Hard drive cleaning

[pheasant]

The box is REALLY starting to crawl. The kids have left, and I'd like
to format and start fresh.

Debating between an external hard drive to copy everything to, format
the installed drive, adding desired programs and data back; OR just
buying another hard drive removing current one, install XP on it, then
put old hd back in as a second pulling off desired programs and data
then formatting it.

This box is 5+ years old, P4 Northwood 2GHz with 512 RDRAM and an 80GB
hd. Also pre USB2 so external drive transfer would be extremely slow.
Don't need anything newer/faster for us, and would like to tinker again
after being away from building since the Athlon Barton pre-locked core
days. Still have a couple mobile XP 2500's collecting dust.

Thanks for your ideas.

Mark

 

[Anna]

"pheasant" <kiavan02@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:1YCdnZfNBNU-tQvbnZ2dnUVZ_g-dnZ2d@midco.net...
> The box is REALLY starting to crawl. The kids have left, and I'd like to
> format and start fresh.
>
> Debating between an external hard drive to copy everything to, format the
> installed drive, adding desired programs and data back; OR just buying
> another hard drive removing current one, install XP on it, then put old hd
> back in as a second pulling off desired programs and data then formatting
> it.
>
> This box is 5+ years old, P4 Northwood 2GHz with 512 RDRAM and an 80GB hd.
> Also pre USB2 so external drive transfer would be extremely slow. Don't
> need anything newer/faster for us, and would like to tinker again after
> being away from building since the Athlon Barton pre-locked core days.
> Still have a couple mobile XP 2500's collecting dust.
>
> Thanks for your ideas.
>
> Mark


Mark:
I'm guessing that you *really* do know what you'd like to do, so the
following is probably merely a "re:run" of your intentions...

Get yourself a nice, new HDD and fresh install a copy of XP onto it. They're
(the HDDs I mean) are certainly cheap enough these days). The only pain here
will, of course, be installing all the critical updates since SP2 (I'm
assuming that you'll be working with an XP installation CD that contains
SP2). Hopefully, you have a broadband connection so that that chore
shouldn't be too onerous.

Then, of course, install whatever programs & user-created data you want onto
the new drive (little-by-little) and see how it goes.

You could then use your old HDD for obvious backup/storage purposes.

I'm assuming in all this that you're not using the PC for high-powered
gaming nor intensive audio/video applications of one sort or another.

The 512 RDRAM should suffice nicely. That RAMBUS RAM is just about the
finest RAM we've ever come across. Rock-stable and seems to go on forever.
Pity market conditions resulted in its demise.

Other than that, you can, of course, undertake the usual "housekeeping"
chores re cleaning up your present system and see how it goes. But I suspect
you know that, right?
Anna

 

[Phisherman]

On Thu, 12 Jul 2007 08:12:04 -0500, pheasant <kiavan02@yahoo.com>
wrote:

>The box is REALLY starting to crawl. The kids have left, and I'd like
>to format and start fresh.
>
>Debating between an external hard drive to copy everything to, format
>the installed drive, adding desired programs and data back; OR just
>buying another hard drive removing current one, install XP on it, then
>put old hd back in as a second pulling off desired programs and data
>then formatting it.
>
>This box is 5+ years old, P4 Northwood 2GHz with 512 RDRAM and an 80GB
>hd. Also pre USB2 so external drive transfer would be extremely slow.
>Don't need anything newer/faster for us, and would like to tinker again
>after being away from building since the Athlon Barton pre-locked core
>days. Still have a couple mobile XP 2500's collecting dust.
>
>Thanks for your ideas.
>
>Mark

First do a thorough scan for errors. I'd burn a few DVDs, then
reformat the drive. Expect to spend a few hours downloading MS
updates, reinstalling apps, configuring internet, etc.

 

[pheasant]

Anna wrote:
> "pheasant" <kiavan02@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:1YCdnZfNBNU-tQvbnZ2dnUVZ_g-dnZ2d@midco.net...

