After spending an hour on google, I have no ideas. So I just installed a second hard drive in my computer. Running Vista, both are sata, no raid or anything. I plug it in everything is great. I restart the computer and the thing runs slow as hell. I unplug the drive and everything runs at normal speed. Anybody who can help, it would be appreciated.

9/28/2009 5:46:33 PM

try different sata channel.

go under task manager and see if any processes are using a ton of resources.

9/28/2009 6:08:59 PM

Ok i said screw it and reinstalled Vista, changed sata port, and nothing was even above a few % points on the task manager. Im completely out of ideas. any other ideas?

9/28/2009 10:14:46 PM

i know a few defective seagate drives will do that.

it's a firmware issue for that, but you didn't mention what brand you have.

9/29/2009 12:01:04 AM

My main drive is 750 WD. The new one I plugged in was indeed a seagate 320gig barracuda 7200.10. Happen to know if that one of the defective ones and could that even limit my main drive when plugged in?

9/29/2009 12:44:18 AM

Also, check for BIOS updates. While not hard-disk related, I had an issue where I went from 2GB to 4GB of RAM and my performance tanked. BIOS issue was the root cause (not the memory).

9/29/2009 1:01:08 PM

Firmware, update it. Check with SATA controller you are using. I have 2 on my mobo and the one sucks.

(side note, ^ what the F bios issue did you have?

10/5/2009 3:03:07 PM

http://forums.whirlpool.net.au/forum-replies-archive.cfm/811449.html
http://www.fluffles.net/articles/seagate-AAK-firmware/6

10/5/2009 3:33:03 PM

^^MSI's bios notes are crappy so they don't reference the fix directly and it's an older mobo (P6N Platinum SLI) so getting info is difficult. There was some weird issue that only appeared with more than 2 sticks in. Fixed with an update.

10/5/2009 3:50:17 PM

The seagate in question does have the aae firmware which looks like its one of the effected. I am curious at how adding the second drive would limit the performance of my other main drive. Any ideas? All of that is just for my information. Thanks for the help

10/5/2009 5:17:20 PM

The seagate in question does have the aae firmware which looks like its one of the effected. I am curious at how adding the second drive would limit the performance of my other main drive. Any ideas? All of that is just for my information. Thanks for the help

10/5/2009 5:18:16 PM