2 HDD's

[dc157_1]

I just finished reformating both of my hard drives. I have a 80GB and a 250GB. Window's XP is loaded on my 80GB but I wanted to use my 250GB for music, movies and such. When I click on my computer the only hard drive that shows up is the 80GB. How come the 250GB isnt showing??? How can I make it appear?

 

[bigsaucybob]

1. Right click on your My Computer icon on your desktop, then select Manage

2. In Manage, select Disk Management

3. If the 250GB is correctly installed, it should appear in the bottom part of the window along with your CD Drive and your 80GB.

4. Right click on the 250GB and select Format, let it format and that should do the trick

 

[pip22]

A few basic 'must do's' when fitting a second disk:

1. Second disk must be configured as a 'slave' by positioning the jumper on it's rear panel, if it's sharing same data cable as the system drive.

2. You may have to go into the BIOS settings and execute 'auto-detect'
for the second drive after connecting it.

 

[dc157_1]

1. Right click on your My Computer icon on your desktop, then select Manage

2. In Manage, select Disk Management

3. If the 250GB is correctly installed, it should appear in the bottom part of the window along with your CD Drive and your 80GB.

4. Right click on the 250GB and select Format, let it format and that should do the trick

Ok I did everything you said and yes it is showing on the bottom with my CD-Rom Drive. But where do I select format at??? I cant see anywhere to do it

 

[Scrat]

Ok I did everything you said and yes it is showing on the bottom with my CD-Rom Drive. But where do I select format at??? I cant see anywhere to do it

At step #4, right-click on the 250GB HDD in the bottom right-hand window of Disk Manager, then from the drop down menu you should have the Format option listed.

 

[bigsaucybob]

Ok I did everything you said and yes it is showing on the bottom with my CD-Rom Drive. But where do I select format at??? I cant see anywhere to do it

You right click on the drive listed towars the bottom of the window, and then select Format.

Edit, make sure you right click on the long white part of the Drive, not the part where it says Drive 1 or something.

 

[dc157_1]

Nope I dont have a Format option on the list. When I right click there are only 2 options...."Properties and Help". my 80GB says Primary and the 250GB say's Unallocated. Im not sure if that has anything to do with it or not?

 

[Angel.of.Death]

OK heres your problem: That space on your HDD is not allocated to a partition. Therefore, you cant format.

Use Partition Magic to Create a partition... Get Partition Magic PLEASE. It doesnt cost a fortune and can be used SO SO much...

Its so very easy to use...

But yes - you can use the way BSB suggested - disk manager. I THINK you can create and format it from there.

 

[PC eye]

Use Partition Magic to Create a partition... Get Partition Magic PLEASE. It doesnt cost a fortune and can be used SO SO much...

Its so very easy to use...

Bonkers! The Dsk mangement tool comes "FREE" along with XP! Why should he go out and BUY a retail software that essentially uses the same process?

By simply booting from a cd with the Gnome Partition Editor on it which is also a "free to download" utility you can easily create partitions for a variety of OSs as well as NTFS for XP. Yoo then would simply use what? the Disk Management tool to right click on the drive's new primary partition and format it there. (Gee? $.35 for cd-r doesn't cost anywhere near as much as $35 does it?)

 

[pip22]

You should be able to see "Create Partition" in Windows 'Disk Management'. If you can only see 'Properties' and 'Help' you may be right-clicking over the drive description area instead of right-clicking over it's blue stripe area to the right. You don't need to spend a single cent or download anything to partition your disk.

 

[dc157_1]

You should be able to see "Create Partition" in Windows 'Disk Management'. If you can only see 'Properties' and 'Help' you may be right-clicking over the drive description area instead of right-clicking over it's blue stripe area to the right. You don't need to spend a single cent or download anything to partition your disk.

Thanks Pip22...it worked!

 

[tlarkin]

right click the device at the bottom of drive management and choose to initialize it. Then right click on the partition panel of that drive and choose new partition. It will launch the partition wizard and format your volume. Just hit next for the most part because the default options are probably what you want.

Also, if you want to change the default location of your "My Documents" folder for windows right click on the my documents folder and change the path to your larger drive.