a new PC.

But, mine still works fine for what i need it for (though HDD space is getting a little tight), but the case is 10 years old, as are the DVD and CDRW drives..

All I do really is iTunes/Pictures/Surfing and the odd game (not since i got the xbox though), and i just dont want to keep throwing money at this old box...

So, could anyone reccomend a decent PC (dont need a screen though) for a reasonable price i'd appreciate it!

[Fidgits]

naaa...

think ill stick with just a new hdd...

i cant find the thread that a guy looking for an EIDE drive posted, it mentioned he should get SATA (or ATA?) and linked to some good drives for older motherboards..

[Fidgits]

magic torch said:

Fidg, you do know it's now 2007?

Does yours have a 'Turbo' button on it?

actually....










no.







Look, the problem is, I bought this damn thing nearly 10 years ago at Uni, and ever since have ended up upgrading odds and sods every year. I should really get a new one I know, but after splurging £300 a couple of years ago on Motherboard/Cpu, and seeing how it does actually work perfectly well for my requirements (okay, getting low on HDD space) I just think spending £400-500 quid on a new machine might be a waste.

But then i really should get up to speed with dual-cores, PCIe, SATA etc...

It's just to get a decent machine, its gonna cost, and if i ended up with a new cheap celeron, its not going to be any better than what ive got already!

[Fidgits]

magic torch said:

Just kidding...

My desktop Mac is 6 years old, used daily, still doesn't need replacing. Original hard and optical drives are long gone though, does the job.

Didn't have home PCs when I was at Uni.

you aint that old Jamie...

[Fidgits]

magic torch said:

Fidgits said:

you aint that old Jamie...

It was well over 10 years ago...

I had an Amiga, but virtually nobody had a PC at home. Couldn't afford one, even with the monochrome screen.

huh.

I remember our first x286 with the green screen, a long, long time ago, and it can't of been that expensive if we had one, but then I think our old man did work in computers back then, so probably did some deal on an older one

I bought this beast in the second year of Uni with a Whopping 600Mhz Athlon processor.. a quantum leap from that old thing (but then it probably was about 8 years later!)

Edited by Fidgits on Saturday 6th January 12:11

[Fidgits]

magic torch said:

Some of us started Uni in the 1980s...

I know, I don't look that old.

you lied about your age then...

or i can't count!

[Fidgits]

ThePassenger said:

Fidgits said:

It's just to get a decent machine, its gonna cost, and if i ended up with a new cheap celeron, its not going to be any better than what ive got already!

Most cheapo machines are AMD Athlon X2 (like the Acer, Dell's low end desktops), it's AMD's version of Core 2 Duo.

Anyway, on topic. You have these options:

1. Buy a PATA 40Gb HDD and hope it works with the old motherboard.

2. Buy any PATA drive you like and a EIDE PCI controller card. This will bypass the disk controllers on the board and thus eliminate the 'will it work'.

3. Buy any new SATA drive and a SATA PCI controller card. You may, depending what comes with the drive need a SATA power converter. This will again bypass the controllers on the motherboard.

1. PATA? is that just ATA? The motherboard is only 18 months-2 years old, i can't imagine it having too many problems?

[Fidgits]

so would this work?

www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/120286

[Fidgits]

ThePassenger said:

Fidgits said:

so would this work?

www.ebuyer.com/UK/product/120286

cool!

sorry to be a pain - but I guess this would work also:
www.dabs.com/ProductView.aspx?Quicklinx=4B7T&CategorySelectedId=11154&NavigationKey=11154,50413,41610000&InMerch=1

[Fidgits]

okay, dug out the manual..

under IDE It says it has 2x UltraDMA 133/100/66

that they are dual channel bus master and can support up to four ultraDMA133/100/66 , PIO modes 3 & 4 IDE devices.

[Fidgits]

ThePassenger said:

Fidgits said:

okay, dug out the manual..

under IDE It says it has 2x UltraDMA 133/100/66

that they are dual channel bus master and can support up to four ultraDMA133/100/66 , PIO modes 3 & 4 IDE devices.

The 250 (second link) should work ok. I'm just trying to remember when 48bit LBA became the norm... but yeah sod it 18 months and you should be fine.

Just been delving deep into the BIOS manual - and the LBA section mentions when LBA is enabled, the 28-bit addressing of the HDD is used without regard for blah, blah

LBA mode required for drives with more than 504Mb of storage capacity

But it also says the BIOS calcutes the maximum LBA capacity based on drive info? I probably can update the BIOS, but i think its an old board and i got the last update?

Dunno if that helps at all?


Oh, and im right in thinking if i get a DVD-RW drive it can still write CD-r's yeah? its just they dont show a write speed for them???

[Fidgits]

OKay, according to this: www.techsupportforum.com/hardware-support/troubleshooting-tips-tricks/123029-137gb-barrier-ddo.html

28-bit LBA only supports up to 137Gb Harddrives, so 120Gig it is!

Edited by Fidgits on Saturday 6th January 20:06

[Fidgits]

if anyones around - I guess this will work?
www.dabs.com/ProductView.aspx?Quicklinx=2FZS&CategorySelectedId=11154&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11154,364220000,41610000&InMerch=1

[Fidgits]

ThePassenger said:

Fidgits said:

if anyones around - I guess this will work?
www.dabs.com/ProductView.aspx?Quicklinx=2FZS&CategorySelectedId=11154&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11154,364220000,41610000&InMerch=1

Yep.

cheers ordered that one then!