O.T. Computer Cleaning Maintenance:

Well here's my usage:

http://i58.tinypic.com/2cegpj5.jpg

I seem to recall seeing a disk image backup
option. Could we use that?

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/w...08b176f?auth=1

From the initial reading it sounds a bit tricky
to shrink backup's and as you can see my HD usage
is pretty large.

What would you do?

Thanks,
Robert

I was just thinking, I still have another
Seagate Barracuda 7200 160 GB HD(although
I don't know if it works or not but maybe
we could get it to work?) and the original
40GB Western Digital HD.

Would there be any point in putting either
in the 8200 or would that overload it and/or
drag it's performance down? I believe it has
connections though?

http://i61.tinypic.com/zj9krp.jpg

'If' you think its a good idea, I seem to remember
setting pins in the rear making one the master
and the other the slave but I can't remember
the details of which ones to set.

Thoughts/Suggestions?
Robert

Mark Twain wrote:
Well here's my usage:

http://i58.tinypic.com/2cegpj5.jpg

I seem to recall seeing a disk image backup
option. Could we use that?

http://answers.microsoft.com/en-us/w...08b176f?auth=1

From the initial reading it sounds a bit tricky
to shrink backup's and as you can see my HD usage
is pretty large.

What would you do?

Thanks,
Robert

Yeah, that's pretty big. And wouldn't be a good use
of space.

My idea fits slightly better, if your working C: is a
bit smaller.

OK, so if you keep the 2TB drive as just ~1800GB of BACKUPS,
then you'll have the ability to put an image (.mrimg) of
C: on the drive anyway.

So this was my dumb idea. new 2TB drive, prepared for immediate usage
+-----+--------------+---------------+
1TB (400 of 1000 used) --- | MBR | 1TB C: clone | 1TB E: BACKUPS|
+-----+--------------+---------------+

Whereas, if you just make backups, if the original hard drive
dies, you would need to purchase a 1TB to replace it. And do
that only when the hard drive breaks (someday). You would
just make Macrium "images" of the original drive, to prepare
for that day. You have your Macrium CD, to restore from
the image saved on the 2TB drive. The difference doing
it this way, is waiting a day or two for the newly purchased
1TB replacement drive to come in. This is still a good
strategy, as no data is getting lost, and you're fully
functional again once the data is restored to the new drive.

new 2TB drive, holding .mrimg
+-----+---------------+ to replacement
1TB (400 of 1000 used) --- | MBR | 2TB D: BACKUPS| --- 1TB drive (one day)
+-----+---------------+

You can have a mixture of random moved folders from the
current C: transferred to the new drive, plus throw in
a few .mrimg as the need arises.

To manage the Macrium image backups, you need to
label them for later. The Macrium backup has a
"Comment" field you can use. But I've also just
created file names for the backup image, to
reflect what they are.

Macrium -- 8500__July_26_2015__full_copy_of_C.mrimg

That way, the file name reflects what it is.

If later I make another one

8500__July_26_2015__full_copy_of_C.mrimg
8500__Sept_26_2015__full_copy_of_C.mrimg

and I run out of space on the backup drive, then
I know it is safe to delete the July one. As a
space management thing.

If I were to compress them with 7ZIP compression,
the file name might become

8500__July_26_2015__full_copy_of_C.mrimg.7z

but if I do that, then I typically need another
1TB drive to do the decompression later, before
using the contents.

Macrium has internal compression options (which
you can use), and they save some space, but for
speed reasons, the compression isn't as good as
7ZIP. Doing 7ZIP compression could take the
computer all day, depending on the size of the
file and the speed of the computer. Progress
on that would be pretty slow if the 8200 did it,
but a bit faster on the 8500. My new machine
can compress at about 18MB/sec on a big archive,
while my older machine (that I'm typing on),
can only manage 3MB/sec or so. Doing compression
is one time the CPU gets a real workout.

Paul

Mark Twain wrote:
I was just thinking, I still have another
Seagate Barracuda 7200 160 GB HD(although
I don't know if it works or not but maybe
we could get it to work?) and the original
40GB Western Digital HD.

Would there be any point in putting either
in the 8200 or would that overload it and/or
drag it's performance down? I believe it has
connections though?

http://i61.tinypic.com/zj9krp.jpg

'If' you think its a good idea, I seem to remember
setting pins in the rear making one the master
and the other the slave but I can't remember
the details of which ones to set.

