Hard drive help

So i just bought a new hard drive I take off my computer case to put it in but guess what it only has slots for 2 hard drives and I already have 2 in there:bnghd: So my question is Should i take out my local C: drive which I think controls everything or get rid of my D: drive which has everything on it I know you are probably going to say C: but i was wondering if that would mess up everything anyone know what I should do?
Or is that a stupid question
and does it matter if the C: is the local and the D: a new volume
Does anyone know if i take out the wires going to one of my currently in drives will it erase any data I have on it? I really need to know



[Edited on 12-10-2004 by Thug69]

If you have an extra bay for a CD-ROM you can always put your disk in their with a mounting kit that lets you put hard drives in those larger bays. Might run you a couple dollars.

Windows and all your important boot files are probably on your C drive, so be careful there. Some hard drives come with utilities that let you transer data from an old drive to a new one, in the event you want to, for example, totally replace your current C drive with the new disk.Pulling the wires out won't hurt anything. Just be gentle. The power cable can sometimes be tight and I once broke the power plug on the drive trying to pull the power cable out.

Also be sure to thoroughly ground yourself before fiddling around in there.

Listen to Bob and Dreamland, they are both correct.

Also, perhaps Bob overlooked making clear that you may not need to remove either c or d hard drive. Look closely at the cable connected to the cd rom. If you are lucky there is another open(unused) cable connection on it. Some do some dont, but most of these ribbon cables are set up with 2 connectors on one end so that you can add a hard drive, or another cd/dvd. Remember to set up the hard drive jumper to master or slave depending on the current setup of the cd rom, but that is for another post.

So if i take out the wires to get a look in there I wont lose any data on the drives?

Okay...most computers built int he last...6 years id say, come with 2 IDE Channels. You say that you already have 2 Hard Drives on 1 Channel. On the other one, if you dont already have 2 Optical Drives, you can put your new Hard Drive on the empty slot. If you DO have 2 Optical Drives along with your current 2 Hard Drives then it would be best to Ghost all your information from the D Drive onto the new Hard Drive and put it in its place.

As for losing the information....nope...unplugging it wont to crap except unplug it.

Oh yeah...IDE Cables are those big flat ones. Some may be rounded...but doubtful.

[Edited on 13-10-2004 by dreamlandmafia]

Originally posted by Bob88
Windows and all your important boot files are probably on your C drive, so be careful there.

Yeah, booting of operating system requires its own boot code which is in primary master's primary partition.
So just copying contents of C-drive wouldn't be enough. You would have to to use those tools made for that operation.

And taking of cables won't destroy content of HD, it's nonvolatile memory so it survives without power.
But just remember to shutdown PC totally before taking of cables.


So you have only two "slots" for HDs?
I wouldn't recommend keeping HDs "side by side" without any space between them. Current HDs generate so much heat that if you just put other directly above another it will very propably shorten "life" of them. At least there should be fan cooling them.

I myself have three HDs with space between them and fans cooling them so they feel only little warm when touched.
(and with other drives drive letters are running all way to N)
PS. Did you know that this case can feel little cramped?

Hey thanks a lot guys I did it pretty easily not hard at all. But E_t i am sure the hd's wont get to hot since the computer is built like that and they are not like touching themselves so they will probably be good