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Need advice on add'l hard drive
Hi, I'm a newbie to the forum and would appreciate any advice on adding an additional HD to my desktop PC (either internal or external). I bought a Dell in December 2006. It's a Dell XPS/Dimension 410/9200 (DXP061) with 2 -250GB (Samsung SP2504C's) hard drives (configured in RAID 0). The processor is Intel (R) Core (TM) 2 CPU 6700 !2.66 GHz. The interface is SATA 3.0 Gbps and rotational speed is 7200rpm. There are 6 Serial ATA ports (SATA). I mainly use the computer for creating DVD movies (using Movie Maker, Photostoryand MyDVD LE) from photo's and video for family and friends. I've been converting all my old Sony 8mm tapes to AVI files and want to use RAID 1 so I have a backup so the new hard drive needs to be at least 500Gb as I have already used almost 320 Gb on my current system. I'd also like to use the SATA connection as it sounds like the fastest way to do a back up of a lot of data. So, I'm looking at reviews on the Seagate Barracuda 7200 1 TB internal HD for $100 and also the external 1 TB Western Digital My Book Studio Edition II for about $280. I'm not real comfortable with installing an internal HD and kind of like the idea of the external HD so I can take it to the lake when I work from there on my laptop. I have no idea if my "motherboard" is SATA compliant and if so what the interface speed is on it. Any help or suggestions would be much appreciated.
Thereal-dbk4297
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November 29th, 2008 08:00
Hello,
I don't quite understand.
You list the full specs of your 9200 including the SATA specs. But at the end you say that you don't know if the motherboard is SATA compliant.
Explain what you really want to know and we can help. Adding a hard drive to a desktop system is very easy.
Robin.Berty
11 Posts
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November 29th, 2008 10:00
Thanks for the quick reply. I wasn't sure if the specs I'm listing are for the
two Samsung HD's or the "motherboard". I'm not really computer literate so
didn't know if the SATA ports it refers to were where I need them to be - Motherboard vs Samsung HD's. I want
to increase my HD size and enable RAID 1 across at least the 500 Gb (2-250's) I have today and don't know the best way to do
that. Thanks for your help!
Thereal-dbk4297
3.4K Posts
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November 29th, 2008 11:00
Hello again,
No problem.
Here are the specs for you system. And yes, you do have 6 SATA2 3Gbps connectors on the motherboard.
And here is a view of the motherboard. Here are the instructions for installing a hard drive. But since you have two hard drives you will need to install the new drive in the floppy drive bay. It's very easy to place the drive in the system, and get Windows to start using it. I must admit that I know nothing at all about setting up or changing RAID.
You can buy and install any brand and capacity hard drive that you want to. Make sure that it SATA2, and is a 3.5 inch desktop drive. Look for the highest cache and lowest access speed as you can afford. :emotion-55:
Thereal-dbk4297
3.4K Posts
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November 29th, 2008 12:00
Hello,
Please edit your reply and remove your service tag number ASAP.
Dell will delete your post if you don't because it's against the rules to list the service tags in the forum.
Robin.Berty
11 Posts
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November 29th, 2008 12:00
Thank you for all the info. I may need more advice as I have the media card reader installed where I think you said I could install the add'l hard drive. I've also have a SONY CD-RW/DVD-ROM CRX310S as well as a TSST corp DVD+/-RW TS-H553A drive above the media card reader. It looks like there is a "blank" space between the media card reader and the DVD+/-RW drive but not sure if a hard drive could be installed there - it looks like too small of a space? You mention I should buy a HD with SATA2 - not just SATA? Would the Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 1TB hard drive be compatible? It says it has SATA-300 - is that the same as SATA2?
Robin.Berty
11 Posts
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November 29th, 2008 12:00
Thanks for letting me know. Sorry!
Thereal-dbk4297
3.4K Posts
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November 29th, 2008 12:00
Hello again,
Yes and yes again.
The space above the card reader will hold the hard drive. It's exactly the right size. You will need an SATA cable to connect the drive to the motherboard. And look to see if there is a spare/unused power plug to power the new drive. You can see what it looks like by checking your existing hard drives. If there is not a spare power plug, no problem, you can by a splitter for the existing cable or an adapter to change one of the larger power cables into an SATA power cable.
And yes again, SATA-300 is the same as SATA2. The older SATA drives are SATA-150. So yes, the 1TB drive is correct for your system.
Thereal-dbk4297
3.4K Posts
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November 29th, 2008 13:00
Seagate is a better brand than WD. IMHO :emotion-15:
Robin.Berty
11 Posts
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November 29th, 2008 13:00
Really? I was just checking out the WD Caviar Black WD1001FALS 1TB 7200 RPM 32MB Cache SATA 3.0Gb/s Hard Drive again and wondered if it would be better because of the dual processor. I'll take your advice though as otherwise they seem to have pretty much the same specs. :emotion-21:
Robin.Berty
11 Posts
0
November 29th, 2008 13:00
Ok, I think I'm all set now - I just need to decide between a Seagate and a WD HD. Thank you for all your help and patience! :emotion-1:
Thereal-dbk4297
3.4K Posts
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November 29th, 2008 13:00
Pssst ... Buy the Seagate. :emotion-17:
Robin.Berty
11 Posts
0
December 9th, 2008 11:00
Hi! Well, I bought a Seagate FreeAgent/XTreme External hard drive (500 Gb) which has two FireWire 400 ports and an eSATA port. The problem is that my Dell XPS 410 does not have either type of port... I'd like to know what I need to buy for each. It looks like I'm going to have to bust open the Dell to install these cables - which I was trying to avoid. Could you please let me know what to buy and how to install it? Many thanks!
Thereal-dbk4297
3.4K Posts
1
December 9th, 2008 17:00
Hello,
Hmm, Bought an external drive that will not plug into your system?
Oh well, first you will need to look at you motherboard and see what kind of PCI slots that you have free. The options that you have are, PCI Express x1 card connector, PCI Express x4 card connector, PCI Express x16 card connector, and three regular PCI card slots. If you have an express slot open I would go with that one.
Here is a picture of your motherboard with descriptions of what you see.
You will need a PCI (PCI type depends on your open slots) ESATA card to fit in your system. Here is an example of what you are looking for.
Good luck, If you could return what you bought and exchange it for a USB powered drive you would save some cash.
Robin.Berty
11 Posts
0
December 9th, 2008 18:00
Thanks for your quick response!
I guess I knew I would need a port (bracket) for the eSATA connection, I looked before buying the external HD and didn't see any. I'm pretty sure I have PCI slots open but do I really need the PCI card if I install an eSATA bracket and run it to the Motherboard? BTW - the Segate External HD does have a USB connection, I just want a faster connection. I have about 300 Gb of video files, pic's and music to back up on the new drive. My system is currently running RAID 0 (very fast) but I am thinking about configuring RAID 1 (I have no back up right now - yikes!) across the new external HD and my two existing internal 250 Gb HD's. It will be peace of mind to have enough room to do a back up...
Thanks!
Robin
Thereal-dbk4297
3.4K Posts
1
December 9th, 2008 20:00
Hello again,
Yes, a bracket like this will work. I should have thought of that first.
As for using the USB cable, I think that you will find that USB2 is quite fast. Real world USB 2.0 transfer speeds are about 40MBps, while real world SATA speeds (both SATA and SATA2) are a little more than 150 MBps. When using SATA from the motherboard, you want to hookup to a non-used channel port for faster transfer. Ports 0 and 1 are on channel 1, and ports 2 and 3 are on channel 2, ports 4 and 5 are channel 3. You can tell what ports you are already using by looking at the picture I posted and looking closely at the motherboard.