Nothing went easily after that though. I did unplug C and managed to get Windows XP running on the 300 gig drive. The problem, which I discovered much later, was that it didn't recognize my network adapter. Then there's a Catch 22. How could I connect to find the correct one from the Internet when my network adapter wasn't working?Also, the wizard that's supposed to make it easy to copy files and settings, didn't work right. I could 'collect' the data from the 'old' disk on a USB flash drive. Yet, when I booted up with the new drive, the program told me that I hadn't inserted the correct data drive for the necessary files. I consider myself a nerd and yet I couldn't figure it out. How in the devil is an average-Joe supposed to figure out what to do?
There's nothing that said I had to get things completed yesterday. I actually copied all data files to the Seagate. It seems to rip right along. It's inside the box along with the old drive C. I'm running Windows on the old one and data on the new one. when I get the time, I'll completely install the operating system and then throw away the old drive.
All the playing around took the better part of yesterday and I guess I enjoyed every minute of it ... in retrospect.