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Author Topic: Two separate Hard drives....  (Read 3012 times)

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joker4440

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    Two separate Hard drives....
    « on: April 15, 2011, 09:27:09 PM »
    I considered myself somewhat tech savvy, built 3 PC's....but never encountered this problem, due to my lack of knowledge, of course. :P

    I decided to build a new i7 Pc which includes a Solid State Drive (64G) and an additional 1TB HD.

    The idea was to have windows 7 and a couple of games on the SSD and everything else would be on the HD. How do I get both drives to work separately and can it even be done??? I don't know much about raid but from what I read I guess it wouldn't work. Not sure how to go about it.

    Thx in advance.

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    Re: Two separate Hard drives....
    « Reply #1 on: April 16, 2011, 02:02:37 AM »
    You can get more help with more information about the system you want to build. Do you already have the parts?

    The following is a personal opinion. Based on your question, you still lack some experience. Before you try SDD and very large drives, may I suggest you buy two 500 GB data drives. Get the system up with one drive. And next test the second drive by making a 'clone' of the drive. Next, do some research or RAID. You can get very high performance with two SATA drives in a RAID. But you have to proceed carefully to get it right.
    Without knowing what SDD you rethinking about, I would say wait until you have more hands on with RAID. At the present time, IMO, RAID gives you better performance for you dolor. SSD presently is suited for industrial applications where price is not a concern.

    (FYI: Some 1TB drives are junk. IMHO.)

    Here is a link with some information you might want.
    http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/248547-32-raid-sata

    Salmon Trout

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    Re: Two separate Hard drives....
    « Reply #2 on: April 16, 2011, 02:56:28 AM »
    Quote
    everything else would be on the HD

    I am wondering exactly what is meant by this. You need to have one drive or partition to hold the "system"; this will be where the OS is installed. Also by default programs that you install will go here in \Program Files and \Program Files (x86).  64 GB should be fine for Windows 7 and a great deal more than just "a couple of games". For example I have a 500 GB drive with a 100 GB system partition with a mature (1 year old) installation of Windows 7 with a lot of programs and 2 users with My Documents etc totalling about 10 GB and the whole lot takes up around 45 GB. This includes an XP Mode VM with a 5 GB (at the moment) dynamic virtual drive. I also have another 400 GB partition on that drive for stuff like multimedia, my digital photography and video collection, and another 250 GB drive for downloads and VMWare virtual machines.

    They "work separately" perfectly fine without any RAID arrangements. I am not sure what you mean by this too.

    You really want to put your Windows swap file onto the drive that has spinning platters to avoid wearing out the SSD.



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    Re: Two separate Hard drives....
    « Reply #3 on: April 16, 2011, 11:02:26 AM »
    For more about RAID, here is a simple  outline...
    Beginners Guides: Installing RAID on a Desktop PC

    patio

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    Re: Two separate Hard drives....
    « Reply #4 on: April 16, 2011, 11:07:03 AM »
    I don't believe he needs or wants RAID.
    " Anyone who goes to a psychiatrist should have his head examined. "

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    Re: Two separate Hard drives....
    « Reply #5 on: April 16, 2011, 11:49:33 AM »
    I don't believe he needs or wants RAID.
    IMO, RAID is a better choice that SSD.
    But what do I know, maybe -
    money grows on trees for the OP.