XP install on a Sata drive when XP is already on the IDE drive?

Mike89 · Post by **Mike89** » Sun Sep 19, 2004 6:38 pm

My son currently has 1 IDE HDD with XP on it.

He recently purchased 2 WD Raptors (Sata).

He wants to hook up the 2 Raptors to the mb Sata connectors and fresh install XP on one of them (he is going to go Raid Striped).

He also wants to keep the original IDE drive hooked up and delete XP off of it.

So how should he go about this?

Currently he has 1 HDD on IDE 1 and 2 CD/DVD drives on IDE 2.

If he just leaves those hooked up as is, will XP on the IDE drive interfere with the new installation of XP on the Sata drive?

Or is he going to have to install XP on the Sata drive with the IDE HDD disconnected and then afterwards re-connect the IDE HDD and then delete XP off of it?

Also. What should the Boot Devices be set at in the BIOS? There is no option for SATA there.

1st Boot Device set to CD (to boot to the XP CD)?
2nd Boot Device ??

DoPeY5007 · Post by **DoPeY5007** » Sun Sep 19, 2004 8:02 pm

he should put the 2 raptors in and set up the RAID and install XP

then put the IDE drive in a USB if he can to get his files off then re-format it and then put it in his syetem

That is how I would do it

The_Frapster · Post by **The_Frapster** » Sun Sep 19, 2004 8:53 pm

With my board at least, there is an option to boot from SCSI devices. This included any Raid cards or SATA devices. It would scan them and then boot off of the first it found.

Best of luck.

Oh, one more thing, might be easier for you if you don't have an USB enclosure Dopey was talking about. Just disconnect the IDE drive and after you get XP installed you can hook it back up and use dos boot disk to boot from. Run Fdisk and you can delete the partition off of the drive, reboot and you should go into the Raided drives with XP on them.

I love computers, there is a million and 1 ways to do the same thing.

Mike89 · Post by **Mike89** » Sun Sep 19, 2004 11:15 pm

The IDE HDD is formatted NTFS. I was under the impression that fdisk does not work with NTFS drives. Is that wrong?

Once XP is installed on the Sata drive, couldn't I just boot back up with the IDE drive connected and then delete the contents of that drive in Windows?

DoPeY5007 · Post by **DoPeY5007** » Sun Sep 19, 2004 11:22 pm

Originally posted by Mike89

Once XP is installed on the Sata drive, couldn't I just boot back up with the IDE drive connected and then delete the contents of that drive in Windows?

yes and no, some times that works and some times it doesn't

it all really depends how well the MB handles it....

the MB may actually then try to boot from the LDE drive

Post by **FlyingPenguin** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 6:35 am

You don't need to use FDISK. When you run the XP installer, it will prompt you install in or delete existing partitions, or create new ones.

Mike89 · Post by **Mike89** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 12:20 pm

FP. The problem with what you said is this.

If I was just going to wipe the IDE drive clean, I would do as you stated. But that's not the case. I only want to delete XP off of it. I want to keep all the data on it cause I'll be putting a lot of that stuff on the new Sata drives.

Post by **FlyingPenguin** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 4:47 pm

Then you still don't want to use FDISK. FDISK deletes and creates partitions.

Assuming your motherboard allows you to boot from the SATA with an IDE drive connected (as mentioned above you probably need to specify SCSI before IDE in the boot order in BIOS) then just the old drive will just appear as another drive letter that you can read the data off of.

Since there are some known issues with haveing two drives with OS installs on one system, I would recommend that you at least delete the Windows folder off the old drive to avoid problems.

Ideally, though, I would copy all your data from the old drive to the SATA drive, and then format the old drive. Then you can copy whatever you want back to the old drive (makes a dandy MP3 storage drive for instance).

Most of your data will be in your Documents folder which will be buried in \Documents and Settings\<username>\\My Documents on the old drive.

However some non Microsoft apps may store their data elsewhere.

Mike89 · Post by **Mike89** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 7:31 pm

You bring up an interesting option.

Would it be possible to copy the entire drive over (OS included) to the new Sata drive? I've done that before with a new IDE drive but never going to a Sata drive. Would Ghost do this?

eGoCeNTRoNiX · Post by **eGoCeNTRoNiX** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 7:37 pm

Originally posted by Mike89
You bring up an interesting option.

Would it be possible to copy the entire drive over (OS included) to the new Sata drive? I've done that before with a new IDE drive but never going to a Sata drive. Would Ghost do this?

I've been watching this and wanting to say ghost the whole time, but I figured since FP was in already I'd wait to see what he said.. He knows a lot more than me..

eGo

Post by **FlyingPenguin** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 8:10 pm

You bring up an interesting option.

Would it be possible to copy the entire drive over (OS included) to the new Sata drive? I've done that before with a new IDE drive but never going to a Sata drive. Would Ghost do this?

Yes, but it's a bit of work. The problem is that your drive controller address will PROBABLY change, and this may involve doing a Repair installation, or at least a boot sector repair.

XP, NT and 2K all use hardware addressing for hard drives (unlike Win9x which lets DOS handle it). If you just Ghost the contents of the IDE drive to the SATA drive and try to boot from the SATA, chances are you'll get a boot failure after the Windows logo (blue screen saying something about not being able to find the Windows partition).

