How Do I Add Another SATA HDD ? Only got room for 2?

[dsperber]

So could I just used the SATA to USB I bought to run the HDD as external? Then buy a cage when I have more money?

This is really not intended for long-term usage.

It is (a) slow-speed running at USB 2.0 speeds, and (b) only provides the interfaces so that you can plug in what would have been an internal drive and use it external to the case. It's really intended for very temporary use.

It is primarily intended to support copying data off of an old drive to a new one, when you upgrade to a new machine or upgrade an internal hard drive, etc. In other words it is a "system installer's trick" to migrate data for a customer, from the "old computer/drive" to the "new computer/drive". It will work fine for that, and supports both IDE and SATA drives making them "readable externally" through a USB 2.0 interface on the new machine. In fact it is the perfect device for that purpose.

But it is not really intended as a long-term solution, especially since the hard drive is generally sitting fully exposed on a carton or something temporarily.

You don't have internal space in your machine for another hard drive. So using any PCIe-to-SATA internal adapter device as was suggested to create additional SATA data connections doesn't help, since you have no place to put another internal drive... even forgetting about power supply requirements and cables to feed another internal drive.

My suggestion still stands, of using an external USB 3.0 drive through either an existing USB 3.0 port if your machine has them, or through an add-on USB 3.0 port through a PCIe-to-USB3.0 adapter card if you have a spare PCIe x1 expansion slot open on your motherboard. Might as well spend $18 for the USB 3.0 adapter card and $115 for a brand new 2TB SATA drive packaged in a USB 3.0 external enclosure with its own power, and get the kind of performance speed and capacity you could really use.

 

[jacko900000]

You've all been helpful

I'll be honest, Some of the stuff has gone over my head but people actually took time to write stuff out.

Guess I just better save up for another 1TB HDD

PC runs quick enough, had some trouble over the last couple of months with it now I know its the HDD I'm going to save up for another one and maybe a new PC soon enough.

Thanks everybody.

 

[Lady Fitzgerald]

You've all been helpful

I'll be honest, Some of the stuff has gone over my head but people actually took time to write stuff out.

Guess I just better save up for another 1TB HDD

PC runs quick enough, had some trouble over the last couple of months with it now I know its the HDD I'm going to save up for another one and maybe a new PC soon enough.

Thanks everybody.

Getting a bigger HDD will be your best bet. Avoid the "green" drives and save up for one of the better drives, such as a 1TB SATA III Western Digital Blue or, if you can afford it, Black. You have only two SATA ports; one is used by the HDD and the other by the optical drive. Adding insult to injury, I doubt Acer put in a power supply that could safely handle the extra load of an additional HDD.

When you do get the new HDD, consider putting the OS on a partition separate from your data. When the time comes for that, get back with us for help on how to do that.

 

[smarteyeball]

Hmm
Not turning out to be such a good PC as its been running for the last 4 years. Maybe time for an upgrade

You still got four good years out of it

How much am I looking at for a PCIE-E 16 to SATA .. or something like that?

& yeah, I can't see any extra SATA or power wires/plugs

It can vary but factor in a $20-40.


This is an example of what you could fit into your PCIE-E x1 slot

Masscool XWT PCIE10 PCI Express 4 Port SATA2 Card | eBay


However having no power to run the drives might be your biggest hurdle. The card draws power from the slot, the drives cannot. Theoretically if you had one spare molex plug, you could use a splitter/adapter to power two drives.

But if you have NO spare power plugs - upgrade limit on internal reached mate.

As mentioned, you could run a drive externally.

I'd personally prefer to use an add on USB 3.0 card + a USB 3.0 enclosure. You wouldn't get "Full speed" but it'd still be quicker transferring data on a regular basis.

 

[DocBrown]

I think the best you could do would be to get a 2tb internal Sata HD (to replace your old internal HD). Format it first into several partitions. Then do a clean win7 install without OEM bloatware as gregrockers tutorial here on SF. Then the best alternative for a second Sata HD would be an external USB case or DOCK unit like I showed earlier.

 

[jacko900000]

You've all been helpful

I'll be honest, Some of the stuff has gone over my head but people actually took time to write stuff out.

