How fast are my hard drives?

[jlpicard1412]

I have two hard drives... one Fujitu 40Gig and one Maxtor 40Gig... how do I get them running at ATA100.. or even ATA66... or how do I now if they are running at either of these..... SiSoft Sandra rates them at 9028 and 9771 respectively... which is poor... the first does have an ATA66/100 cable but the other cable is ATA33 . any advice?

 

[camieabz]

Well if you can get an ATA66/100 cable on the other drive, do so. I'm pretty sure any 40GB hard drive must be at least ATA66.

Find the model no. / serial no. and go to the website to find their specs.

<b><font color=blue>The Cisco Kid</font color=blue></b>

 

[Ncogneto]

first off enable dma in device manager and as the above said make sure you have ata 100 cables.

It's not what they tell you, its what they don't tell you!

 

[jlpicard1412]

I have ATA100 cable on the Fujitsu.. which is my boot drive...DMA is enabled ... the other is a MAster with my CD drive as slave..... can the CDROM take ATA100 cable?
Is there a BIOS setting that needs to be set?

 

[OldBear]

Yes the cable will fit the CD. Your BIOS should automatically
see them.

º º <font color=blue>You get what you pay for. All advice here is free.</font color=blue>

 

[Guest]

I think only the first IDE channel (blue connector) supports ATA66/100. If you put a CD or DVD rom with a ATA100 HD, both devices will be running at ATA33, even on a 80pin calbe. Because the CD rom doesn't support ATA100. Your system will take the lowest speed.

 

[Ncogneto]

What motherboard are you using with them?

It's not what they tell you, its what they don't tell you!

 

[Ncogneto]

The blue connector only denotes which controller is primary.

It's not what they tell you, its what they don't tell you!

 

[Toejam31]

That's not exactly true, not anymore. Modern chipsets support <A HREF="http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/if/ide/confTiming-c.html" target="_new">Independent Device Timing</A>.

Toejam31

<font color=red>My Rig:</font color=red> <A HREF="http://www.anandtech.com/mysystemrig.html?rigid=6847" target="_new"><font color=green>Toejam31's Tantalizing Tantric Toy</font color=green></A>
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____________________________________________________________

<font color=purple>"Procrastination on your part does not constitute an emergency on my part."</font color=purple>

 

[jlpicard1412]

Thanks,
That will explain the drive on my secondary because it's a master with the CD-ROM as slave....but the other drive is on it's own on the primary... the motherboard is an FIC AD11 ... latest edition with fan on Northbridge.

 

[jlpicard1412]

FIC AD11

 

[Ncogneto]

Wjhat drivers are you using for your IDe controller?

It's not what they tell you, its what they don't tell you!

 

[jlpicard1412]

Do you mean the Via 4in1, etc?... mine are verson 35?.. I think.... they are atleast 29 'cos they came with the motherboard.

 

[Ncogneto]

Did you install the VIA ide drivers? If so go back to the microsft default IDE drivers and see if that helps ( many times it does)

It's not what they tell you, its what they don't tell you!

 

[jlpicard1412]

Well, would you believe it... I had this idea last night that I would look in the BIOS in Integrated Peripherals, so I did and guess what......... UDMA was disabled!!!!!.. ahha... being a sort of shrewd person.. I set it to auto, and then tried SiSoft Sandra again and got nearly 17000 for drive c9000+ before) and 22000 for drive d: (9800 before) .... a bit of an improvement... still a question occurs..... drive d: is master to a CDROM slave using 40 channel cable..... drive c; is on it's own on an 80 channel cable... but comes off worse, does this mean that Fujitsu aren't as good as Maxtor?.. perhaps another question to be answered on another rainy day???????????
Meanwhhile I would just like to thank all those who helped steer me in the right direction, ncogneto, Old Bear, camieabz, Amuro_nt and Toejam31, ... thank you all....
JLP

 

[Ncogneto]

does this mean that Fujitsu aren't as good as Maxtor?..

Depends on which maxtor your copmparing to which fujitsu. You probably have a 7200 rpm Maxtor with 2 meg of cache and are comparing it to a 5400 rpm fujitsu with 512k of cache. Even though the fujitsu is still operating at umda mode 4, with its slower spindle speed and lower cache buffer it will nor function as well as the maxtor even though it is slighly crippled operating at umda mode 2. You would be best of swapping the maxtor and fujitsu drives around to get the peak performance out of the maxtor.

It's not what they tell you, its what they don't tell you!

 

[jlpicard1412]

THey are both 5400rpm...

 

[Ncogneto]

both have same amount of cache? Is one fuller than the other?

It's not what they tell you, its what they don't tell you!