Move the parts one at a time. In other words, install one part, boot up, get it working and then shut down to install the next part. Doing it in any other way will be a puzzle if things go wrong (they often do).
i put in the floppy disk drive from my old dell today. I had to ghetto rig it to stay in place. I guess the ugly face isn't too noticable since it is on the bottom of Dell's flex space thing.
I have an 80 gig serial ATA hard drive in the Dell. I bought a Seagate 200gb IDE 7200rpm 8 mb cache hard drive for $60. The problem is I don't have any IDE plug-ins available.
My list of options are:
1. IDE to SATA converter
If I do this I'd have to somehow install it into the desktop in the "Flex" area. I may have to take out the floppy drive.
I'm not sure if I can even get it to fit properly. $30
2. PCI EIDE controller card
PCI card that will allow 2 IDE ports $30
I plan on adding additional LCD screens within a few months. I'm not sure how taking up a PCI slot will cause additional problems.
3. Return or sell the Seagate 200gb IDE 7200 8mb hard drive and buy an SATA drive when I can get a good deal on one.
I hear the prices fluctuate a lot.
I'm currently looking at a Maxtor DiamondMax 10 - 250GB Serial ATA 7200RPM 16MB Buffer Hard Drive for $107.
I'll be doing research on the quality differences.
BTW, I'm still not feelnig confident about the first two options because the reviews I've read are both + and - on reliability.
Which option would you choose or what would you do different?
What else are you running off your IDE ports? You should have 2 ports with 2 connectors each. That's 4 IDE devices on one machine. Are you sure you need all that?
I have two cd drives that are connected to my only IDE port. After typing up the post I think I've determined that the first two options are a real pain. Reliablility is uncertain and the total costs are only a little different. I'm buying another hard drive.
EDIT: actually I just realized I looked over vhehn's post. I'm looking into the new cable.