roynoblin said:
I only have one PC. I purchased a new hard drive and windows XP home. I now
move the power and ide cable to the drive I want to boot from.
My ribbon and power supply will let me install two drives. I set to auto
and
while I'm online after booting from the first HD, someone could hack
int> the PC gave me a C: and D: drive. When I installed the new XP on the
second
drive and rebooted, the PC went nuts. Hence I reformatted the second
drive,
moved the cables, installed XP and registered with MS. Now by moving the
cables I can boot from both drives.
Is there some way I can chouse, which drive to boot to and not have to
keep
moving the cables?
My reason for doing this is security and speed. I go on the Internet with
the
first HD and never with the second HD.
If I can install both HD's and chouse which to boot from, would it be
possible o my second HD?
Thanks Tim and JS, with these two replies I'm sure I can get this working.
AJR, I am a retired NTS (network technical specialist) with over 30 years
experience. I bought my first PC in late 70's or early 80's. I can't
answer
why all people would want to duel boot. I could write a book on the
advantages but will limit to Speed and Security. DL's reply answers my
question on security.
Hence the needs for duel boot. The drive I use for the Internet is so full
of
anti-virus and firewall, it is slow. My second drive has XP and the
software
I need for my home movies and pictures. They also go back over 30 years.
My
hope is having time to convert all my VHS tapes, slides and pictures to
DVD.
Without all the other security needs, it clicks along pretty good. It also
has personal records so I am hoping with it being setup with need of a
password; no one will be able to access it through this drive.
Thanks again for all the replies. AJR, my guess is you're a young man,
please
keep an open mind. How well I remember when BG started. He felt if people
wanted it, he would make it. His critic's helped him fix it and he fixed
it
for free. He kept an open mind and my guess is he still does.
roynoblin:
In addition to the excellent advice & recommendations you received from Tim
Daniels et al., let me add another approach you may wish to consider...
Assuming you're working with a desktop PC and your computer case has one or
two available 5 1/4" vacant bays that you can utilize, you can equip your
computer with one or two removable hard drives in their mobile racks. By
equipping your desktop computer in this fashion you will, for all practical
purposes, be able to simply and easily maintain a near fail-safe backup
system and at the same time be able to experiment with different programs
and configurations with the full realization that should anything go awry
you will be able to return to your original system and configuration in a
near-instant. And accomplish
this from the comfort of your computer chair with no need to get inside your
computer case to make (what can be) complicated cable/power disconnects and
connects. In my view it's close to an ideal system for many, if not most
desktop PC users and I can virtually guarantee that once you begin working
with this hardware configuration you'll probably never want to return to the
"old" way. It's really that good.
The HDDs are housed in so-called "mobile racks" that fit in the 5 1/4" bays
of a desktop's computer case. The racks themselves are two-piece affairs
with the HDD residing in a removable tray or caddy that slides in & out of
the rack. The beauty of this arrangement is that the hard drive(s) can be
easily accessed from outside the computer case and are instantly connected
or disconnected to & from the system according to the user's needs.
Note that these mobile racks are designed for desktop computers and are not
designed for laptop/notebook machines because of the latter's size/weight
considerations. (Although I note that a very few manufacturers have released
notebooks with one internal HDD and one removable HDD).
So by using a disk imaging program such as Symantec's Norton Ghost or
Acronis True Image or other disk imaging program, the user can routinely
clone the contents of his or her day-to-day working HDD to the second HDD,
thus having a virtual bit-for-bit copy of that working drive. And through
the use of additional removable trays the user is free to create additional
clones on hard drives that can be easily removed from the premises for
near-absolute security.
Then again, one can use separate (limitless!) hard drives for whatever
purposes desired -- installing different operating systems, installing
experimental programs of one sort or another, providing each family member
with his or her own HDD secure in knowledge that each system will be
physically distinct and not impact on any other system. And with additional
removable trays the user can make clones of those drives if desired.
