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General discussion

New SATA hard drive

Oct 13, 2004 11:32AM PDT

I just finished building a new computer with the following parts: 450W pwr. sup, P4 2.8GB CPU, ATIB VT7 v2.0 mobo, Seagate ATA/IDE 200 GB hrd drv, GeForce 3 vid crd, WinXP, SP2. When I plugged everything in I automatically used the standard ribbon cable for the hard drive (not the SATA cable) and plugged it into IDE1 as a master. I have partitioned my HD, installed XP and transferred all my files from the old hard drive, via CD.
I am now reading/educating myself about the benefits about using the new Serial ATA cable and I see on the Seagate box that they recommend using the Ultra ATA/100 interface.
My question is now that all my files have been loaded and the HD partitioned using the old IDE/"ribbon" cable can I now make a change and disconnect that interface and change to the new Serial ATA interface without loosing any files or whatever? Will I have to make any change in the BIOS settings? Thanks for any help. Carl2125

Discussion is locked

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Is the drive a SATA [Serial ATA drive]??? OR
Oct 13, 2004 12:23PM PDT

an ATA drive [the S in SATA does not stand for Seagate]?? I guess that it is possible that the drive has both types of connections, just never have seen one.

The signal connector for a SATA drive is a small 7 pin cable [not a ribbon].

Unless I am totally discombulated the Ultra ATA 100 is the ribbon cable, the key difference from the older ribbon cables is that it has 80 conductors [still 40 pin connector]. There are 40 extra ground wires to provide less noise on the signls and less crosstalk between adjacent signal wires.

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Re: Is the drive a SATA [Serial ATA drive]??? OR
Oct 13, 2004 12:34PM PDT

Thank you, Ray for your information. Yes, I know S stands for Serial and the cable is a much smaller, 7 pin cable. I now see my hard drive does NOT have two different connectors, only the 40 pin ribbon/IDE connector, so it is not a Serial drive. Thanks again for your pointing out a few things to me. Question answered. carl2125

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BTW the 80 conductor can be used
Oct 13, 2004 12:30PM PDT

on any IDE drive, even the older one. It simply provides more noise margin for whatever drive it is used with. They are also color coded and support Cable Select jumpering of the drive. With cable select the drive on the end connector is the master and the drive to the "middle" connector is the slave.

Changing from a 40 wire to a 80 wire cable will do nothing but improve noise immunity and allow the ATA 66, 100, and 133's to perform better. [no they really never acheive those speeds].

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Re: New SATA hard drive
Oct 13, 2004 2:10PM PDT

SATA is a whole different new type of HDs so if you want a SATA HD you have to buy it and maybe just clone your files into that HD.