Guess I just better save up for another 1TB HDD

PC runs quick enough, had some trouble over the last couple of months with it now I know its the HDD I'm going to save up for another one and maybe a new PC soon enough.

Thanks everybody.

Getting a bigger HDD will be your best bet. Avoid the "green" drives and save up for one of the better drives, such as a 1TB SATA III Western Digital Blue or, if you can afford it, Black. You have only two SATA ports; one is used by the HDD and the other by the optical drive. Adding insult to injury, I doubt Acer put in a power supply that could safely handle the extra load of an additional HDD.

When you do get the new HDD, consider putting the OS on a partition separate from your data. When the time comes for that, get back with us for help on how to do that.

I did have a partition on my 1TB, I don't know whats happened with that.. All of a sudden it just stopped loading windows and constantly gave my errors (see my older posts) So Im guessing thats what the error was.

Hmm
Not turning out to be such a good PC as its been running for the last 4 years. Maybe time for an upgrade

You still got four good years out of it

How much am I looking at for a PCIE-E 16 to SATA .. or something like that?

& yeah, I can't see any extra SATA or power wires/plugs

It can vary but factor in a $20-40.


This is an example of what you could fit into your PCIE-E x1 slot

Masscool XWT PCIE10 PCI Express 4 Port SATA2 Card | eBay


However having no power to run the drives might be your biggest hurdle. The card draws power from the slot, the drives cannot. Theoretically if you had one spare molex plug, you could use a splitter/adapter to power two drives.

But if you have NO spare power plugs - upgrade limit on internal reached mate.

As mentioned, you could run a drive externally.

I'd personally prefer to use an add on USB 3.0 card + a USB 3.0 enclosure. You wouldn't get "Full speed" but it'd still be quicker transferring data on a regular basis.

Yeah 4 good years, Never let me down until recently everything has been going wrong. Flawless running aswell always booted in less than 30seconds.

Think I'm just going to save up and buy another (i think this is correct) a 3.5 SATA 1 TB HDD.

Then I'll look into buying better graphics and filling them slots.. If they're there, might as well use them right?

What would you recommend to fill rest of those slots?

 

[jacko900000]

I think the best you could do would be to get a 2tb internal Sata HD (to replace your old internal HD). Format it first into several partitions. Then do a clean win7 install without OEM bloatware as gregrockers tutorial here on SF. Then the best alternative for a second Sata HD would be an external USB case or DOCK unit like I showed earlier.

The only reason I was wanting to external HDD is because the 1TB I have was originally in my PC.. That broke, Does work but really not sure whats up with it.. Recently got error on PC when installing windows 7 "can't find drivers" .. Found out that was a HDD error.

So the main reason to putting that 1TB external is so its not sat in a box doing nothing until I have enough money to buy another 1/2TB HDD.

 

[DocBrown]

So which HD is win7 running from right now ? Laptop HD ?

 

[jacko900000]

So which HD is win7 running from right now ? Laptop HD ?

Yeah a 120GB HDD from a laptop its the only thing I had to get my PC up and running.

 

[DavidE]

If you do get a new HD look at 2-3 TB drives.
They are more cost effective than 1 TB drives now (USA).
Newegg often has 2 TB 7200 rpm HD's on sale for ~$80 USD.

 

[AddRAM]

I`m sure it`s been mentioned, but it looks like your cheapest and easiest way to do what you want, is to buy an external drive enclosure.

Rosewill RX35-AT-SU BLK Black External Enclosure - Newegg.com

Your 1 terabyte drive probably works fine, and just needs to be formatted, as you have suggested.

If you`re just gonna use it for storage, well then usb should be fine for ya.

 

[DocBrown]

The adapter that you ordered off eBay should work to get some of your files off the old 1tb HD.

 

[DavidE]

Reading back through this thread, I'm not sure if you just had Windows problems and the HD is OK, or the HD is failing.
If you are thinking of using your 1 TB hard drive again you should run diagnostic testing program(s) on it to determine if the HD is failing.
Is the HD manufacturer shown on the label on your 1 TB HD?
HD manufacturers have testing utilities that you can boot from a CD/DVD to test a HD.

If the HD is failing it should be replaced.
If the HD is OK, then you should still be able to use it.

In post #27 you stated:

Recently got error on PC when installing windows 7 "can't find drivers" .. Found out that was a HDD error.

