how hard is it for a person who's super-power is to break computers?

I have a tower PC and I want to add a second hardrive (I asked for empty space for this when I made the computer because I couldn't afford it at that time but I saved up some money and can afford it now... probably).

I want this hard drive to 'remember' all the files I'm working on (video, image, docs, stuff like that) so that the main hard drive can 'remember' and 'think' about the programmes.

How hard is it for someone like me who excels at breaking computers just by walking into the same room where the computer lives, to install and set up and tell the computer to put the "video", 'photo' shortcut file folder thingy to look at that drive instead of the main drive where it looks now.

And with those words, you should have a good grasp of how little I understand (and how much ) of how my computer works.  But I was able to install ram chips without much fear so that's good.

So...

Do I do it myself and save a few dollars or do I get my computer builder people to do it and have to drive into town and hang out there for a couple of hours while they make the machine go happy?

I vote that if you can't risk losing all your data, it's cheaper to pay for it to be done.

It's not difficult, BUT, I know you are talented at computer damage :D

Something you might consider is an external drive, that eliminates the installation, although you still need to move things to it with software or manually. Manual the first time plus a backup program would do that. Less risky.

I've got external hardrives, but I use them mostly for backup and long term storage.  

When I'm working with video editing, I notice that the speed these drives talk to the computer is longer than if the files are stored in the computer - both with this computer and in my old one where I had two hard drives inside.  It's milliseconds longer, but they add up when working on a video this size to be an hour or two extra time.  

Ah...

So how hard would it be? I could do it, I don't consider it complex. But that's a skill I have. I would have to put some serious thought into knowing how to set up your loom. Your skills are not the same as mine. Is it a skill you want to have? If so, it's not that hard to learn. But if you wouldn't enjoy it, or ever care to use it again, it might be better to pay for it to be done.  

I know you are capable of acquiring any skill you want to have, is this one you want, or just a task you want over with so you can do better things with your time?

I'll see how much the install costs next time I'm in town and how long I would need to be without my computer.  There was talk when they built the PC that they might be able to do the install for free since I have loyalty to their shop.  

Also wondering if there are any benefits to waiting a few months.  I need it between now and six months so if there is a big tech improvement on the horizon, it might be worth waiting.  

Hi R,
Someone who knows how to do this, should be able to do this in about 15 minutes or less if they have a spot ready to plug it in to test. Most shops have a 1 hour minimum, so you would probably pay more than that.

My recommendation would be to get someone to reinstall your computer on an SSD (if it's not already) and use your current drive as the secondary. However, if you want to learn and try it yourself, I think we could probably get you most of the way.

Specific to directing all you pictures and photos to the other drive... there are built in profile folders in Windows (My Documents, Pictures, Desktop, etc). They are there for you to sort your stuff... though I have rarely seen people who actually use all the folders as expected. There are built in shortcuts to these folders. Your best bet would be to make your own folders on the second drive and shortcuts to them.

I think installing it is something you could probably do just fine. Most hard drives are going to have 4 screws (or some sort of tool free bracket) to mount it. The connectors and power will only fit one direction. There is a chance the computer will get confused about which hard drive it should start with. If that happens, just unplug #2 until you can take it to someone. But most likely it will start up fine, and with a few settings in Windows to see the hard drive properly, you would be ready to start using it.

First, have you bought the hard drive yet? There are two main physical sizes, and depending on what you get, you may need an adapter.

Second, Can you send pictures of the inside of your computer? And the specs or at least model of your motherboard. If the pictures are clear enough, we may be able to figure out what you need and walk you through setting it up.

***Edit*** I wouldn't bother waiting. If you wait for 6 months for the next big thing... by then they will announce the next big thing coming out in another 6 months.. you could wait forever... or just get something now :)

Everything that Matt said ^.

I haven't bought the hard drive yet.

The computer is under a year old so the main hard drive is pretty darn awesome.  I just don't like having it more than 60% full with my files and as I'm editing several videos at one time, it gets a lot fuller than that pretty quickly.  The problem with keeping my files on the same drive as the computer uses for 'thinking' is that it seems to slow stuff down when there's not enough free space.  I don't know why.  It's just a thing computers do to me.  (I do the weekly defrag and clean and all that stuff to make sure there isn't file clutter)

But I planned for this when I bought the machine.  I decided to put all my money into the better graphic card and thinking part (processor?) of the machine and to give it as much future proofing as possible. The original plan was to take the two hard drives out of my old machine and stick them in the new one, but that's only going to give me a couple of T, so it won't be many months before I need more space than that.  Might as well do it once and do it well.  

I've got one empty space at the front of the tower (where the cd drive would normally go but I got an external one) and two empty spaces at the back.  I don't know what size they are, but it's sort of traditional tower size.  I choose the cheapest case possible.

