Primary IDE Slave?

[dcloud]

I was reading in my MB manual and my Lite-On DVDRW manual that the Lite-On drive should be plugged into the secondary IDE port on MB. This way it will appear as the Primary IDE Slave in the BIOS setup screen. I checked all my connections to make sure everything is plugged in correctly, and it is, but the Lite-On is appearing as the Secondary IDE Master. You can see a picture of what I mean HERE.

Any suggestions how I can get the Lite-On as the Primary IDE Slave, or is it not really all that important?

Thanks.

- dc

 

[shortylickens]

NOT important.

The whole primary/secondary master/slave issue was a big deal back in the DOS/Win95 days.

It doesnt matter anymore. Just make sure you set your bios up to boot from the drive you want to boot.

 

[Zepper]

You didn't say how many IDE drives you had before the LiteOn and how they were hooked up, but if you had One hard drive and one other optical drive (which were already both on the Primary IDE channel, then hooking your L-O as the master on the secondary channel is the way to go for best performance anyway - cross-channel data transfers being usually faster than same-channel transfers. Best performance on PATA IDE is one drive per channel. I will often buy a PCI IDE controller to "make it so" if there are more than two PATA drives.

.bh.

 

[dcloud]

Thanks guys. I've thought about it and I'm going to leave it as is, although I'm going to replace the bulky three-plug cables with a couple two-plug ones. Now all I have to do is figure out why programs still take a while to load. I thought after more RAM, the new PSU, and better cables that would have been taken care of. More brainstorming I guess.

- dc

 

[Zepper]

Make sure all drives are running DMA. If your PC is a major brand like HP, compaq etc. They often come with big slow drives (2MB cache etc.) to save a few beans. Switching out with a latest generation, top of the line drive might help.

.bh.

 

[dcloud]

Thanks, Zepper. Where do I check to make sure DMA is turned on? Would that be in the BIOS, and if so where'bouts?

My PC was built for me by a friend. HD is a Maxtor, but I believe it is 2MB cache. I'm thinking of getting one or two SeaGate 200GB Serial ATA drives (when I can afford it).

- dc

 

[Zepper]

I think you can check in either Device Manager (look at the advanced properties of each channel of your IDE drive controller) or Storage Management in the Control Panel.

.bh.

 

[dcloud]

Thanks. Here's what it said in Device Manager

Primary IDE Channel is

Transfer Mode: DMA if available
Current Transfer Mode: Ultra DMA Mode 6

Sceondary IDE Channel is

Transfer Mode: DMA if available
Current Transfer Mode: Ultra DMA Mode 4

- dc

 

[dcloud]

Today I went to Newegg and ordered 2 new two-plug round IDE cables to replace the long bulky three-plugs, some Artic Silver 5 thermal paste, and another case fan (I have an empty spot in the bottom/front of the case for it). I'm thinking of replacing the CPU fan and heatsink I have with a Zalman CNPS7700-ALCU 120mm 2 Ball Cooling Fan. I've checked the specs and the Zalman will fit on the MB perfectly, without bumping into the PSU.

- dc