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| Thread ID: 104410 | 2009-10-26 20:58:00 | Added Second SATA Drive | Terryds (15378) | Press F1 |
| Post ID | Timestamp | Content | User | ||
| 824376 | 2009-10-26 20:58:00 | I have added a second SATA internal drive to my desktop in order to provide more capacity and to back up my old disc before it crashes (there's a few years on the system). I believe I have successfully cloned my old disc to the new disc and I would like to make the new disc my primary boot disk. However, if I look at the bios boot sequence, it lists 1) A drive, 2) Sata drive, 3) ide drive (not installed), and a couple of other sources. There doesn't seem to be a procedure to "add" a second sata drive to the boot sequence. If there are two sata drives, are they automatically looked at sequencialy when booting up (i.e., first port 0, then port 1, etc.)? If the original boot drive (C) crashes or I disable the sata port 0, will the bios look at the second sata drive in port 1? | Terryds (15378) | ||
| 824377 | 2009-10-26 21:40:00 | Depends how your BIOS is designed. Looks to me like it will try Floppy drive first, then any SATA drives, then any IDE drives. There is probably a separate menu somewhere, possibly called "hard drive priority" which will let you choose which SATA drive it will try to boot from first. |
Agent_24 (57) | ||
| 824378 | 2009-10-26 22:14:00 | I'm hoping that boot sequence is the case, that the meaning of the sequence is "any", for each numbered boot source. So far, I have not found a menu that would give me the ability to prioritize the sata drives. Just thought!! I may just try and interchange the sata drives between ports 0 and 1. If it's looking at port 0 first, then the new drive will be "numero uno"! | Terryds (15378) | ||
| 824379 | 2009-10-26 22:47:00 | is the second drive even showing as being there ? | wainuitech (129) | ||
| 824380 | 2009-10-26 23:00:00 | Yes, the second sata drive is there as drive (F), and I can view files and programs, copy between drives, etc. After physically installing, it initially was not. I then found that the sata port (1) I had plugged in to was not enabled (of the 4 ports on my motherboard, it was the only one not enabled). I've cloned my original sata drive to the new drive, and according to my software cloning application, the cloning was a success. | Terryds (15378) | ||
| 824381 | 2009-10-26 23:10:00 | (of the 4 ports on my motherboard, it was the only one not enabled). Murphy's law eh! :D Depending on the board, it will be someplace either under Boot, or HDD options to select which drive boots first. Different Boards/BIOS have different locations. |
wainuitech (129) | ||
| 824382 | 2009-10-27 17:50:00 | Thanks to all, and I'll check out if there are HDD or boot options. However, I believe I may have found the easiest solution. This morning, I restarted the computer and got in to the bios and disabled sata port 0 (where original (C) drive was plugged in) and the computer booted up with my new drive that was plugged in to sata port 1. What's even more interesting is that the computer automatically designated the new drive as (C)! It is definitely the new drive as the properties of the (C) drive now show the larger capacity disk. I think now I will indeed go in and swap the sata ports of the two disks and see if both disks show up as (C) and (F), with (F) being my old disk. If this works out, it is very easy method for replacing/upgrading a sata internal hard drive (at least with Dell Dimension 8400 that I have). | Terryds (15378) | ||
| 824383 | 2009-10-27 21:37:00 | What motherboard do you have? Download the manual for it, it's likely it will tell you where the option is.. | Agent_24 (57) | ||
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