external hard drive help?

Question

i bought a simpletech/pininfarina 160gb external hard drive today, and I want to know if I can make it my main hard drive, as apposed to using it for back up. does anyone know how?

Answer 1

While it is possible that you could go into the BIOS and select the system to boot from your external drive, I would not suggest that you do so. If the drive is not hooked DIRECTLY to your motherboard, then XP allows the drive designation to "float." (For lack of a better word.) Thus, if you hook up your external drive and XP tells you it is "M," then you tell the BIOS to boot from M. However, somehow the external drive is disconnected and then reattached, it may be assigned as "Q." Even attaching a flash drive may disrupt the assignment of the drives.

I don't suggest you do this. It is a lot of trouble and is unstable. Also, the connection is slowed through the USB port. (Not as fast as a direct connection through SATA.) If you need a new hard drive, I suggest that you purchase an internal hard drive of the correct configuration (SATA vs. PATA/ATA) and correct size. The faster (at least 7200rpm) the better. It is very easy to install an internal hard drive. Good luck!

Answer 2

It may be possible but depends on your bios settings and if there is the option in the bios to boot from a USB device. There are many articles on this subject on the Internet might be worth your while taking the time to read some of them so you know more about the problems you can encounter and how you might be able to overcome them.

From what I have read it seems it is almost impossible if you are using anything older than Win XP SP2.

Best of luck, hope it works for you.

Answer 3

yess just go to system setup by tapping F2 or delete key while starting computer.
the go to boot sequence and make the first boot device as removable drive
also make sure tht usb emulation is turned on
save and exit
so i expext the OS been installed on ur external HDD

if not the insert the OS cd in the top drive of ur computer and restart the computer
keep tapping F12 key when u start the computer tapp it a little bit slowly and ull get boot menu
select cdrom and hit enter and be ready to hit enter again as soon as u see press any key to boot from cdrom....
hit enter to insatll windows...then accept the license agreement.....then ull see the partition screen and u should see the external HDD been mentioned.........dont do anything to C drive.....select the other partition check the space 160gb or littlr lees should be mentioned and then continue formatting the HDD and it will install on its own dont do anything tiil it ask for language or time and date screen
dont even hit any key while the system is rebooting wutomatically

Answer 4

i would open my computer up , it would show those little slice metals on each of the harddrive , the back of the harddrive will tell u where to move to , to make it slave or main , and u can do the same thing the older harddrive . much simpler