How to Add a Hard Drive to Your Computer

Everyone should have an external USB hard drive for backup and extra storage.

My opinion on hard drive upgrades has changed in the past few years. In the earlier version of this manual and in articles I have written, I have treated a second hard drive as an optional upgrade and a convenient place to put backups, but I am now convinced that every computer should have an external USB hard drive.  When ordering machines for clients I usually include one of these units with the original purchase and install and configure it as part of the initial set up. Here is my reasoning:

• In the past, the reason you added a hard drive was because you were running out of space.  These days computers ship with 160GB - 320GB hard drives on a base configuration.   If you add up the space taken by Windows and your Program Files directory, I will wager you are not over 10GB.  Even if you are a digital picture fanatic or you like to download movies every day, it's going to take awhile to fill that drive up.  In 2009, additional storage is almost always for redundancy and backup.
• Fewer and fewer computers have space for an additional internal drive.  Laptop sales have now eclipsed desktop sales, and no laptops have room for second drives. Even the newer sleek and sexy desktop models only have one internal drive.  Even if your computer does have space, why bother cracking the case when you can just plug in an external? 
• Amazingly, external drives are often no more expensive than bare drives!  And external drives just plug into a USB port and you're done.
• Having known several people who lost everything in Hurricanes Katrina and Rita (including their sensitive financial data in Quickbooks and years of family pictures in digital format that they did not have backed up), and also with a wary eye on the worldwide political situation, I think it is a good idea to be able to “grab and go” if absolutely necessary.  In other words, if you all of a sudden need to leave your home or business, all you do is unplug that external hard drive and GO - and your data goes safely with you.

 In fact, many of my clients take this one step further, and purchase two identical external hard drives.  Each Friday they rotate and take one off site.  Whether you take your home backup to the office, your office backup home, or keep a copy of your valuable data in a safe deposit box, two devices gives you even more security and peace of mind.
 One of the best places for great online deals is Tiger Direct.  If you click that link to go to the page, then click on “External USB/Firewire” you'll get a list of the external USB hard drives available today.  For example, when I just checked and found several drives available for around $50.  I usually buy the Western Digital Passport drives, and the price for a 500GB model is around $119 currently.  Is that cheap insurance or what?  If you shop around (even check your local electronics and office supply stores) you might get an even better deal.
 Once you have the hard drive, you need to do one thing before backing up to it - format it for NTFS. Most hard drives come formatted for FAT to be backwards compatible with earlier operating systems, but you definitely want your drive to be Windows XP, Vista, and Windows 7 's native format - NTFS.  This sounds ominous, but it's no big deal.  Once you have your hard drive installed, open up My Computer and identify which drive letter it has been assigned.  On my computer, it is F:\.  Make sure you do not have any files, folders, or programs open, and then open a command prompt (Start → Run → type “command” without quotes → hit <enter> or click OK.)  Now type the following command and hit <enter> (be sure to substitute the correct drive letter for your machine - I'm using F: in this example):

convert F: /FS:NTFS

Note: this could take a LONG time depending on the size of your drive - kick it off before you turn in for the night!
 That's it - you now have a great external backup and storage solution!  For more on how to complete your backups