Teach me about slavery

[OlBlueCJ7]

I need to learn about making slaves.






I have two 120gb 3.5" hard drives - one was in an external enclosure, and one was in an old computer I had. Something messed up in the wiring or something for the external one, because it doesn't power up properly, it just clunks & whirs. I've pulled the drive out of the enclosure, and would like to just put it into my existing desktop computer as a second (slave?) drive. The part I'm confused about is where do I plug in the flat ribbon cable thing, and how do I set up the 'jumper' thing on the drive so that it doesn't try & boot from that drive?

I was going to put both drives into my desktop to recover any files off them, then wipe them clean & start over; leaving one in the desktop, and putting the other in a new enclosure. I figure this way, I can verify that both drives are still good before having to buy a new external enclosure.

So, where does the flat ribbon cable from the 'new' drive get plugged in, and what do I do with the jumper? iirc, it had like three options - master, master & slave, or slave?

[cheftyler]

Ok, first thing's first, are you sure the drive from the enclosure is still good? Generally when I get a whirring (ok noise) and clunking (bad noise) drive the drive is fried, not the enclosure. Putting that aside, what brand of drives do you have?

On most drives there is a wee diagram that shows you where to put the jumper to make it a master, slave, or cable select (cable select is the devil and I don't ever use it.)
This graphic 'splains it but this is probably not the configuration of your drive
http://www.networkclue.com/images/peripherals/jumpers.gif

Next the IDE cable (ribbon cable) is already in your PC unless your entire IDE chain is utilized (an IDE chain is the ribbon cable with usually between 2 and 4 IDE connectors on it at various parts of the cable). Pop open your machine, and look @ the IDE chain and see if there are open connections. If not, and your motherboard has another open IDE slot on it, then you need another IDE cable (cheap @ a computer store). The second IDE slot *should* be near the first one on your MOBO but there is nothing else that an IDE cable can plug into on the MOBO (and nothing else will plug into the slot either and least not correctly).
Don't forget you need to run power to the drive as well, which is the second plug on the HD and comes off the power supply.

Did I miss anything?

[OlBlueCJ7]

So, just to confirm, I need to move my jumper so that the drive is setup as a slave right (single, or dual?)?

One of the drives is a Maxtor Diamond 9 or something (out of an old HP), and the other is a no name - I think the drive said "M.n" on it or something.

The only reason I think these drives are good is because the Maxtor drive came out of a computer with a supposedly fried MOBO, and when I put it into the external enclosure that I have, it does the exact same thing as the originial external drive.

I've got all the stuff to make these internal (IDE cables, etc), so I figure it's at least worth a shot to see if they're salvageable.

[Brutus]

I would think that if the drive came out of an external enclosure... it is already set up as a slave drive.

[Jake_Blues]

I would think that if the drive came out of an external enclosure... it is already set up as a slave drive.

Not necessarily, since external drive enclosures don't use the motherboard's IDE or SATA interfaces.

You need to set one drive as the master and the other drive as a slave. However, this won't prevent the operating system from booting off the second drive. The Master/Slave thing is really only important to the motherboard for controlling the hard drives. It will happily boot from either drive. It should try to boot from the master first, but that's not written in stone anywhere.

Just stick 'em both in and see what happens.

-E

[FJBen]

If you are hearing "clunking" thats usually a bad sign.

It "should" attempt to boot from the master first, then the slave. Maybe check the BIOS on startup to see if you can change the boot order of master/slave or not.

[OlBlueCJ7]

If you are hearing "clunking" thats usually a bad sign.


Quit trying to burst my bubble dammit! :flipoff2:

I stand to lose about 110gb of mp3's here, so let's keep our fingers crossed, alright? :D

[PhantomD AKA Zach]

clunking and ticking is usually a drives death noise...


an external enclosure with a single drive should ALWAYS be master...

with two drives, I have no idea...

