IDE to SATA cable conversion...

[spyder850]

Hey guys,

Im a noob to the forums here, but here goes.

I have reciently upgraded to a brand new Dell Dimension E521 Desktop which has a 160GB SATA drive in it, but i find no connectors (power or data) for my 30 GB IDE hard drive from a previous machine.

I plan to use OSL2000 as an os loader to ask me each time when i boot up
My problem:

Now, id like to use my 30 GB hdd (running windows ME)in my new Dell Desktop but i have no connectors for it! ive attempted to use my existing data cable from my previous machine to see if at least my data cable will work for the 30 GB drive, but the connector is too long...Is there a way i can connect my 30 GB Drive using SATA power and data connectors?

I hope ive been clear...If not let me know. Any help would be much apprieciated.


Thanks,
GD

 

[spyder850]

hey guys sorry for the second post! my browser was acting up.


mucho apologies.

 

[Lemon13]

get a ide-pci card and connect the old hdd there

 

[Nelviticus]

You'll need to reinstall Windows ME on the 30GB drive if you want to boot from it though - you can't just take a boot drive out of one machine and put it in another as all the installed drivers will be wrong.

Nelviticus

 

[spyder850]

Thanks for the help guys, but the one ive found is listed here at tigerdirect...would you say this is what controller pci card youre talking about Lemon13?

http://www.tigerdirect.com/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1070704&Tab=0&NoMapp=0

It offers RAID but i dont need that, i just want to be able to boot from either my SATA 160 GB that came with my new machine or my 30 GB drive with windows ME on it. Is it possible to just use it to boot from the second drive and not utilize the RAID or must i use the raid?


Thanks,
spyder.

 

[wahnula]

Spyder,

The above will work...just make sure you have a apare PCI slot. And why oh why would you EVER want to boot into WinME???

Tony

 

[spyder850]

yes wahnula, windows ME (the Mistake Eddition) my mother loves it...she first used windows ME when we got our PC in the year 2000 and she wont use anything else! since she got another one, we share it in the house, i use it occasionally for research and paperwriting (im still in school)and she likes her photos, her email, so why not keep her happy...


good ole win ME...


and yes i have an extra pci slot. so i am good to go. ive ordered the adapter a few days ago so i should be getting it soon!

thanks for all your posts guys! i hope it works out well!


thanks again,
Spyder.

 

[Nelviticus]

Spyder, you can't just boot a new PC from an old drive. It won't work. The installation of ME on your old drive has all the drivers for your old PC and none of the drivers for your new PC. You can make a NEW installation and copy the old files but you can't just plug the drive in and boot, even with a PCI IDE card.

It might get as far as booting but it will be unstable.

Regards

Nelviticus

 

[spyder850]

Yeah...im having mucho trouble not only with the ME hdd...i reformated it, and reinstalled windows ME, and the drivers and such wont even recognise my cd rom drive! i wanted to at least keep the os windows based...now, i have a windows xp media center cd...and i've used the cd key finder jellybean to obtain my cd key, is it possible to use that cd to put windows on my new drive? or will it conflict since i have the same cd and key for two drives?

or maybe i should post a new thread...

any friggin help would be lovely.


im feeling this is IMPOSSIBLE!

 

[Nelviticus]

I think you're allowed to use the same copy of Windows for two separate installations as long as they're both on the same machine, so you should be able to install Media Centre Edition (MCE) on your old hard drive with your existing key. There should be a sticker on the case showing the key - if you've found it with jellybean just double-check that they're the same.

When you boot from the installation CD it will ask you which drive you want it installed on. When it's all finished you will see XP's own boot loader whenever you start up, asking you which installation you want to boot from.

Why do you want two installations though? You can just set up two users instead.

Nelviticus