Do I Have Enough Power?

[miss031]

I have recently installed a WD 250GB HD for extra space (yes, cables and jumpers are right). Having many problems, tried many things.

Last resort, wondering if I have enough power. I have a 300W power supply, and I already have installed: a 120GB HD as the master (primary IDE), as well as a LG 52X Cd-RW (Master on 2nd IDE) and a Pioneer DVR-111 DVD-RW (slave). I also have have 6 or 8 USB ports, wired keyboard and mouse, old school 17" monitor.

My electrician at work always told me that if something works, but doesn't work quite right, check the power.

Win XP SP2
AMD 1.529 GHz
ASUS A7N266-VN
WD 120 GB
WD 250 GB (Hopefully)
512 MB RAM
BIOS 8/30/02 (P.S. How do I update this?)

 

[miss031]

Also, another question, if you please: I have 2 IDE cables, an 80-pin on the hard drives, and a 40-pin on the disc drives. My DVD says it will only burn at 16x with an 80-pin cable (with 40-pin it will only burn 8x). Can I switch out the one on the hard drives, or should I just get another cable?

 

[jcortes]

since i see no graphics card i asume you dont have one. and if that is the case a 300 watt psu should be fine a CPU with peak usage only takes like 75 watts and a harddrive takes about 15 watts. and what are the problems you didnt even say what the problem with the drive is.

 

[jcortes]

Also, another question, if you please: I have 2 IDE cables, an 80-pin on the hard drives, and a 40-pin on the disc drives. My DVD says it will only burn at 16x with an 80-pin cable (with 40-pin it will only burn 8x). Can I switch out the one on the hard drives, or should I just get another cable?

get a new ribbon cable with 2 plugs.

 

[miss031]

since i see no graphics card i asume you dont have one.

Yeah, I do have a vid card, just too lazy to look it up: NVidia GeForce 2, also have a NVidia NForce sound card. Does that make much difference?

 

[jcortes]

yes a big one. that uses alot of wattage find the exact make and model of the graphics card.

 

[miss031]

and what are the problems you didnt even say what the problem with the drive is.

Here goes:

Drive came with no drivers, only a piece of paper. Physically installed it, BIOS detected it, looked fine in windows, created 3 partitions: 60, 90 & 100 GB. Formatting only worked (using Disk Management) on the first partition, stalled on second and third.

Started to transfer files to new HD (using it for music & vid storage). Once files were transferred to new HD, when I tried to retrieve them with my ITunes updater, received CRC error. They play fine if I just open them from new HD. Got concerned, started to bring the files back to old HD before reformat, same thing - CRC error. Wasn't too many, so I left them on when I reformatted. Did quick format this time, because full format stalled.

Got WD's disc drive tools (Data Lifeguard or something). They are gay. It said it would take, like 90 hours to check the drive for errors. Cool. Forget it.

Put a few files on new HD again, started converting vid's and saving them on new HD because old HD is almost full. The converted DVD files would save on new HD, but can't get them back off. Also, changed limewire to download onto new HD, but when files complete downloading it says "Disk Error" and they don't save. They just go away.

Right now, new HD is unplugged.

 

[miss031]

find the exact make and model of the graphics card.

NVIDIA GeForce2 Integrated GPU 32.00 MB

All i can find.

 

[jcortes]

that just sounds like a bad cable or drive first try getting a new cable then try a low level format using Maxtor Powermax to wipe the drive completely and if that doesnt work trash the drive.

 

[miss031]

try a low level format using Maxtor Powermax to wipe the drive completely

Will that program work if the drive is Western Digital?