Is it possible to flash a Seagate drive to make it NCQ?

[MowSow]

I have 2 identical Seagate drives, 160GB Barracuda 7200.7 7200RPM SATA, Model ST3160023AS.
While looking on the Intel Storage Utility. I saw both drive with the same Model numbers listed above.
Current Serial ATA transfer mode: Generation 1
Different serial numbers of course .
The last item was:
Native Command Quering support was Yes for one and No for the other !! what the heck !!
The Yes had a firmware of 8.12
The No had a firmware of 3.05
Can I flash the second one in order to make it support NCQ !!!?

 

[Googer]

I have heard of people doing it with Hitachi's and IBM's but I don't know anything about Seagate. Your Best bet is to hit the storage review forums and ask them. Truthfuly NCQ does not realy improve perfomance in desktops or games at this time, servers that get multiple requests simultainously will benefit from NCQ; So don't worry about it!

 

[Intelman07]

Hey man, let me know what happens, I have a 200GB 7200.7 series. The only drive of the 7th generation that doesn't have NCQ 🙁 But if I can flash it, I'd like to 😀

 

[mage333]

imho, you'll only notice NCQ performance on a desktop when it's used with a heavily fragmented hard drive. can you say "danger will robinson?" I not bashing NCQ though. Theoretically less movement should extend the lifetime on your harddrive, but it's too early for conclusive data. I don't think I've helped answer your question at all. I'm such a deadbeat pathetic loser.

If you've got the binaries, winflash.exe will flash pretty much any bios you've got, without having to boot from a floppy.

 

[MowSow]

Thanks guys .. very nice answers .. I'm not going to worry about it