Adding more Hard Drives

[warnerj]

I want to add more hard drives to one of my old computers since I have a pile of them laying around (different makes, sizes, speeds) & Make MP3's available to my son. I have read about RAIDS & don't think that is what I want (don't want redundancy). Only want to use the HHDs that I already have. Can someone clarify if I can just add a PCI IDE controler for 4 more HHDs?? If so, is that a different card than the RAIDS cards?? (will RAIDS card just act as 4 additional IDE slots allowing different sizes and speeds & acting as 4 seperate drives) Could someone point me to a brand/Manufacturer. I see RAIDs cards advertised everywhere...Don't want to buy full-blown RAIDs system - Just want to add 4 more (independant) HHDs & use what I have laying around the house.
All Coments Welcome!!
Thanks
John

 

[Crashman]

There are lots of IDE controller cards on the market, you're just seeing RAID a lot because it's popular. A RAID controller can use drives without putting them in RAID mode, but then again, why pay for a feature you don't need?

The biggest problem with most IDE controller cards is that they have boot BIOS. A few don't. Boot BIOS will try to take over the boot order of your PC and make the first drive on the IDE controller card your boot drive. Sometimes mainboard BIOS can overcome it, other times it can't.

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