Trouble connecting new DVD drive.

[wolfmother88]

Hi everybody. I recently bough a new Dell DVD±R/RW / CD-R/RW Internal Combo Drive, and i am having trouble setting it up. The old drive connected with different cables and entirely different plug spots ion the back, so i have no idea how to connect the new one. Im not very good with computewrs, so help would be greatly appreciated.
Old drive:

New drive:

Plugs that will fit into new drive:

 

[ITGuy702]

Your new drive uses a SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) Connection. While the old one uses an IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics) connection.

The important question at this time is:

Do you see ANY other cables that look like and have the same kind of connections at the end of the cables anywhere inside your computer?

If so, GREAT! We can go from there.

If not, then you have a slight problem...You're computer doesn't support direct SATA connections.

But wait, all hope is not lost....

I know they make IDE to SATA adapters, but I'm not 100% sure if they make an adapter that you can use in your situation.

However, the adapter should look something along the lines of this:

Please check your computer for what I had asked above and we will start from there.

 

[wolfmother88]

I found a drive that has the same plug outputs as my new drive. I think its the C Drive.

 

[SNGX1275]

Just look to where that blue cable goes from the hard drive to the motherboard. There will be at least 1 other plug that looks just like where the hard drive plugs in. Plug the new drive into that.

 

[ITGuy702]

SNGX1275 is correct. Please check that and let us know the status of this situation.

 

[wolfmother88]

Okay, i plugged it into the motherboard next to where the C drive plugs in, and i filled the other slot with a connecter coming off of the larger cord that goes into the C drive. The drive gets power now, but my computer still isn't recognizing it when i put disks in. I think that windows is still trying to boot off of the old drives, because when i boot up my computer, it says drives 4 and 5 (slave and master) not found.
How can i boot off of the new one?

 

[ITGuy702]

Was that the only spot to plug in that type of connection? I'm not sure about that mobo (motherboard) or if it even matters but I believe mine has a separate slot for the dvd r/w drive. Try to see if you can locate a different slot.

 

[wolfmother88]

Well, there are four slots, but they are all next to each other

The blue cord is the C drive and the black cord is the new drive
Ive tried plugging it in to the other slots, but i have the same results, and i cant unplug the C drive or my computer gets that blue screen and says that it has to restart.

 

[ITGuy702]

Yeah, you definitely don't want to unplug your HD (C Drive)

Hmm...it should work in any of that slots you have it plugged in. Let me do some digging around and see what I can come up with.

 

[wolfmother88]

Thank you very much for your help, but i have finally figured it out myself.
My SATA drives taht were turned on didnt correspond with the one that the plug was in.

 

[ITGuy702]

Good Job wolfmother88

Now you don't have to keep opening up that machine.