How much of a performance hit on HDDs will you get from using 40 wire IDE cables instead of 80 wire?

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iamtrout

Diamond Member
Nov 21, 2001
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How much of a performance hit on HDDs will you get from using 40 wire IDE cables instead of 80 wire?
 
J

Jiggz

Diamond Member
Mar 10, 2001
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Approximately 33%-50% hdd performance. 40 wire is designed for ATA33 while the 80 wire is designed for ATA 66-100-133. Although, the actual transfer of hdd is way below their rated transfer speed, it's still fair to say 33-55 % performance hit based on their rated speed.
 
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Tostada

Golden Member
Oct 9, 1999
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80-conductor cables are required for ATA/66 and above. They're usually recommended for ATA/33 but you don't need them. Your BIOS should detect older cables and default back to ATA/33. ATA/33 is still Ultra DMA, so it's not going to hurt performance too bad other than limiting your bandwidth to 33 MB/s. If you have an older drive it's not going to matter.

In general I'd say that if you have a 7200RPM drive with at least 40GB platters you're hurting performance by running in ATA/33. If you have a modern drive with 80-100GB platters you're definitely slowing the drive down by using an old 40-conductor cable.
 
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Vegito

Diamond Member
Oct 16, 1999
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it was pretty funny.. on one of my system, I didn't have a 80 wire at 36". I plugged a 40 wire in and they system detected the hdd at ata-33 instead of ata-66 or 100..

for longer length it'll probably drop to the lowest speed..
 
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Doctorweir

Golden Member
Sep 20, 2000
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40-conductor = PATA-33 max; more = unreliabe, data loss possible, won't run at all, etc.
80-conductor = PATA-66 to 133
PATA to SATA adaptor to get rid of the 80 conductors = priceless :D
 
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