Please help with my configeration with new back up HD

[Trebax]

Hi, I'm about to adjust my hardware configeration and I would really appreciate some expert advice.

Currently I have one master HDD on EIDE1 with a CDR as the slave. On EIDE2 I have just a master DVD drive.

I want to add another HDD so as I can backup my windows and all of my files.

I'm thinking of adding the back up HDD as a slave on the EIDE2 cable which has my DVD as a master.

Is this the best way to do it or should I have both HDD on EIDE1 and both CD drives on EIDE2?

Please can you advise.
Thanks in advance

My operating system is Windows XP pro.

 

[wolluf]

There's lots of threads with similar questions - you might want to search for some other opinions.

Generally best to put devices with similar speed interfaces on the same cable. Having said that, 2 hard drives is better combination than hard drive and CD/DVD drive (IMO).
Against this of course, is if both hard drives are on separate IDE connectors (& contollers), copying between them should be faster than if both on same (ie, master & slave)

Drives using at least ATA33 interface speed can be connected to the same cable and the faster one will not be slowed down to the slower speed. With PIO mode drives (eg, shows as Mode4 on POST screen), this is not true - both drives run at the speed of the slowest.

If all your devices are ATA33 or faster - they should all run at full speed whatever the config. If both Hard drives are at least ATA33 but at least one of the CD/DVD drives is PIO, I'd put the hard drives together on the same cable.

 

[Trebax]

Ok, well I gues the main thing is that there isn't a wrong way of doing it. But I will follow your good advice - Thanks!

On another note. I would like to use the new HDD to completely back-up my current system. So as I can use it if my master hard drive fails in any way.

At the moment my master HDD is partitioned - I have half devoted to the OS and any programmes and I use the other half for storage (music, films, files etc) and games.

I would like to almost identically clone my current HDD onto the new back-up HDD.

Please can you recommend the best way of doing this.

Thanks

 

[wolluf]

Symantec Ghost and Powerquest Drive Image will both let you clone & recover your partitions (if you're happy spending money on them). XP's got its own backup program of course (which I've never used, so can't comment). One thing about backing up the partition with the o/s on - you generally need to be 'outside' the operating system (XP backup apart - i think this works in situ) to run backup, as various files are not accessible for copying when the o/s is running.

 

[dcwtechmech]

Great advice Wolluf !!!!! Let everything that have breath praise the Lord.