Michael Ahrens said:
Hi,
is it possible to use a S-ATA II-hard drive with the P4PE-board ?
Thanx, Michael
There is a terminology problem with SATA, and by SATA II, I hope
you are referring to operation at 3Gbit/sec on the cable. The
SATA transfer rate is supposed to be backward compatible, so
a drive interface operating at 3Gbit/sec, should also be able
to operate at 1.5Gbit/sec. But the drive doesn't automatically
change its end of the interface - the motherboard can do that
(on say an NF4 board), but as far as I know, the drive end needs
the use of a "Feature Tool".
For example, the "Feature Tool" on this web page, can be used to
set the transfer rate on a disk. If your hardware is only
capable of 1.5Gbit/sec operation, DO NOT use this tool to
set the transfer rate to 3.0Gbit/sec. A SATA II drive should
ship with the interface set to 1.5Gbit/sec, and the "Feature
Tool" can be used to change the setting to 3.0Gbit/sec. If
the drive is already operating at 3.0Gbit/sec, you would need
to find a motherboard with 3Gbit/sec drive interfaces, then
use the Feature Tool, to dial the drive down to 1.5Gbit/sec
operation again.
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/download.htm
(See page 22 here.)
http://www.hitachigst.com/hdd/support/ftool_user_guide_198.pdf
To summarize - it should work. If it does not work, the drive
may have been set to 3.0Gb/sec, or spread spectrum may be
enabled. A "Feature Tool" can be used to change the settings
to be compatible with your motherboard - check the tech documents
for your disk, to make sure the disk is not shipped from the
factory using its 3.0Gb/sec setting. If is possible if you
bought disks intended for use in a server, or bought used
disks that were pulled from a server, that the interface
could have been set to 3.0Gb/sec.
HTH,
Paul
