Hard drive questions

Hi everybody,

I am very confused and I desperately need some assistance.

I have a 10 year old Dell XPS Gen5 that I need to replace the hard drives on. Right now there are two 160gig SATA I drives (RAID 0), but I would like to use two 500 gig SATA II drives for the added space and performance. The computer specs seem to indicate the system is SATA II equipped, but could one of you kind people somehow verify that for me? If it is, must I change a BIOS setting somewhere, or will the system automatically adjust to them?

Ultimately I would like to remove the RAID 0 setup and use a single drive, but I know that can be very difficult. To complicate an already bad situation, the computer runs Windows XP which I must keep due to specialized software which requires XP. My first thought was to dual-boot XP and Linux on a new SSD, and only run XP for the required software. For general use I thought I would run Linux for better security, but Linux cannot recognize my RAID setup. I suppose I could purchase two SSD’s and keep RAID 0, but that would be quite expensive, and I have absolutely no idea if my 10 year old BIOS would even recognize new SSD’s.

I have already made several full images of my system on an external drive using Macrium Reflect, so I feel confident that I could restore the system if and when the time comes. Hopefully, some of you knowledgeable people can suggest a good way for me to proceed.

Thank you all very much.

 

The single SSD is a good idea and pretty much eliminates the need for a RAID. You will need a storage drive unless you buy a BIG SSD.
Have you considered Win7 and MVWare for your XP programs?
The Dell XPS Gen5 came with 32 bit and 64 bit processors I believe, check what CPU you have as it will determine what OS you can install. You may be stuck with a 32 bit OS due to your legacy programs.
What do you plan to do with the system besides the legacy programs?

 

Hi DOA,

Thanks for the reply. The entire situation seems to be a catch 22. A single drive system would be great, but I can’t undo the RAID 0 configuration and install the new controller driver without reinstalling XP. I can’t reinstall XP because several of the needed programs I run cannot be reinstalled due to license install limits of those programs (used up years ago). I can, however, restore an image without issues.

When I ran the Windows 7 Upgrade Advisor, it informed me that my video drivers and my RAID controller drivers were incompatible, and Dell has no upgraded drivers for Windows 7. Thus, I would need to replace my video and controller cards if I went with Windows 7 (too expensive for this computer). Even if I could, I still don’t know if I could dual-boot 7 and XP given the driver issues.

So, it looks as though the best I can do is upgrade the two drives and HOPE they are recognized by my BIOS, and HOPE they run at SATA II speed. Linux runs fine (albeit slow) from a USB stick.

If you, or if anybody else has additional thoughts, I would love to hear them.

Thanks again for your thoughts.