Installing Sata drives?

[yogart]

I want to add a second drive and thinking about adding a PCI Sata card and a Sata hard drive.

1)With adding a second drive to my PC, will I need to change my BIOS, and need to format and partision the new sata drive?

2)If yes, is it difficult?

[Bjs]

http://www.peachpit.com/articles/article.asp?p=98835&rl=1

It gose ...

1: Remove all power from system (the power cord especially) .
2: Install pci card .

This will depend on the motherboard setup and the number of other card's already installed , which needs special attention to avoid conflict's .

A: Onboard agp / agp slot / pci1 = shared resources ... you can NOT use pci1 .
B: Pci2 / pci3 = share resource's ... only one may have a card installed ... not both .
C: Pci4 / pci5 = share resource's ... only one may have a card installed ... not both .

Screw this up , and you'll find yourself in a real pickle ... you may find you need to remove other card's so as to get this device up and running correctly first ... a hassle in some setup's .

Then followed by

3: Repower system ... system ask's for driver's , and need's to reboot when done .

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4: Check device manager that new device is up and running correctly ...

If not , uninstall the device (reverse of install procedure) , and try in another pci slot .
If device still has issue after all pci slot's have been tested ... the device should be returned under rma as defective .

If device is running fine , then

5: Shut down system , remove power cord .
6: Install new sata hard drive (follow manufacturer's note's)
7: Reboot system

8: Wait till pc pick's up device is connected before going on .

9: Right click on "my computer" , and choose "manage"
10: Click on help icon in this new window > help topics > disk management > how to > manage disk's > initialize new disks .

From help file :

New disks appear as Not Initialized.
Before you can use a disk, you must first initialize it.
If you start Disk Management after adding a disk, the Initialize Disk Wizard appears so you can initialize the disk.

11: Come back to "how to" , and go down to "manage basic volume's" , then to "create a partition or logical drive" .
12: Then follow the advice in the help info below that to format the partition's ... "format a basic volume"

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Difficult ... depend's ... for a complete newbie it might just be a little over the top to understand ... but then you can always ask if you get stuck ... in my case ... you might need to pm me as I dont have alot of time to track posts for replies ... when doing so , include post number so I can recall all the info already previously discussed .

The one important note I would mention would be not to share the power coupling from any other device , and check your current psu is 450watt's or better .

[Krispy Kritter]

Of course, if you are using an older pc and you don't already have 4 IDE devices in use, it would be easier (and cheaper) to just get an IDE drive. If all of your IDE connectors are in use, then SATA is your best bet.