Here's what I recommend (remember, as long as you don't delete anything on the original drive you have nothing to lose, but I would disconnect the original drive after Ghosting it and before trying to boot into Windows or do the following):

- While you still have the IDE drive installed, boot from it and install any drivers that are required for the SATA controller (you may have already done this when you installed the mobo drivers - check the Device Manager, it's usually under SCSI devices). The SATA controller needs to be recognized in Device Manager before going any further to make this as smooth as possible.

- Ghost the IDE drive to the SATA drive (and it doesn't matter if you're using a RAID stripe array, although I personally don't recommend it - the minor performance gain is not worth the risk of data corruption. Your call).

- After Ghosting, shut down and pull the IDE drive.

- Make sure BIOS is setup to boot from the SATA drive.

- Try booting from the SATA drive - if you're VERY lucky it may work. If you get a blue screen error after the Windows logo, continue on...

- Boot from your XP CD and at the very FIRST menu choose the "Repair" option and run the "Recovery Console". When you are logged on to the recovery console (looks like a DOS prompt), you can run the FIXBOOT command to try to fix boot sectors (type FIXBOOT and press the enter key).

- Reboot and hopefully that will work.

- If the XP Installer can't find your SATA drive you need to reboot from the CD again but this time press F6 immediately when prompted to "Press F6 to install SCSI or other controller drivers". You'll need to have the SATA drivers handy on a FLOPPY (must be on a floppy). This really shouldn't be necessary though if you installed the SATA drivers properly from within Windows before Ghosting (as mentioned above).

- If you still get a blue screen error on bootup then you need to do a Repair Install of XP. This re-installs XP and all drivers. Be aware that it will install only the generic Windows drivers and it also resets your computer back to the version of Windows on the CD with no critical updates or service packs installed (except for whatever service pack is slipstreamed on the install CD). You'll have to re-install all your drivers, service packs and critical updates afterwards. You will NOT lose any data or applications - everything will still be installed and look the same.

WARNING: If you do perform a Repair install, DO NOT under ANY CIRCUMSTANCES connect this computer to the Internet (dialup or broadband) until you have turned on the Windows Firewall first! Since a repair install will undo ALL security updates, you will be vulnerable to the Sasser, MSBlaster, and Scob viruses (infection will happen withing 10 minutes of establishing a broadband connection). Do not disable the firewall until you have installed the security updates. Physically unplug the network cable from the computer before doing the Repair Install.

To do a repair install:

- Boot with the XP CD, press F6 (as mentioned above) when prompted, to install the SATA drivers (make sure you have the drivers handy on a FLOPPY).

- Skip the first menu and select the Repair option in the SECOND menu (after the EULA agreement is displayed).

- Go have a cup of coffee and a smoke - this will take 35 minutes or more. It will essentially look like the last two-thirds of a new Windows XP install. You WILL be asked for your Windows XP serial number during this process and you may be asked to Activate Windows again (DO NOT DO THIS OVER THE INTERNET UNTIL YOU TURN ON THE FIREWALL - you have 15 days to Activate anyway).

Hope this helps, if you have any questions feel free to post.

Mike89 · Post by **Mike89** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 9:10 pm

You said you didn't recommend hooking up the two Sata Raptors in Raid Striped (I think that's what my son planned to do). Why?

How would you hook them up? There are two Sata controllers on the motherboard (A7N8X Deluxe). Would you just hook one to each not using any Raid?

Also a question regarding Ghost. When copying the IDE HDD over to the Sata. How are the drives going to be displayed? Drive 1 for the IDE and Drive 2 for the Sata? What about the Sata drivers during this process? How is Ghost going to see the Sata drive without the Sata drivers?

Post by **FlyingPenguin** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 9:31 pm

Ghost is a DOS app. Needs no drivers. SATA drives should be recognized by BIOS as a SCSI device automatically which means DOS and Ghost will see them. If the SATA drives are in a RAID stripe array then they will appear as a single drive to Ghost.

I don't recommend RAID stripe arrays in general. You are statistically increasing the chance of a drive failure with only a small increase in performance.

Simply put, you now have two drives instead of one. You've increased the chance of having a failure since a failure of either drive will result in the loss of all data on the array - RAID striping with 2 drives is non-redundant. I just don't think the risk is worth it.

If the system is for fun and games and not mission critical, and you have the two drives to play with, and your son wants to experiment with RAID striping, fine, so long as he is aware that he's increasing his chances of data loss. I'd rather install the two drives as two seperate drives.

Mike89 · Post by **Mike89** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 9:45 pm

If you have time, please explain the different types of Raid. I'm aware of two. One writes copies of everything to both drives and one writes half of everything to one drive and half to the other drive. Is that correct?

To be honest, I guess I'm just a simpleton cause neither makes much sense to me (both seem too complex and against my K.I.S.S. principle). I'm much more comfortable with the conventional 2 drive setup.

Post by **FlyingPenguin** » Mon Sep 20, 2004 10:15 pm

RAID Explained: http://www.sohoconsult.ch/raid/raid.html

You'll be interested in RAID 0 and RAID 1.

Raid 0 (RAID Striping) is non-redundant. Each sequencial sector is alternatively written on each drive. This improves performance somewhat because the computer doesn't have to wait as long to access data (on average) but provides high risk because your data is split between two drives.

RAID 1 (RAID Mirror) is used in servers and mission critical systems. The data is mirrored on each drivet(total redundancy). Either drive fails, all your data is still secure on the other drive. This wastes half the storage though since the array is only as big as one of the drives.

There are other variations of RAID but hey involve more than 2 drives.

I believe in KISS as well, which is why I don't recommend RAID striping.