Ultra DMA 33 or ATA 66/100, please explain this

[BrandonV]

Hello.
I recently added a 120 GB WD (7200rpm, 8mb) slave to go along with my primary drive (WD 100GB, 7200rpm, 8mb). After initializing and partitioning the slave I got Win XP to recognize it.
I'm confused as to how to set these drives up, my Intel mo bo supports 'Two IDE interfaces with Ultra DMA 33 and ATA-66/100 support'.

Can someone reccomend the best way for me to get the most performance out of these two drives?

Thanks!

 

[thorin]

Just make sure you're using a ATA66/100/133 cable (it has 80 wires/40 pins instead of 40/40 like ATA33 cables...the wires in the ATA66/100/133 cable a noticebly smaller when compared to a ATA33 cable or floppy cable) and you'll be fine.

If you need more then that you'll have to be more specific. You said you've partitioned and done a format what you are still confused about?

Thorin

 

[bradruth]

In this case, higher is better. You'll want to run ATA100 (or at least ATA66). ATA33 is used for CD/DVD/CDRW drives, but modern hard drives (in the last 5 years or so) use higher standards. The number stands for the peak mb/s that the HD can transfer, although they rarely even reach 66 mb/s. So ATA66 is the minimum you'd want to run, but ATA100 would be better (theoretically).

P.S. Don't worry about ATA133, it's pretty much just marketing hype since hard drives can't run that fast. By the time they do, serial ATA will be the standard.

 

[BrandonV]

I'm not confused, I'm just not sure that my drives are set to perform at their maximum capabilities. I do have the correct cable (ATA66/100/133) and it works fine, I just want it to perform well.

Will it revert to ATA 100 automatically or will I need to run WD's installation tool?

Also, I was using a 4GB Seagate drive as a slave and it was not necessary to format and partition it, why is it necessary with this 120GB?
I lost about 9GB worth of usable space after part. and format.

Thanks!

 

[bradruth]

Since it is rated at ATA100, it will default to that as long as the other drive on the cable can run that high. Also, just because a drive is called 120gb doesn't mean it is that much, as they are generally marketed slightly higher than what their max capacity really is. New drives require formatting and partitioning.