Additional HDD for aging computer

Dr.EM

Dr.EM

Dr.EM

Soldato
Joined
15 Jun 2006
Posts
3,900
Location
Swindon
This should be simple, and it probably is! My computer currently has a 250GB hard drive, but it's nearly full now so my plan is to pop a new 1TB drive in alongside it. Not as a RAID1 or RAID0 or anything, just so that it hopefully appears as drive E or something. My motherboard is this, currently using just 1 SATA for my current HDD so 3 are spare:

http://uk.gigabyte.com/products/product-page.aspx?pid=2615#sp

they are SATA2, 3Gb/S ports, but I will be getting a modern SATA3 6Gb/S drive as come summer time I plan to do a new build and the 1TB drive will move over into that, alongside an SSD boot drive. Sure that's no problem though, just wanted to check it really is as simple as installing the drive and using it, no special software, BIOS settings etc to enable it? This is probably the drive I'd get:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=HD-257-SE
 
Couple of things to note:
1) The drive doesn't come with cables so make sure you have a data cable to hand or order one with the drive.
2) Check your PC's power supply has a spare SATA power connector, if not you can get molex to SATA converters.

Once you've got the drive and it's installed boot into Windows and head to Disk Management (right click on My Computer and pick Manage). Once in there you'll need to initialise the disk (you should be prompted automatically) - pick MBR rather than GPT at this stage. Then go and create and format a new volume on the disk. Once that's done it'll appear as e:. If not you can change drive letters around in disk management.
 
Thanks for that! Just opened the side, I have a spare SATA power on my PSU and the distance between SATA ports and HDD is very short so I guess I best add one of these to my order:

http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CB-074-AK&groupid=1929&catid=1928&subcat=

This is all currently on Win XP btw, so when I move this drive over I was hoping that everything I'd put onto it would just stay there and appear on the new machine (will just be music, video etc, not games/software), but in fact might I have to format it again for installation in a new Win 7 machine?
 
You'll be able to move the disk into a Windows 7 machine without any problems, all the files on it should be accessible.
 
Windows 7 will be able to read a drive formatted in XP.

When you get the SSD install it as the only drive and install Windows 7(8). Once it's installed connect the other drive(s).
 
OT, but how is the drive no longer on offer? It was this morning and the this week only states "Special offers running from 26/12/12 to 02/01/13" so if it was on offer this morning how is it no longer this afternoon?
 
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