Sata? Ide? How to tell?

[Jdm240sx]

well i just put my computer together and i was wondering how can i tell which mode my hard drive is in?
i didnt have to install the sata driver with a boot disk like i normally would
i assumed that the motherboard automatically changed it into ide? or did it already have the drivers?

how can i tell if im in sata or ide mode?

Processor : Amd X2 5200
Motherboard: Biostar Tforce 570 Sli
Hard Drive: Western Digital 160 Gb 16Mb Sata 3.0

thanks in advance!

 

[locky28]

SATA Cable or Serial-ATA

IDE/ATA Cable

As munkey said they are different interfaces and use different cables to connect your mobo to your HDD.

IDE is slowly dieing (thank-god) and the faster, prettier, and easier to cable manage SATA interface is taking over.

SATA II refers to somewhat of a revision of SATA with 300mb/s buffer. No real advantage over conventional SATA in the desktop space.

 

[apache_lives]

i think what he means is what mode is the sata ports working, and as in IDE (compatibility) mode or sata (native/NCQ/raid etc) mode, and for that question, check your bios!

 

[Jdm240sx]

yeah thats what i mean apache

i looked in my bios but i cant seem to find it all it says is WDC 160gb and all those funny characters afterward
is there any other way to determine what mode its operating in

 

[g-paw]

If all your hard dirves and optical drives are recognized, then the BIOS are set correctly for the drives. Check the mobo manual to see where you can find your drive settings, usually in Advanced and on board devices in the BIOS

 

[frozencpu]

Easy way is to look in device manager under IDE.

 

[apache_lives]

yeah thats what i mean apache

i looked in my bios but i cant seem to find it all it says is WDC 160gb and all those funny characters afterward
is there any other way to determine what mode its operating in

its not in the hdd area its somewhere in another menu, but either way it wont matter too much performance wise

 

[merc14]

The "F6 Drivers" you are referring to are for RAID. SATA doesn't require that you load a driver to run it, any more than you need to load a driver to run an IDE drive.

May I recommend that you google RAID, SATA and IDE and do a little research so that you'll have a better understanding of what your system is running, how it operates, what your system is capable of and all the options available to you. Afterall, you paid for these capabilities in your chipsets and are missing out on some excellent options available to you, like RAID, due to a lack of understanding. RAID 0 is great!

 

[piratepast40]

The "F6 Drivers" you are referring to are for RAID. SATA doesn't require that you load a driver to run it, any more than you need to load a driver to run an IDE drive.

That may be true for that motherboard but not for all. Some integrated controller chipsets DO require the manufacturers drivers for SATA.

 

[Damon Line]

If you installed Windows on a SATA drive without installing additional drivers through the F6 option, your drive is operating in IDE mode.

 

[Zorg]

If you installed Windows on a SATA drive without installing additional drivers through the F6 option, your drive is operating in IDE mode.

Yup.

 

[joex444]

I'd like to point out that your method of determining based on F6 drivers only works for Windows XP.

Under Vista, I don't have to provide it any drivers for my ICH8R RAID drivers -- it finds them itself and shows my arrays without any prompts or drivers being manually loaded.

 

[Zorg]

I don't/won't use Vista. I guess he will have to look in the BIOS if he is using Vista.