Primary IDE Channel - No 80 Conductor Cable Installed

[Max Jamison]

I just replaced my Intel Pentium II Celeron 400 CPU and
motherboard with a new AMD Athelon 2400 CPU and
motherboard. When I try to boot up, I now go into a POST
loop that includes the following statement: "Primary IDE
Channel - No 80 conductor cable installed." Only one
problem: I have never HAD any 80 conductor cables
ANYWHERE on my computer!

My computer includes:
1 3.5" floppy drive (A - pre-existing,
3 hard drives (C:, D:, and E - pre-existing,
1 250MB Zip drive (F - pre-existing,
1 CD drive (G - pre-existing,
1 DVD/CD-R drive (H - new.

The POST finds all of the above. I have double checked
all of the ribbon and power connections, and found all
okay.

What's going on, and how do I fix it?

 

[grahamilton]

Sounds to me you have no idea what a 80 Conductor Cable is, I think you
should read the manual that came with the motherboard, theres always
something about this in motherboard manuals
When you say replaced do you mean you built your own computer with those
parts, if so;
I could write a lot about this, but I'm not because I cant be arsed also
theres plenty about this on the internet goto www.google.com and search for
it.
Basicaly, you need to replace the IDE 40 conductor cables that are attached
to the hard drives with IDE 80 conductor cables, it is not neccesary to use
IDE 80 conductor cables on Optical Drives (your CD &DVD/CD-R drive). go to a
computer shop and ask them for a IDE 80 conductor cable (you may need to 2
if you have three hard drives) and get them to explain the basics about
this, tell them what motherboard, hard drives & optical drives you have and
ask them about installing them.

If you bought this PC as a complete unit from somewhere, I suggest you take
it back and tell what's happening.

A temp. solution is to go into your BIOS and disable UDMA for your drives,
this will reduce performance for those drive.
Anyway good luck

 

[Max Jamison]

1) You're right about my not knowing what a 80 Conductor
Cable is. The only cables I've ever heard of that fit
the 40 pin IDE1 and IDE2 receptacles are 40 pin ribbon
cables. So, HOW in the blue blazes are we supposed to
tell the difference between 40 Conductor Cables and 80
Conductor Cables if BOTH are 40 pin ribbon cables?
2) Page 2-16 of MSI's KTV4V Series Quick User's Guide
simply states:
"Hard Disk Connectors: IDE1 & IDE2
"The mainboard has a 32-bit Enhanced PCI IDE and
Ultra DMA 33/66/100/133 controller that provides PIO mode
0-4, Bus Master, and Ultra DMA 33/66/100/133 function.
You can connect up to four hard disk drives, CD-ROM,
120MB floppy (reserved for future BIOS) and other
devices."
3) I replaced the existing ATX-style Aopen AX6B
motherboard/Intel Pentium II Pro Celeron 400 CPU with a
new ATX-style MSI KT4V motherboard/AMD Athlon XP 2400
CPU. That SHOULD have been a "no brainer"! Whether the
PC in which I replaced the motherboard was factory-built
or home-built is irrelevant. MOST reputable PC builders
like Dell and MANY local firms use open architecture -
and the same high quality parts. I stay away from
proprietary factory-built PCs like HP and Compac
PRECISELY because I may want the option to upgrade AS I
wish WHEN I wish later on.
4) I DID search Goggle AND Yahoo AND Microsoft's website
AND my PC repair book from my 1995 A.A.S. in Computer
Network Technology. Nada!
5) I HAVE taken my PC back to the local store from which
I have purchased 90% of it's parts. The new techie
working my problem has no more idea than I about
differences between IDE 40 and IDE 80 conductor cables.
After 3-4 hours of work, he's replaced the 40-pin cable
that came with the motherboard and the other new one I
took out of a package with new ribbon cables. He can
boot to the CD drive IF it's connected to the IDE1 or
IDE2 cable, but NOT if it's connected to the SIIG Dual
Channel Ultra ATA/133 PCI Controller card. He intends to
remove the 133 controller card, "repair" the Microsoft XP
Home Edition installation on the hard drives, and then re-
install the 133 controller card.
6) My MSI motherboard's AMI BIOS setup does not permit
disabling UDMA (as my older Aopen motherboard's AMI BIOS
setup did).

 

[Randy Vikssten]

1) You're right about my not knowing what a 80 Conductor
Cable is. The only cables I've ever heard of that fit
the 40 pin IDE1 and IDE2 receptacles are 40 pin ribbon
cables. So, HOW in the blue blazes are we supposed to
tell the difference between 40 Conductor Cables and 80
Conductor Cables if BOTH are 40 pin ribbon cables?

Both 40-conductor and 80-conductor ribbon cables
have 40-pin *connectors*. Half the conductors in the 80-
conductor cable are connected to one or more of the
several grounded pins of the connector. That puts each
signal conductor between 2 grounded conductors - shielding
it from cross-talk and other extraneous bad stuff. They have
different appearances, since the 80-conductors make 80
ridges along the cable instead of 40 ridges. See the following:
http://www.pcguide.com/ref/hdd/if/ide/conf_Cable80.htm .
If the tech diagnosing your PC's problem doesn't know the
difference between 40- and 80-conductor ribbon cable and
when 80-conductor cable should be used, he's a pretty clueless
tech - get another one, quickly.


*|RandyVikssten|*

 

[SebD]

Hi,

I'm new here and no whizz-kid so please be gentle with me.

I have the same problem.

I got given an oldish PC recently for spares and as my main Hard Drive is only 40Gb and the Drive in the gifted PC is 120, I figured I'd fit it to my machine.

I got the same message as the Original Poster and followed the helpful advice of the correspondents and retrieved the 80 Conductor Cable lead from the donor PC. Whilst I don't get the "....No 80 Conductor Cable...." message, now, I can only delete old partition and create new partition, after which the formatting hangs at 20%.

The new 80 Conductor cable works fine with the original 40Gb HD, so I'm guessing (probably incorrectly) that it's not a motherboard issue (incidentally, I could also remove and create partition and format - again only to 20% - with the old 40 Conductor cable, too.

I'd really appreciate some help if someone's got the time, but as I've already stated that I'm not an expert, a pompously superior "I know more than you know" type of response will be wholly wasted. If you know how to help, but prefer to spend your time impressing me with your "intellect/savvy/experience/nounce" and talk down to me rather than offer up your superior knowledge and experience with a good heart, then please don't bother wasting your (nor my) lifespan with it.

There's plenty more help forums I can go to.

Sorry if I appear a tad prickly, but I was frankly quite gobsmacked at the response that the OP received.

Nice folk only need reply.

Fanx in advance.