Installing and Cloning SATA internal Drives

indexster

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How do I install a new WD Caviar Blue 500 GB Hard Drive 16 MB Cache, 7200 RPM SATA II WD5000AAKS into a HP Pavillion a1224n Computer?

I am currently running this system with one Samsung 200gn Internal HDD...and make the new WD my primary Boot disk? (On the new WD 500 I'm told the 4 jumpers on this SATA II that NO JUMPERS should be "Jumped" on this WD5000AAKS.

I have Ghost Trial, Acronis and a WD Tetrabyte USB external My Book Essential. I hear I should (must) use a Boot disk to stop the current C:\ from booting.
This is my First SATA experience and I guess I really don't know how to install a SATA Drive--better yet two internal SATA hard drives? I've been working on this for 4-5 hours a day for a week.

As I say...RED FLAG when the device has 80 or more pages of documentation
 
Solution
Yours is a common situation and easy to do if you follow the steps. First some general info for understanding.

With SATA drives there is NO setting of Master or Slave, and NO need to set jumpers (with one small exception, MAYBE). In fact, you are better NOT to move any jumpers on a SATA drive. They are used for different purposes, and setting some wrong can disable the drive.

The one exception on SATA jumpers is for a very specific combination: when you are installing a SATA II (3.0 Gb/s drive unit in an older machine that has original SATA (1.5 Gb/s) controllers on the mobo. In this combination the faster newer drive is SUPPOSED TO figure it out and slow itself down automatically so it can communicate with the controller. However...

gtvr

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You most likely set the boot order in your BIOS. Don't mess with jumpers.

Do you need info on how to physically install it?

Clone the data from the old drive to the new drive, switch the boot order, and you should be good to go. Of course, back up any crucial data first, to a CD or something - pics documents or the like that you can't lose.
 

indexster

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Thanks! That's the BEST answer of 6!
I have already have installed the new WD 500gb and BIOS "sees" it

Do I need to Boot with a CD for cloning?

There's a question of losing the boot and other data by RUNNING the clone application directly from the installed 200gb HDD. i.e. the files in the 200gb being "in use" and thus unabled to be copied.

What Clone program would you use?

Thanks for the hours you're saving me. I REALLY APPRECIATE THAT !
I'm doing this for a friend. I'm an "intermediate" Geek and have set up 100 systems using IDE drives AND
early on... the SATA's were 40%-50% SLOWER than my screaming WD 500gig IDE Drive!

THANKS AGAIN
Dave In Atlanta
 

gtvr

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Never used the WD software, if ghost is a trial I'm not sure what it will or won't do. I've heard good things about Acronis. Yeah, if you can boot from a CD to clone, do that.

If a SATA drive is running slow, make sure you are using AHCI mode (set in BIOS) and the OS has all the right drivers.
 

Paperdoc

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Yours is a common situation and easy to do if you follow the steps. First some general info for understanding.

With SATA drives there is NO setting of Master or Slave, and NO need to set jumpers (with one small exception, MAYBE). In fact, you are better NOT to move any jumpers on a SATA drive. They are used for different purposes, and setting some wrong can disable the drive.

The one exception on SATA jumpers is for a very specific combination: when you are installing a SATA II (3.0 Gb/s drive unit in an older machine that has original SATA (1.5 Gb/s) controllers on the mobo. In this combination the faster newer drive is SUPPOSED TO figure it out and slow itself down automatically so it can communicate with the controller. However, sometimes that fails and you need to force it. For that purpose WD and some others use a jumper that is installed on a particular pin pair. In fact, some HDD makers ship their drives with this already installed so it is sure to work, and those who KNOW it is not needed (they have a newer SATA II controller) can remove it. Check your system specs for controller type and speed, and check the WD instructions for where this jumper should be placed IF it is needed, or removed if not.

