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Question About Dell Dimension 4550 Hard Drive Upgrade
I have a 2002 Dimension 4550 desktop that works great to this day. I wanted to upgrade the HDD from 80GB to a 640GB SATA Drive.
I purchased the IDE to SATA adaptor and installed the WD 640HD.
I had no luck getting windows to install on this bigger drive. It would just freeze up just a few minutes into installing Windows XP Pro. I tried and tried and spent hours trying to get this to work but no luck.
Is there a limit on how much HDD capcity this 4550 can handle. I'm using A08 BIOS version.
Thanks for any advise.
Mike
rdunnill
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January 8th, 2011 00:00
I used a 4550 as a workstation for a while and I installed a Syba 150R PCI SATA card and Hitachi 160gb SATA hard drive. It worked a treat, not just in the 4550 but in a 3000 and 2350 as well.
I have never tried the IDE-to-SATA adapters, and I'd be leery about them just because. The Syba card is only $15-ish and I know it to work with old Dells, and although I haven't tried it, I'm sure you could use drives up to 2tb in the 4550.
osprey4
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January 8th, 2011 05:00
I have yet to hear of an SATA-to-IDE adapter working. The 4550 can certainly handle any size IDE drive available, which is exactly what I suggest you purchase.
rdunnill
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January 8th, 2011 11:00
Alas, the OP has already purchased a SATA drive, and in that situation it would be more cost-effective to buy a budget SATA card.
Cheers, RD