IDE Ribbon Cable help

[Buffalo]

Advice please,

I run two hard drives on my PC, but would like more "4 max"
is it just a matter a replacing the double IDE cable?

I've had a look on google but only came with IDE Dual Device Cables,
but that would only hold 3.

pehaps a external caddy would be a solution

Any advice appreciated

[Virtualbody1234]

You can only connect 2 drives to IDE cable (Master and slave).

Most motherboards have 2 IDE connectors so 2 cables can support up to 4 devices. The problem is that optical drives also use them.

If you motherboard has SATA then you can use that.

You can also use a USB2 external housing.

Lastly, you can add a PCI card that can add more expansion capabilities to your system.

What motherboard do you have?

[Darth Sushi]

Most MB have 2 IDE connectors (each connector can handle 2 devices each for a total of 4 devices). Your are NOT going to find an IDE cable with 3 or 4 connections because there is no such animal.

Other solutions:
SATA Drives
USB external drives (you can daisy chain these up to 128 times)


_____________________________
Damn VB, you're too fast for me! Or I'm too slow.

[Barbarossa]

Each IDE connector can have 2 devices. A master and a slave. Most mobo's have 2 ide channels, so you can have 4 hard-drives, so long as you don't want any optical drives.

You might want to consider a SATA drive, or connecting an external drive via USB.

[Buffalo]

Thanks for the info

I've got a KM2MCOMBO-L ~ a bit outdated now :(

I like the sound of the PCI card for expansion, did not know they did one.
ebuyer have a caddy @ £3.99, looks okIDE Caddy With 2 Fan (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=72253)
I'm sure they would work on the PCI expansion

I'm a bit unsure about USB2 for an external drive, compared to the PCI card idea, Will see if I can get some details on transfer speeds first.

SATA Drives: don't know if that would work on my PC, unknown if I could convert, I've seen the New Maxline Pro 500GB with 16 MB Cache, good reports.

Much appreciated

[Buffalo]

External Serial ATA 1+1 Port PCI Adapter - ebuyer @ £12.04 PCI Adapter (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?rb=16959537981&action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=60614)

This would be a great upgrade for my PC at a low cost,
and would work well I hope with the Ebuyer Caddy + sata drive for each bay in the PC, and would be handy so I can hot swap if need.

Ask a question, get an answer, problem sorted, Nice one!

[clocker]

Ask a question, get an answer, problem sorted, Nice one!
It's just because you're not French.
We seem to terrify them...

[Duffman]

Anything terrifies the French lol...

[clocker]

Hey Duff...how's the RAID array working out?

[Virtualbody1234]

The PCI card that I was refering to was: http://www.promise.com/product/product_detail_eng.asp?segment=Non-RAID%20HBAs&product_id=87

http://www.promise.com/product/images/Ultra133_TX2.jpg

[Buffalo]

Thanks for the info :)
the only price I can find at the mo is £34.61 for this card, not as cheap.
looks good, can run 4 drives on it, but the data rates only 133mb/s

would I be better using the SATA Port card with data rates @ 1.5Gb/s
and the Serial ATA card comes ready with the cable as well.

I'm sure this is the one to go for, well hope! :lol:

[tesco]

Thanks for the info :)
the only price I can find at the mo is £34.61 for this card, not as cheap.
looks good, can run 4 drives on it, but the data rates only 133mb/s

would I be better using the SATA Port card with data rates @ 1.5Gb/s
and the Serial ATA card comes ready with the cable as well.

I'm sure this is the one to go for, well hope! :lol:
I would go for that card and a sata drive.
Then you can use the drive if you build/upgrade your computer later on.

Make sure you've got enough connectors for power in your computer, and for a sata drive you will need a molex to sata cable.

[Buffalo]

Thanks Rossco, The one thing I did not think about... "power connectors"
just had a look, yes i have two available.
found a molex to sata on ebuyer @ £4.11 each:ITEM: (http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?rb=16974661313&action=c2hvd19wcm9kdWN0X292ZXJ2aWV3&product_uid=77810)
Seagate ST3250824AS 250GB @ £65.77 each

x2 HDD £131.54/x2 molex to sata £8.22/1x Serial Ata card £12.04
= £151.80 ~ 304.726 CAD

sounds quite good to me, will be a good setup at a good price!

Thank you

EDIT: Sata power converter on ebay, buy it now price £1.99 + £1.00 p&p

[Duffman]

Hey Duff...how's the RAID array working out?

eh good, i get problems if I don't defrag once in a while, but other than that i get 12 day uptimes no prob, sometimes it does that clicking but it doesn't crash it anymore, so its all cool.

[Virtualbody1234]

Thanks for the info :)
the only price I can find at the mo is £34.61 for this card, not as cheap.
looks good, can run 4 drives on it, but the data rates only 133mb/s

would I be better using the SATA Port card with data rates @ 1.5Gb/s
and the Serial ATA card comes ready with the cable as well.

I'm sure this is the one to go for, well hope! :lol:

IDE maximum data rate is 133MB/s
SATA maximum data rate is 150MB/s

But the mechanical limitation of most drives is still less than 100MB/s.

You won't notice any speed difference.

You can still go with SATA if you want. Look for the best price for the card and drive combination.

[peat moss]

Ask a question, get an answer, problem sorted, Nice one!
It's just because you're not French.
We seem to terrify them...


Or the French Canadiens ,who just like to be different ! :) Ok OK could n't help it !:D

[lynx]

Try the new WD drives:
http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?product_uid=94403

16MB cache for only 60p extra per drive but save money on the sata power converters - WD drives still accept molex power connectors.

If you are getting 2 drives don't forget that you need a data cable for each drive with sata. The controller card only comes with one cable so you need to buy one for the second drive.
http://www.ebuyer.com/customer/products/index.html?product_uid=58191

[Buffalo]

Thanks Lynx
All I need now is buy one get one free :lol:
Thats a good deal, 250GB - 16MB Cache at that price.
love the look of the SATA cables compared to the old IDE, that would make a well tidy PC.
Thanks all for ya help on this one :)

[Appzalien]

If you have chosen sata drives thats ok, you can always switch them to a sata capable motherboard later but you need to know that a sata pci card is limited by the speed of the pci bus, you will not get 150mb/s speeds until you have a sata motherboard.

[lynx]

If you have chosen sata drives thats ok, you can always switch them to a sata capable motherboard later but you need to know that a sata pci card is limited by the speed of the pci bus, you will not get 150mb/s speeds until you have a sata motherboard.Standard pci bus throughput is 33MHz x 32 bits width = 1.056Gb/s. While this does not match the 1.5Gb/s (not 150mb/s) of the Sata I interface, it still outstrips the media speed of about 500mb/s for a high end drive. Without multichannel RAID the limiting factor is still the media transfer speed and will continue to be for some time.

[fkdup74]

you will not get 150mb/s speeds until you have a sata motherboard.While this does not match the 1.5Gb/s (not 150mb/s) of the Sata I interface....


What is the long-term road map for SATA?
SATA defines a roadmap starting at 1.5 gigabits per second (equivalent to a data rate of 150MB/s) and migrating to 3.0 gigabits per second (300 MB/s), then to even higher data rates. This roadmap supports up to 10 years of storage evolution, based on historical trends.

http://www.sata-io.org/faqs.asp

Perhaps 'alien had his casing wrong....
but then I've seen multiple instances of case-raping in this thread. :frusty: