What do I need to add another HD...

[Snerticus]

I have the Asus A7M266, 1.3GHz with a Thermoengine HS and a soyo 38 cfm fan, 512mb Crucial PC2100 registered ecc memory, Herc GeForce Ultra II, Yamaha 16x writer, Pioneer 16x DVD, Sigma decoder card,Herc game theater sound, Kingston lan card, and 2 IBM 30 gig DTLA 307030 (ata100, 7200rpm) in an Enlight 7237 case with a 400w Antec p/s. I'd like to add at least 2 more HD. Right now I'm running W2k on one disk and Win 98 on the other. Do I need a controller(sp?) card or a raid card? Any input would be appreciated...Thanks😕

 

[RaiderJ]

Since I would think that you don't have any free IDE channels, I would go buy an IDE controller card, or a RAID card if you plan on buying the same size/speed hard drives. Personally, with a nice setup like that, I would set a RAID array between 3 drives for Win2K, and leave the other drive running 98

 

[Migroo]

Yep. IDE or RAID controller card, from someone like Promise will sort you out.

Make sure you have mounting room in your case for the new Hard Drives!

 

[Snerticus]

Thanks RaiderJ and Migroo, I'm not sure I want to run RAID, but I do want more HD's. I like the simplicity of having an operating system on a HD and the space to play with. I d/l XP PRO and would like to mess with it, but don't want to change my other OS's. Looking inside my case, I'm not sure I can mount any more 3.5'' stuff anyway. I have 2 open bays above my dvd and writer, but they are 5 1/4 '' ( I think). Might have to look into adapters for 3.5'' to 5 1/4''...Thanks

 

[Harvey]

As much of a pain as it may be, your best shot may be to sell your motherboard and buy another with built in RAID. Most of these boards can be configured for either RAID or simply adding two more IDE channels.

The money you get for your Asus could offset the cost of an add in RAID card, in which case, you could break even, and it would all be built in.

Hope that helps. 🙂

 

[spikegifted]

or if you want to achieve a higher state of geekhood, you can buy yourself a scsi controller - you can hook upto 15 drives on that babie!! 😛 l33t!!

 

[Snerticus]

Thanks everyone, I'm looking around now to purchase 2 40 gig HDs now (Dell small business((25% off and free shipping)) or newegg) and a Promise 100 card. Also the drive rail adapters to mount a 3.5'' drive in a 5.25'' bay. Quick question...IDE cable length...Should I worry about exceeding 18''?...I've seen some 24'' cables and thought you should'nt excede 18''...Thanks

 

[nord1899]

Well two things about the cable length:

1. 24 inch is not a problem. I have those in my system and they work fine.
2. You don't need them as your case is not even 18 inches tall. I made the same mistake with mine and wish I had gotten just the 18 inch version.

24 inch IDE cables are really only useful where the IDE connector is at the bottem of the mb when mounted and the HDD's are at the top and the case is a full server tower.

 

[Snerticus]

Thanks for your input...I ordered 2 40gig IBM Deskstar 60 GXPs' and a Promise Ultra 100 TX2 controller card.