hard drive?

[MR CMH]

hi

just wondering can i have 2 hard drives in one pc and if so do i have to put xp on the 2nd one if i have it on the 1st one.

thanks

[[M]uuhh]

Yes you can & no you dont, it will simply show up as another disk drive. i would ask how to do it at your local compouter shop before trying it yourself without knowing what your doing.

[MR CMH]

dont u just put it in and start up the pc and thats it. and also make the pc boot from the one with xp in it.

don't you?

[Archaon]

Yes except for the last bit, but your first question hardly made most of us think "hardware installation expert"...

[MR CMH]

wots the last bit

[Vini]

also make the pc boot from the one with xp in it.

thats the last bit, xp should be alright as it is. you shouldnt need to tell it anything providing you get the setup right (i dont want to go into it technically, i could confuse you)

you wont need to do anything apart from plug it in.

[[M]uuhh]

well he will need to format and partision it, thats where he will need some one to show him ;)

[MR CMH]

why do i need to format it and partician it

[dangerous_dom]

Because your operating system won't recognise a drive unless its formated to a specification your operating system can work with. For example, Win XP uses the file system known as NTFS - so a new drive will need to be formated to the NTFS spec.

One other thing everyone seems to have forgot - you mother board will have 2 IDE channels. You can run 4 devices on two IDE channels. Thats a 1 'master' and one 'slave' on each channel. If you put a second hard drive in on the same channel as the existing one, you will need to set the new one to 'slave' (the OS should be the master). Thier will be a switch (or jumper) on the back of the drive for setting master/slave.

[Archaon]

Basically some drives may work as soon as the PC boots up, some may require you to mess with disc management to get the drive and space to "show up" in Windows.

New HDDs almost always come set on CS, or "Cable Select" so if the new drive is on the slave port of the cable you shouldn't have any problems. Check, though.

[MR CMH]

what you say is good harddrive space. i have loads of games and i download alot so what would you size should i get.

i have a 80g at the moment( which is annoying )

[[M]uuhh]

120gb, as its your first time, i recommend go to your local computer repair shop or whatever and buy it from there and they will show you on a real pc how to set them up under windows (format / partision), thats your best option.

[MR CMH]

Is Their A Certain Type Of Hard Drive I Need Or Can I Just Get Any Hard Drive. I Want A 120g Plus My 80g

[[M]uuhh]

depends on your motherboard, but you "should" be on with any ATA100/133 harddrive lke this http://www.kustompcs.co.uk/acatalog/info_6227.html

DONT GET Serial ATA or SATA!!!!! they probably wont work for you