Running two Hard Drives off one IDE cable in Windows XP

  • Thread starter Thread starter Lee Bowden
  • Start date Start date
L

Lee Bowden

Hey everyone,
I am currently running windows xp on one of my hard
drives and windows me on my second hardrive. At the
moment I have to keep unplugging one of the other to use
them. I would like to have them both running at the same
time aswell as running my cdrw/dvd drive. My IDE cable as
3 plugs on it, so i plugged both hard drives onto it and
then connected it to the controller on the motherboard,
but my bios only detected one of my hard drives. Can i
not do this then? Any help will be much appreciated.
Thank you
Lee
 
I'm not familiar with your technical background, but i'll
start by asking do you know how to set up master and
slave drives? If not, read on.

Basically this is something you have to do so you can run
two HDs off a single IDE cable. Each hard drive has
unique jumper settings for master or slave mode, so
you'll have to take a look at the manual (if you got one)
or the notes on the HD itself.

I believe the master drive goes the middle (say you were
looking at the IDE cable, one end goes in the
motherboard, the other end goes into the slave drive, and
the middle one goes into the master). Your motherboard
is going to send signals down the IDE cable, and the
master drive is going to decide whether those signals are
intended for itself, or if they should continue down the
cable to the slave drive.

If you're having a problem getting bios to recognize your
other HD, that could be the problem.




~b
 
-----Original Message-----
Hey everyone,
I am currently running windows xp on one of my hard
drives and windows me on my second hardrive. At the
moment I have to keep unplugging one of the other to use
them. I would like to have them both running at the same
time aswell as running my cdrw/dvd drive. My IDE cable as
3 plugs on it, so i plugged both hard drives onto it and
then connected it to the controller on the motherboard,
but my bios only detected one of my hard drives. Can i
not do this then? Any help will be much appreciated.
Thank you
Lee
.
Your WINDOWS ME is running in SLAVE MODE and should be
Click to expand...
placed on a second cable as MASTER. Your BIOS will not
let 2 different systems to run at the same time.
 
Thanks you guys, I got it all working. I my windows XP
hard drive as my master and ME as the slave. I just
forgot all about the jumper settings "DOH" Thanks again
Lee
 
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