How did you find out it was a HDD error, and what HDD error?

Is there anything on the 1 TB HD now that you still need to recover?
Or, are you OK with cleaning the HD and seeing if you can reinstall Windows on it, assuming it is not failing?

 

[jacko900000]

Reading back through this thread, I'm not sure if you just had Windows problems and the HD is OK, or the HD is failing.
If you are thinking of using your 1 TB hard drive again you should run diagnostic testing program(s) on it to determine if the HD is failing.
Is the HD manufacturer shown on the label on your 1 TB HD?
HD manufacturers have testing utilities that you can boot from a CD/DVD to test a HD.

If the HD is failing it should be replaced.
If the HD is OK, then you should still be able to use it.

In post #27 you stated:

Recently got error on PC when installing windows 7 "can't find drivers" .. Found out that was a HDD error.

How did you find out it was a HDD error, and what HDD error?

Is there anything on the 1 TB HD now that you still need to recover?
Or, are you OK with cleaning the HD and seeing if you can reinstall Windows on it, assuming it is not failing?

When I put the disc in to install windows 7 I got 2 errors.
1: booted from CD, boot from windows (to upgrade)
2: to clean install.. No boot drivers could be found

After searching around a little on this, I found that my PC wasn't reading the HDD.

I have everything I need off the HDD, for the last 4/5 months my pc has kept breaking so not left any data on it.

If you see my old posts

• amd data change update new data to dmi
• Windows 7 Wont boot - Showing recovery box - Administrator X: CMD

These were the main errors I kept getting when my PC broke.

The 1TB HDD is official, It came with my PC and it does say 1TB on the HDD so I know its legit.

I'm not 100% sure on how to check if its having errors and need's to be replaced though

 

[AddRAM]

Are you sure it wasn`t saying "No boot DRIVE can be found" or did it actually say DRIVERS ?

They are 2 totally different messages.

Where did you get the install dvd from ? Did you buy it ? Did it come with the pc ? Or did you make it yourself or borrow it ?

An improperly prepared install dvd will easily give you a driver error message.

 

[DavidE]

I'm not 100% sure on how to check if its having errors and need's to be replaced though

I asked:

Is the HD manufacturer shown on the label on your 1 TB HD?
HD manufacturers have testing utilities that you can boot from a CD/DVD to test a HD.

If you have the HD out of the PC, does it show who the HD manufacturer is?
If it does and you tell us if it is WD, Seagate, etc. , someone here can probably give you a link to the best tool to test it with.

 

[jacko900000]

Are you sure it wasn`t saying "No boot DRIVE can be found" or did it actually say DRIVERS ?

They are 2 totally different messages.

Where did you get the install dvd from ? Did you buy it ? Did it come with the pc ? Or did you make it yourself or borrow it ?

An improperly prepared install dvd will easily give you a driver error message.

No was Driver error, but got two.. Can't remember exactly what they said but I know it was 2 driver errors.

The installation disc came with the PC, I also made one myself (ISO burner) and a friend borrowed me his copy still said driver error.

When I booted CMD too I searched for the C drive and nothing came up, would only find the F drive which was my Disc Drive.

Also noticed before the PC broke, I had a partition on my 1TB HDD but couldn't find either =/

 

[jacko900000]

I'm not 100% sure on how to check if its having errors and need's to be replaced though

I asked:

Is the HD manufacturer shown on the label on your 1 TB HD?
HD manufacturers have testing utilities that you can boot from a CD/DVD to test a HD.

If you have the HD out of the PC, does it show who the HD manufacturer is?
If it does and you tell us if it is WD, Seagate, etc. , someone here can probably give you a link to the best tool to test it with.

Its not out at the moment, But had it out and I'm sure its a Seagate HD because I checked their website too but couldn't find anything =/

1TB Seagate

 

[DavidE]

You can start here with testing using the bootable CD image option/download.
SeaTools for DOS tutorial

If others know a better article/tool for testing, I'm sure they will post that info...

 

[jacko900000]

So I got the SATA to USB..
Connected, Showed up that it was installing drivers but in My Computer & Disk Management its not showing my HDD.

I disconnected it and a message popped up saying "Disk H must be formatted before use"

Any ideas?