2 CD/DVD Drives 1

[butterfm]

Hi,

Is it possible to have 2 CD/DVD drives on the same IDE channel or should they be on separate channels. If so, re there any disadvantages to having them on the same channel.

Thanks,
M.

 

[mahamat]

It is possible to have two cd/dvd drives on the same IDE channel as long as one is set to "master" and the other is set to "slave", the jumper settings should be marked at the back of each drive. There are no real disadvantages to doing this and it is a very common setup.
Try to stick to putting the master drive on the end connector on you IDE cable and put the slave drive on the middle connector as this can sometimes cause difficulties.

 

[zpetersen]

A good way to look at this is what other types of drives you have in this machine. A typicle motherboard has 2 ide ports to which you can connect 2 ide devices.

Say you have 4 devices: CD/DVD Rom, CD-RW, and 2 Hard drives. its a good idea to have set it up like such:

Primary IDE:
HD 1 - master
CD/DVD rom - Slave

Secondary IDE:
HD 2 - Master
CD-RW - Slave

The idea behind this is to keep traffic moving efficently. if you are copying data from the CDROM drive to the CDRW the data goes from primary ide-->motherboard-->Secondary IDE. whereas if you had the CDrom and CDRW hooked to the same IDE port the data has to pass from the cdrom to the motherboard and back up the same IDE path. this will result in slower data access times.

Basically..you want to try to keep your IDE channels one way streets as much as possible.

 

[butterfm]

Hi,

Thanks for your help.

I have 3 IDE Devices. 1 HDD, a CD-RW and a DVD-RW and as you mentioned there are 2 IDE ports on the mother board and therefore 2 IDE cables each with 2 connectors.
The 2 connectors on each IDE Cable are very close together and therefore it is impossible to have my CD and DVD drives in drive bays next to each other but with one of them as the slave on the secondry IDE (the same on as the HDD). The connectors just won't reach.

Can IDE cables be bought where the connectors are further apart?

Thanks,
M.

 

[zpetersen]

yes you can get IDE cables that are longer than the standard cables. check the ink below for more information

http://www.directron.com/flatide.html

in your case i would set it up as follows: HHD1 master on primary IDE and then .. whichever other drive i used more often i would make that one the slave on the primary and put the other as master on the secondary.

so.. say i used my dvdrw every day..

PrimaryIDE=HDD1(master) and CD-RW(slave)
SecondaryIDE=CDRW(Master)

 

[butterfm]

Excellent thanks for your help.