About to format my hard drive - QUESTIONS?

Question

I currently have an 80GB hard drive, but I'm buying a 300GB new one. My plan is to have the OS in the new one, and have the 80GB one as slave. How do I do this? I know I must first install the OS in the new one, but after placing the old one as slave, will I have to format it?

Answer 1

You do not HAVE to format the second drive. But why would you want to leave it filled up with the Windows program, and all that other program files you will not longer need?

Remove the original drive, and put in the new one. Install Windows and get it working on the new drive.

Then add the old drive. You may need to change the little jumper on the front of the drive (near where the power cord plugs in) to make your computer recognize that there is a second hard drive. You can have two drives on the same cable, but the one you boot from must set to "master" and the other to "salve".

Once the computer can see the old (second) drive, you should transfer over to the new drive anything you want to keep (music, pictures, videos, etc.). Then format the old drive to get rid of all the junk on it you don't need or want. What is the point of having a second drive if there is no room to put things on it.

Finally, copy the music, videos, pictures, etc. back to the second drive. Most people who have two drives will put Windows and all their programs on the first (C) drive, and all the "data" on the second. Then they can easily back up everything just by backing up that second drive. If something happens, you can reinstall Windows and programs, but you can't data. By keeping the data separate, it is easier to backup and recover if needed.

Answer 2

Put your OS and certain basic programs and things that are easiy reinstalled on the 80GB hard disk. Use the 300 GB for the slave. You will be better of this way. You can keep things on it without a fear of losing them. If your OS crashes you can reinstall it back on the 80 GB and the slave will still have all your stuff. You also won't have to worry about losing things with important stuff on the slave. This will save you a lot of pain in the future.

Answer 3

No, you won't need to format it, just set the jumpers on the old drive so that it is set to "slave" or "SL" and make sure the new drive is set to "MA" or "master".

Also, be warned, SOME older systems have problems with drives larger than 128 GB. There are two potential causes for the problem - the Computer's BIOS (which you may be able to upgrade) and Windows itself (which both XP and 2000 have patches for - if you use the latest Service Pack, Windows should be ok).

IF you hit this problem you can also buy a third party controller card to get around it if the BIOS update failed to work.

Answer 4

No, you will not have to reformat your 80GB hard drive. However, once it is a slave drive, if you do not intend on ever booting with it again you can remove the windows and program files folders on it. They will just be taking up space. Of course, if you put some of your files in those directories, then back them up before you delete them. Also you may want to delete your documents and settings folder also, but chances are you have stuff in them, so you can keep that one. Also, if your 80 GB hard drive is formatted for FAT32, I would recommend formatting it anyway, and switching it to the NTFS file system. It's more stable.

Answer 5

It depends on how old your computer is. Some require you to set a jumper on the drive as master/slave. Newer ones auto detect.

Once you get the OS up and running on the new drive, you can copy any files off the old drive. I'd recommend formatting it just to get rid of the old OS and any other junk that is cluttering it up, but you shouldn't *HAVE* to format it, just a good idea.

Answer 6

How did you format thepersistent? It you probably did it from a DOS or command on the spot, you could nicely be hitting a cut back with the BIOS of the computing device that may not enable it to verify or use complicatedpersistent (in DOS) that are over 39 gb (a common barrier) attempt the format back from interior abode windows. bypass to the administration Panel, the government techniques, then computing device administration, and look at thepersistent under the Disk administration section. See what it shows there for length, form of partitions at thepersistent. If it has 2 partitions on it (the 2nd is probable unformated), then you definately will could desire to delete the present partition and create a partition that makes use of the wholepersistent, then you definately would be waiting to format it.

Answer 7

Do you want to use it as like a file slave? Or like an OS slave? If you wanna double boot I think you can boot from both if you set the 80 gig as slave. If you don't format nothing will be really damage I believe.
If you do set it as slave it will either do one of three things, be damaged, double boot (2nd OS you can boot from) or thirdly you just a have slave harddrive that you can look through while you're using your 300 GB.

Answer 8

I would leave the 80G as master and have the 300 as slave.

80G is more than enough for windows, and otherwise you will have to completely reinstall everything or image the drive to new drive.

I'd suggest having windows and applications on that drive, and all your data files, videos, MP3, etc etc etc on the 300.

If you have an application like driveimage or ghost to "image" the 80G dive, leave a spare area on teh 300 as a backup partition with a KNOWN GOOD image of windows so if you ever get a bad virus / hardware failure on the 80, you can be back operating much quicker.

Answer 9

If you want to use 300gb primary harddisk , you have to plug it as a Master , then do 80gb slave. When you plug your new harddisk you have to install system in it first, put windows boot cd in your rom, then first format 300gb hdd , then install it.

Answer 10

no it wont format,jus adjust the appropiate jumper at the back of the hard drive 1=master,1=slave.and install the OS on the 300