To add a SATA HDD to your system you will need to have a physical space to mount it in, an unused SATA port on the mobo, a SATA data ribbon cable to connect with and an unused SATA power connector from the PSU. I'll assume you have these. The plan is to install the new unit as a second HDD with appropriate settings in BIOS Setup, install (unless already done) the cloning software you will use, run the software (with adjustments I'll cover) to make the clone, shut down and change hardware so that the new drive completely takes over in place of the pld one, then reboot and check it is all working. I will suggest that you disconnect the old HDD and just leave it there for a while as an untouched perfect backup of your system up to the point of the upgrade. LATER you can reconnect it and set it up for other uses.

I'll also assume that you have an optical drive connected somehow - either as an IDE device, or an another SATA device. That does not really matter.

You do NOT need any special Boot Disk for this.

I do not know Ghost, but I have used Acronis and will advise how to use it. I don't know whether you have a full copy of Acronis True Image, which is what you need for this purpose. Acronis makes other products, too, but some may NOT be suitable for cloning. If you do NOT have True Image, get the free downloadable customized version of it from the website of your HDD maker, WD. They call it Acronis True Image WD Edition. Also get and read the manual for this software. It is very good and very powerful and does LOTS of things beyond cloning. It should be installed on your existing older HDD so it knows the full capabilities of your hardware and OS.

So, step by step, here goes.
1. Install the new 500 GB HDD unit. When you boot, go immediately into BIOS Setup. On many machines this means holding down the "Del" key as it starts up until the screen shows you the BIOS startup menu. BUT on some machines it is another key and you should watch the screen for a prompt to tell you how to enter BIOS Setup. Within Setup go to where the SATA ports are configured and check that the new HDD's port is Enabled. Near there you will find a place to set the SATA Port Mode. On some systems you make one Mode setting for all SATA ports at once. If that is your case, leave it set as it is. If not, look at the mode for the SATA port that already has your old HDD on it. I might be IDE (or PATA) Emulation, or Native SATA, or AHCI, or RAID. Whatever that is, use the same setting for the port with the new drive. Now, back out of that menu and go to where you specify the Boot Priority Sequence. The most likely setting for you is the optical drive first, then the old HDD that is already working, and NO other options. Save and Exit, and the machine will boot from your old HDD as normal.

2. Start up the cloning software. You must specify which drive is the SOURCE unit, and which is the DESTINATION drive. Make SURE you set the new 500 GB unit as the DESTINATION, because whatever is on that drive will be overwritten with new stuff. Then the first task will be to analyze the Partitions on the old drive and figure out how to create Partitions on the new one. (Any brand new HDD has no organization on it at all, so areas must be reserved as Partitions (each to be treated as a separate "drive" with its own name), and then each such Partition must be Formatted.) On simple systems you might have only one Partition on a HDD unit that uses up all the space the unit has. Some people create two or more Partitions on one drive to keep different things separate (like, the OS on one and all applications and data on another). Many factory-made machines actually have a small semi-hidden Partition that contains a backup copy of the key parts of the OS; it is not easily accessible to prevent having it corrupted, but it is used by recovery software that came on a CD with your system to restore from a disk disaster. Then they have the larger main Partition you know as your C: drive.

3. IF there is only ONE partition on your old drive, the cloning software by default will probably propose that it make a Partition on the new HDD of the same size to receive the clone. Most people do NOT want it that way. They would rather use ALL of the new drive in the Partition. IF that is your situation (see next step for alternative) you can leave it the way it is (and later use that Unallocated Space to create your own extra Partition(s)), OR you can manually use the menus to tell it to set the Partition to whatever size you want, up to the max. Do what you choose.