Zach

[OlBlueCJ7]

Okay, new issue. My 'new' computer doesn't use the same IDE/ribbon cable as the two drives I'm trying to install. My new computer has this rather small, blue cable, and then the power cable, both of which are different than the drives I'm trying to install.

I don't see anywhere to plug another IDE cable onto the mother board, so maybe this isn't possible anyways?

Pics to come shortly.

[cheftyler]

So, your new computer uses SATA drives...you're screwed :D

[OlBlueCJ7]

Chit - that's what I was afraid of.

Oh well, I guess now I have to open the new enclosure I bought. I was hoping I wouldn't have to open it just to find I have two dead drives. :(

[jtw2]

you can probably find an IDE pci card though. failing that get an external usb enclosure for IDE drives and do it that way.

[cheftyler]

He's already got a new enclosure :D

[OlBlueCJ7]

Ya, I just really don't want to use it, because I paid too much for it at Circuit Shitty. ($40 for a 3.5" enclosure? ACK!)

[forum]

Your motherboard in the new computer *should* have an extra space on the board for an ide cable. It's rare that they don't have 2. Or at least temporarily unplug the optical drives since I highly doubt they use SATA.

[jtw2]

He's already got a new enclosure :D

ah, I was too ADD to read the whole thing!

[PhantomD AKA Zach]

no ide? not even for a cd rom drive!

Zach

[Jake_Blues]

I'm sure the MOBO has at least one IDE interface. Often times in a computer with a SATA hard drive, the IDE ribbon cable going to the CD-ROM only has one connector on it, instead of two, though.

-E

[OlBlueCJ7]

I've got two optical drives, and both are using IDE. Can I unplug the IDE & power cable from one of those & use that to try & spin up these hard drives? Or will the computer wig out by expecting one of those optical drives to be there?

[Jake_Blues]

I've got two optical drives, and both are using IDE. Can I unplug the IDE & power cable from one of those & use that to try & spin up these hard drives? Or will the computer wig out by expecting one of those optical drives to be there?

It shouldn't freak out too badly. CD-ROMs have slave/master selections just like hard drives, so just make sure that you check how the CD-ROM was configured in the Master/Slave arrangement and jumper your hard drive the same way.

-E

[jtw2]

shouldn't wig at all. devices are probed and discovered at boot time. It doesn't "know" there is anything there until it looks for it. As Jake said though the jumpers are what matters though most systems now use cable select rather than master/slave.

[OlBlueCJ7]

WTF ever happened to Plug 'N Play? :laughing:

Computers SO weren't designed for e-tards like me.

[Jake_Blues]

most systems now use cable select rather than master/slave.

Every motherboard I've seen in the last 10 years SAYS it supports cable select, but this has almost never worked for me. Seems I always end up jumpering them for master and slave.

I avoid putting multiple devices on the same IDE port like the plague if I can though. The computer can only control one device on each IDE port at a time, so if you have 2 drives on the same IDE cable, you are halving their performance, if both drives try to run at the same time.

-E

[cheftyler]

... cable select (cable select is the devil and I don't ever use it.)

Yup, never seems to work out for me.

[FJBen]

let me know if you need me to take a look at it...amazingly thats one thing I"m good at even tho I hate it...

now paying attention to directions on the other hand :D

[Jake_Blues]

http://images.thinkgeek.com/action/large/20f6af7.jpg (http://thinkgeek.com)

-E

[jtw2]

http://www.colorado4x4.org/gallery/files/6/3/8/6/hdd1.jpg

http://www.colorado4x4.org/gallery/files/6/3/8/6/hdd2.jpg

[jtw2]

.308 at ~100 yds

[OlBlueCJ7]

Jeff, those pug-sized pics are really hard to see. :D

[jtw2]

ya. that's a fiber channel Seagate Hard drive. that's all of the platters blown out in the back.

[jdogg4]

http://images.thinkgeek.com/action/large/20f6af7.jpg (http://thinkgeek.com)

-E

Best Idea yet. :thumbsup: