Promise ATA 66 card..How would you set up these things??

[stockjock]

I have a Promise ATA 66 card..and I have these things that could connect. I would like to know how you would connect to get best performance. Maxtor 20.5 gb ultra ata 66 7200 rpm HD, WD 40 gb ultra ata 100 7200 rpm HD, Samsung 16X DVD, and a Mitsumi 4x4x32 internal CDRW...
How would you use the the Promise card..I've heard that its best to use that card for your hard drives as it is a faster transport than the ultra ata 66 controller on the MB..
I need to know exact specifics on how you would set up..like master/slave configurations too...

Thanks

 

[Budman]

I would use each HD on the card seperate channels & then connect the DVD & Cdrom to onboard IDE.

 

[stockjock]

so both HD's should be set as master and the cds set as masters as well???
since each will have its own eide channel..am I thinking in the right direction

 

[Noriaki]

I have a promise Ultra100, and I found it easier to have my boot drives on my motherboard (just one less step, at least when installing OSes), and extras on the Promise.

Motherbaord
primary master: IBM75GXP (main windows98SE/2k boot drive)
primary slave: WDExpert (linux boot drive)
these two being for different OSes won't see much if any concurrent use so I didn't worry about them being chained togheter.

secondary master is my DVD rom (I use it as a CDRom when installing Win98 and Linux for booting and stuff)

On the promise I have a CDRW as the primary master with no slave, and an mp3 storage drive as the secondary master and getting a Zip drive for a slave.

 

[stockjock]

But aren't you wasting the benefit a that card by not utilizing the faster PCI bus...I may be totally wrong, please let me know...

 

[Budman]

If you want the fastest setting you will have each HD as master on the Promise card & the DVD & CDRW master on each onboard channels, This way you'll be able to copy cd's on the fly but you'll need a total of 4 cables,both Hd's need ata66(100) cables but the dvd & cdrw only needs regular cable.

And setting up Win ME on promise controller is not a problem.

 

[stockjock]

thanks Budman...thats what I was thinking...I have the cables ..so thats no problem except it will interfere with airflow..but I will make do..

 

[Noriaki]

<< But aren't you wasting the benefit a that card by not utilizing the faster PCI bus...I may be totally wrong, please let me know... >>



Not sure what you mean...
The IDE controller built into your motherboard is a PCI device...it doens't use a physical PCI slot, but it's still a PCI Bus device...
Using an addin promise card isn't any faster than using the built in IDE controller...the benefits are you can get faster ATA than your mobo supports, and you can have more than 4 IDE devices, but using one on a PCI card certainly isn't faster than the one in your mobo.

 

[stockjock]

thanks for clearing that up for me...Like I said...I mite be wrong..It should also tell you something that I had to ask which way was best giving another clue that I don't know what I'm talking about..LOL

 

[Eug]

<< Using an add-in promise card isn't any faster than using the built in IDE controller... >>

Sure, it is, and I think you were alluding to it in your message. As you probably know, the standard mobo controllers on older recent boards are usually ATA33 (not stockjocks's tho') which has 33 MB/s throughput, while the ATA100 is at 100 MB/s. There are no drives in existence that even come close to 100 MB/s, but there are several 7200 rpm hard drives now that hit more than 33 for peak sustained throughput rate. (I am ignoring burst rate because in reality it's not a big deal.) In contrast, even the 50X CD-ROM drives don't even hit 10 MB/s for max throughput. So yes, it does make more sense to put hard drives on the ATA100 controller and the CD/DVD-rom drives on the motherboard IDE. But you are right in saying the actual PCI bus isn't any faster, however.

Now in real life, it may not make much of a difference, because most drives that are even just 1 year old won't hit a peak sustained throughput of 33 MB/s.

stockjock, you already have onboard ATA66, so it's really irrelevant. I'd stick with the onboard IDE for your hard drives, for simplicity's sake.

By the way, no hard drive in existence gets close to 66 MB/s either. All of them are well under 40 MB/s, including your 40 GB WD ATA100 drive.

 

[Noriaki]

Well yes if you have a Promise Ultra100 and only ATA33 on your mobo the promsie is a bit faster.

I mean in his case, the promise won't be.
He has an Epox 7KXA which has ATA66 onboard, and he has a Promise 66, so they are both are ATA66 and both PCI devices, so speed difference should be negligible.

But yes you are right, if he had ATA33 vs ATA100 it would be different.