Adding hard drive to a PC.....

[Speeddog]

A bit of history on this machine that may be helpful.

Bought in '03 with XP as the OS.
Needed to have the capability to run NT, as I've got design software that only runs on NT.
Handed the PC over to a local geek who partitioned the drive, installed NT, etc.
Everything worked fine.
Several years ago, Norton AV fuxxored things up, had to call out a geek at an eye-watering price.
Everything again fine.

As E is nearly full now, it doesn't run well.

As I understand it:

Imaging my E to a larger partition of a new HD is a functional improvement, but brings along baggage.

----------------------

How can I easily get a functional improvement now with minimum possibility of damage, and have the ability to do an optimum fix later?

Image E to a larger partition on a new HD, then later do a fresh install XP on another partition of the new HD?

[ducpainter]

The fresh install would have no registry entries for your applications.

None of them would work with that install.

[DrDesmo]

1.) Determine if you can use a SATA hard drive or IDE.  If you're not sure, open up your computer case, take a picture, and put it in this thread.  I would imagine you could use SATA

2.) External adapter, plug the new drive into this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16812232002&cm_re=sata_usb_adapter-_-12-232-002-_-Product

3.)

- Acronis True Image - http://www.acronis.com/homecomputing/products/trueimage/index.html

OR ...

- DriveImage XML (Free, what I use, works great.) http://www.runtime.org/driveimage-xml.htm

Either of those pieces of software will completely clone your HD so you don't need to reinstall, reconfigure, or copy anything.

4.) Replace old hard drive

5.) Possibly change the drive letter through your windows XP / vista recovery CD

6.) Enjoy  

Cheers,
Adam

PS: Throw Norton in the garbage and install Microsoft Security Essentials (It's free and great.)  Also do a google search for "CCleaner"

[Speeddog]

I will never knowingly buy another Norton product. F them. 

My existing HD is a WD800BB, 80Gb EIDE.


Largest internal IDE drive I found on a quick search is 500Gb.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136111

Would an external SATA drive going through the USB yield the high data transfer rate advantage vs. the IDE?
Seeing as the PC in question is early '03 vintage, how do I determine what USB I have?
When am I going to see the advantage of the higher data transfer rate?

'cause there's 1.5Tb external available for ~same price as that 500Gb internal IDE....
http://www.frys.com/product/6305611?site=sa:Hard%20Drive%20&%20Memory%20Pod:Pod1

[ducpainter]

chances are if you have an IDE drive as oem you don't have SATA capability. You can buy sata/ide controllers to fix that.

If you go to computer management you can google the usb controller and get the specs.

[DrDesmo]

I will never knowingly buy another Norton product. F them. 

My existing HD is a WD800BB, 80Gb EIDE.


Largest internal IDE drive I found on a quick search is 500Gb.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136111

Would an external SATA drive going through the USB yield the high data transfer rate advantage vs. the IDE?
Seeing as the PC in question is early '03 vintage, how do I determine what USB I have?
When am I going to see the advantage of the higher data transfer rate?

'cause there's 1.5Tb external available for ~same price as that 500Gb internal IDE....
http://www.frys.com/product/6305611?site=sa:Hard%20Drive%20&%20Memory%20Pod:Pod1

I wouldn't worry about the transfer rate in your case, just rock an IDE drive.  There are many other "bottlenecks" on that age of a system (memory, single core processor, etc.) that would make it almost irrelevant. 

Cheers,
Adam

[ducpainter]

I wouldn't worry about the transfer rate in your case, just rock an IDE drive.  There are many other "bottlenecks" on that age of a system (memory, single core processor, etc.) that would make it almost irrelevant. 

Cheers,
Adam

You're right of course...

but if he buys a sata drive he can use it with his next computer.

[Monster Dave]

You're right of course...

but if he buys a sata drive he can use it with his next computer.

You're right of course...


but he's not trying to build a new PC, just get his current one up to par.

[erkishhorde]

I will never knowingly buy another Norton product. F them.  

My existing HD is a WD800BB, 80Gb EIDE.


Largest internal IDE drive I found on a quick search is 500Gb.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16822136111

Would an external SATA drive going through the USB yield the high data transfer rate advantage vs. the IDE?
Seeing as the PC in question is early '03 vintage, how do I determine what USB I have?
When am I going to see the advantage of the higher data transfer rate?

'cause there's 1.5Tb external available for ~same price as that 500Gb internal IDE....
http://www.frys.com/product/6305611?site=sa:Hard%20Drive%20&%20Memory%20Pod:Pod1

The spiffy thing about USB is that even if your computer doesn't have USB 2.0, you can still use it and only get the USB 1.0 speeds. Then when you eventually upgrade you're system and have USB 2.0 capability, you'll get the faster speeds.

The problem is that I don't think you want to try and run your OS on an external harddrive through a (potentially) USB 1.0 cable. That would be a nasty bottleneck if you got it to work. But if you go the external route, you could move all of your data files onto the external and leave only program files on the internal HD to try and free up some space doing that.

I gotta say, I'm impressed that your HD hasn't konked out on you yet. My HDs rarely make it to 7 years but then again I've been buying crappy Seagate stuff that hasn't even been making it through the 5 yr warranty so I have to send them in.  I think your best and safest bet is to go with a larger IDE drive. You can still transfer it over to a new PC when you upgrade. It just won't be as fast as an SATA. But ya know, depending on what you're running, you might not even notice.

[Speeddog]

So could I have both a SATA and IDE drive running at the same time, or does that release the magic smoke?

Computer Management says:

One of "Intel(r) 82801DB/DBM USB Enhanced Host Controller - NNLL"
Three of "Intel(r) 82801DB/DBM USB Universal Host Controller - NNLL"
Four of "USB Root Hub"

- NNLL being a number-letter
I'm assuming that means I have USB 2.0 on at least one port?

If I have to spend money, I would like for the HD to be usable on my next PC.
Assuming they don't change to some new spec before then. 

External does have more convenience, but higher chance of lost/stolen/FOD.

If I can swap stuff around enough so that I can clear off my OEM HD and re-partition to maybe 50Gb for XP and 30Gb for NT.
That would be +150% and almost +300% for their partitions.
Then have my data on the added HD.

[erkishhorde]

So could I have both a SATA and IDE drive running at the same time, or does that release the magic smoke?
IDE and SATA drives can both be on the same system as long as you have enough of the correct controllers for them or if they're hooked up via USB like as an external. IDE HDs use the same controllers as CD, DVD, 3.5" drives. Sata use their own controllers.

Computer Management says:

One of "Intel(r) 82801DB/DBM USB Enhanced Host Controller - NNLL"
Three of "Intel(r) 82801DB/DBM USB Universal Host Controller - NNLL"
Four of "USB Root Hub"

- NNLL being a number-letter
I'm assuming that means I have USB 2.0 on at least one port?
Dunno about this.

If I have to spend money, I would like for the HD to be usable on my next PC.
Assuming they don't change to some new spec before then.  
Even an IDE drive will be usable on your next system. It just won't be as fast as an SATA. Worst case, if you get an IDE and for some random reason your new PC doesn't have enough IDE controllers for you to hook it up, you can get an enclosure for it and turn it into an external drive.

External does have more convenience, but higher chance of lost/stolen/FOD.

If I can swap stuff around enough so that I can clear off my OEM HD and re-partition to maybe 50Gb for XP and 30Gb for NT.
That would be +150% and almost +300% for their partitions.
Then have my data on the added HD.
This is something only you know because we can't see your files. I highly doubt that the entire 20GB of E is the OS and I'm betting most of it is data but how much of it is actually data is some you'd have to look up. You don't want to be moving program files around to free up space but any of your pictures, music, and documents can be moved. I would say that this is probably the least painful method to go right now.

Out of curiosity, do you know which files are on which partition? I'm assuming E is your Windows XP. What's on C that it only "needs" to be 9GB? I'm guess D is Windows NT and F is data. C is data too maybe?

[ducpainter]

You're right of course...


but he's not trying to build a new PC, just get his current one up to par.

I realize that...

but why throw money out the window?

If he replaces the box chances are it will be SATA compatible and if he buys that big external drive it will come in handy.

So could I have both a SATA and IDE drive running at the same time, or does that release the magic smoke?

<snip>
If I can swap stuff around enough so that I can clear off my OEM HD and re-partition to maybe 50Gb for XP and 30Gb for NT.
That would be +150% and almost +300% for their partitions.
Then have my data on the added HD.

You bet you can.

You will have trouble re-partitioning drives that already contain info...assuming you want to save it.

[Monster Dave]

I realize that...

but why throw money out the window?

If he replaces the box chances are it will be SATA compatible and if he buys that big external drive it will come in handy.You bet you can.

True. It all depends on budget. But I agree with what was said about putting an OS on an external drive (not a good idea).

[Speeddog]

Documents and Settings folder is 2.6Gb, Program Files folder is 3.2Gb, WINDOWS folder is 5.5Gb.

Currently using 17 Gb of 20Gb in the partition that's being a PITA.

---------------

So I could image all my stuff onto the new external drive.
Wipe my old 80Mb drive clean, so temporarily I would have my OS externally.
Partition my old drive 50 XP / 30 NT.
Image my original XP and NT back on my old hard drive.
And carry on, with improved function because my OS isn't fighting in a phone booth.

Yes?

[ducpainter]

Documents and Settings folder is 2.6Gb, Program Files folder is 3.2Gb, WINDOWS folder is 5.5Gb.

Currently using 17 Gb of 20Gb in the partition that's being a PITA.

---------------

So I could image all my stuff onto the new external drive.
Wipe my old 80Mb drive clean, so temporarily I would have my OS externally.
Partition my old drive 50 XP / 30 NT.
Image my original XP and NT back on my old hard drive.
And carry on, with improved function because my OS isn't fighting in a phone booth.

Yes?

Make note of all the drive letters.

What could go wrong?