Tom's Hardware > Forum > CPU & Components > Other Components > PCI Slots & ATA 100

PCI Slots & ATA 100

Forum CPU & Components : Other Components - PCI Slots & ATA 100

Tom's Hardware: Over 1.4 million members in 6 different countries available to answer all your high-tech questions. Sign up now! Its free!
Ask the community Add a reply
Word :    Username :           
 
Anonymous   05-20-2002 at 11:06:04 PM

It is my understanding that a PCI slot runs at about 1/3 of the FSB speed (or some fractional percentage less than full FSB speed). If I plug an ATA 100 PCI card in a PCI slot on my ABIT BF6 motherboard running a FSB speed of 100 MHz, can the ATA 100 board with a hard drive that can burst to 60 or 80 MB/s actually work at full capacity in a PCI slot? I know we are talking MHz and MB/s, but could someone please help me understand how this works?

Please forgive me if this is a stupid question.

dwhunt

Add a reply
Sponsored Links
Register or log in to remove.
delpart   05-21-2002 at 07:24:59 PM
- 0 +

ATA100 and PCI are different bus interfaces on the motherboard. PCI is for slot cards and ATA is for hard drives. PCI has many different speeds but the number 133Mb/s comes up in my mind as the current throughput. Older and slower speeds are out there. ATA (AT Attachment Interface) is the spec for hard drive throughput also measured in Mb/s and maxes out at about 66.7 Mb/s.

en Xristos

Reply to delpart
Crashman   05-23-2002 at 06:54:45 AM
- 0 +

PCI bus runs at 33MHz and 133MB/s. Your board supports several bus dividers, such as 1/3 for a 100MHz FSB or 1/4 for a 133MHz FSB, to make it stay at 33MHz. An ATA100 board will never use all 133MB/s, but it does share with other devices on the PCI bus.

What's the frequency, Kenneth?

Reply to Crashman
Anonymous   05-23-2002 at 04:24:53 PM
- 0 +

The FSB speed is currently set at 100 MHz. I am mainly trying to understand how the PCI throughput can be 133 MB/s when the PCI bus is running at 33 MHz.

dwh

Reply to Anonymous
Crashman   05-23-2002 at 07:08:02 PM
- 0 +

Megahertz is Mega Cycles per Second. The PCI bus is 32 bits wide at 33MHz. 32 bits/8 = 4 bytes. 4 bytes x 33MHz = 133MB/s

What's the frequency, Kenneth?

Reply to Crashman
Anonymous   05-28-2002 at 06:38:49 PM
- 0 +

Exactly what I was looking for.

Thanks Crashman!

dwh

Reply to Anonymous
Ask the community Add a reply
Tom's Hardware > Forum > CPU & Components > Other Components > PCI Slots & ATA 100
Go to:

There are 935 identified and unidentified users. To see the list of identified users, Click here.

Forum map
Bestofmedia Forum ©
2000-2009 Bestofmedia Group
Page generated in 0.223 seconds
Please mind

You are about to answer a thread that has been inactive for more than 6 months.
If you still wish to proceed, please ensure that your posting is original and does not duplicate or overlap any prior responses to this thread.

Add a reply Cancel
Sponsored links
  • Ask the community now
  • Publish
Ad
Related Topics
See all relatives topics
They won a badge
Join us in greeting them
How do I win badges?