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MSI K7T Pro2-a ATA100 Problem

K

Kryzon

Junior Member
I just purchased the MSI KT7 Pro2-a motherboard and I am running Win2k. I have 2 hard drives on the first IDE channel and 2 CD-ROMs on the second IDE cable. The hard drives are the IBM DeskStar 45 Gig 7200 RPM ATA100 and a ATA66 10 Gig Drive.

Ok, now the problem: whenever I am doing I/O to the hard drive my computer loses almost all multitasking ability. For instance, if I am copying a file it will completely slow down everything else I am going. Has anyone else experienced this problem or does anyone know a solution? I know that there are problems with ATA100 and the AGP controller where performance is lost but it does not seem like things should be slowing down this much. It?s so bad that MP3s skip while installing a game off of a CD.

Thanks for any help
-Joe


My System:
900 MHz AMD Thunderbird
MSI KT7 Pro2-a Motherboard
256 MB PC100 RAM
45 Gig IBM Deskstar 7200-RPM ATA100
10 Gig Western Digital ATA66
GeForce 2 MX
SoundBlaster Live
3COM 905B
8X DVD
HP 8100i CD-R
 
I dunno if I am right or wrong, but isn't it recommended to have the HDs on separate IDE connectors, each with their own ATA66+ cable? Im not sure, people, correct me if I'm wrong...

 
I'm thinking that having two HD on the same IDE cable, that it can only run as fast as the slowest drive can handle (66). SO maybe by trying to force 100 its driving the system down
 
Yea, i agree. I heard that putting 2 atas of different speed causes both of them do use the lowest setting. HOwever, the problem you're describing was happening to me alot... where the hdd is extremely slow. I put up a thread and i got it fixed. They told me (however, i am in win98) to go to device manager and select the hdds, and check the boxes next to the DMA. My problem was solved.
 
putting 2 hd at the same cable will not effect the faster hd

i put ATA 66 and 100 at the same cable

the faster hd still running ATA100
 
Be sure the drives are running in DMA mode......Win2K automatically sets drives to PIO mode as default........
 
Well I also have a MSI K7T Pro2-A and an IBM 75GXP 30Gig w/Win2K. It's set to DMA if available but sets it to PIO mode. How can I work around this?

Thanks,
Ron
 
heng1028

Incorrect. Having both UDAM100 and 66 devices on the same cable will cause it to default to UDMA66

 
There must be an easy fix for this problem I keep hearing people are having with ATA100.

I've yet to experience, nor have had customers complain, of these problems on the 2A board.

My DMA box is checked. I have my hard drive all by itself on the Primary controller.

I, however, am using ME. MSI's website does have a BIOS revision that addresses the "loss" of hard disk drives due to Win2K and the 686B Southbridge.

Word.

 
supersix: are you sure that running both 66/100 will slow the 100??

i have been using the 100 and 66 together and i bench it with hd tach..

the 100 is running UDMA100
 
Hey guys, good call. My hard drive was in PIO mode. This was because I didn't have the VIA ATA100 drivers loaded. If you need them you can get them here:
http://www.soltek.com.tw/English/download/drivers.htm

BEWARE: if you install these drivers be careful because there is a problem in Win2K where the computer shuts down before the hard drive writes out all it's data. This results in data loss and many people have had to perform a clean install afterwards. This will supposidly be fixed in Win2K SP-2.
 
Sorry Heng.

Your link is a discussion on PIO mode channel sharing. Not UDMA.



<< Master/Slave Channel Sharing: By its very nature, each IDE/ATA channel can only deal with one request, to one device, at a time. You cannot even begin a second request, even to a different drive, until the first request is completed. This means that if you put two devices on the same channel, they must share it. In practical terms, this means that any time one device is in use, the other must remain silent. In contrast, two disks on two different IDE/ATA channels can process requests simultaneously on most motherboards. The bottom line is that the best way to configure multiple devices is to make each of them a single drive on its own channel, if this is possible. >>



Mercilessly ripped from :Storage Review

Another quote from them, on a different page:




<< For performance reasons, it is better to avoid mixing slower and faster devices on the same channel. If you are going to share a channel between a hard disk and an ATAPI device, it is generally a good idea to make the hard disk the master. In some situations there can be problems slaving a hard disk to an optical drive; it will usually work but it is non-standard, and since there is no advantage to making the ATAPI device the master, the configuration is best avoided. >>



Taken from here.

It is not a good practice to put mixed-mode drives on the same channel.

Kryzon:
Always get motherboard device drivers directly from the chipset manufacturer, in this case, VIA Tech.
For more information about VIA than you can shake a stick at, go VIA Hardware.
 
Yes they are right you need VIA 4in1 version 4.28 beta this come with win2k driver for ATA 100. I had the same problem with you.
But I had corrupt drive with this driver in win2k, and finally I have to use win ME and I think I will use win98 later, cos it seems there problem wit this win me for overclocking.
 
I believe Microsoft has released a pre-SP2 'hotfix' for ATA100 under Win2k if you don't want to use VIA's beta drivers. Not sure of the link but sniff around MS support and you should find it. Useful if the VIA drivers make your CD-ROM or CD-RW disappear
😉
 
I read from viahardware forum he has the patch from microsoft, but he says he need to call microsoft for that, unfortunately he has for german language win2k ARRRGGGHHHHHHHH, Anybody have this patch???
I try to look around in the microsoft site but no luck so far.
Cos I install win2k more than 10 times only for corrupt file with VIA driver !!!!
 
WELLDONE!!!
Finally I can use win2k again, you need to reinstall VIA drivers first and apply the hotfix, the control panel says PIO mode but thats the bug chek documentation at microsoft.

Work fine now !!!!
 
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