Thoughts/Suggestions?
Robert

Adding a drive...

1) Draws 12W more electricity. The drive is likely
to keep rotating (unless you set it optionally
to spin down when not being used). Some green
drives draw 5 to 7 watts.

2) The power supply needs enough amps on its end,
to handle the load. I would not expect that to be
a problem. It is a problem for people who add
twenty hard drives to their computer, and must
be carefully considered in that situation. With more
than four storage devices, "do your maths".

You will need a pair of the green plastic rails,
to slide the drive into the 3.5" bay.

In your picture, I see two 80 wire cables. Those
are the good ones. Those allow higher speeds and
CS (cable select) jumpering. Dell loves to use CS,
because it doesn't matter how many drives they install,
or in what bay, the CS is always correct. And that's
why they gave you two 80 wire cables. It speeds up
computer assembly at the plant by 15 seconds.

Motherboard --------X------X One drive config, use
CS the end connector.

Motherboard --------X------X Two drive config. CS
CS CS jumper on both. 80 wire cable.
Verify original drive is CS,
then add the second CS drive.

With the older 40 wire cables, the data rate is limited
to 66MB/sec. You can use Master/Slave jumpering with either
kind of cable. It's the 80 wire cables that tend to
support Cable Select (CS) as a jumper option. The jumpering
doesn't affect speed. The ATA spec says the computer
has some way to figure out the cable is 40 wire or 80
wire, but I don't know which wire it checks to figure
that out. So the following work with 40 wire or 80
wire cables. The difference between MA/SL and CS/CS,
is a matter of convenience, not performance. With the
40 wire cables, for the most part, this style of
jumpering is your only option. The 40 wire cables are
less likely to be CS-ready.

Motherboard --------X------X One drive config, use
MA the end connector. Jumper
it "Master" or "Master Only"

Motherboard --------X------X Two drive config. One drive
SL MA is "Master with Slave", the other
drive is "Slave"

Motherboard --------X------X Two drive alternate configuration.
MA SL "Master with Slave" plus "Slave"

Going from config #1 to config #2 is a natural progression
with master/slave jumpering. While the alternate configuration
can certainly be used, it requires more puttering around
if changing back to a one drive setup again. The point of
me drawing in config #3, is to show that MA is not always
on the end of the cable. It's not fixed by the position.
Rather, the two drives have to pick "opposite things".
Don't put two MA or two SL on the cable. Two CS on
the cable, on the other hand, is just fine.

Western Digital and Seagate use slightly different
jumper terminology. Seagate has

Master

while Western Digital has

Master alone
Master with slave

and WD distinguish a Master setting type for each
config. So Master Alone is config #1. Master with Slave
would be for config #2 or config #3.

The Slave has no funny labeling options, and is just "Slave".

The label on the hard drive, has the basic
jumper options on display. You check the
web site for a "complete" table of values.

For example, if the hard drive has a 2x4 array of
jumper pins, the jumper positions might be.

Master Slave Cable_Select Clip
X X X X
X X X X

Clip is used when sticking a modern IDE drive
in a computer from around 1998 or so. It causes
the hard drive to change the geometry declaration.
The computer end, interprets the drive as either
a 2GB drive, or as a 33GB drive, depending on how
old the computer is. You should not need the Clip
jumper for the 8200.

If you find a new hard drive "won't go over 33GB",
then as a debugging item, you check that some
dopey person didn't put a jumper on the CLIP position
(as a means of jumper storage).

I like to look up the jumper table, just to
see how many crazy options there are. IBM are
the champs at that stuff, as some IBM drives
have a wealth of alternate geometry settings
that nobody has ever heard of. Some old drives,
you could change the declaration of the size of
a sector. And that's why I like to read up
on the drives sometimes, to see what stuff I've
never heard of before.

SCSI drives (not on your computers), have a wealth
of jumpers and switches, and require a lot more
reading before you can configure one. My older
computers used SCSI, and I probably have around
a half dozen crappy old SCSI drives in the junk
room. The 9GB ones still run, but the ball bearing
motors in them, sound like chainsaws. They're
quite loud and annoying.

*******

When you partition the drive in Disk Management,
your copy of Windows will always select the
maximum size allowed correctly. If not patched up
to date, the 160GB drive will allow making a
137GB partition, with say WinXP Gold version.
The full 160GB would be considered, if the
OS is running WinXP SP3.

