Help with Purchasing new system

Titus

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I teach from home and write textbooks. My husband is also into graphic design and video production. I have a $4,000 budget to purchase a desktop (I already have the monitors).

I'm considering one of the next generation Dell computers. I need speed and good graphics.

My question is what are advantages of getting a second hard drive?

Thanks.
 
and with that price range, you can basically buy the best of the best when it comes to computers.
 
Titus said:
My question is what are advantages of getting a second hard drive?

Like it was said before, its more storage.

you can also have the second drive unplugged 95% of the time, and plug it in (while computer is off obviously) and copy files over as a back up. then unplug the drive (while the comp is off again) when your done backing up. that way if there is a power surge, or a virus, all your vital info is stored in a safe place that is relitivly easy to get at, worse come to worse.
 
I was wondering if it would be possible to load the video programs, graphics, and games on one drive and my productivity software on another? When you load your operating system on (XP or possibly Vista) do the OS's occupy a particular drive or are they automatically loaded on both drives. Or do you specify the drive?

I do have a separate backup drive (external) and backup software as well as a new laptop for remote access.

I've just never had two drives and am trying to understand the basics of their operation and optimization.

Thanks.
 
The OS is primarily loaded on one main hard drive that you specify to boot off of in BIOS. The second hard drive is just your dump drive for whatever you want. I would partition the main hard drive so that the OS goes on one and the apps on the other partition. Then all the data files you work with can go on the second hard drive. Since you do graphic intense work and video production, this setup will work well because you need a lot of space to store all that you do.

For performance purposes, you can also RAID your hard drives together but technically, it's still "one" hard drive even though physically, it's two hard drives. You don't double your hard drive space which is the down side.
 
yes it is. Q6700 ($2000), ABIT AW9D-MAX ($230), Team Xtreem PC2-6400 CAS 3 ($430), Dual X1950XTX (450 ea.), Zippy PSL-6701P 700W ($284), 2x Seagate 7200.10 320GB ($90 ea.), Lian Li V2100b plus ($300), DVD burners (60 ea.), Scythe Ninja Plus ($40).

There you go, an easy $4484 without tax and shipping. Its perfectly possible ;) But dont follow this as you probably dont know a place to get a Q6700 ;)
 
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