Adding a new HDD to a HP

corblimey

I'm considering adding a slave HDD for extra space, but times have changed since the last time I tried something like this (adding one to my Win95 Gateway, in case you're interested ). How do I go about finding out what sort of HDD is suitable for my machine? Komplett have a range of internal HDDs, 2.5", 3.5", IDE, SATA, buffer, speed, etc. Haven't a clue what to get.

pauln

If it's a standard PC desktop were talking about then something like this would suit nicely.

3.5"-IDE-8Mb Buffer-200Gb.

What operating system is the HP machine running, sometimes the larger drives can give problems on a Win 98 machine. You wouldn't be looking at SATA unless the machine was built within the last few months and the buffer doesn't matter to much, I think it adds a little to the transfer speed but for everyday use 8MB is fine. Speed, 7200 RPM min I'd say.

astec123

Your biggest problem will be the OS you run, windows 95 can only see a small portion of a 200Gb drive, just a problem to do with the code windows uses. You only real solution is to buy a better version of windows 98 or later, that will recognise more of the space. The trouble with this is that these need more resources that you probably have, as you are on Win95 I would guess about 16mb of ram as things went on more and more ram is needed, so this would need to be upgraded, but alas the motherboard wont cope usually with more than 4 or 8 times what it started with, so you need a new motherboard to cope with that, and then another problem, the processor wont be compatable. Really its a bad problem you have yourself in if you want more space, you either have to get a small capacity drive (or several) or just buy a new system. But buying a large capacity drive for Win95 is a futile exercise as you wont be able to use it all.

edit just realised you meant your last upgrade was a win 95 machine, above still applies really as 98 can only see a max of 15Gb (dont quote me on that). Win98 SE I believe could work with more.

corblimey

Sorry for the confusion. The last time I tried a hw upgrade was with a now 10 year old machine, so I was guessing things have moved on since then.

The HP I'll be attempting to upgrade is about a year old, Win XP Home installed.

alas the motherboard wont cope usually with more than 4 or 8 times what it started with

I'm not sure what you mean by this, astec.

Does my installed OS make any diff to your recommendation, pauln?

pauln

Nope, only the OS could make any difference on a new machine like that and since your on XP you should have no problems.

astec123's info was spot on if you where on one of the earlier OS's, with a comparably older machine.