I was wondering if someone could give me a specific answer to this. I can't find any tool that could directly test the compatibility and I don't know anyone who could lend me a 250GB hard disk to test.

Anyway, I want to buy a 250GB hard disk for back-up and storage. I read that if you have SP1 for XP it would work...but...I need to be sure since I can only buy once for now. Thanks!

My current system is:
Windows XP Pro Ver 2002 SP1
Intel Pentium III 736MHz
320MB RAM
Motherboard i815EP-ITE

BIOSVersion IntelR - 42302e31|Ver 1.65|Award Modular BIOS v6.00PGN

BIOS Characteristics
ISA is supported
PCI is supported
Plug and Play is supported
APM is supported
BIOS is Upgradable (Flash)
BIOS shadowing is allowed
ESCD support is available
Boot from CD is supported
Selectable Boot is supported
BIOS ROM is socketed
EDD (Enhanced Disk Drive) Specification is supported
Int 13h - 5.25 / 360 KB Floppy Services are supported
Int 13h - 5.25 /1.2MB Floppy Services are supported
Int 13h - 3.5 / 720 KB Floppy Services are supported
Int 13h - 3.5 / 2.88 MB Floppy Services are supported
Int 5h, Print Screen Service is supported
Int 9h, 8042 Keyboard services are supported
Int 14h, Serial Services are supported
Int 17h, printer services are supported
Int 10h, CGA/Mono Video Services are supported
ACPI supported
USB Legacy is supported
AGP is supported
LS-120 boot is supported
ATAPI ZIP Drive boot is supported


Current Hard Disks:
40GB Master
120GB Slave (NSTP Formatted no OS. Storage)

I want to buy Seagate Barracuda since I'm comfortable with it and it's the one I could afford right now. Should I go for 250B or higher or lower? Would it work with this system?

Also, I wanted to buy a cheap but good DVD Writer. It would be my first time so any tips? I've read some stuff already but it would be nice to be given user experiences. Can my system support a DVD Writer? I don't have much programs installed anyway and I make sure that there's not a lot of background programs.

Thank you very much!

a dvd write might work well, however you have to record on lower speeds and maybe upgrade your ram.

as for the hdd, i'm quite sure that a 250 wont work, you might work around this by partitioning it as multiple disks, or maybe a bios update might help. not sure though