Hard Drive issue..want to know if I can..

[Guest_imported]

Ok, here's my situation. I'm running out of hard drive space and I have really important data I need to back up(audio data)...I don't really want to back up to cdr because it will take hundreds of hours and discs...I'm still making the decision to by a new hard drive so this is my situation..

I have 2 drives mounted on my cpu...
1 drive is a 45 gig hard drive which is set to primary and the other is a 15 gig hard drive which is set to slave...

I split the 45 gig hard drive into 3 partitions, the first partition set as the c drive contains the os..which I figure is safe to reformat if I need to reinstall windows...and the other 2 partitions are split into 18 gigs..1 for audio and project uses, and the other for backup purposes...the 15 gig hard drive is set to the D drive and contains all the programs I run...like I said all my drives are filling up..and I want to reformat everything and start over...my question is...

Will I be able to take out the Slaved 15 gig hard drive and put in a new 40 gig hard drive set it as the slave and still access windows so I will be able to back up data from my primary 45 gig hard drive with out it having any issues?

If anyone can help I'd greatly appreciate it..thanks..

KANE

 

[edfair]

Depends 1) whether the new 45 is handled by your hardware
2)Whether you consider reloading the programs an issue.

You would have been better off to have your programs on one of the drive0 partitions, even though it would be E:

You can get around it by moving all the programs to unused space on c: (XP?) , putting your new drive in and moving the programs back to d:. You might lose some from hidden stuff that doesn't transfer correctly.

Reformatting and starting over sounds like a better option to me but I only have 1 or 2 programs, and they are hard copy documented with parameters to use. Ed Fair
unixstuff@juno.com
Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply. Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[Guest_imported]

hey thanks for the quick response...

Well I'm not to concerned with the programs on my D drive...as I can always reinstall them...what I really want to do is reformat my pc and start from scratch with a new 7200 rpm 40 gig hard drive..but before I do that I want to back up my data on to the new 40 gig hard drive that I'm going to buy and take out the 15 gig hard drive that currently store all my program files,...I'm just wondering if windows will act funny if I take out the 15 gig hard drive because it contains all my program files...I might try and add 3 drives, but it would probably bring more problems with it..let me know if it is possible to do the 3 drive situation if any knows..?? thanks for the replys

Kane

MY SYSTEM SPECS -
PROCESSOR: AMD ATHLON 1.2 GHZ
MOBO: DFI AK75AC motherboard,
MOBO CHIP SET: Via VT8363
BIOS: Award
RAMS: 416 megs
OS: Windows XP pro.
PRIMARY MASTER: Western Digital 45 GIG HD 5400
PRIMARY SLAVE: Quantum Fireball 15 GIG HD 5400
SECONDARY MASTER: PLEXTOR 12/10/32A
SECONDARY SLAVE: ASUS 40x MAX
VIDEO CARD: Nvidia GEFORCE 2 mx
SOUND CARD: M Audiophile Delta. 24/96

 

[edfair]

3 drive , no problem. Drive mapping will change.

Having programs be suddenly gone will cause error messages on startup. Possibly fatal. Ed Fair
unixstuff@juno.com
Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply. Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[Guest_imported]

Ok..well judging from what you've said, I can add the third hard drive with out taking out the Primary Slave hard drive? How would I go about doing that, would it be posibble if I added the new 7200 rpm hard drive as the Secondary Master and have my CDR set as Secondary slave. I've read issues about setting it up this way and I think I heard some where if it's DMA 100 or something like that it wouldn't really affect hard disk performance that much, I read on my mobo specs and I should have DMA 100. Also the reason why I need to add this third hard drive is so that I can back up all my existing data on my other hard drives, so the drive on the secondary master is temporary, If this configuration is compatible without error then I'll do a reformat and repartioning of the other 2 primary hard drives, take out the Primary slave and switch the new hard drive that I set as the Secondary Master with the backed up data on the Primary slave, basically swap the drives...Install OS on the Primary Master...and when I boot up the OS I'm figuring I should have all the backed data...If you have any ideas I'd appreciate it much...
Thanks

KANE

 

[edfair]

Why worry about CD anyway? You'll be shifting data around. Do it as simple as possible. And why reformat? All you've done is moved programs from one hard disk to another? Drives filling up isn't a reason for formatting, is a reason to start culling useless junk. And if you have speed issues you could try defrag. Ed Fair
unixstuff@juno.com
Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply. Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.

 

[Guest_imported]

Great, so I should add the third hard drive to Secondary Master and I should be able to back up data to it right? Yeah I figure I don't need the cd as this will all be temporary anyways...so you think the plan above without the cd hooked up to it will work? Let me know and thankyou for your oppinions..

KANE

 

[edfair]

Yes , it will work. Ed Fair
unixstuff@juno.com
Any advice I give is my best judgement based on my interpretation of the facts you supply. Help increase my knowledge by providing some feedback, good or bad, on any advice I have given.