Hi R,
Simply having files on the hard drive will not slow it down until about 85% full. It sounds like you could hit that and more when editing videos. Accessing the files is what can slow it down. Trying to do stuff with large files (like editing videos) could definitely slow it down. It is more nuanced than this, but really the only 3 areas that are going to slow down a computer are the hard drive (being full, starting to fail, and reaching the maximum speed when the rest of the computer can go faster), trying to use more than 75% of your RAM (which isn't often the problem for normal people, but editing videos is not normal use), or the CPU (reaching its maximum, starting to fail, overheating).

Since your computer is new, we will assume the CPU and RAM are sufficient and it is the hard drive getting full that is causing the most trouble. I'd still be curious what hard drive you got, and what size it is. SATA HDD? SATA SSD? M.2 SSD? PCIE SSD? NVME? Lots to choose from :)

If it is a "normal" cheap case, I'll guess you have the 3.5" sized bays. If you need a lot of storage space (you were talking T, I'm assuming you mean terabytes?), then this will be perfect and you can get one of the large 4-16TB sized drives. Again, I would need pictures and/or motherboard specs to recommend something.

Lastly, I don't want to make it more complicated than it needs to be, but three things to keep in mind. Backups - make them regularly and store them somewhere where your computer is not. A larger drive is cheaper than multiple smaller drives, but it also means a lot more data to lose when it fails. Personally I would rather have several 4TB drives than a single 16TB drive. I know you may not have the space in the case, but something to think about. The third thing is backups - make them regularly and store them somewhere where your computer is not... I know dejavu... but we just had a server crash at work... 3 out of the 4 drives decided they didn't want to work. Backups saved my bacon.

I got it so I can use all the bells and whistles on DaVinci Resolve (including Fusion which is a hog when it comes to resources).  Basically, I took the requirements of all the different software I use, and said "build me something that will be happy running this and be good for the future."

The big problem is I only had so much money when I got the computer so I left a lot to be ugraded later (and made sure I had a power thingy strong enough to handle this - and cooling thingy so it doesn't go on fire).  I threw most of the money into the processor (only a dozen cores, but I still love it) and the graphics card as these were giving the most grief last computer.

Here's an example of the videos I'm working on right now

Video 1 - 31GB
Video 2 - only 1/4 filmed - 10GB
Video 3 - just started filming - 1 GB
Video 4 - 10 GB
Video 5-7 - (1/3rd filmed) 40GB
Video 8 - 50.5GB
Video 9 - 6 GB (but only half filmed)

(these don't include the files for the actual editing or proxi files.  It's just the source files)  

It also doesn't include about a dozen videos that I'm still filming but are unlikely to be finished filming this year because nature is fickle.  Those get dumped on the external until I'm ready.

With everything else I ask this machine to do, it's at about half full on the memory and that's where it runs smoothest.  I can run my photo editing software and video editing software at the same time without any lag.  But it doesn't like doing this if I let the memory get more than 60% full. It's not a big lag - just a tenth of a second when I ask it to do too much thinking at the same time.  No one else seems to see it but I do and it bugs me.  

So it's time to get the second hard drive.  

All I know is when I start saving up for my camera that shoots 6K, I also need to save up for a new computer and lenses.  So mostly I need to win the lottery if I want to start filming in any-K.  1080 will have to do for now.  

I finally got to the computer shop.

It looks like, for the fast one, it's about $100 per Terawhatever.  That's what I was expecting.  The chip is quite small, like a ram chip but shorter - I thought it was going to be a full solid-state drive.  So I need to double-check check I'm getting the right thing.  

I want it to remember files.  Lots of them.

Does this sound like the right thing?

But the installation is included (because I'm a repeat customer) and takes about 10 min.  No appointment needed.  

Hi R,
What you are describing sounds like an M.2 SSD. See picture for an example. Does it look a bit like that?

SSD or Solid State Drive refers to the storage type, you can think of it like the warehouse. An SSD can be manufactured to use one of several different kinds of connections. The connections are going to be the roads and loading bays on the warehouse and will help determine how fast things get from the warehouse to where they need to go. SATA is probably the most common connection and would come in a "full size" drive like you were expecting. M.2 is different, but faster, kind of connection. If your computer supports it, I would definitely get that kind.

My only question would be if that M.2 slot is already in use. It is rare to have more than one M.2 slot, so I would just want to make sure it was not replacing what you already have. I know you said you wanted a second drive.

That looks just like the one, only it said terabites instead of GB

I'll double check that they don't have to remove anything to put it in.  But I don't think they will as I asked for lots of upgrade space as I knew i'll need more memory in less than a year from buying it.