Hard drives are a special case. On a cost- per-bit basis, drives are cheap and getting cheaper all the time. When a drive fails, the cost of replacing the physical device is relatively small, but the data stored on the old drive is often irreplaceable. So you shouldn’t throw away an apparently broken drive until you have done everything possible to recover the data, and you shouldn’t do anything to the drive that might erase or damage any more data. When your boot drive (almost always the C: drive) fails, you have two related problems: the first is to get the computer working again, and the second is to recover as much of the data from the broken drive as possible. If a secondary drive fails, the computer will probably continue to load and run Windows, but you still have to find a way to recover the data from the broken drive. Therefore, you should treat the two objectives separately. First get the computer and Windows running again, and then worry about the data on the damaged drive. If you’re going to do this yourself, you’ll have to open up the computer case and install a new drive. Bear with me on this; it’s not that difficult and it will save you a lot of money if you do the job yourself. But if you’re absolutely convinced that you can’t do this repair on your own, at least read the section “What to Tell the Service Guy” on page 191.

NOTE: Of course, if you have been careful about making regular backups of your data, a drive failure is little more than a minor nuisance. You can install a new drive, load Windows from the Microsoft CD, install new copies of your application programs and utilities, and restore your data files from the backup media. No big deal, right? Well, yes, but making backups is one of those things that we all know we’re supposed to do ever y few days, but most of us don’t bother. If you do have an up-to-date backup handy, you have my permission to feel superior to the rest of us. If not, put down this article right now and go make backups of all your data.

Restoring the Computer to Useful Operation

When Windows won’t load because of a hard drive problem, your first priority should be to remove the damaged drive from your computer and install a new C: drive. After you have Windows working again, you can worry about recovering the old data. Reinstalling Windows from scratch on a new or different drive is a time- consuming process, but it’s the only way to be sure that you don’t lose data on your damaged drive. You will probably kill at least half a day messing with the computer before you get it back to its state before the drive failed. If you have never done it before, removing and installing the drive itself, formatting the drive, installing and updating Windows, downloading and reinstalling drivers, reinstalling and updating security software (such as antivirus and firewall programs), reinstalling and updating software, and tweaking your personalized settings can easily consume a full day or more. If the damaged hard drive is the only one inside your computer, you will need to buy and install a new drive. If you have more than one drive, you can use the other drive as the boot drive, but considering the low cost of new drives, you might just as well buy a new one instead. You will need at least two gigabytes of free space for the Windows XP software alone, plus space for all of the programs and data that were stored on the damaged drive.

You can buy a new hard drive at most places that sell computer supplies, including most computer retailers, mail-order and online merchants, and office supply stores. The best prices are probably at the big national chains, where there’s almost always one brand or another on sale with a mail-in rebate offer. Look for the best combination of drive size and price, but make sure the new drive is at least as big as the old one. We’re assuming that the damaged hard drive uses an Integrated Data Electronics (IDE) connection to the computer’s motherboard. If it’s a Small Computer System Interface (SCSI) drive or a Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA) drive, you will want to replace it with a new drive of the same type. (See the section “SATA Drives” on page 181.) To remove the old drive, follow these steps:

1. Turn off the computer. If there’s a power switch on the back of the case, turn that switch off.

2. Unplug the AC power cable from the computer case.

3. Disconnect all of the other cables from the computer’s back panel.

4. Remove the outer cover from the computer. This probably involves removing two or more hex-head screws or thumbscrews to separate the cover from the case.

5. Find the hard drive. It’s probably located directly behind the front panel of the computer, but it might be someplace else inside the case.

6. The drive is connected to the rest of the computer through two cables: one for power and the other for data. Carefully disconnect both cable connectors from the back of the drive. Don’t unplug the data cable from the motherboard.

7. If there are screws holding the drive to the case, remove them and slide the drive out of the case. If the case uses tracks or some other method to mount the drive, remove the drive from the case. If your computer has more than one IDE hard drive, remove both of the drives connected to the IDE1 connector on the motherboard.

The computer uses tiny jumpers on the back of the drive to identify each drive as either a master or a slave drive. Look on the top of each drive or in the documentation supplied with the drive for one or more diagrams that show the correct jumper locations. If you have removed only one drive, put it aside in a safe place until you have installed the new drive. If you have more than one drive, find the drive with the jumpers in the master position and put that drive aside. Replace the other drive, with the jumpers in the slave position, back inside the computer.

Installing a New Hard Drive

You might want to add a new hard drive to your computer because the one already in place isn’t big enough to hold all of your files (especially if you want to store a lot of large video or audio files), or because the installed drive has failed. If you’re just adding more storage capacity, you can generally leave the old drive in place (unless you’re dealing with a laptop computer that has space for just one drive).