When problems happen, is if a WinXP SP3 OS prepares
the drive, you have data on the drive, and you then
stuff the drive into a WinXP Gold era computer. There
could be data corruption in that case.

As long as you consider that the drive has no useful
data on it (i.e. you don't care what happens to the
contents on the IDE drive now), in Disk Management you
can remove all the partitions, and that will allow
the OS to pick the correct (limiting) maximum size
for you. If you were actually caring about the
data on the drive, you would have to be a lot more
careful about your combinations of Windows OS version
and hard drive size. If you check the System
control panel, and the label says you're
"Service Pack 3", then you would have nothing
to worry about. You can do that check now if you
want, before even cracking the 8200 computer case.

The WinXP versions are Gold, SP1, SP1a, SP2, SP3.
SP1a is SP1 with MS Java removed. Gold is the initial
release. Large drive support arrived in SP1, and
required a registry change as part of safe handling
at the time.

I used to run computers with as many as seven hard
drives in them, but now I generally limit myself
to two hard drives. As running seven of them,
with the price of electricity, isn't all that
reasonable.

Have fun,
Paul

With your first comment(It draws 12W more)it decided
the question. The 8200 cam with (2) sets of green rails
which they mounted on the inside of the case. I took them
off because I thought they were causing noise(it was
the fan housing)but I still have them. I save everything.

In any case, I'll just leave the older HD where they are
and use them later if needed.

Robert

It sounds as if your suggestion is to move the
entire HD from the 8500 to the External HD and
add a few disk images which would be great as
as backup drive but where do I put all the
folders and files from the 8500 that I want to
lean out?

As far as time/waiting etc remember I still have
the 8200 that I could use should I need it albeit
slower than the 8500.

Also this is my desk top:

http://i62.tinypic.com/28hzww3.jpg

Do you see anything I can loose?

Robert

Of course! I have 2TB's on the external HD and I
kept thinking of 1TB. You're suggesting to use
1TB to clone the HD and create disk images and
I can still use 1TB for storage, correct?

Is there going to be some way to delineate with
partitions which is which?

Thanks,
Robert

Mark Twain wrote:
Of course! I have 2TB's on the external HD and I
kept thinking of 1TB. You're suggesting to use
1TB to clone the HD and create disk images and
I can still use 1TB for storage, correct?

Is there going to be some way to delineate with
partitions which is which?

Thanks,
Robert

After the cloning is complete, you can apply
labels to the partitions. Do "Properties" on the
partition, and perhaps there is a place to type in
a label.

I'm not saying this is a perfect idea. If your
C: partition had been smaller (40-60GB), and you
kept your downloads separate from the C: partition,
that would give the control needed to do a nice neat
(efficient) job.

You certainly have room on the 2TB drive, to clone
a 1TB drive, then add a 1TB partition onto the end
of the disk. That will work. It's just a bit wasteful.

As a "neat and tidy guy", many of my OSes are shrunk
down, and excessively large downloads or .mrimg files,
go on a data-only partition. And shrinking partitions
on Windows isn't that simple, unless you use a Partition
Manager. At least one free Partition Manager, was
chock full of Adware (OpenCandy). I loaded it up in
a virtual machine for a look - what a mess :-)
Tossed it.

So yes, if you want to try cloning over the
existing boot drive, to make the new external
drive into an "emergency C: drive", it will work.
It just limits you to roughly 1TB for your other
data re-arrangements. Cloning the partitions over,
then cleaning them up and shrinking them, gives you
something to work with, and saves more space for making
a big backup partition (for your files or your .mrimg
files and so on).

I bought a defragmenter program recently, that
does a good job of preparing a partition for shrinkage
using Windows 7 disk management. I didn't buy it with
that specific application in mind. I bought it just for
usage as a defragmenter. But it can be pressed into service,
when required, for other housecleaning chores. Windows 7
and Windows 8 don't defragment large files for you,
so the program I got, is for doing that step
separately.

*******

OK, lets get down to specifics.

Say that this is the source disk, the internal 1TB.

