Ide cables

Hi

I was intrigued to see when i upgraded my motherboard Cpu that all my devices were on standard ide cables - i.e the 40 wire white ones. I know that ultra ata 66/100 (80 wire grey ones) cables transmit data at 66mb/s and 100mb/s but does any one know how fast the standard cable is and is it worthwhile me changing the cables for a an ata cable to tweak my system. My 30 gig ibm hd is 100 compatible and my 8,4 quantum is 66 compatible. Also in my current setup i have the 30 gig as primary master and cdrw as slave, and the 8.4 as secondary master and a dvd rom as slave - i have heard that if both hds are on the same cable (be that ide or ata) the transfer rate between disks will be increased because it dosn`t go through the motherboard, is this true?


Profftnt

The standard IDE speed is 33, and ATA is 66/100/133, not really a big price difference between the 2 types of cables, and ATA is well worth the extra couple of bucks.

I dont understand what exactly you mean on the last bit, how it dosent go through the motherboard.

I understand that if the hds are BOTH on the same cable the transfer of data between the 2 is faster because it is then not limited by the mother board speed.

Will i see a noticble difference if i switched the cables in terms of boot speed and general application loading?

I know that there is no significant cost difference in the cables, but what i am bemused by is the fact that when the system was originally built by my local independent retailer tha he didn't use the ata cable! I have also noticed it is not just him, most "Big" firms such as gateway (the machines in my office - bit out od date but do the job) all came with the standard cables!!!!

Profftnt

You know, I've never even thought about the IDE cables on my machines. I just used whatever cables I had that either came with the mother board or I had lying around. With that caveat, I think your motherboard needs to support the bus speed you want to run. Just because your hard drives can use 66 or 100 mb/s doesn't mean you can do that without mobo support. I also think (don't know for sure) that the data goes through the motherboard even if both HDs are on the same cable. In my PCs, I have the cables where they fit. I have to put both HDs on the same cable because that's the only way the cables will fit. I have heard to put them on the same cable, I've also heard to put them on separate cables. Conclusion: I don't think it matters.

How do you know you don't have ATA cables? I've never heard that cables are color coded. You can get them in all kinds of colors these days.

If you have the old 33 IDE cables and you can support 66/100 then an upgrade is in order!

it dosn`t go through the motherboard, is this true?<--(^^;?(I think it's not true. Because the data must be read into memory once. )

And I think it's half-true if your drives are SCSI connection, because it uses its own bios and doesn't annoy CPU.

My mobo does support 100mb/s thats why i am thinking of changing the cables - well i am going to change i am just waiting on the cables to arrive!. Yeah i agree, i thought that they had to go via ram first but i have also heard conflicting advice on the loaction of the hd. But does it matter what orientation they go in?????? i.e can i use them in reverse with the 2 connectors that are close together on the motbo side and then have the long section normally 12 inches going up the tower to my dvd drive????????

As for the type of cable, the old cables are white with the pink stripe (for pin 1) and generally the wires are thick and there are only 40 of them. in the ata cable the wires are finer and there are 80, but still in a 40 pin socket. These tend to be of grey colour - i know there are fancy colours now available but historically they were grey. There is a good account and pictures on http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/if/ide/confCable80-c.html

Of course however i think that new systems will be using the new fancy round cables for faster transfer rates and plus some of them glow!!!!

Profftnt

(^^;?(Though I'm also a kind of person who just tag together.)

When your mobo supports it, you'd better change it. But whether you can feel the change or not is another matter. And as far as you keep the IDE standard, the cable length and place should not affect (though I don't make out what you mean well). However, there are several features in HDD itself and DVDD still so according to manufacturer and their firmwares. In the end, you cannot but introduce some benchmark test and try several settings and combinations, as we cannot object to other's opinion generally which would have their own ground in their configurations.