adding second hard drive to desktop

[AussieGuy92]

i am upgrading a desktop computer and installing a second and possible a third to store video files from my video camera and as backups i presume that adding another hard drive is not that hard is there anything else that i have to buy when i purchase the hard drive.

i think i might need to buy another internal enclosure correct? how about a cable? anything else?

 

[Tews]

Are the drives internal, or external?

 

[AussieGuy92]

internal hard drives

 

[Tews]

If its an IDE drive, you may need a cable, but open your case and check if you already have one with an open connection... If its a SATA drive, make sure that your MOBO supports SATA... Either way its an easy upgrade and should take just a few minutes to do...

 

[strollin]

If the machine uses IDE drives you will need an appropriate cable and you will need to set jumpers to specify which drive on the cable is master/slave.

If using SATA drives, you will need a SATA cable for each drive and you will need an available SATA port on the mobo. You need to check in your BIOS to make sure that the SATA port you plug the cable in to is enabled.

You'll also need to have an available power connector and you may need to partition and format each drive you add.

 

[ignatzatsonic]

You also should consider the purpose of any new drive.

If purely for storage, as opposed to an operating system, you might consider a "green" drive that runs at a lower speed---typically 5400 RPM or so. Western Digital and Samsung both make such drives--not sure about Seagate.

Besides being cheaper, they tend to run a little cooler and use less electricity, although not by a large margin. I did the math on a WD "green" drive and found that it would save perhaps $3 or $4 per year in electricity expenses if operated 12 hours per day.

In my experience, all the major brand names are "reliable" unless you choose a model widely known to have a design defect. This is rare, but does happen--the old IBM "Deathstar" drives come to mind. I haven't heard of any major design flaws in the last few years. You can of course easily find horror stories about any brand, but I wouldn't make a decision based on such stories. All brands have bad examples and if you have bad luck, naturally you would not be inclined to buy another drive of that brand.

The Samsung drives I have owned have tended to run several degrees cooler than WD or Seagate. That might be a slight consideration if your case tends to run a little hot.

Your PC should immediately recognize the drive. You will have to partition it and then format it. Use NTFS as the file system when you format. I'd use a single partition unless you have an over-riding reason to split the drive into multiple partitions. Typically the best policy is a single partition with a folder structure that organizes the content in a way that you find sensible.