Boot flag = 0x80, active
+-----+-------------------------+---------------------------+
| MBR | System Reserved | ~1TB C: |
| | (a tiny partition) | Say 400GB of files |
| | | actually stored on disk |
+-----+-------------------------+---------------------------+

Clone that to the 2TB drive. This is the external drive
after you are finished. This will take a while. You do the
Clone step with Macrium Reflect Free. Remove any partition
on the external 2TB drive, before opening Macrium. That
will be less confusing. I'm assuming you have *no* valuable
data already on the 2TB external drive. After the clone is
finished, this is what we've got on the external.

Boot flag = 0x80, active
+-----+-------------------------+---------------------------+----------------+
| MBR | System Reserved | ~1TB E: | Unallocated 1TB|
| | cloned from machine | Say 400GB of files | |
| | you think might break | actually stored on disk | |
+-----+-------------------------+---------------------------+----------------+

Now, in Disk Management, click on E: . Look for the word
"Shrink" as an option. The wizard will show information
on how much you can shrink. Shrink the space at the
end of E: . After this step, E: will be 500GB instead
of a whole 1TB. It will be 500GB and hold 400GB of files.
You cannot shrink E: smaller than the space needed to
hold the files in there. You cannot shrink E: below
500GB because of a couple metadata files. A proper
Partition Manager (ideally, a free one *without* adware
in it), could shrink the partition down to 401GB of space.

Boot flag = 0x80, active
+-----+-------------------------+---------------+----------------------------+
| MBR | System Reserved | ~500GB E: | Unallocated 1.5TB |
| | cloned from machine | 400GB files | |
| | you think might break | | |
+-----+-------------------------+---------------+----------------------------+

That's about as "efficient" as I can make the clone
for you. You want to finish shrinking E: now, as moving
stuff after the data partition is created, means
even more chugging for the disk drive.

So, say we're satisfied with the setup, now create the
backup partition. In Disk Management, create NTFS F:
and assign a label as you see fit.

Boot flag = 0x80, active
+-----+-------------------------+---------------+----------------------------+
| MBR | System Reserved | ~500GB E: | 1.5TB F: "BACKUPS" |
| | cloned from machine | 400GB files | |
| | you think might break | (Emerg.OS) | |
+-----+-------------------------+---------------+----------------------------+

After this is done, if the original internal 1TB inside
the computer won't boot, disconnect it. Then, insert
the 2TB drive from the external casing, back inside
the computer. You should be able to boot from it.
*Do not* allow the original drive to be connected
at the same time as the 2TB is inside the computer,
until the 2TB drive has *booted at least once*.
A cloned drive must be booted *by itself*, the
first time it is used.

HTH,
Paul

I have to re-read your instructions so I'm
clear on the procedure.

I clone the OS to the external HD using
Macrium Reflect then go into Disk Management
and look for 'shrink' option to reduce file
to 500GB, then create a backup partition NTSF F:
(right click for options -label e.g. 'Complete
OS backup 7-26-15').

Can this be tested by changing the startup sequence
in the BIOS on the 8500? or should I?


I went into Macrium and this popped up:

http://i57.tinypic.com/3588k81.jpg

http://i59.tinypic.com/2qlygq1.jpg

http://i61.tinypic.com/i6m8tj.jpg

http://i61.tinypic.com/205pgk.jpg

http://i59.tinypic.com/egxp1s.jpg

http://i62.tinypic.com/18yatx.jpg

http://i60.tinypic.com/2uhs5dx.jpg

So I just click clone this disk and it will
clone everything above?

Robert

Mark Twain wrote:
I have to re-read your instructions so I'm
clear on the procedure.

I clone the OS to the external HD using
Macrium Reflect then go into Disk Management
and look for 'shrink' option to reduce file
to 500GB, then create a backup partition NTSF F:
(right click for options -label e.g. 'Complete
OS backup 7-26-15').

Can this be tested by changing the startup sequence
in the BIOS on the 8500? or should I?


I went into Macrium and this popped up:

http://i57.tinypic.com/3588k81.jpg

http://i59.tinypic.com/2qlygq1.jpg

http://i61.tinypic.com/i6m8tj.jpg

http://i61.tinypic.com/205pgk.jpg

http://i59.tinypic.com/egxp1s.jpg

http://i62.tinypic.com/18yatx.jpg

http://i60.tinypic.com/2uhs5dx.jpg

So I just click clone this disk and it will
clone everything above?

