BleepingComputer.com: Installed 2nd drive

My computers 80gb hard drive is almost full. I had an extra 160 gb drive hanging around so I installed it today. I haven't yet partitioned/formatted it yet as I don't know what is the best course of action.

I am having some minor windows issues with my current drive (can't shut down process, some right click problems, can't install a printer driver I need etc). I'd like to keep the new dirve as clean as possible. I was thinking of reloading windows xp pro on it but was wondering is it possible to migrate SOME of the programs but not all? I don't really want to clone my hard drive as then I'd bring the problems with me.

In summary:

a) Do you have any partitioning recommendations?
Should I load the operating system on the new drive
c) Is it possible to migrate only some programs?

Thanks

Carolyn

Hi and welcome to the BC forums equinecpa!
Lets get started with your questions.

a) Do you have any partitioning recommendations?

My suggestion is to partition the whole 160Gb drive as one partition.

Here's what I suggest you do.

Remove the 80Gb drive from the computer for now.

Put the 160Gb drive as the primary drive, if this is an E-IDE drive make sure the jumpers on the harddrive are set to MASTER (some drives require no jumpers when they are the only one on the data cable)

Make sure you have the windows XP disk in a cdrom, make sure in the BIOS setup utility you have this cdrom as a bootable device to boot ahead of the harddrive.
Start your PC once you have the BIOS setup to boot from the XP CD.
When the white letters on the black screen say "TO BOOT FROM CDROM HIT ENTER" Do so before the prompt goes away.
Choose to format the Hard drive and install windows XP.
Let the process begin, right up until Windows XP is done fully installing.
Do any windows updates you need to do and install all your drivers.
Do another windows update.......this whole process will take several hours to complete.

Once all is said and done......you will re-install your 80Gb drive as a SLAVE drive, you can still access it through "MY COMPUTER" or in the BIOS you can change the boot devices around to once again boot to the 80Gb drive first.

Either way you will still be able to transfer your files from the 80Gb to the 160Gb by going to MY COMPUTER and accessing the other drive like it was a folder full of files.

Once your done with the 80Gb drives's contents, you can re-format it and use it as a BACKUP drive.

Your next question was>>
c) Is it possible to migrate only some programs?
Yes as I said you will still have access to them through MY Computer.


Hope this helps. Please let us know how you made out and what you decided to do.

Good luck!

OK I had to make a slipstream CD as I have an original XP Pro disk and it wouldn't recognize my drive (>137gb). During the windows set I get this message "file\i386\c-1252.nls could not be found. Error code is 7 . Windows setup can't complete. I've done a search and it seems this is a somewhat common error when not using an original xp disk. Some say clean your disk and try again (I did try twice and got the message twice). Any suggestions? Should I burn another disk? How do I clean my CD-writer and my cd?

Ok..I succeeded with the XP pro windows install. I made a new slipstream disk but took one extra step-and I don't know if this made the difference or not but will post in case it helps others.

Before I copied my XP CD I went into explorer and made sure I had "show hidden files and folders" checked (it was) and "hide system files" unchecked (it wasn't so I unchecked it). I slipstreamed another CD and now here I am working off a fress xp install.

So I'm now booting to the new drive and can see my old drive and files in my computer. How do I get the printer drivers and other settings ( I have dual monitors but the new boot hard drive doesn't see this yet...) installed on the new hard drive? Is there a way to move them without doing a fresh install from the disks?

And then the applications, what's the best utility to migrate selected programs from one drive to another? Is it possible to boot on my new drive but operate the already installed programs on the original drive rather than moving them? I'm exploring it now but don't see how I can actually run the programs...

This post has been edited by equinecpa: 06 February 2010 - 11:23 AM

Two weeks later...update and another question.

I got the hard drive installed with XP on the new hard drive. I then reloaded most of the programs. I kept my data on the original drive.

My issue: The computer was running so great when I installed the new drive with just xp and no programs- it was like having a brand new computer . As I added the programs it has slowed down considerably. Is there any way to avoid this slow down. I've almost at the point I'm considering buying a new computer but I look at the specs on mine and it really doesn't seem that bad.

From System Properties:
Intel Pentium 4 cpu 3.2 ghz, 3.19 ghz, 3.0 gb of ram.
Windows XP sp3

I'm a CPA so I"m running mostly financial type programs such as spreadsheets, tax software etc. Sometimes when I click on "my computer" it can take 20 seconds or more to load, other times it comes up in a couple seconds.

Can someone perhaps point me to some system diagnostics posts or tools to identify the "bottleneck" in my computer. I'm at my wits end and really don't have time to mess with t his in my busy season! Would perhaps upgrading to windows 7 help at all?


Thanks

Carolyn

This post has been edited by equinecpa: 21 February 2010 - 10:19 AM

(FWIW: I was an accountant in earlier days). Isn't tax season fun ?

You have a single-core CPU with 3GB of RAM...and you are running software which is memory-intensive and CPU-intensive. You probably also don't have a SATA hard drive and don't necessarily have a very large cache on your hard drive.

I don't know what you expect out of that system, but I can tell you that you probably really need a dual-core system, with 4GB of RAM, and a SATA II drive. Note that I did not say "quad-core".

As for the installation slowdown...that's normal, happens to anyone with a computer. The more the system is tasked to perform this chore and that chore...the slower the system speed gets as a fixed amount of resources...is continually called on to do more and more.

How much free space on this hard drive?

Windows 7 would be a step forward, but not for the reasons you seem inclined to want. It's a step forward because XP is now history, and Windows 7 is going to be the O/S of choice for the next few years...and I think it's an improvement upon XP/Vista.

Louis

New hard drive is 160gb with 156 gb free space. It is not SATA - I installed it because I had it, and needed the HD space. The motherboard is compatible with SATA but I fear the time has probably come to not upgrade but by a whole new system.

Fortunately (IMO), a new system meeting the specs I outlined...is relatively inexpensive these days.

I have never seen any point in buying more system than I really need or utilize...so I tend to stick to dual-core systems. The advantages of a quad-core system to a user like me...don't exist, IMO. May never exist until user applications are written to take advantage of the core multiplicity.

The 4GB of RAM (approximate $100 value) is pretty much what I would suggest for anyone running Windows XP or Vista or Win 7.

Louis