NOTE It’s not essential, but many computer retailers and mail-order or online places sell inexpensive round IDE cables that replace the flat ribbon cables supplied with most drives and motherboards. The round cables are more flexible than the flat ones, so they’re easier to handle inside the computer case. When you buy your new drive, think about getting a round IDE cable at the same time.

Mounting the Drive

The first thing you must do is to open up the case and find a place to put the new drive. Most desktop and tower cases have spaces for several drives, but the exact location varies from one case to the next. You can usually find a place for an additional drive directly above or below the existing hard drive, or behind an unused panel on the front of the cabinet.

NOTE Even if you’re planning to replace the existing drive, it’s a good idea to leave the old one in place until you can copy your data files to a new drive. See “Recovering Your Data” on page 183 for information about retrieving data from a damaged drive.

It seems as though every computer case uses a unique mounting arrange- ment for hard drives and other storage devices. CD and DVD players might slide in from the front of the case, or they could move forward from the inside. Some use removable tracks, racks, or sliders, and others bolt the drives directly to the framework of the case. Hard drives might fit behind removable faceplates or be buried deep inside the case. The only certain thing is that there is a way to install the drives; it’s a safe bet that the person who assembled the computer didn’t build all the sheet metal racks around the drives. Laptop computers are no better. On some machines, you can simply lift up the keyboard to get to the hard drive, but others force you to remove several layers of other components before you reach it. Too many laptops seem to be products of the Trash Compactor School of Industrial Design; that’s the method that lays everything out on a big work table and then squeezes it all into a tiny enclosure. Reversing the process is a lot more difficult. If you can find an instruction manual that explains how to disassemble your computer, that’s the place to start. Even it it’s just one of those exploded diagrams with screws and washers flying off in all directions, it will probably tell you what the designer had in mind, and where to find that last critical screw that holds everything together.

you’ll have to spend some time staring at the drive to figure out exactly how to remove it. On a more positive note, once you figure out how to remove a drive from a particular case, it’s a safe bet that other drives use the same mounting technique. Fortunately, all of the drive manufacturers place the mounting screw holes in the same locations, so replacing one brand of drive with another will not present any new mounting problems. The physical mounting arrangements are the same, but each drive manu- facturer uses a slightly different system to configure and format the drives, so it’s essential to follow the specific instructions supplied with each drive. That’s fine in theory, but some retailers buy drives in case lots and resell them without manuals or other documents. If you don’t have a manual, download a manual and installation software from the manufacturer’s website before you try to install the drive.

NOTE: In some computer cabinets, it’s very difficult to reach the tiny machine screws that hold the drives to the frame. A #1 Phillips screwdriver with a shaft at least three inches long can often make it easier to insert or remove the screws. While you’re at it, make sure that you don’t use a magnetized screwdriver around your computer; the magnetic field could erase or damage the data on your hard drives and floppy disks.

Before you mount the drive, look for the labels that identify its make and model number, along with several other important characteristics. Note these values:

Name of the manufacturer Model number Capacity Number of cylinders Number of heads Landing zone Number of sectors If the BIOS does not detect them automatically, you will need to type these values into your computer later. If you copy them now, you won’t have to remove the drive again later to read them. If all of these values are not printed on the label, the computer’s BIOS will probably detect them. If not, use the make and model number of the drive to look for the drive’s specifications on the manufacturer’s website. To use an existing drive as the new primary drive, move the jumper on the back of it from the slave to the master position, replace the drive in the computer, and connect the cables to the drive.

Changing the BIOS Setting

After you reassemble the computer, connect the power cable and turn it on. Immediately press the key that opens the BIOS setting menu (usually F2 or DELETE) and go to the screen that shows the hard drive settings. If the BIOS does not automatically detect the drive as the IDE1 Primary drive, move the cursor to that menu item, and press the ENTER key to run the autodetect function.

Formatting the Drive

Before you can use a new hard drive (or a floppy disk, for that matter), it’s necessary to format the drive. Formatting creates a file system on the drive, along with one or more partitions, each of which appears to Windows as a separate “logical” drive with its own drive letter and file allocation table. The drive letters you see in the My Computer window are the names of logical drives. If you want to assign more than one drive letter to portions of the same physical hard drive, you can partition the physical drive into two or more smaller logical drives. Even if a drive has a very large physical capacity, the actual amount of storage on the drive is determined by the computer’s BIOS. In many computers, the BIOS has a maximum drive capacity limit that was much bigger than the designers expected to need at the time the computer was built. That limit might be 4GB, 8.4GB, or about 130GB. Every time the BIOS people raised the limit, it seems as if the drive manufacturers intro- duced a new line of even bigger hard drives. If your drive’s capacity is greater than the limit of your BIOS, you must use special software (included with Windows XP or supplied with the drive) to bypass the capacity limit.