Robert

If you were to clone the OS to the 2TB external drive,
to do a "test boot", you'd pull the 2TB drive out
of the enclosure, and put it inside the 8500. I don't
think the external drive would boot as an external.
That's because the USB bus must be modified as a
"boot bus extender", USB must be discovered early
in the boot process, for Windows to continue to be
able to contact an external hard drive. (Windows
"disconnects" the external drive, part way through
boot, and that's why it won't work.) Rather than
try the long long recipe to make that happen (fix
the Windows USB subsystem to make it bootable), it's
easier to move the 2TB drive inside the 8500.

And you'd *only* need to do that, if you want to
"test boot" right now. It's OK to leave the OS sitting
there for a rainy day, when you might need it.

Always remember, that when you boot the 2TB drive
for the *first* time, it's not allowed to see the
disk it was cloned from. Once the 2TB drive has booted
one time, by itself, then it does not hurt to connect
the original 1TB drive again, and have both drives present.
The OS has trouble figuring out which partition is
C:, if it "sees itself" on the first boot.

*******

Most of your pictures, depict the Macrium "update"
menu. It has release notes, on what was fixed on
the various releases of Macrium.

I am running Macrium 5 here. You are running Macrium 6
as near as I can tell from the decoration in the upper
left hand corner. If you accept an update from Macrium,
by clicking the "Update" button in the lower right
corner, that will likely pull in a later version
of the release 6 software.

For the most part, you don't care about that. What you
do care about, is that the Macrium Rescue CD you prepared,
"aligns" with the version of Macrium you're using. If I was
running Macrium 6, I would want the rescue CD to also be
Macrium 6. I suspect Macrium was careful to make the product
backward compatible, so you can restore from a Macrium 5
..mrimg, to the computer. But best practice for me, is to
use an up-to-date rescue CD, if I change versions. If I had
backups made by both Macrium 5 and Macrium 6, I would
want to keep two rescue CDs handy, just in case. Macrium
has demonstrated great attention to detail, so my sort
of caution is probably unwarranted. But I've experienced
enough software products, to not give any of these
companies too much trust.

If you installed Macrium 6, as your version from the very
beginning, you have nothing to worry about. I happened to
start with Macrium 5, and for the time being, I'm still
using it, and declining to use the update button.

You can accept an update at any time, as long as you
have assured yourself that Macrium 6 can read your
old .mrimg files (whatever version they were made with).

*******

OK, your last image has the important bits. You can clone all
of those.
0x80 boot flag
+-----+-------------+---------------+------------------+
| MBR | DellUtility | Recovery/Boot | C: partition |
+-----+-------------+---------------+------------------+
13GB of 25GB 321 of 907GB

After the MBR and three partitions are transferred, the external
2TB disk will look like this. I'm assuming the optical drive
is D: , and the next available letter is E: .

+-----+-------------+---------------+------------------+-----------------+
| MBR | DellUtility | Recovery/Boot | E: partition | 1TB unallocated |
+-----+-------------+---------------+------------------+-----------------+
13GB of 25GB 321 of 907GB

In Disk Management, if you shrink E: the maximal amount that
Disk Management can handle, the final configuration looks like this.

+-----+-------------+---------------+--------------+---------------------+
| MBR | DellUtility | Recovery/Boot | E: partition | 1.45 TB unallocated |
+-----+-------------+---------------+--------------+---------------------+
13GB of 25GB 321 of 453GB

Then, you can make a fourth primary partition, down at the end. The
BACKUPS partition will hold your xxx.mrimg files. You can pick
any sort of meaningful name you want for the .mrimg files. The
label on the disk partition, is a different issue than picking
a filename for each .mrimg backup you make. I like to use
partition labels in Disk Management, to help me avoid accidents
when moving stuff between partitions.

+-----+-------------+---------------+--------------+---------------------+
| MBR | DellUtility | Recovery/Boot | E: partition | F: "BACKUPS" |
+-----+-------------+---------------+--------------+---------------------+
13GB of 25GB 321 of 453GB 0 of 1.45TB used

There is sufficient slack space left on E:, for E: to boot with
no problem. You could safely squeeze E: a bit more, but it would
take some third-party tools to do it.

And if you get bored with this setup, you can also
remove those partitions, keep F: and resize F: . So
you're not "stuck" with this setup forever.

With large hard drives, some of these operations will
take a while. Planning is very important with big disks,
because a mistake can cost you half a day of waiting.

