» Order Online
   » Contact Us
   » Guestbook
   » Newsletter Archives
   » Our Staff
   » Home
   » Site Index
Free Email Newsletter

 

Office Helper Internet SpecialsOffice Helper free catalogsOffice Helper computers, etc.Office Helper productsOffice Helper news you can useOffice Helper resource linksOffice Helper web design services

Office Helper newsletter archives


Installing and Configuring Your
New Hard Drive (Pt. 3)


Get connected! Before I present this final article about installing and configuring your new hard drive (and configuring your system to properly recognize the old drive), I wanted to let you know that beginning with our next issue of Everything Office, I'll be discussing topics that have to do with networking. These will include information about firewalls, network security, hacking and how to network the computers in your office or home.

Although it is relatively easy to set up and configure a new drive, because there is a number of issues that must be addressed in order to do this properly, it has not been possible for me to discuss each of them in detail. In order to keep these articles relatively brief, I've had to do some generalizing, so if you have one or more specific questions to which you would like answers, please email me.

Please visit our Newsletter Archives, to review the previous three articles about choosing and installing a new hard drive, as well as transferring your data (or your entire system) from your old to your new drive.

The specific issue that I will be discussing in this final article deals primarily with how to configure your old drive in order to get your computer to properly recognize it as the correct drive letter. If you have decided to keep that old drive as a place to store files or backups of files, you may have a problem unless you follow these instructions.

Remember, if you will be setting up your new drive using the special 40pin/80 wire data cable that came with your drive (thus taking advantage of the high-speed 66MB/sec. transfer rate of the drive), I recommend that you do NOT connect your old drive or your CD-ROM to your mainboard (or the adapter card you purchased if your mainboard does not support the ATA-66 specification) using the cable to which your new drive is connected. The preferred method in this instance is to set the jumper on your new drive as master/stand-alone and connect it to the PRIMARY BUSS on the adapter card or mainboard. Then, using the 40 pin/40 wire cable already inside your computer, connect your old drive (set to master/stand-alone) and your CD-ROM (set to slave) to the SECONDARY BUSS on the card or mainboard. Keep in mind that none of the drives connected to the adapter card will not be recognized by your mainboard's BIOS, but will be recognized by the BIOS on the adapter card.

Once this is complete and your BIOS recognizes the drives properly, it's a matter of following my previous instructions with regard to formatting and installing the operating system and/or transferring files. Remember, you cannot move a Windows' based software application (i.e. Word, Excel, Netscape, Quicken, etc.) from one drive to another by simply moving a folder. You MUST install a Windows' based software application, just as you must uninstall it to completely remove it. In the case of a DOS-based program, you can move the folder(s) that contain the DOS program to a new location, but you will also need to redirect any start-up shortcuts on your desktop or your start menu to the new location.

Once you have all of the files, etc. transferred to your new drive, my recommendation is that you disconnect your old drive (even just temporarily) from your computer for several days to make sure everything works properly. This may require that you reset the jumper on the primary drive back to a 'stand alone', but not necessarily. Try it first without resetting the jumper. If your computer won't recognize the drive properly, or won't boot, reset the jumper to 'stand alone' or 'off' (see your drive instructions).

The reason I recommend this is a matter of security, because the next task you should perform is to repartition and format your old drive. Once you repartition that drive, all of the data previously installed on it is GONE FOREVER! If something isn't working properly or you forgot some files that you wanted or needed, you'll still be able to get that data if you haven't partitioned and/or formatted the old drive. So, have a little patience and wait a week.

When you are sure that all is well and that you have everything you need from your old drive, reconnect it to your computer as described above and in previous articles. Place your Windows Start Up floppy disk (boot disk) in your 'A drive' and boot your computer. Then you are asked if you want to start your computer with or without CD-ROM support, choose the WITHOUT option. When the boot is complete, it will stop at the 'A:>', called the 'A prompt'. Look for the line of text that says, "The diagnostic tools were successfully loaded to drive X (where X = a specific drive letter your computer will assign)".

Switch to the X drive by typing the assigned drive letter, a colon and finally press the ENTER key (i.e. E:, then ENTER). Next type FDISK and press ENTER. When you are asked if you wish to enable large disk support, type Y (for Yes) and press ENTER. Where it says, ENTER CHOICE, type the number corresponding to "Change drive" (usually number 5) and press ENTER. Now choose your old drive (obviously the smaller of the two drives shown in the table) and press ENTER.

Next (to be sure you have selected the correct drive), at the ENTER CHOICE, type the number corresponding to DISPLAY PARTITION INFORMATION and press ENTER. Look at the column MBYTES. Have you selected the correct drive? (For example, if your new drive is 20GB and your old one is 2GB, you'll see a total of nearly 2000 MBYTES if you looking at your old 2GB drive. If you see 20000 MBYTES, you are on the wrong drive, so go back and pick the correct one. When you are sure you are looking at the correct drive, press ESC to return to the main menu.

