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xb36o

20 Posts

16138

August 20th, 2005 18:00

Can you install a SATA HD on a Dell Dimension 4600?

My brother has a dimension 4600, if he wants could he install a SATA drive, or does the 4600 not have SATA compatability?

Say for instance, if he wanted to upgrade to a 10k rpm drive, could he?

thanks

ejn63

1 Rookie

 • 

87.5K Posts

August 20th, 2005 18:00

Yes, the system supports two SATA drives. In a mixed configuration (SATA with EIDE in the same system), the SATA drive must be the boot drive.

shesagordie

10 Elder

 • 

46K Posts

August 20th, 2005 18:00

xb36o
 
Yes, you can install SATA in a D-4600. But, it will have to be installed as the C: boot hard drive
 
Yes, you can use a 10K drive.
 
 
Bev.

brmalmat

12 Posts

April 28th, 2006 02:00

Regarding the following:
Yes, you can install SATA in a D-4600. But, it will have to be installed as the C: boot hard drive
This rather blows. Here's why.
 
I currently have a 30 GB C: drive and a 40 GB F: drive, both IDE. (The D: and E: are DVD/RW and CD/RW.)

I'd like to save the contents of the 40 GB F: somewhere (maybe DVD/RW temporarily). Then I can copy Windows and apps from the 30 GB C: onto the 40 GB drive. Then I toss out the 30 GB drive, and make the 40 GB drive be the C: boot drive. Finally, I'd buy an 80 GB or 100 GB SATA drive for F: and then restore to that drive the contents saved from the old F: drive.
 
To put it simply, I'd like to replace the 30 GB C: boot drive with a 40 GB drive that I already have. And then a new, large SATA drive would become F:
 
But if I must boot from the SATA drive, then I have two problems.
 
1. The 80+ GB SATA C: drive is way too big ... I need the F: drive to be the big one.
 
2. More importantly, as soon as I install the SATA drive (which will be empty), I won't be able to boot (unless I do a fresh Windows install on the SATA drive). Yuk. What a waste.
 
Maybe there's an out ... I currently do large data (video, etc.) on F:, just to keep the data flow independent of the C: drive. Does this reasoning still hold for a SATA drive? Maybe I should just buy a jumbo (160+ GB SATA drive) for C:, and not even have a second drive?
 
Or maybe I should scrap the SATA idea, and try to find a large (80+ GB) IDE drive?

shesagordie

10 Elder

 • 

46K Posts

April 28th, 2006 02:00

brmalmat
 
Personally I would install a large IDE hard drive.  There's no speed advantage in using a SATA drive in the D-4600.
 
Bev.

pjries

4 Posts

May 8th, 2006 04:00

shesagordie,
I really appreciate the information you provide on these forums!

I'm replacing my failing Maxtor HD in my Dimension 4600 and had been considering a SATA drive.. specifically one of the Western Digital Caviar SE16 drives, but your post here gives me pause. I'm wondering, tho, would there be any speed advantage with a SATA drive with the 16MB cache versus the IDE drive with a maximum of 8MB cache?
Any help, greatly appreciated, and again, many thanks for the attention you give to this forum.
Pam

shesagordie

10 Elder

 • 

46K Posts

May 8th, 2006 18:00

pjries
 
If both hard drives are 7200rpm, then there is no speed advantage.  Personally, I would go with a Western Digital JB series, IDE, 8mb cache hard drive. Look for a WD drive with a three year warranty.
 
Bev.

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