# Adding a second internal hard drive



## wildchild (Sep 6, 2003)

Hello all, I have a Power Mac G4 500mhz machine with 256 ram memory and a 40GB hard drive with Mac OS X.  I want to install a second internal hard drive for stuff like video clips and photo's etc..  What is the process to install a second hard drive and just have it act like one large empty drive that I can just save to or must the drive be formated with Mac OS X using the install CD 

I just want the second drive to be one large storage space no OS, can someone help walk me trhough this ?

Thanks

Dan


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## DeltaMac (Sep 6, 2003)

1. Shut computer off
2. remove hard drive bracket (remove one screw at front of hard drive bracket)
3. install 2nd hard drive by attaching to the 'U' shaped bracket above the existing hard drive (Apple may have put a small packet of the corrrect screws in the original box)
4. Set hard drive jumpers so 2nd drive is a 'slave' device. (important)
5. Reinstall bracket with 2 hard drives in place
6. Attach to existing data and power connectors.
7. Boot system
8. Format hard drive using Disk Utility (in your Utilities folder)
9. Use 2nd drive for data storage!


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## wildchild (Sep 6, 2003)

Thank you for the reply, worked like a charm  

Thanks again

Dan

PS. I find this forum to be very heplful and the information and members are 99% correct most of the time. This is a great source for Mas users world wide. I might also add that most Mac & PC problems that some folks pay top dollar for someone else to do they could have done it them selfs.


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## mseydel (Sep 6, 2003)

I've had an extra drive sitting around(I believe it's a 40GB Maxtor ATA) that I attempted to install in my G4 Dual 867 Mirror about a week ago...I set it up as a slave, mounted it in the bracket(Apple had left me a few extra screws), but I couln't get my pudgy fingers to attach the drive...eventually I got frustrated and left it mounted but not attached, and powered up my Mac again. I felt like I was ten seconds away from hurling my Mac out the window. Is there a way to open up the bottom of the case, or an I just going to have to be persistent?


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## Pengu (Sep 7, 2003)

Be persistent. If the IDE ribbon is a problem, disconnect it from the motherboard, plug it into the two drives, and reconnect it to the motherboard when you've screwed the drive bracket back in..
Also. For those that are wondering, the Master/Slave settings make no difference to booting OSX, you just can't have two of the same kind on one ribbon.


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