I've had this computer for a looonnnggg time, and the puny 38gb hard drive isn't cutting it anymore, I feel like every week I'm running cleanups just so I could get a few free gigs (I've ran out of space countless times).

 

 

 

So my questions for you are:

 

 

 

What do I need to know when upgrading my storage?

 

What companies/websites/stores would be best for buying a new hard drive?

First of all hard drives are not called memory, they are called storage. People may think when you say memory you mean ram and not a new hard drive.

 

 

 

Well first you need to know what type of interface you have to hook your hard drive up to, it's either SATA or PATA (mostly called IDE). I almost certan it's IDE because your old hard drive is less than 40GBs. Are you also going to install your operating system on this drive and use this as your primary drive or just use it for extra space when your other drive fills up?

 

 

 

http://www.Newegg.com (US only) is a good website for hard drives or Bestbuy is a good store if you don't want to order it online. Seagate and Western digital are good hard drive brands.

there are also other good websites for hard drive, such as amazon, buy, dealstudio, whatever. Here is one I usually go, you can try

 

http://www.[Link removed]/viewsavings.p ... roup_id=12

Another oft-overlooked solution is to buy a hard drive and a stand alone case which you can connect to your system via usb.

 

 

 

This method is useful if you only wish to store files(mp3s, jpegs, etc) on it, not use it as main drive to host applications.

 

 

 

The major advantage to this is that you don't have to take your pc apart to install the new hard drive. The disadvantage is that you'll be pulling data over usb which is slower than if you were connected via IDE or SATA. However, if you use this for simple storage, that should be a moot issue.

@Olgath, specifically, hehe "moot".

 

 

 

 

 

So I'm thinking of putting in a slave drive, my dad has a 500gb external drive, but without a firewire and only with usb, that doesn't work so well.

 

 

 

Any information for me on how a slave drive will work?

Any information for me on how a slave drive will work?

 

Buy a drive compatible with your system (most likly IDE if you're running on a 38gb (assumed 40gb formated?) drive now), set the jumper to slave, plug it into the second plug on the IDE ribbon, format it and go. If all goes as planned (and you aren't using some ancient version of Windows) you should end up with another drive letter to store stuff on.

 

 

 

Simply googling for hard drive installation should turn up quite a few helpfull guides.

set the jumper to slave

 

 

 

If you are going to do this, you need to make sure your other hard drive's jumper is set to master and not cable select. If it's on cable select, then make sure the jumper on the slave drive is set to cable select as well, then plug it in the slave end of the IDE cable.