Well after a recent motherboard failure, I purchased a second hard drive. They are both SATA, one is 160GB, the other 250GB.

At present everything is installed on the 250GB drive, and the 160GB is configured as a slave, and has my old OS and all my files on. This second drive wont boot as the OS is corrupt, but I am simply using it as a backup for photos.

So how do I make the most of 2 drives? I would like to keep regular backups.

The PC is mainly used for tinterweb, Office type stuff, watching the odd DVD, and for storing photos and camcorder vids.

Any advice appreciated - both for how best/easiest to keep backups, and for best utilising both drives!

RAID, but IIRC you need two drives the same size, otherwise it only works at the size of the smallest drive... thats about the limit of my RAID knowledge lol. To be honest, probably the way you are now is easiest. Try finding out what drive has the fastest seek time, use that as the drive for the OS etc, and use the slower drive as the storage drive.

Using creating a hardware RAID array would require the disks to be wiped and as stated above the drive size would be limited to the smallest disk (that's if the RAID controller will even let you run two different sized disks- they're funny s0ds!).

Without losing disk space you could use a partition resizing utility to create a new partition on each disk. Create a software RAID mirror using Win XP disk manager using the newly created partitions. This would provide some data redunacy but it does carry an over head and you will sacrifice performance for redunacy.

However if your want a quick improvment your best best is to stick the page file on the the opposite disk to the OS, this well documented tip for speeding up the OS. Preferably the page file should be on the faster of the two disks.

How do I swap the page file to the other disk?

How do I swap the page file to the other disk?

Control Panel > System > Advanced

Choose "Settings" from the Performance group.

Then the 'Advanced' tab, then click "Change" under "Virtual Memory".

nearly there ...

Choose the Drive you want to put the file on, and the size, then click "Set".

Then you need to reboot.

Sorted

2 x cup holders.

Using creating a hardware RAID array would require the disks to be wiped (snip).

You can create a RAID1 array.. with that you can usually select a source drive so you wouldn't lose any data and you would gain some redundancy.. no good in your case Tom as really you need 2 drives of the same size.

You could setup the windows backup software to backup your selected files on a daily or weekly schedule to your old drive.. this would require the machine to be on at the time you schedule the job for though.

You can create a RAID1 array.. with that you can usually select a source drive so you wouldn't lose any data and you would gain some redundancy.. no good in your case Tom as really you need 2 drives of the same size.

You could setup the windows backup software to backup your selected files on a daily or weekly schedule to your old drive.. this would require the machine to be on at the time you schedule the job for though.

And how do you do that?

Great stuff HKP,

From the start menu, All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Backup

It should start with the wizard.. once you've selected what you want to backup and selected where you want to put it there will be an "Advanced" button.. click that..

You can now select type of backup, if you want it to verify the backup, and when to run the backup.. you can now setup your schedule.

From the start menu, All Programs, Accessories, System Tools, Backup

It should start with the wizard.. once you've selected what you want to backup and selected where you want to put it there will be an "Advanced" button.. click that..

You can now select type of backup, if you want it to verify the backup, and when to run the backup.. you can now setup your schedule.

Excellent.

No probs Tom.. the backup util will just create a file where ever you told it to backup to.. so providing it'll fit onto a CD/DVD you can also archive these off if you really want/need to.

Depending on the motherboard type (if it supports SATA2), you also have the option of having one drive in a caddy and make it hot swappable / removable. Something like this. Can be useful as you can back up all your data on to it and then remove it and take it home / to other safe place. In the case of a total disaster, you'll have your data still backed up.

As I understand it all SATA drives are hot swappable.. not just SATA2 ones

As I understand it all SATA drives are hot swappable.. not just SATA2 ones

I thought it was the controller that permitted it. I know my older motherboard which provided SATA1 didn't but my current one does - I get the remove hardware notification icon in the system tray and can say I'm removing my main system drive :eek:

The controller will run at whatever protocol the drive supports, so may "throttle back" to SATA1, but still provide the PnP ability of SATA2

My current P4 mobo that's just SATA (not SATA2) came with a header that allows external connection of SATA drives... must admit though it's not something I've had a play with...

Having a read through the manual is seems at least 2 of the 4 sata connectors support hot swapping, my board has 2 different SATA controllers... so it does appear to be a controller supported function as you say.

The SATA I spec states that the drives should be hotswappable, it was just that so few people implemented it on the cheapest chipsets.

You must be aware that by hotswap they mean pull it and it wont explode with the power on, rather than a pull it and you won't loose your data. If you pull a drive you would have to have synched the data so it is all written, and would want to pull the drive out a tiny amount to break the connection then leave it there for a minute while the spindle spins down. If you don't do this you will destroy the hard disk by crashing the heads, or at least scraping them across the platters.

The SATA I spec states that the drives should be hotswappable, it was just that so few people implemented it on the cheapest chipsets.

It's the SATA controller in my Intel southbridge that doesn't support the hot swapping of drives...

The SATA controller in the southbridge does make installing XP a little easier as I don't need any separate drivers on a floppy disk

You must be aware that by hotswap they mean pull it and it wont explode with the power on, rather than a pull it and you won't loose your data. If you pull a drive you would have to have synched the data so it is all written, and would want to pull the drive out a tiny amount to break the connection then leave it there for a minute while the spindle spins down. If you don't do this you will destroy the hard disk by crashing the heads, or at least scraping them across the platters.

Hehehe... after thought or what?

Nope, same with PCI express hotplug.

Hotplug isn't what people think, which is ripping the device out unannounced. In that context hotplug just means electrical hot plug so the thing won't go bang.

To hotplug a device you need to announce you want to hotplug it before you do so the OS (or BIOS if done that way) can sync all the data and power the device down.

Oh and whoever said about hotplugging your main HDD, just you try it and see what happens when you plug it back in and try to carry on :P