noob question re sata hard drive install

[ThriceNightly]

hi all, I appreciate this is a probabaly a very simple question

i am rebuilding my pc and am replacing the existing 120gb sata hard drive with a new 160gb sata version

once the operating system is installed on the new drive I want to be able to plug in the old drive and copy accross my media files.

I basically need to know how to do this having never run more than one hard drive at a time in a system (do i need to do anything in the bios or with the jumpers on the hard drive etc)


thanks

 

[semi-pro waster]

You could just have made both threads into one here.

To do the install I'd unplug the existing SATA drive as occasionally Windows seems to find it amusing to span the install across both so you have something important like the boot file on one and most of the rest of the install on the other drive. Once Windows is set up then you should be able to copy across, just remember to set the correct boot order in bios and because the SATA drivers(if needed) will be installed then the drive should be recognised correctly.

Secondly to your partitions question, I don't bother personally but a lot of people do, it can help in the event that you need to reinstall Windows as you don't risk losing your data on the other partitions. Somewhere in the region of 15-20gb should be plenty for a Windows install and allows space to expand.

 

[ThriceNightly]

thnaks for the reply (much appreciated)