> Mark:
> I'm guessing that you *really* do know what you'd like to do, so the
> following is probably merely a "re:run" of your intentions...
>
> Get yourself a nice, new HDD and fresh install a copy of XP onto it. They're
> (the HDDs I mean) are certainly cheap enough these days). The only pain here
> will, of course, be installing all the critical updates since SP2 (I'm
> assuming that you'll be working with an XP installation CD that contains
> SP2). Hopefully, you have a broadband connection so that that chore
> shouldn't be too onerous.
>
> Then, of course, install whatever programs & user-created data you want onto
> the new drive (little-by-little) and see how it goes.

Well; I've got my options in mind, but appreciate bouncing it off
others, as usually 2 ideas or more will often come up with a better
solution, or confirm the one I'd choose as the best option.

I'm leaning toward another internal, but am sort of concerned how XP may
react when the old drive when it finds another "C" drive has replaced it.

Don't know if it will have a hissy and refuse to boot, look to the new
and reassign the old "C" to an unused letter(hopefully), or look to the
old and reassign the newly installed drive/OS.

Last build I did, my main drive is H, didn't know that putting in a
memory card reader before initial boot would result in that happening,
no big deal, but with an upgrade, don't know how it will react.

Maybe that's not much of an issue for a savvy tech, but I'm just a shade
tree tinkerer.

 

[Anna]

>> Anna wrote:
>> Mark:
>> I'm guessing that you *really* do know what you'd like to do, so the
>> following is probably merely a "re:run" of your intentions...
>>
>> Get yourself a nice, new HDD and fresh install a copy of XP onto it.
>> They're (the HDDs I mean) are certainly cheap enough these days). The
>> only pain here will, of course, be installing all the critical updates
>> since SP2 (I'm assuming that you'll be working with an XP installation CD
>> that contains SP2). Hopefully, you have a broadband connection so that
>> that chore shouldn't be too onerous.
>>
>> Then, of course, install whatever programs & user-created data you want
>> onto the new drive (little-by-little) and see how it goes.
>> Anna


"pheasant" <kiavan02@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> Well; I've got my options in mind, but appreciate bouncing it off others,
> as usually 2 ideas or more will often come up with a better solution, or
> confirm the one I'd choose as the best option.
>
> I'm leaning toward another internal, but am sort of concerned how XP may
> react when the old drive when it finds another "C" drive has replaced it.
>
> Don't know if it will have a hissy and refuse to boot, look to the new and
> reassign the old "C" to an unused letter(hopefully), or look to the old
> and reassign the newly installed drive/OS.
>
> Last build I did, my main drive is H, didn't know that putting in a memory
> card reader before initial boot would result in that happening, no big
> deal, but with an upgrade, don't know how it will react.
>
> Maybe that's not much of an issue for a savvy tech, but I'm just a shade
> tree tinkerer.


Mark:
The potential problem you mention can be avoided by simply installing the XP
OS onto the new HDD while ensuring that no other storage devices are
connected in the system at the time of that installation. That includes, of
course, your old HDD.

Since the new HDD will serve as your boot drive it should be connected as
the Primary Master - assuming it's a PATA HDD, or connected to the
motherboard's SATA0 (or SATA1) connector - assuming it's a SATA HDD. I can't
remember if you previously indicated what types of HDDs you'll be working
with.

Finally, after you've installed the XP OS onto the new drive and determine
that it's properly functioning, you'll connect your old HDD as a Slave to
the PM boot drive or anywhere on the secondary IDE channel (again, if it's a
PATA HDD) or to a secondary SATA connector if it's a SATA HDD.

Upon that initial boot while both HDDs are connected it would be wise to
access your motherboard's BIOS and ensure that the boot priority order has
been properly set.

The most important item in all of this is as I've stated in my first
paragraph above. Make sure the *only* HDD or storage device connected at the
time you install the XP OS onto your new HDD is that new HDD.
Anna

 

[Plato]

pheasant wrote:
>
> The box is REALLY starting to crawl. The kids have left, and I'd like
> to format and start fresh.

Boot with your XP cd and start fresh.

--
http://www.bootdisk.com/