Paul

If I leave the HD where its at and
only use it if my HD in the 8500
goes bad. Then I remove the old HD
(thus preventing it from seeing the
disc it was cloned from)and replace
it with the 2TB HD and have it boot
up for the first time by itself.

Correct? Then you said it wouldn't
hurt to connect the original HD again
and have both present but if the original
HD crashed why would I put it back?

I updated Macrium to 6.754 I believe then
it prompted me to created a rescue disk
which I did. Then cloned the disk:

http://i60.tinypic.com/doxhqf.jpg

So how am I doing?

On disconnecting the external HD; after I
received the OK to eject the connection does
it matter if I power off the external HD first
and then pull the plug or visa versa? I kind
of think pulling the plug first is better than
powering it off because I heard a small thumb
when I did.

In passing the CD-DVD light on the 8200 have
flashed when I turn it on and remain lit. Then
when I get it going it goes out. Another intermittent
problem.

Robert

Mark Twain wrote:
If I leave the HD where its at and
only use it if my HD in the 8500
goes bad. Then I remove the old HD
(thus preventing it from seeing the
disc it was cloned from)and replace
it with the 2TB HD and have it boot
up for the first time by itself.

Correct? Then you said it wouldn't
hurt to connect the original HD again
and have both present but if the original
HD crashed why would I put it back?

This is certainly true. But there might be
other situations, where the internal hard
drive is still good, and yet you want the
"opinion" of booting a known-good copy of the
OS. And that copy on the 2TB disk would be
convenient.

I'm just trying to give a warning, so you
get the best mileage out of this setup.


I updated Macrium to 6.754 I believe then
it prompted me to created a rescue disk
which I did. Then cloned the disk:

http://i60.tinypic.com/doxhqf.jpg

So how am I doing?

So your next step would be entering Disk Management.
While there is a path to get there from Control Panel,
I prefer to just type the name of the command.

diskmgmt.msc

You put that in the Run box.

Once there, select the J: partition. That's the
906.80 GB on the 2TB disk, and shrink it. In
Step 2 here, you can see the "Shrink Volume"
choice in the right-click menu.

https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/.../gg309169.aspx

Did you notice something else interesting ?
The J: partition has 94.82GB of files, while
the C: partition has 381.24GB of files. This means
some "un-copyable" system file stuff didn't get
copied. That could be System Restore stuff,
some artifact from doing backups, that sort of thing.

So in terms of your original task, cleaning up C:,
it could be that a part of the size of C:, isn't
actually your files doing it.


On disconnecting the external HD; after I
received the OK to eject the connection does
it matter if I power off the external HD first
and then pull the plug or visa versa? I kind
of think pulling the plug first is better than
powering it off because I heard a small thumb
when I did.

In passing the CD-DVD light on the 8200 have
flashed when I turn it on and remain lit. Then
when I get it going it goes out. Another intermittent
problem.

Robert

For your new enclosure, you want to use "Safely Remove".
For that to work, you can't currently have any files
open on the 2TB drive. So your applications have
to be closed. Otherwise, the request to "Safely Remove",
will be denied. Sometimes it's hard to figure out
what is keeping the drive busy.

The way the new enclosures work, Safely Remove should
cause the blue LED to go off on the drive enclosure.
If you feel the casing, the drive should also
stop spinning. It spins down. The spin down is
controlled, and easy on the drive.

Now, you can switch off via any power switch
on the enclosure. This prevents the drive
from spinning up again. Since the drive has
stopped spinning, you're less likely to bump it
and crash the heads.

After the Safely Remove, you could also unplug the
USB from the back of the computer. But I think
my first priority is probably the power
switch on the enclosure, followed by unplugging
the USB cable. The tasks have equal priority,
but me reaching for the power switch, is so there
is no way for the drive to spin up again.

On some Windows OSes, the LED won't go off. In such
a case, verify the Safely Remove actually worked,
and that there is a confirmation dialog on the screen.
Then, you can unplug the USB cable. Followed by
powering off. Maybe it "clunks", but you hope not.

If the LED goes off, that's the best way to do it.

If you have to deal with the drive with the LED
still ON, that's not the best for the drive.

You want this drive to last for a while. Drives have
certain auto-retract features, but we don't
want to test those :-) Some drives, turn the
spindle motor into a generator, to get enough
power to use the voice coil actuator, to park
the heads up the ramp. Before the spindle runs
out of RPMs. While I have read of this, I
don't have any proof they actually do that.

