Hi all,

As you can see this is my 1st post. I've spent the last 2 weeks reading over posts, etc. I have recently purchased a new 30gig hd. My current 15gig hd is partioned into 7 drives(C-I) of varying sizes from 1.5 to 3 gig. I would like to install the new hd with the same # of drives, although the sizes would again be different and I may add 1 or 2.

I've been thinking about what should be the simplest/easiest way to retain all of my current info. Which of the following scenerios makes the most sense?

1. Install the new hd as a slave. I have never had a system with 2 hds. Can I then partition it without affecting the existing hd? I presume I can. The new drives would then be J-?. I can then transfer(copy) all of my info to the new drives. What happens then when I make J the active partition (because it would be identical to the existing C) and remove the old hd? Will all of the drive letters automatically move up?

2. Install the new hd in another computer, format and partition as required, transfer virtually all of the info to it via hard wire connection (parallel cable) and then install the hard drive in this computer and reinstall/restore the neccesary hardware drivers.

3. Remove the existing hd, install, format and patition the new hd, then restore from backups all of my info. I know that the restore wants to put everything back to where it was, with the new partition sizes and number, will there be issues with this?

Should I remove all cards and the 2nd cd prior to installing the new hd?
I presently have sound, video, modem and lan cards. Is there a preferable order to replace them?

I have done a few clean installs before but would like to avoid having to re-install everything from scratch. I have also read somewhere that win98se has problems with more than 30gig hds. Will this be a concern in the first scenerio?

Thanks for any advise that I know you wizards can provide.
My system: 1gig duron, GA-7ZMMH mobo, cd, cdrw, fdd, 384ram, SB5.1 sound, nvidea Gforce2 400 64meg.

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If you got the new drive retail, it probably came with software that will allow you to partition and copy working versions of your current drive to the new one. I would use that in a variation of your first scenario. If you didn't get the retail version, you can still download the utilities from the drive makers website.

Hi Budfred,

Thanks for the quick reply. This new hd is oem and did not come with any software. I will check out the Maxtor site for the utilities you spoke of.

Seems there is a problem at the Maxtor site. When I try to get a download of the utility - maxblast3, all I get is a message that there is a server error. The new hd is a Maxtor Diamond Plus 8. I guess I'll have to wait and see if they get it working again.

Presumably this is a single boot (using Win98) and you eventually just want one physical drive ... or are you intending to add the new drive as master and have the old drive as a slave.

You can make a clone (as described above) but there are other options of course depending on what you finally want to achieve and what software you have at your disposal.

Depending on the software, the partition sizes can be kept the same or expanded to fill the disk. It is also possible, with utilities like PM, to reallocate any unused space to the partitions at a later stage if the "cloned" partitions are identical in size and structure to the originals.

The formatting (rather than the OS) is the main limiter with respect to maximum partition sizes. Thus FAT16 volumes can only be 2GB but on FAT32 this is increased, theoretically at least, to 2TB.

If your BIOS, however, don't support the size of the HD you are installing - it will be possible to add drive overlay software as one method to overcome this problem.

There should be no need to remove the other hardware while you get your new HDD up and running and there should be no problem with partitioning the new drive when it is added as slave as long as you are careful to not repartition or format anything on the current master.

What backup format/method and software have you been using? By adding the new drive as slave you may be able to just use this to "clone" your current backups instead of using any other software and then just swap the drives ensuring they have the correct jumper settings.

1) Download the software from Maxtor.

2) Install the new drive as the master device on the second IDE Controller. This is usually where the CD-ROM is.

3)Insert the maxtor disk and reboot.

4) Follow the bouncing ball on MaxBlast software and partition the drive anyway you want.

5) Continue following the bouncing ball and the software will guide you through transferring the data from the old hard drive to the new hard drive.

6) Remove the old hard drive and replace it with new hard drive.

7) Re-boot and you're done.

8) You can add the old hard drive as slave on the primary IDE controller and re-format the drive once the new drive is installed and working.

If all goes well, it should take less than 1 hour to accomplish this task.

Thaks for the replies,

First, I plan on removing the old drive and using it on another system.

Secondly, how can I accomplish the swap as classicsoftware suggests if I cannot get the utilities from the Maxtor site? Seems simple enough to be able to use dos format and fdisk utilities.
If I can ever get the utilities to download, will I then be able to copy them to a cd and make it a boot disc?

Third, I presume that the bios will support the new hd. I bought and installed the mobo 1 year ago.

I am using HP cd writer as my backup program. It came with the cd-rw.

Thanks,

Try the maxtor site again.

I downloaded it today.

If you still cant get it, send me aprivate messagre and I'll e-mail you a copy.

The utilities from Maxtor install on a floppy, so you don't have to worry about making a bootable CD. You can do the partitioning and formating from DOS, but the Maxtor utilities makes it much easier and more reliable to transfer your OS and current setup. If you still can't download it, you may want to try a different browser, especially if you are using an older version of Netscape.

Also, you shouldn't have any trouble with your BIOS unless your new hard drive is one of the new SATA (Serial ATA) drives.

There is something wrong with their site. I just downloaded the hard drive testing utility that is larger than maxblast3 utility without any problems.

Here it is

Good luck

Thanks classicsoftware for the file,

It is done. Took about 1:45 hr. Actually quite painless. Only missing 1 link to a shortcut for fastfind on bootup.

Next time will be much quicker as I did a few things that weren't necessary. Here's a few things to note from this swap:
1. I could have set both drives to "cable select" and just swapped the cable plugs - master/slave because I had a cable with 2 ends. That would have saved about an hour. I went thru the procedure of changing the jumpers, which meant removing the drives twice. I did not swap out the secondary ide channel to the cd as classicsoftware suggested, altho that would have worked.
2. Copying files took 1/2 hr because I did not relize the maxtor software only copied the c: (boot) drive. It would be nice if their software would include the option to continue copying the other partitioned drives to where ever you wanted to put them.
3. Even though the bios was set to auto detect the hds, I had to do that manually with each addition, swap master/slave, remove of a drive.

Thanks to all who replied with advise, now, I hope I can help someone else with this wealth of information.