dual hard drives

Hi everyone! I am new to computers, and I need some advice.

I have an old Compaq with a 20G hard drive with windows 98. I was given 2 bare 30G hard drives with Windows ME recently. I checked them seperately, and they work. I have 7G (!) of songs on my tiny li'l hard drive. So what I would like to do is either A) have dual hard drives permanently or B) have dual hard drives long enough to copy my favorite files to my new 30G hard drive or C) Find a way to get the files from my 20G to my new 30G any other way.

The problem I am having doing dual hard drives is this--one of my hard drives has 98, one has ME. Which operating system will start up? Do I need to F disk the 30? (I have a copy of ME to reinstall) How do I F disk a hard drive?

The second problem is this--how do I know if I have 2 slots on the motherboard to plug in the hard drives? I have two grey, thick, flat cables somewhere that are marked "master" and "slave." If anyone knows where there is a tutorial or even a diagram (including picture) of a motherboard and where all of its components go, I would be very happy!

I apologize for the length and complexity of this post, and thank anyone with advice in advance!

Personally, if you are happy with Win98 then I wouldn't worry about ME. On the back of the 30GB drive there is a jumper that you will need to set to Master. Once that is done. Connect the hard drive to the grey flat cable marked Master, then plug in the 4 pin power adapter from your power supply. Boot into Win98 and open up my computer and right click the new hard drive and select format. Then you can copy all 9GB of mp3's over.

wouldnt it then boot from ME, if the 30 gig with ME is master?
wouldnt the 98 HDD be master already? if so then the 30 gig would have to be the slave and then use 98 to format.
im sorry if this add confusion, its just i want to learn, as i have no clue!

i think what grinch meant to say was to set the 30G to slave so your 20G will boot up with win 98. then just reformat the 30G hard drive and you're all set.

oh
ok, well that clears it up for me, i hope it was as helpful to molly as it was to me

But then again his origional hard drive and cd-rom drive could be on the same IDE cable. Therefore, it would be Master on the second IDE cable.

no that is not the case most of the time. having a cd-rom drive and a hard drive on the same ide cable is not recommended.

I know it is not recommended, I personally wouldn't do it but the origional poster isn't me.

Thanks, everyone! There's a bit of confusion, but I think I can sift through. Your advice is helping.

However, I'm not sure if I have 2 spots on my motherboard for master and slave hard drives. how can i tell? does anyone know where i can find a diagram of the motherboard that labels all the parts and what plugs into them?

Who made your computer?

The second HDD connects to the same IDE cable as your primary HDD so there is no need for you to go looking on your mobo for a second 40 pin IDE connector. Take a look at the IDE cable and search for the second [ currently unused ] connector. Make sure your secondary drive has its jumpers set correctly to slave and simply connect away.

There are normally two 40 pin IDE connectors on an IDE mobo, one channel is for your HDD(s) and the other is for your optical drives such as CD-ROM or DVD. There is also a third IDE connector which is 32 pin and is for your FDD.

Wow, thanks everyone! I now have 2 hard drives in my computer. I successfully formatted the 30G and the 20G is my master (because it has my anti-virus on it).

I also have a scanner. Now, my floppy disk drive is A:, my master is C:, my slave is D:, and my scanner is E:. The scanner is just plugged into a USB. I wonder why my CD drive is not showing up at all?

does that mean that your cd drive is not showing up in my computer?
put something in the cd drive that will autorun and see what happens.
are you cd drivers installed at all?
is it showing up in device manager. to access that is right click on my computer, press properties, click the hardware tab, then click device manager. once you are in device manager, click DVD/CD-ROM and if there is nothing, or a yellow question mark, you may have to re-install your drivers. knowing the particular brand and model of your cd drive would be helpful in locating drivers.

That would make me believe that it isn't hooked up. I am asssuming that the two hard drives are on one IDE cable and you should have a second IDE cable hooked up to the CD drive. I would make sure the jumpers are set correctly and everything is plugged in nice and snug.

Your scanner is turning up as a storage device ?

I suggest you do what Grinch said. Make sure your Primary and Secondary HDD's are on the same cable and therefore connected to the same channel on your mobo, and that the CD drive is connected correctly to the secondary IDE channel of your mobo [ the primary and secondary channels should be clearly marked on your mobo].

Don't forget to check that your cables are connected to both the mobo AND your drives the correct way !! Even if it is connected [ or you think it is connected ], if its not connected the correct way, the drive will not be visible.