NOTE: Don’t be surprised if the BIOS or the formatting tool shows a slightly smaller capacity than the one on the drive package some drive makers show capacity in decimal kilo- bytes (equal to 1,000 bytes), while Windows and the BIOS makers use binar y kilobytes (equal to 1,024 bytes), so Windows will report the capacity of a 200GB (decimal) drive as a little over 180GB (binar y).

If you are using the new drive as your boot drive, at this point the BIOS startup sequence will display a disk-error message because the new drive does not contain any boot files. If the new drive is not the boot drive, the boot sequence will run and Windows will start, but Windows Explorer (My Com- puter) won’t show the new drive. There’s a formatting utility included on the Windows XP CD. If you’re installing a new drive as the C: drive, you can format the drive as part of the process of installing Windows:

1. Place the Windows XP software CD in the computer’s drive.

2. Restart the computer.

The computer should start to install Windows from the CD. If the computer can’t find the CD, open the BIOS Setup Utility and change the Boot Device Sequence to place the CD drive ahead of the hard drive. 3. Shortly after the Windows Setup routine loads the initial programs to the computer’s memory, it will offer to format and partition your drive. The Windows formatting tool bypasses the BIOS capacity, so you should be able to reach the full capacity of the drive. If you’re installing a new drive into a computer that already has a boot drive, start the computer and run the formatting and partitioning program supplied with the drive after Windows loads. The package that contains the new drive should also include a CD and possibly a floppy disk with the formatting tools for the drive. If not, download the software from the drive manufacturer’s website (look for a link to “support” or “downloads”).

Follow the instructions on the website to create a CD or a floppy disk from the downloaded software. In most cases, the formatting program on either the Windows CD or the disk supplied with the drive will format and partition the drive without any trouble. But some drive makers require an alternate jumper setting or some other obscure configuration to bypass the capacity limit; if you don’t know the secret handshake, you may spend hours beating your head against the table as you try to get the thing to format properly. If your drive won’t format itself with a capacity close to the size shown on the drive label (but don’t forget about the difference between binary and decimal kilobytes and megabytes), look for instructions in the manual supplied with your drive or in the Support section of the drive manufacturer’s website. When Windows is up and running on a new boot (C:) drive, install all the extra drivers and other software necessary to activate your video controller, network interface, sound card, and other peripheral devices and services. Don’t forget to load the latest Windows patches, updates and service pack, and your antivirus and antispyware software. To link to the Windows Update website, open Internet Explorer, and select Tools Windows Update.

SATA Drives

Within a few years, Serial ATA (SATA) will become the standard interface for hard drives, CD and DVD drives, and other storage media. SATA drives produce less heat than IDE drives, they are easier to install and replace because they don’t require jumpers, and the connectors are easier to handle. The smaller cables also improve the flow of air and the cooling inside the computer case. In the future, SATA will also allow faster data transfer than the older IDE drives. Most computers and motherboards made in the last couple of years support SATA drives, even if they came with older-style IDE drives. However, you should confirm that your own system can support SATA before you buy a new drive. If you can’t find the information you need in the manual, consult the tech support center for your computer or motherboard by telephone or e-mail. If your computer’s power supply does not include a SATA power con- nector, you will need an adapter to connect power to the drive. These adapters are often included with SATA drives. Installing an SATA drive is easier than installing an IDE drive because it doesn’t require any jumpers, and the computer’s BIOS can automatically detect multiple SATA drives. If your BIOS does not detect an SATA drive after you install it, confirm that the data-cable connectors are firmly seated in the mating connectors on the drive and the motherboard, and the power cable connector is seated in the drive. If you’re using an adapter cable between the power supply and the drive, make sure it’s connected to a cable from the power supply.

Replacing a Drive in a Laptop Computer

Hard drives in laptop computers have smaller dimensions than the ones in desktop computers. Each maker has its own system for opening up the case and mounting the drive, so it’s much more difficult to offer general instruc- tions for replacing a drive. On some models, it’s just a matter of releasing the keyboard and lifting it out of the way, but on others, it’s a form of major surgery. If you’re not comfortable working inside a laptop computer, don’t try to learn how to do it now it’s more important to recover the data on your drive than to develop skills as a hardware technician. After your data is secure, you can either pay somebody to install a new drive or ask the laptop maker’s technical support center for instructions on doing it yourself. To recover the data, connect the laptop computer to another computer through a network, and follow the instructions in the next section of this article.

What About USB Drives?

USB and FireWire hard drives and other storage media (such as pocket-size flash drives) are separate devices that plug directly into a USB port or some other kind of input/output socket. Because it’s easy to connect and disconnect these drives, they are extremely convenient for backing up data, storing data offline, and moving data from one computer to another.

Windows XP should automatically detect a USB, FireWire, or flash drive as soon as you connect the drive to the computer. If nothing happens when you plug in the drive, try restarting the computer. If that doesn’t work, make sure your computer has Windows XP Service Pack 2 installed.