There's no evidence of any other energy storage
solution on the drive. Supercaps cost
too much money, and I've never seen one on
a hard drive.

So if you hear a "clunk", that might be the
mechanism. An emergency retract, caused by a
perceived power failure. If you spin down the
drive via Safely Remove, the power fail is
"expected", the heads are already retracted,
and there is no "emergency".

They don't really want to land the heads on the
platter itself. They want the heads to go up
the ramp. Safely Remove is one way to get there.

Paul

I haven't done anything as of yet since
yesterday, I'm being cautious since I've
never done this before and from your earlier
comments this can be tricky.

When I do this, it's going to ask how small
do I want to shrink it? 95MGB?

While saving space, would it be less 'tricky'
to leave it as is for when the time it's needed?
Also, this won't increase any space in the storage
partition so what is the reasoning behind doing the
skrinkage again?

I always click the safely remove for USB Flash stick,
or external HD's. I thought about exactly what you said;
about the drive still spinning, and so after safety
disconnect/remove I powered off the drive then pulled the
USB cord from the 8500.

Unless you see something wrong with it, I prefer to
keep the cord attached to the external HD rather than
plugging/unplugging.

As I said, I also prefer to have the drive on it's
cardboard box I made for it with the fan pointing downwards.
It does have pads for standing vertically but 'Murphy's Law'
being what it is I decided caution was a better option.

The fan is extremely quiet; I had to put my ear right up next
to it to hear it and barely even then!

As for the light on the 8200, as I said when I saw it on, I
held the power button until it went off. It's as if the 8200
hadn't completely powered itself off or the drive hadn't.


Yesterday this happened and it took some time to get the 8200
going. I've noticed this. Sometimes its easy sometimes not. Does
it make a difference if the 8500 is online or not? Also, I still
have to check the top fan and lately it hasn't been starting on
its own but once going it seems fine.

Robert

To briefly refresh:

Dell XPS 8500, with Windows 7 Professional, SP1,
with Spywareblaster, Avast, Windows Defender and Windows
firewall.

(1) TB HD
Intel (R) Core (TM) i7-33-3770 CPU @ 3.40 GHz 3.40 GHz
Ram 12.0 GB
System type : 64-bit operating system

VLC player

Dell Dimension 8200 with XP, SP3, with Spywareblaster,
Avast, Malwarebytes and Windows firewall.


Seagate Barracuda 7200 160 Gb HD
Intel (R) Pentium (R) 4 CPU 1.80 GHz
Ram 1.79 GHz, 1.00 GB of RAM
System type : 32-bit operating system

Upgraded video card (GE 6200)
Upgraded PCI card with (4) 2.0 ports
Removed dial-up modem card

and (external hard drives)

Seagate Backup Plus 1(TB) 2.5 USB Portable HD

8500 and 8200 backups and Rescue Disk created

WD BLACK SERIES WD2003FZEX 2TB 7200
RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal
Hard Drive

Cloned OS from 8500, Rescue Disk created

Patriot Flash stick

Should I use the Seagate Backup Plus exclusively
for the 8200 and clone it as well? I suppose not
since it would have to be able to mount inside the
8200. Just a thought.

Robert

Mark Twain wrote:
To briefly refresh:

Dell XPS 8500, with Windows 7 Professional, SP1,
with Spywareblaster, Avast, Windows Defender and Windows
firewall.

(1) TB HD
Intel (R) Core (TM) i7-33-3770 CPU @ 3.40 GHz 3.40 GHz
Ram 12.0 GB
System type : 64-bit operating system

VLC player

Dell Dimension 8200 with XP, SP3, with Spywareblaster,
Avast, Malwarebytes and Windows firewall.


Seagate Barracuda 7200 160 Gb HD
Intel (R) Pentium (R) 4 CPU 1.80 GHz
Ram 1.79 GHz, 1.00 GB of RAM
System type : 32-bit operating system

Upgraded video card (GE 6200)
Upgraded PCI card with (4) 2.0 ports
Removed dial-up modem card

and (external hard drives)

Seagate Backup Plus 1(TB) 2.5 USB Portable HD

8500 and 8200 backups and Rescue Disk created

WD BLACK SERIES WD2003FZEX 2TB 7200
RPM 64MB Cache SATA 6.0Gb/s 3.5" Internal
Hard Drive

Cloned OS from 8500, Rescue Disk created

Patriot Flash stick

Should I use the Seagate Backup Plus exclusively
for the 8200 and clone it as well? I suppose not
since it would have to be able to mount inside the
8200. Just a thought.

