SATA and IDE

[Nofeark21]

I have a computer that has a SATA drive currently in it. I am trying to add an IDE drive to transfer files from. I added the IDE drive but had to use the IDE cable from the CD-ROM drive. Now what happens is it keeps rebooting.
There are no jumpers on the SATA drive and I moved the jumpers and tried and same thing occurs.
What am I doing wrong?

Thanks for the help.

 

[wolluf]

1. Is this IDE drive definitely ok (ie, not damaged)?
2. Are you connecting it and the CD drive to the same cable? If so, have you jumpered both devices correctly? (eg, assuming 80 connector cable, device jumpered as master on the end connector, device jumpered as slave on the middle connector. If using hard drive as master, it may have 2 settings - one for sole master, one for master with slave present). If you are coonecting both, try just connecting hard drive.
3. What's the boot sequence on your machine. Often IDE defaults to before SATA - which might mean its trying to boot from IDE drive (which if it has an operating system from another machine on, would almost certainly cause rebooting). Go into the bios and make sure SATA is higher in the boot sequence than IDE.

 

[cdogg]

If you can't tell what the jumper settings are on the hard drive, go out to the manufacturer's website for a diagram. If you don't want to even do that, then you can remove the jumper altogether, disconnect the CD-ROM drive, and attach the hard drive on the "end connector" on the IDE cable. Depending on the hard drive, doing this will force it to use cable-select or master.

Like wolluf said, an 80-wire IDE cable will give you the best speed if the IDE drive is less than 6 years old. However, it will still work on an older 40-wire cable.

Once you see that the BIOS is recognizing the IDE drive, you should be good to go...

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein
[tab][navy]For general rules and guidelines to get better answers, click here:[/navy] faq219-2884

 

[ArizonaGeek]

The other thing you could do is get an external drive case, they run about $20 or so and you could hook up the drive via USB or Firewire. Would save your space in your case (wow didnt know I could rap) and also save on the heat factor in your case. Just throwing it out as a suggestion.

Cheers
Rob

 

[Nofeark21]

The IDE drive isn't damaged thats for sure. I plugged it into a different machine that only had IDE drives in it and copied the users settings to an external hard drive so the user could use it.

What I would like to do is install that drive into the new PC so they have more space, but the new drive is SATA and there is not another 80port IDE slot. The only one is for the CDROM drive. Is there a way to install it into machine? I don't think so but if someone could tell me that would be great. Otherwise the External hard drive option AZ gave me is a good idea.

Thanks

 

[wolluf]

IDE connectors support 2 devices. If the cable currently attached only has one connector (apart from where it connects to board), then just buy a new one with 2, and set up drive as master and Cd as slave, for example (80 pin cable, end connector is master, middle slave).

 

[Nofeark21]

The cable has a master and slave connector on the cable. I think it will be kinda difficult to attach the hard drive as the master and CD Rom as the slave because the CD is on top and the HD is in the middle. Makes for a hard connection unless there is an easy way.

 

[cdogg]

You can reverse that. Since this isn't a boot drive, it doesn't matter if it's master or slave. So go ahead and leave the CD-ROM as master and make the IDE hard drive slave.

And like wolluf said, you can replace it with an 80-wire IDE cable too so that you get the best performance.

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein
[tab][navy]For general rules and guidelines to get better answers, click here:[/navy] faq219-2884

 

[jlockley]

Working on a similar issue here, which I will post separately, if I don't find an answer.

However: It actually does matter what you attach as master and what as slave with some optical devices, which cause difficulty if not installed as master.

Having your main drive a slave is not a problem. Just reverse the bays or get a longer cable. They're pretty cheap.

 

[cdogg]

jlockley,
That's a good point, but to keep it in perspective, it only matters a small amount of the time. But it's good to bring up just in case. Also, sometimes the optical drive will only work with a 40-wire cable, so keep that in mind too...

~cdogg
"Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." - Albert Einstein
[tab][navy]For general rules and guidelines to get better answers, click here:[/navy] faq219-2884