I have a 'slave' hard drive fitted (my old pc's disk), have transferred the files i needed and don't really need the thing anymore (would use it if I could boot up using this but cannot find a way!). Friend has just sent another HD with lots of movies on for me to enjoy; can I just replace the slave and plug in the new drive and drag the files onto my C drive? C DRIVE: 120 gig, win xp home. D and E: Dvd player and Cd rewriter. F: (the 'Slave' drive) Win 98, 8gig. NEW DRIVE: 80 gig; 'Dynamic Disc Overlay'-- contains 30gig of files (friend's old mother board wouldn't take 80 gig (?)) Still waiting for more info on this disc i.e.O/S etc. Cheers, sorry for long post and lack of info on new disc! Nodding means: I don't understand.

Yep, just pull the slave drive (F:), set the new drive to slave and away ya go. It'll either work or it won't. If it does, I'd copy the movies like you want to do then format the drive to get the full capacity. You can then use it to backup important files. Skip

Well, Since the 80G has a drive overlay, you'll probably need to boot on IT. M2 If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.

Well, just heard that the drive apparently has no O/S on it. Will give it a go. "Since the 80G has a drive overlay, you'll probably need to boot on IT." Can you please clarify that for me (I'm not that computer literate to be honest!) Thanks fellas. Nodding means: I don't understand.

A drive overlay is usually used to 'compensate for' a motherboard BIOS which does not support the drive When the drive boots, the overlay loads some code that is needed to access the large disk. The OS then does it's thing just as if the cade had been loaded from BIOS. Given that, a drive with an overlay will generally not be accessable unless you boot from the overlaid drive. M2 If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.

Ah, right, but if the 'new' disc hasn't got an O/S loaded, how would one boot from it? My motherboard will take an 80gig drive no problem. Will give it a go and see what happens... gulp! Nodding means: I don't understand.

Try reading the 80 as slave. Then try booting from it as master. If no joy, you're about out of options. M2 If at first you don't succeed, you're about average.