Not really any harder to install them than most parts. Depending on the case, you'll likely just need a screwdriver.

As for reccomendations, another SATA drive would probably be best. Any big-name brand such as Seagate or Western Digital is fine.

If you alredy have a Sata drive it means your MB suports them, so just go and buy another one. If its just a regular 'storage' drive, you should look for a 7.200 RPM - SATA II drive. As for brand, anyone should be fine, I like Seagate and Western Digital. As far as size goes, I think the 1TB ones have very good prices nowadays.

Now if you are looking for performance, Westend digital has some disks at 10.000RPM and than there is the SSD drives, but they are much more expensive and have much less storage capacity. If you don´t know this drives you problably don´t need them, stick with the SATA II models and you should be fine.

The instalation is rathr simples, you just have to plug 2 cables (power and sata) one to the PSU and the other to the MB. You may have to format the drive once installed, but thats not hard either. If you need any help, we are here to help.

Cheers.

Thanks guys...

Another thing to remember when installing a new drive....... They have little plastic plugs on the back called "Jumpers", and they have to be set in accordance to whether you want the drive to be a "Master" or "Slave"...... Master is usually the drive with the OS on it. Just be careful you get them in the right position. You can usually find instructions and diagrams for setting the jumpers on the drive manufacturers website, and sometimes on the drive itself.........

Hi Richard!

Yep they're right on the drives.  You should look inside of your case and look for 2 things, an open internal drive bay and an available power connector. 

One last thing to consider is your power supply.  As these things age they tend to become less efficient and no longer perform optimally.  So... if you have a stock PC from say Dell, HP, ACER etc. and its 2 or more years old and you have taxed it with other add-ons like a graphics card then change the power supply out for a better one at the same time.

I only see one sata cable hookup. But I'll just replace existing hard drive since it's pretty old and(weird noises) & only 320gb's. The new one is a western digital 1 tb serial ata drive..New corsair 550w power supply. Since I'm updating to Windows 7 I'll just replace the old one before installing it.. Also back up...Thanks guys..

If you haven't bought it yet, get the Western Digital black drive. They are alot faster than the green.

That's the one.

Western Digital does make some of the best hard drives out there.

If you want to use this as your main drive, I recommend you get the faster Western Digital Black. If you're going to use this as a secondary drive to store your movies/music/photos/extra files that just don't fit anywhere else, you can save yourself a buck or two and get the Western Digital 1TB Green because it is a lot less expensive, and it uses less power, generates less heat. These are desirable features on a secondary hard drive.

If you want pure speed, the Western Digital Velociraptor is amazing, at 10000RPM, it makes even the most unruly application very snappy.

When installing hard drives remember to keep plenty of space above and below the hard drive and ensure proper air flow around the drive. Improper ventilation causes overheating, and that's one of the biggest factors that contribute to hard drive failures and very easily avoidable.

I have a WD External HDD, 1TB. Can I remove it from it's case and use it as an internal? I think I've heard of this being done.

the only reasons against do this that I can see are

1 voiding warranty.

2 external drives are more expensive than internals

3 external drives from wd are usually the green drives for the heat reason and the usb being slow the slow drive will not make any difference in performance

harpo

That will only apply to 'PATA' drives [IDE] .  SATA has no master/slave relationship as they are not Parallel, but Serial ....

Thanks guys..

That shows how old my computer is!! I've never seen a drive that didn't need jumpers!! So how does the computer know which is the master drive with the OS on it without jumpers??

Each serial channel has a number associated with it, so just set the right HD to boot in the BIOS, and you'll be good to go!

easy there is ONLY ONE drive per cable and only ONE connector at each END of the lead

the number of drives supported is controlled my the number of connectors on the motherboard/controller card, current motherboards can have from 2 to 10 SATA connectors and controller cards can have from 2 to 8(mostly 2 or 4) sata connectors

and the master drive is the drive on the lowest number sata port, but the bios can also boot of other drives

harpo

Cool.... thanks guys!

I hooked up hard drive just like the one that came out and it works fine. I was just wondering what the other hookups (on the left side) are for?

What's the model number of your motherboard or can you take a picture and post it?