At ENTER CHOICE, pick the number corresponding to DELETE PARTITION OR LOGICAL DOS DRIVE (usually # 3) and press ENTER. From this menu, type in the number 1 (DELETE PRIMARY DOS PARTITION) and press ENTER. Where it gives you the blinking "Warning" about erasing all of your data, followed by the question "WHAT PRIMARY PARTITION DO YOU WANT TO DELETE?", type in the number 1 and press ENTER. Next it will ask you for the VOLUME LABEL. Look at the table on the screen and find the VOLUME LABEL column. If there is a label, it will be identified there, in which case type in the name exactly as it appears in this column and press ENTER. If there is no label, just press ENTER. Finally, you are given one last chance to abort, to which you will answer Y (for Yes) to the question ARE YOU SURE? Press ENTER. That's it. Everything on your old drive is gone!

[Note: If your old drive has more than one partition, as your new drive probably does if you followed my suggestions, you should also delete both the LOGICAL DOS DRIVE(S) IN THE EXTENDED DOS PARTITION (first) and then the EXTENDED PARTITION itself. You will not be able to delete the EXTENDED DOS PARTITION without first deleting the LOGICAL DRIVE(S).]

When you have deleted all of the partitions from your old drive, you must now create a new partition on the old drive and then format the drive. Here is where you will help your computer assign the correct drive letter to your old drive.

Let's use an example to help make this easy for you to understand. You have your new 20GB drive already partitioned and formatted. It has two partitions: a C and a D partition (one is your primary partition, the C, and the other is your extended partition, the D). You also have your old 2GB drive which presently has no partitions...yet.

Here is a little secret you need to know. If you create a new PRIMARY partition on your old drive, and then format the drive, when you reboot your computer, your old drive will become the D drive in your computer and the D partition of your new drive will become the E drive. This can really mess everything up quite royally.

[For example, prior to adding the old drive, you have your new drive with two partitions. You've installed Windows and some new software. When you installed Netscape, you decided to put it on your D partition (D-drive). Everything is working fine until you add your old drive back into your computer and make the mistake of creating a PRIMARY partition on it and formatting that partition. Now you reboot your computer and find that Netscape won't work. Why? Because your computer has automatically assigned the PRIMARY partition of your old drive as the D partition (D-drive) and pushed what was formerly the D partition (where Netscape resides) of your new drive up one drive letter to your E drive. When you try to launch Netscape, your computer looks on your D partition (where Netscape is supposed to be) and can't find it. Ooops!]

Solving this problem is easy, because you know the secret. When you create a new partition (or more than one if you wish) on your old drive, do NOT create a PRIMARY partition. Instead, create an EXTENDED PARTITION and then create one logical drive within the EXTENDED PARTITION. Format the logical drive within the EXTENDED PARTITION by rebooting your computer with the WINDOWS START-UP disk (boot disk) still in your floppy drive. When asked if you want to enable CD-ROM support or not, choose number 2, NO CD-ROM. When you get to the A prompt (A:>), write down the drive letter assigned to the location of the DIAGNOSTIC TOOLS.

Now format your old drive. But how do I know which drive letter is the correct one to format?? Well, first of all keep in mind that until you format your old drive, it has no drive letter assigned to it and won't until after the drive is formatted. The mistake you don't want to make is to accidentally format one of the partitions on your new drive. In this example, your new drive has a C and a D partition, which means you DO NOT want to format either of these. Look on your notes and see what your wrote down as the drive letter which your computer assigned to the DIAGNOSTIC TOOLS. In this example, it should be your F drive. So now, you have a C, a D and an F drive. Where is E? Ahh..it is the EXTENDED PARTITION on your old drive, waiting to be formatted.

You can easily verify this by first typing C: and then pressing ENTER. You will now see C:>. Now type D: and then press ENTER. Now you will see D:>. Now type E: and press ENTER. Oh, oh, I'm getting an "Invalid Drive" error message. Why??? Because you haven't formatted your E drive yet (the EXTENDED partition on your old drive). Going back to your notes, log onto the drive letter assigned to your DIAGNOSTIC TOOLS, which should be your F drive. Now type FORMAT E: and press ENTER (that's the word FORMAT, then a space, then the letter E, followed by a colon). A message will appear, advising you that everything on this drive will be erased, do you want to proceed? Answer Yes and press ENTER. When the format is complete, it will ask for a VOLUME LABEL. You can type anything here or just leave it blank. Now press ENTER. Done!

Remove the disk from your floppy drive and reboot. After Windows loads, go into the Windows Explorer (not Internet Explorer...RIGHT click on START and then choose EXPLORE or click START, PROGRAMS and then WINDOWS EXPLORER). There you will find your C and D drives (the two partitions on your new drive), your E drive (the partition on your old drive) and your F drive, the CD-ROM drive. Congratulations. You did it!

We, at Office Helper, appreciate the opportunity to bring you Everything Office. Don't forget to check out this week's great tip on our website. And remember, in our next issue, I'll begin a series of interesting topics that will focus on networks, firewalls, Internet security, virus attacks and a whole bunch of good stuff of which you really, really need to be aware.

Thanks!
Rich Poremba


RETURN TO ARCHIVES


| Internet Specials | Free Catalogs | Computers | Product Line-Up |
| Newz U Can Use | Resource Links | Web Design |
| Home | Guestbook | Order Online | Email |


Office Helper
1330 Ross Street
(just off McDowell Blvd., 1 block south of the Petaluma Cinemas)
(800) 862-4963 - (800) 933-7964 (Fax)
oh@officehelper.com


© Office Helper 1999, 2000
Feedback     Privacy Statement