So if and when the day comes when one's HDD goes to "Hard Drive Heaven"
("Hell"?) it's a quick & simple matter to replace that drive with a cloned
HDD, and to do so from the comfort of one's chair without the need to get
inside the computer case.
My preference, if at all possible, is to equip one's desktop PC with two
removable hard drives. However, if the user has only a single 5 1/4" bay
available to house just one mobile rack, he or she can still profitably use
a single removable HDD. In this instance assuming we're working with a fixed
internal HDD as well as a removable HDD and further assuming that PATA and
not SATA HDDs are involved, the fixed internal HDD (presumably the C: drive)
would be configured as Secondary Master while the removable HDD would be
configured as Primary Master. This would allow a boot from the removable HDD
when connected without the need for accessing the system's BIOS. However,
the user could reverse these connections if for one reason or another it was
more practical to do so.
Of course, if the desktop PC was equipped with only a single removable HDD,
i.e., no fixed internal HDD, then that PATA HDD would be obviously connected
as Primary Master.
Most mobile racks are equipped with a simple ON-OFF keylock so that the HDD
contained therein is electrically disconnected from the system when the
rack's keylock is in the OFF position. (For additional safety one can
physically disconnect the removable HDD from the system by a simple pull of
the removable tray's handle after turning the keylock to the OFF position.
No more difficult than opening a miniature desk drawer)
Installing the rack(s) is a comparatively simple matter. No more difficult
than installing an optical drive. And installing (as well as uninstalling)
the HDD in the removable tray is a few seconds affair in most cases.
Do you see the enormous advantages in this hardware configuration? Now you
can safely "play around" with a wide variety of programs & configurations on
either your day-to-day working HDD or a cloned HDD, confident that if
anything goes awry (even to the extent that your working HDD becomes
physically or electronically defective), you have a perfectly good bootable
clone that is virtually instantly at hand. And you can easily clone back to
your internal HDD (assuming it's non-defective) the contents of the
previously cloned removable HDD.
And consider how this type of hardware arrangement admirably lends itself to
a multi-boot system such as the one in which you're interested. Note the
absolute physical isolation afforded by this arrangement and its inherent
advantage of near-instant booting to whichever operating system desired by
the user. There's no need to access the motherboard's BIOS to change the
boot order; a simple turn of the mobile rack's keylock is all that is
necessary. Through the use of removable hard drives you now have at your
disposal within a single PC a *limitless" number of hard drives that you can
use for any purpose whatsoever.
There are a wide variety of mobile racks available on the market today
ranging in cost from about $25 (all plastic) to $50 and up for the
all-aluminum models. Interestingly enough, in my experience working with
more than a score of different makes & models by & large we've never found
much difference among them either in performance or reliability. Since we're
working nearly exclusively these days with SATA HDDs, we're using mobile
racks designed to house that type of HDD. (Mobile racks are designed to
house either PATA or SATA HDDs). As of late we've been using the Athena
MR-125 model. It's an all-plastic model that's relatively inexpensive -
about $25 or so. Has a 80 mm fan at the bottom of the rack which is a nice
feature. I know Newegg carries it and it's generally available from a number
of online vendors. I believe it also comes in a model designed for PATA
HDDs. But there are many, mobile racks designed for both PATA & SATA disks,
so do a Google search of "mobile racks" or "removable hard drives" to peruse
the many different models that are available.
Depending upon the make/model of a particular mobile rack, additional
removable trays may be available at a considerably lower cost than the
entire mobile rack itself. However in many cases additional removable trays
are either unavailable for individual purchase or their cost is so high when
compared with purchasing the entire mobile rack which includes a removable
tray that it's not really economically feasible to purchase only the tray
itself. So that the user winds up purchasing the complete mobile rack(s)
just to obtain the removable tray(s).
I can assure you that once you begin working with removable HDDs you'll have
but one regret -- that you hadn't had this hardware configuration on your
current or previous desktop computer(s). The flexibility, together with
peace of mind that you gain from this arrangement cannot be overstated.
Anna