Robert

Your 8200 doesn't have SATA. Your plan for the
8200 would include re-using the 40GB or 160GB
IDE drives you currently own. And you can do that,
when the time comes. No rush.

Backup the 8200 with Macrium. If the internal drive
in the 8200 fails, then install the 160GB IDE drive,
and restore using the Macrium boot CD plus the
..mrimg file on an external drive.

So the story for the 8200 is an "ordinary" one.
You already have your replacement drive on hand,
and probably in ten to fifteen minutes, could be
booting from the 160GB.

Naturally, all of this is subject to reviewing the
size of the current partitions on the 8200 internal
drive, and making sure they will fit in an emergency,
on whatever you stock for a replacement drive. I gather
the 8200 uses the old 137GB rule, so it will likely
fit just fine on the 160GB IDE.

*******

To control the 2TB drive, yes, you can leave the
USB cable connected. Use "Safely Remove". When the
LED goes out, turn off the power switch.

The next time you want to use the 2TB drive, it needs
to be "detected". The easiest way to do this, is reboot
the 8500. If you don't do that, if the 8500 remains
running, then you might have to unplug and replug the
USB, to achieve detection. Turn on the power to the
2TB enclosure, any time you expect to be using the drive
in the next few minutes. Then see if a reboot does the job.
And the drive is detected again.

The only risk to the 2TB enclosure, would be if the
8500 power supply fails. Most good quality supplies
have OV protection, so the chances of it shooting into
the stratosphere are limited.

While a lightning storm could affect the adapter
used to power the 2TB drive, I'll leave that to
your weather and electrical supply experiences, to
judge the risk implied there. Since the switch is off,
that reduces the risk of a transient coming though
when the disk is not being used. So the risk is probably
relatively low, for "near" lightning strikes. But the
adapter could still be blown, by being left plugged in
all the time, and something happens to your power. I don't
think I've ever had a wall adapter blown here, so again,
risk is likely low.

*******

The Windows Disk Management "shrink" function in Windows 7,
can only shrink the envelope size by half. Your partition
is ~900GB, you could shrink it to ~450GB. There is only
~98GB of data or so, on the cloned copy. Some wasteful
Windows function probably made up the rest of the space,
and Macrium didn't copy it (not needed).

If, instead of Disk Management, you used a third party
Partition Manager, you could shrink the partition further.

This is an example of a free partition manager.
I installed this in a VM, tested with Adwcleaner,
and there was no adware. And no prompt in the
installer, to install any adware.

http://www.paragon-software.com/home...nal/eshop.html

The download is 50MB in size. It's from CNET, but
like Macrium, the download is clean. That means
Paragon likely pays $0.03 for each download.

http://software-files-a.cnet.com...
pm14free_x64_eng.exe
53,091,632 bytes

The product offers a huge manual as a separate download.
If you have insomnia, this will cure it. All disk-related
software products are like this. It's the nature of the
subject, to be both boring, and dangerous (if you make
a mistake).

http://download.paragon-software.com..._en_manual.pdf

1) After the 50MB installer is run, you'll see this.

http://i57.tinypic.com/2vug3tt.jpg

Select "Switch to Full Scale Launcher"

2) Select the partition (i.e. J: on the 2TB drive).
Right-click and "Resize/Move partition".

http://i61.tinypic.com/2ef43k5.jpg

3) Adjust the numbers. Reduce size of top box.
Middle box should stay the same, whatever it contains now.
Bottom box is space gained by the operation.
Click the bottom box to verify the amount gained.
If the cloned partition had 98GB of files on J: ,
I would set the reduced size of J: to 120GB, leaving
22GB of slack space for that OS, if or when it ever runs.

http://i60.tinypic.com/32zmn2b.jpg

Click Yes, if the setup operation went well.

And the Apply button is up near the upper-left.
You must Apply to make it work.

4) Here, you can see I snipped 1000MB (~1GB)
from my original partition, and now that space
appears as "unallocated" down at the end of the disk.

http://i57.tinypic.com/2gufktf.jpg

HTH,
Paul