4. IF, on the other hand, there are TWO or more Partitions on the old HDD, the default proposal will be what is called "Proportional" sizing of the Partitions created on the new HDD. This divides the new HDD space into two (or more) partitions so that each one takes the same proportion of the available space as it did on the old one. For example, if the old 200 GB unit has a 40 GB small first Partition (maybe the hidden recovery Partition) - that's 20% of the old drive - it will propose to make a 100 GB (20% of the new larger drive) first Partition on the new one, etc. This also may NOT be what you want. If your old drive has this structure, the semi-hidden backup Partition from the old drive will not need to take up any more space on the new one, so there is no need for it to be bigger. You can manually intervene again via the menus and set that Partition size on the new 500 GB unit to be the same size (or maybe marginally larger) as on the old 200 GB unit. THEN you change the actual accessible main Partition size to the whole rest of the new HDD. That way the old structure of 40 GB hidden and 160 GB as a C: drive will be transformed into a 40 GB hidden and a 460 GB C: drive. (Well, actually, the "500 GB" drive will only have about 465 GB of total space the way Microsoft system counts it, so that new C: drive may be a bit less than 430.)

5. So, now that you've adjusted how the new Partition(s) are going to be created, you can check a few other items for each of them. MOST of these already will be set by default to the correct values and you will NOT need to change them. Some (maybe all) of the partitions may be set as Bootable. Do not change this. I am sure the large main Partition (to become C:) will be Bootable. There will be some notes about the File System to be installed on each Partition. In almost all cases it will be NTFS, and there is NO need to change that unless you KNOW you need FAT32 for a special reason.

6. Once all the options are set you run the cloning task. This will take a very LONG time, so just let it run - probably many hours. When is says it is done and successful, exit from the software and shut down the machine. Disconnect power, open the case, and change a couple of cables. I suggest you remove the data cable from the new HDD. Then disconnect both the data and power cables to the older HDD, and connect its data cable to the new one. This way the new 500 GB unit is connected to the SAME SATA port as the original HDD that had been serving as your boot device. And, the old HDD is isolated and cannot be changed by accident. Close up and reconnect power.

7. Boot into BIOS Setup again and go to the place where you set the Boot Priority Sequence. It should now show the optical drive first, and the new 500 GB HDD second, and NO other options. Save and Exit and your machine should boot up exactly as it always did. The only difference is that your C: drive will now be MUCH larger!! That was the point, right?

8. After you are happy with all this, you can decide what to do with the 200 GB unit. You could reconnect it and it ought to be recognized as a second HDD with all its files ready to use. You could transplant it into another external HDD enclosure and have an extra external hard drive, maybe using the 200 GB unit as a backup device. In either case you might be well advised to wipe it clean and start fresh. To do this you can Delete the Partitions it has, then Create one or more new Partitions on it and Format them, ready to use for data. When you do this, since the unit is NOT going to be your boot device, you can have the Primary Partition you create be non-bootable. You will find that ALL of these things can be done using Acronis True Image's other functions.

9. If you do not already have good backup software, Acronis itself can sort of do it. It is not intended for that, and does not do scheduled backups and incremental backups. BUT you can simply use it to make a CLONE of your C: drive (adjusted to the available size of the external HDD you're using) which IS a bootable clone. You can re-make the clone any time by Deleting the Partition on the drive and making a new clone to it. And if you ever need it, even if your machine cannot boot from an external hard dive, you can open up the external unit and transplant the HDD containing the clone into your case, making it a new internal C: drive you can boot from.
 
Solution

indexster

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:bounce: :bounce: :bounce:

WOW ! Well from MY Experiences --you did PERFECTLY.

"Step by Step" AND now it's in COPY which is NOT 80+ Pages as Acronis is...and I'm STILL reading Norton's Ghost. When I had a small business company in 1990 (First Time Computing) I joked with a few of my clients and said" You're paying me $75.00 an hour to READ!" And then I wrote (Step by Step) what I called my "EZ-1-2-3" NO MORE than Three Steps and NO MORE than a Single Page. Then I sat down with them at the PC for the inauguration.

When I saw 80+ pages for Acronis (TO PRINT? I DON'T THINK SO...) THAT'S A HUGE "RED FLAG" TO ME.

MANY MANY THANKS FOR MAKING AND TAKING THE TIME TO DO A GREAT "Step by Step" Doc ! This will be timely considering the new Pre-dominance of SATA! (NEVER and NOT IN MY PC!)

Dave in Atlanta