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Does anyone know of a way that I could stick my old 1.2 gig hard drive into a new computer without loosing the data stored on it? Or how to transfer said data from said drive to a new one. I really don't want to loose all of my data when I get a new machine this spring, and figure that I might as well start looking for answers now.
It's the backup that worries me. The thought of cramming 150+ megs of valuable data onto floppies (the only medium availible to the old computer) is not something that I want to consider. Especially since I like to triple+ backup anything I stick on floppies to make sure that it works.
Your best bet is to slave it to the master drive in the new computer as Salem suggests. I have done this many times without problem. I would add the best place to get instructions on doing this is the hd manufacturer's website. One thing you should do first is to enter the bios and write down the drive geometry settings (cylinders, heads, etc.) before pulling it from your old computer.
There are utils available to copy your old hd to your new hd. Generally you can download them free from the hd manufacterer's websites. I don't like them myself, I dual boot win95/linux and they can cause strange problems due to the nonstandard partitioning software intregrated into them. But in your case they may work fine.
edit> Upon reflexion, stay away from the drive copying utils. In the case of a new computer, they are basically useless.
If I were you I would definatly get some form of data transfer better then a floppy such as a cd burner or lan connection
The old machine has win95 and I don't think that I will have money for a pair of NICs after I build the new machine (lazy student on a budget here). With luck, I will have enough money to put a burner on the new machine, but that remains to be seen.
I'll probably have to try to slave the old drive and then hope that it doesn't screw up
Install the new drive as drive "D", then boot off a bootable floppy (with XCOPY and XCOPY32 on it) to a command line. Copy all the files from drive C (your old drive) to drive D (your new drive) using this syntax:
XCOPY source destination /D /E /C /H /K
i.e.: XCOPY C: D: /D /E /C /H /K
Double-check to make sure all the switches are correct for your situation. Also, this will take HOURS, so do it before bedtime, you go to work, etc.
Mark
If I go to the trouble of slaving the old drive, it will most likely stay there. Or I could just copy it, transfer it back to the old machine, reformat it, and give the old machine to my grandma so that she'll stop complaining about not having a computer, solving several problems at once.
Thanx guys.
slaving the old drive isn't that troublesome. i've done this with 400mb hard drives, and they came out fine. the IDE specifications haven't broken backwards compatability in the last 7 years, imho.
on a side note, ethernet network cards are dirt cheap today.
ive never had a problem with second hard drives. there is no way you can loose the data on the old drive unless you delete the data yourself (or drop the drive out of a 12th storey window). NIC's cost about $10-20 (dunno - i live in england, and they are £10 over here so get a converter), or you can stick the burner in ur old pc for a day or so.
Using the burner on the old machine for a while might work, then when all of my roms are safely on cd, I can just run gwscan on the old hd, reinstall the os, and give it to grandma, ending all issues and still saving my data.
the reason that I'm not considering NICs is that i will probably spend my last dime building this computer and still end up having to ask my mom for money.
Thanks for the suggestions.
just stick it in the computer as a slave drive. its a simple procedure and it will work, unless you damage the drive by accident.
then from within windows you can get your data and remove the hd at your leisure, or just keep it there for some extra space.
if it has standard ide connectors and power plugs on the back it should work.
i see no way in which you could actually damage ur HDD if you put it in as slave unless you do something rlly stupid (i.e. drop it, put a current on it, drop a magnet on it :D) just take it out, change the jumper to be slave, plug it into the new comp, and start it up :). the new computer should automatically detect the new HDD and drive it. Then you can access all the data on it and copy it, take it out, etc, etc. i am repeating the words of other here :)
Basically it comes down to this, unless you are a complete idiot in putting parts into a computer (consdering you build your new comp. urself i'll presume ur not) there is no danger in the operation :)
There is really only one potential problem, and that is not too difficult to avoid. Depending on the bios of the old computer, there could be a drive translation problem. That's why I recommended entering the bios and writing down the current configuration. Without a record of the current (C,H,S, LBA, etc.) setup, it can be a real pain to read the data on the drive. If the bios of the old computer is new enough it won't matter but better safe than sorry.