Installation Question

ok a friend gave me a computer that had a problem that we think was from two anivirus programs conflicting...he did something that made it un bootable so he parted it out....i got the 30 gig hd...how do i install it in my computer as a slave drive...format it and use it just like another drive???

 

I'm assuming you know how to physically install it, find a bay--connect the power--connect the IDE cable. You need to check the jumper pin settings on your current hard drive. It will most likely be set to MASTER. You'll need to check for a MASTER WITH SLAVE setting.

On the 2nd drive set it's jumper pins to SLAVE.

There should be labels on the drives that show the various settings.

Power up and the system will assign a drive letter. If you have other drives, (ie: CD's, DVD's, etc), you will want to check to see if their drive letters change. Some of the applications that use those drives might get a bit confused.

Good luck

 

what about formatting and loading dos and an operating system? or will the new drive just be seen as storage for my existing os???

 

Your O/S remains on the exisiting drive in your system. If you don't know what caused the drive to become unbootable then you probably can't confirm whether it's still working at all. If it is working, when you install as a slave drive and reboot the existing O/S on your master drive will assign a drive letter to the new drive and it will be immediatley accessable.

 

Ok Thanx!!