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I need to install a second hard drive in my PC tower. This worries me. But it must be done and I don't want to take it somewhere to be done for me. So , I will myself.

Main questions:

a)anyone know of any good computer related websites that have total hand-holding for novices installing hardware? And then all the assigning and master-slave-IRQ-ports-IDE-DMA- aaaaahhhhhhhhh!

b) anyone here have a Dell PC tower? Have any of you done this and are there any peculiarities with Dell that they don't divulge on their tech support site?

thanks alot

Hi Alan, my best advice go buy a usb 2.0 snap it into the pci slot. This is really easy to do. Take your case apart and snap it in. Install the driver. Plug in your usb hard drive and you are ready to rock.

This link should help you install a hard drive. http://pcsupport.about.com/library/weekly/aa112702a.htm

Here is a link to pcworlds top ten hard drives. http://www.pcworld.com/reviews/article/0,aid,109615,00.asp


[This message has been edited by jeff2 (edited 04-15-2003).]

[This message has been edited by jeff2 (edited 04-15-2003).]

Wow thats excellent !
Thanks alot

I have installed many hard drives, and it is not that difficult. I have had the best luck installing the second drive as the secondary master. You may need another 40 or 80 pin ribbon cable to do that. I usually configure CD drives and ZIP drives as slaves. Just be careful to align pin one on the ribbon cable with pin one on the drive and set the jumpers accordingly. Once you have the drive installed, you will need to partition the drive and then format it. Most drives have software to do that, but it can be done with windows as well. Feel free to email me if you get stuck at waltsongs@lycos.com.

Hope that helps
Walter Farmer

http://www.prosoundweb.com/recording/articles/tascam/pc.shtml

That's my favorite online manual for setting up a PC for recording. It covers adding a second harddrive, among other things. I added one to my Dell Dimension 4100 successfully so my situation's probably similar to yours.

------------------
Later,

Pat

Hello- Farmboy-

What is Slave and what is Master....

I am doing this with the intention of keeping the 30 GB drive in my PC for programs/crap and non-audio data, then making the second BIGGER drive as the all-audio drive.
So in my case, is the small drive the master and the new giant Audio drive the Slave??

thanks

Most Mother Boards have two IDE channels, a primary and a secondary, so you can install two IDE cables, each of which has two IDE connectors. That allows up to four IDE devices. In order to have both IDE devices on the same cable, one must be set as the Master device, and one must be set as the Slave. There are usually jumpers on the drive that are labeled M S and CS with CS standing for Cable Select. I have never used the CS setting. If you are connecting both Drives to a single IDE cable, you will need to leave your smaller drive set as the primary master (which it most like is), and set your newer larger drive as the primary slave. If you are using a second IDE cable, you should configure the Large drive on that cable as the Secondary Master.

Hope that's clear
Walt