Adding a Hard drive, XP Home

I`ve got a new 60GB hard drive on order. At present I`m running on a 10 GB HD and no particular problems except I have to keep storing media on CD`s to keep the 10GB half empty.
I`ve got plenty of power supply.
I have a Cd burner and CD Rom.
From what I`ve gathered so far I install the new hard drive after checking the bios, XP recognizes it, then computer management> disk management come into play.
I plan on partitioning the new drive(slave) into three equal partitions and leaving the 10 GB (master) as is.
I hven`t seen the new HD yet, it`s a present from my daughter, I assume it will have some instructions with it. Any pitfalls ahead? Point me toward a good step by step?
I`ve found a couple but none that fit exactly.
As Usual thanks
Moore

 

The biggest pitfall that I have ever run across is JUMPER settings. Getting them right can be a real pain at times.

Also be prepaired ( many aren't ) for the CDROM letter to jump up by 3

Not knowing any better I assume that it is now D:

By adding three new partitions lettering will change to Master C: Slave D: E: F: ) and the CDROM will be come G:

I bring this up because I see this in your post

So that alone says you will be getting " Can't Find " errors. This is NORNAL. And can be fixed.

Need more help Come On Back.

BillyBob

 

Definetly wait for others to comment but I believe that IF the existing CDROM is in fact D:, you could just copy the contents of the CD to the new D: drive.

But please do understand that I THINK thos would work.

BillyBob

 

My entry into the drive lettering sweepstakes

C current HD

D first partition on the new HD

E & F: the roms

G thru ... then the rest of the partitions on the new HD.

Regards - Charles

 

That is possible. But I have not added a new HDs since the days of 98. And even If I diid add a new HD to this XP machine the CDROM is set to S:

But still It does not hurt to be prepaired. Because as you and I both know that many times things do not go the way we think they should.

BillyBob

 

Well, Well. It appears to be well worth my time to jump in here. I learned something new.

BTW. I made a mistake here

That is on the 98SE machines. The HD on this XP is I: The first one after the HD partitions.

So. IF I understand correctly I could add another HD and it would start a J: And if this actually the case it sure would make like a lot easier.

But this also brings up a question. Does this apply to both XP home and XP Pro ?

BillyBob

 

Hi Christer,

That scenario would happen if the drive letters for the opticals weren't moved towards the end of the alphabet AND the first partition on the new HDD was made a primary.
Ok, that's after the user's intervention.

At the first bootup, that drive will be D primary though.

Regards - Charles

 

Boy! What a great web site. All kinds of good information. I`m going to try to get my CDRW and CDROM on the last two letters. Not a killing matter If I don`t.
I`ll print all the posts off just in case a virus gets us before I install the new drive

 

Well more learning for me. I was not even thinking about a primary partition on the 2nd HD. But why would anyone want a Primary partition on the slave drive ? Maybe for a separted OS ?

But I will stand firm on one thing here. When we get this all together and get thing straighten out this post WILL BE PRINTED OUT. It is VERY educational. And I was THINKING about adding a 2nd HD to this machine. But after a BIG TIME cleanup of unused/needed/leftover stuff/trash I now have lots more room.

But overall I am glad that I jumped in.
Thanks for the education folks.

BillyBob

 

Hi BB,

But why would anyone want a Primary partition on the slave drive ? Maybe for a separted OS ?
Sure, that's one reason - I dual boot.

Also why wouldn't you? Other than for the reasons that Christer gave - a predictable sequence of added drive lettering, that also applies to the way I outlined. I know what the next drive letter will be.

Doesn't make any differnce as to system function.

Regards - Charles

 

Moore

Boy! What a great web site. All kinds of good information.

There is no way I could do anything other than 100% AGREE

BillyBob

 

Hi Christer,

Maybe not want but if the "new" HDD is a used HDD it may have a primary partition and the scenario would be according to Charles.
Not my experience. Added a new HD and came up D with the opticals shuffled to E & F. That's where the 2nd OS was added. Then added a 2nd partition to the D drive - using PM - and that became G, also primary. If you remember back, I started a thread on "What is the ideal OS partition size ".

Since then have added 2 External HD's and 2 flash drives.

The differences between the way to do this is perhaps due to your use of HD racks.

Regards - Charles

 

Darn !! All kinds of questions popping up here.

When we speak about partitioning does it make any difference in what software we use to do same ?

I myself have never used ANYTHING from Windows or PM to do my HD setup. I have always ( so far ) used the very old fashioned FDISK from the 98 Startup disk to setup and format a new HD.

But it has also been about ( at least ) five ( 5 ) years since I messed with a new HD.

BillyBob

 

LOL, that's what's maddening at times, always multiple ways of doing things.

A further complication to my setup: both of the original HD's were replaced with new HD's that are larger than the originals and the originals became the two external HD's, they were cloned and since the new are bigger, the partitions were adjusted proportionally.

Regards - Charles