[TheTeZ]

Hey, im sure plenty of you people have made the home made hard drive switch, you know... with a DPDT switch. Well i made one, and it looks pretty awesome.
I followed the directions to make it, and it sorta works.... i can start the computer, but it will boot from the newer os.... OR get an error and then start the newer os, depending on which way the switch is flipped. [im trying with vista and xp]

Im curious for anyone who made one... how exactly did you set it up...... bios sand all... im now using 2 IDE HDD's ....

Little help. i can give more specific details if you need it.. Thanks in advance

[JohnWill]

That's the reason I recommend the hard drive drawers. You have to power down to change the power anyway, so why not simply slide in a new hard disk?

http://www.computergate.com/products...prodcd=XMRL26A

[TheTeZ]

yeah, the only problem with the slides, is i am a poor college kid, who can only afford to buy the switch which i already did.... I just need to know what my problem is...

[JohnWill]

I guess if you can't afford $5.95/ea for two of these, you are indeed destitute.

It's pretty difficult to know what the issue you have is, but I can tell you that without disconnecting the IDE connector, powering down a drive on an IDE channel will likely affect all the drives on that channel.

[TheTeZ]

ACtually... i cant really.... like i said .. "poor college student" ... pretty much means ... broke to the extreme... But i think i figured it out... i just gotta shut down and try it.... I found something ... theirs a company who used to make these, ... and sell for way too much, but either way they said for western digital drives they need to be set to slave with the jumper....

for anyone who may see this in the future ill post weather or not it worked...

[TheTeZ]

well that didnt work... so i switched my WD hard drive out for my Seagate from my linux PC and i should be able to set them both to master.... i just need to work on that when im not so lazy....

[Jomama46]

Broke and lazy. Hmmm! They don't seem far apart. LOL

[TheTeZ]

ha ha .... yeah.... they arnt.... but hey man, when im not at college, im out asphalting, i enjoy my lazy time.

[JohnWill]

Perhaps you should have waited to purchase that switch until you found out if it would work.

[TheTeZ]

well all i bought was a $2.50 switch, i had wires, and ... thats all that is needed.... im ok with that, and i am pretty sure its going to work with my Seagate hdd, just need to adjust the jumpers

[TheTeZ]

ok, well my switch is working fine, and i want to add lights to show which drive is active.
I know how to do it all... except what the "5v" power is. any tutorial i find says connect the other end to the 5v... where is this 5volts comming from... Can anyone help?

[TheTeZ]

got it, its the red cable in any of the power plugs...

[Jomama46]

where did you get the instructions for the "hard drive switch" Do yo have a link?

[DoubleHelix]

I've never heard of a college student that didn't have or couldn't come up with $10 in a month. Surely you've had a beer, a pizza, or a couple of sodas.

I would suggest getting the proper hardware rather than risk blowing your whole rig. If you do, you'll obviously be without a system entirely since you're so broke.

[JohnWill]

You just don't understand the priorities of the typical college student!