ultra-ada100?

[zimu]

i am thinking of getting this new 60 GB drive, i'm not too sure whether it is compatible with my machine.
what does all that ultra-ada100 and EIDE interface mean? cause my drives right now are IDE and i don't know whether they'll support this eide crap.

thanks

 

[sohcrates]

what motherboard do you have right now?

newer drives are either ata100 or possible ata133...which means that your "normal" IDE controllers probably won't allow you to run at those transfer speeds...so you would have to buy an ata100 or 133 controller card, and plug the hard drives into that. also, you will need to make sure you get 80 wire IDE cables, since the "normal" ata33 40 wire cables will not allow those speeds.

this is all, though, dependent on what mobo you have

 

[zimu]

wow its that confusing eh?
i don't know what motherboard i have, but its quite an old thing... its a dell dimension L-400C.

would it work?

 

[sohcrates]

<< wow its that confusing eh?
i don't know what motherboard i have, but its quite an old thing... its a dell dimension L-400C.

would it work? >>



well, here's the thing. most likely, your older mobo won't recognize the drive as an ata100 or whatever...but it's not the end of the world.

you can just put the drive in there, and have it run at a slower speed....it's not the end of the world or anything

OR, you can get the controller card (usually around 30 bucks) plus a new ata100 IDE cable (less than 10 bucks) and have the full speed of the drive.

just also be aware that many older motherboards can't recognize hard disks as large as 60 gigs because of bios limitations...but there are workarounds for that when the time comes

 

[bacillus]

I would second the use of an ata100 pci card to use with that 60GB hdd! 🙂