2 Hard Drives w/ windows

stephen · #1 05-30-2005, 08:12 PM

i am tryuing to install two harddrives on a new computer, one has windows XP one has XP professional, i would like to install my current hard drive with all of my information on the new computer with Windows XP professional, how or even is this possible? When i hook both on them my computer just crashes. i would like to just reformat one of them. i would like to reformat my new computer hard drive so i can keep all of my old information, but when i hook up just my older hard drive, it wont start windows. if possible can u give me full detail on this plz..

IneRtia dRaft · #2 05-30-2005, 09:25 PM

old pc: Windows XP Home

new pc: Windows XP Pro

so you want all the info from the old harddrive to the new harddrive? if so what are you trying to trasnfer? if its something simple you can just burn it over or have a flash drive.

if you wanna format the new hdd disconnect your master hd and plug in the new hdd. make sure the jumper setting is correct. pop in a OS cd and format the hd before installing the OS or if its running in DOS just format from there.

stephen · #3 05-30-2005, 09:27 PM

no i just want to have both hard drives on there one of them has 40GB and the other is 80 GB so theres no use and throwing one of them away

IneRtia dRaft · #4 05-30-2005, 09:31 PM

so you wanna use the old hdd as your master for new pc?

stephen · #5 05-30-2005, 09:35 PM

yes, exactly!

tzobal · #6 05-31-2005, 04:53 AM

Hi

As Inertia said:

1. Disconnect drive to have the OS.
2. Connect the drive to be formatted and make sure it is the master.
3. Pop in the OS disk and format the drive. Do not complete installation
4. Connect drives again, OS drive (old one I beleive...) as master at the end of the band (wire, watever) and connect the formatted drive as a slave at the middle of the band.
5. Boot and off you go.
6. You might find that you might have to repair/update the windows installation on the old drive.

I think that is it! If I am talking out of my behind, please people let me know!

stephen · #7 05-31-2005, 05:17 PM

No, actually u helped me alot. but i need to figure out how to reformat and then put windows back on. because the computer i got is from a business and it keeps asking for administrative properties. it wont let me do system restore or install anything from the internet or a CD. can i change the settings w/ out having to reformat the disc.

tzobal · #8 05-31-2005, 07:01 PM

Right!

This is how it works in my (extremely large) organisation:
There are a few administrating accounts pre-set on the computer.
You cannot alter any settings unless you are a local administartor, which you clearly are not! As you clearly do not have any administration accounts login details, you will not be able to alter any settings. Now you can either bang you head against that wall or you can 'cut your losses' and start fresh.

1. If you can backup any personal data from the specific drive, do so - CD, DVD, memory stick or whatever shakes it for you.
2. Formating an active disk is impossible from within Windows so having access to any settings before hand is not relevant.
3. You can only format a disk either before it has loaded the 'active' OS or if it is a secondary drive which has no OS on it.
4. If you know how to, in BIOS, change the boot option to the CD-Rom. If you do not know, wait a minute, we'll get to that.
5. Make sure, the drive to carry the OS is connected on it's own at the end of the band, 'Jumpered' to Master.
6. Put the Windows CD in and start the PC. The PC will boot from the CD and will start the windows Installation. Choose to go for a fresh installation which will give you the option to Format the drive and start fresh. If you are not that confident, do not create any partitions yet. You can always do this later. Voiala!
7. If you do not know how to change BIOS settings or you have a dodgy Windows copy or whatever and you have a floppy drive, get yourself a set of Boot floppy disks -
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...5-bd5afee126d8 Home Edition
or
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/d...7-4fed408ea73f Pro edition

You pop the first disk in, turn the PC on and just sit back and watch the show.

This is to install the fresh copy of windows.

Just to format a disk for later use see the steps in my first reply.

Good luck and again let me know if my arse learned English al of a sudden.

valleyman · #9 06-19-2005, 11:25 PM

Hi. I was adding a hard drive to my dell and needed to format it and put windows xp home on it so I hooked it up as a master slave drive and formatted it. So I had a 40 gig(the original) and a 30 gig. I got windows on the 30 so each one has windows on them. When I went to boot from the 40 gig it said something like cannot boot because of the disk drive configuration settings. Is it bad that I formatted the 30 while both hard drives were in it? so I had one as master primary(the original 40) and one as primary slave and I formated the slave while the master was in. is that the problem?