Was going to by a new main HD to replace the aging Western Digital in my G4 400 Sawtooth but I'm not sure what will happen. Just to be ready for the future and a new Mac Pro in 6 months or so, I installed a Seagate 500 GB SATA HD inside my G4 using a Macsense PCI card (2 Sata 150/1 ATA).
Still have room for one more SATA drive and one more ATA HD using that card.
Is there any reason I should keep using a standard type main HD? Would it be better to use a small SATA HD or could I partion another larger 300GB+ HD and use a 20 GB partion for my OS and Apps. Currently using about half the current 20GB capacity.
I do have two external FW drives 250 & 400Gb (+ the SATA 500GB internal), I'm starting to get a tangle of wires and would like to keep any current purchases compatible with the SATA HD's in all the new Macs. Could I just pop my curent Seagate 500GB SATA 300 HD in a new Mac pro and keep my itunes library intact and growing with the MacPro?
I know my system is full of huge bottle necks like the 100mhz front side bus and the 400mhz processor, so I'm not looking for SATA speeds or see a need to buy a 300 SATA card, which won't work on a Mac pro, just looking for compatibility and not too many unforseen technical headaches.
My itunes library maxed out the 200 GB FW drive so I moved up to a 400 GB FW and then decided to get the 500 SATA for the same price as an another external FW drive.
I was thinking about cloning the old original drive to a new SATA drive. I was wondering if I could clone the original Western Digital 20GB to a Partition of my 500B SATA HD, or if there is some advantage to keeping a small ATA/IDE type main HD?
Or, should I invest in a small 10,000 RPM SATA drive for faster booting, now and in the future?
Any problems I should watch out for with a switch to all SATA on this old machine?
I'm already noticing the internal SATA has a very different feel than my Fire Wire drives. I wonder if the SATA drive is even as fast the FW HD's with my present set up? Would having 2 SATA drives allow faster transfers between them.
I've already made a 20 GB partition on the 500 GB internal SATA using Super Duper to make a bootable clone. The plan was to take out the original HD and then copy that clone to the the SATA main drive.
I can't find the info any longer, but the internal SATA was reading as a "slave" drive, which I don't think I want. It's plugged in alone on a seperate PCI card, but I'm not sure where the slave setting is or why that came up?
This was the first internal HD I've ever installed and I was surprised how easy it was, but I think there is a lot more involved that I don't quite grasp.
On a side note, for some reason the itunes library data base wants stay associated with the 500 internal SATA HD, rather than External 400 GB FW drive, but his could be some other issue. Fine either, way I'm tired of fighting iTunes and losing my library, just as long as I have one HD for backup and one for playing.
Here's more info on the SATA/ATA PCI card. (It was the only one I could find at Frey's)
http://www.macsense.com/product/storage/sua-100e.html
Serial ATA & Ultra ATA 133 Combo PCI Card for Mac
2-Port Serial ATA plus 1-Port Ultra ATA/133 Card
Upgrade your hard drives to 150MB/s and over 120GB/drive
Macsense SATA card Revue
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/feedback/Macsense_SUA-100E_card.html
-
Dave
Still have room for one more SATA drive and one more ATA HD using that card.
Is there any reason I should keep using a standard type main HD? Would it be better to use a small SATA HD or could I partion another larger 300GB+ HD and use a 20 GB partion for my OS and Apps. Currently using about half the current 20GB capacity.
I do have two external FW drives 250 & 400Gb (+ the SATA 500GB internal), I'm starting to get a tangle of wires and would like to keep any current purchases compatible with the SATA HD's in all the new Macs. Could I just pop my curent Seagate 500GB SATA 300 HD in a new Mac pro and keep my itunes library intact and growing with the MacPro?
I know my system is full of huge bottle necks like the 100mhz front side bus and the 400mhz processor, so I'm not looking for SATA speeds or see a need to buy a 300 SATA card, which won't work on a Mac pro, just looking for compatibility and not too many unforseen technical headaches.
My itunes library maxed out the 200 GB FW drive so I moved up to a 400 GB FW and then decided to get the 500 SATA for the same price as an another external FW drive.
I was thinking about cloning the old original drive to a new SATA drive. I was wondering if I could clone the original Western Digital 20GB to a Partition of my 500B SATA HD, or if there is some advantage to keeping a small ATA/IDE type main HD?
Or, should I invest in a small 10,000 RPM SATA drive for faster booting, now and in the future?
Any problems I should watch out for with a switch to all SATA on this old machine?
I'm already noticing the internal SATA has a very different feel than my Fire Wire drives. I wonder if the SATA drive is even as fast the FW HD's with my present set up? Would having 2 SATA drives allow faster transfers between them.
I've already made a 20 GB partition on the 500 GB internal SATA using Super Duper to make a bootable clone. The plan was to take out the original HD and then copy that clone to the the SATA main drive.
I can't find the info any longer, but the internal SATA was reading as a "slave" drive, which I don't think I want. It's plugged in alone on a seperate PCI card, but I'm not sure where the slave setting is or why that came up?
This was the first internal HD I've ever installed and I was surprised how easy it was, but I think there is a lot more involved that I don't quite grasp.
On a side note, for some reason the itunes library data base wants stay associated with the 500 internal SATA HD, rather than External 400 GB FW drive, but his could be some other issue. Fine either, way I'm tired of fighting iTunes and losing my library, just as long as I have one HD for backup and one for playing.
Here's more info on the SATA/ATA PCI card. (It was the only one I could find at Frey's)
http://www.macsense.com/product/storage/sua-100e.html
Serial ATA & Ultra ATA 133 Combo PCI Card for Mac
2-Port Serial ATA plus 1-Port Ultra ATA/133 Card
Upgrade your hard drives to 150MB/s and over 120GB/drive
Macsense SATA card Revue
http://www.xlr8yourmac.com/feedback/Macsense_SUA-100E_card.html
-
Dave