(I Think) I fixed the DMA problem in Win2K

[w9design]

I just got an IBM 75GXP hard drive and couldn't get DMA to work in Win2K.
Sandra scores were about 1700.
Then I got a pang of inspiration. My Quantum ATA/66 drive was working admirably in UDMA mode. I read on Microsoft's site that Win2K doesn't support ATA/100. So then I downloaded IBM's ATA Switch utility and set the drive to ATA/66.

And voila. Sandra score is now 22143.

It appears that Win2K forces ATA/100 drives into PIO mode. When you drop them down to ATA/66, it enables DMA.
Let me know if this helps your situation.

 

[bigshooter]

What is your ide controller? I have a gigabyte bx2000+ with a builtin promise ultra66 controller. It automatically runs in ata66 mode.

 

[w9design]

I'm using the onboard IDE of my MSI K7T Pro2A.
I also have one of those Promise Ultra66 controllers, but my sandra scores are actually 2000 points higher using onboard IDE than on the Ultra66, so I use my ultra66 for my ZIP and Orb drives.

 

[Slacker]

Take a look at this, it will show you how to set dma or check to see if it is on.
http://www.rojakpot.com/Other_Articles/Win2K_Tips/IDE_DMA/IDE_DMA.htm

 

[robg1701]

You might want to look HERE as this is what IBM has to say about it.

 

[erub]

Fixed my problem. I think the reason I was having trouble is that the drive is ATA-100, but my system is only ATA-66 - changing it to DMA under Primary IDE Channel did nothing, it would come up in PIO mode. After switching to UDMA-4, autodetection seems to happen a lil faster too

 

[erub]

New Sandra score under win2k of 22262 - and I was doin some forum browsing while it was going!

 

[SUOrangeman]

weird problem, but a very nice find on the SP1 issue. But, does this affect controllers like those on a PCI card (say, Promis Ultra/Fasstrak) or just the first four ports on the mobo (IDE0 and IDE1, ... not additional ones like IDE2 & IDE3)?

-SUO