you guys are so helpful: I got a new comp problem

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

Hey fellas. you guys have always been great!

Well, tonight my computer a Dell Dimension E521 desktop about 2 years old. Tonight I saw the blue screen of death. it wouldn't activate the operating system. Tech support finally helped me get it going again but reccommended that I get a new hard drive.

Is this hard to find? How much would it be. Will I be able to put my files on it? Do I use the reinstallation disk for the operating system on the new drive? How do I get this all going?

Any advice from computer savvy folks would be appreciated.

 

[USS KG5]

The best news is that new drives are better value than ever. When purchasing think of how much capacity you need, if you download a lot, have a large capacity media player you sync to your desktop etc I would recommend a 500GB or more if it fits your budget.

Also an issue is the type of drive. The newer standard is called SATA and your desktop at two years old probably supports it. If not then look for an IDE drive. It is easily to tell the difference as SATA uses a small data connector less than an inch across and IDE connectors are slightly over two inches.

If you do have SATA you can get a 500GB drive for less than £50 in the UK now (not sure about the US or other countries), and can get drives of 750GB or even 1TB for reasonable money. If you are not a big gamer I would not worry too much about performance, but it is worth getting a 7200RPM drive from a good name (Western Digital, Samsung etc).

As for copying your files I'd recommend a full backup before you do anything else - your HDD might have come back to life for now but it is not guaranteed forever, so get any valuable work, pictures, music off ASAP. If it is only 10GB or so a few DVDs will do the job, any more and I'd borrow a portable drive, or use that if you have it.

If you don't want to do this then simply take out your old drive, as you can add it as a second drive after you reinstall windows, and do a clean install from your restore CD to your new drive. Make sure you have the drivers you need for your hardware (almost always supplied with a Dell anyhow).

Don't forget when you do this you will need to reinstall all your software, so dig out your cds and get ready to do some downloading of installers. You also will need your Microsoft patches, and on a clean install putting on XP SP3 will cover most bases there.

Please if I've missed anything anyone else please chip in!

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

I haven't gottan that far just yet. I'm trying to get my word files like my novel onto a jump drive. most of nthe stuff in"my docs" has been transferred but now I'm getting an error message saying the directory cannot be created.
What does that mean?

 

[USS KG5]

Few possibilities: -

1. The disk you are copying to is full, or too ful to copy that folder.
2. The disk is corrupt and needs a full format.
3. There is an upper limit on files in the root directory of a folder in FAT that is not very big (512 files I think) is your external drive formatted as FAT?

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

its a jump drive im using to back up documents. i think its 512. according to the properties its not full yet

 

[Flying Spaghetti Monster]

even if i create a new word document..something small and it still wont copy to the jump drive

 

[Deks]

I haven't gottan that far just yet. I'm trying to get my word files like my novel onto a jump drive. most of nthe stuff in"my docs" has been transferred but now I'm getting an error message saying the directory cannot be created.
What does that mean?

It's possible your Windows are beginning to go bonkers, or your HDD is the problem.

Firstly, backup your data if possible (getting a usb stick with large enough space is one way to do it).
Don't reset the OS unless absolutely necessary.
If you are having issues with creating new directories then consider the possibilities that USS KG5 posted.

Prior to getting yourself a new HD, you have to ascertain which one is in your computer at the moment (ATA or SATA).
Check your motherboard specs to see if it can support SATA hdd.
If it can, then buy a new SATA hdd ... and taking into consideration your computer specs, my educated guess would be it came with a version of XP.
But if the mobo doesn't support SATA, then the regular one will do (my sugssestion would be Seagate Baracuda).
What else ... right ... check device manager in your present OS, and ascertain the names of critical hardware (such as the graphics card, LAN, Wifi-if you have it, sound card, modem) and download necessary drivers for them (if you will be installing XP, then the drivers must be for XP).

If you will be installing XP on your new HDD (and if it will be SATA), make sure your XP has SATA drivers slipstreamed onto it along with SP3 ... otherwise if you go with the vanilla version of XP thatdoesn't have SATA drivers and your HDD will be SATA, it will create issues (a bypassable one from BIOS ... but a nuisance nontheless)

 

[Jadzia]

Can I jump in here and ask...

my motherboard doesn't support sata, but can i use an external sata hard drive connected via usb?

I expect I can, but just want to check. 1TB drives only seem to come in sata.

 

[USS KG5]

Can I jump in here and ask...

my motherboard doesn't support sata, but can i use an external sata hard drive connected via usb?

I expect I can, but just want to check. 1TB drives only seem to come in sata.

Performance-wise although a lot of motherboards allow you to boot from USB the performance is pretty abysmal.

You would be better off using a small IDE drive to keep your windows install on and shunting your data over to a portable drive.

As long as it connects through USB (preferably the faster USB 2 if your PC supports it) the actual physical external drive can be any type.