More than 4+ IDE drives?

[Ablang]

Is it possible to install more than 4 IDE drives (HDs, CD-ROM, CD-RW,
DVD-ROM, DVD-Rx, etc) in a home computer system (PM, PS, SM, SS)?

If so, how and what is needed?

 

[nooneimportant]

Methinks that an add on IDE decoder card will allow additional IDE
devices... are fairly cheap if i remember right but will need an open PCI
slot....

 

[Jim]

Search eBay for "Promise Ultra100 TX2", can be had for as little as $15-20!
Requires an open PCI slot, but very easy to setup. Not sure these cards
will support ATAPI devices though, like optical drives. It's best that you
keep opticals on the motherboard IDE channels, and leave all the HDs on the
Promise controller, can handle up to four HDs. If that's not enough, just
add another card!

HTH

Jim

 

[salty_dogs]

yes indeed it is.

but many motherboards have only 4 channels avail. 2 master and 2 slave.

i have a motherboard that also has serial connectors for two more drives of
this type.

but what i ended up doing was installing a pci card that makes use of a raid
array. you can connect up to 8 devices on this card. i have 4 smaller hard
drives that are written to and read from at the same time, which in turn
speeds file writing and transfers...

so thats the long answer. you could have more than four.

 

[Will Dormann]

yes indeed it is.

but many motherboards have only 4 channels avail. 2 master and 2 slave.

Your terminology is off. Many motherboards have only 2 channels
available. One primary and one secondary. Such a configuration
supports 4 devices.


-WD

 

[Dino]

Your terminology is off. Many motherboards have only 2 channels
available. One primary and one secondary. Such a configuration
supports 4 devices.


-WD

http://www.adstech.com/products/USB_2_Drivekit/intro/USB804intro.asp?pid=USBX-804

This works well if you run WinXP.

 

[*Vanguard*]

"Dino" said in news:[email protected]:

http://www.adstech.com/products/USB_2_Drivekit/intro/USB804intro.asp?pid=USBX-804

This works well if you run WinXP.

Primary and secondary refer to the IDE channels. Master and slave refer to the drive config on each channel. You're both right. With the newer mobos having 2 SATA channels (1 onboard controller), you could have up to 2 hard disks plus 4 more drives (hard disks, CD-ROMS, tape, etc.) for a total of 6 drives. When adding a PCI card, either or SATA, how many more drives you can add depends on your budget and number of open slots. Be sure your power supply can handle the load.

 

[Leon Smith]

If you have SATA connections on your motherboard you can plug regular IDE
drives into them using a converter. I'm doing this to get an extra HD
running. http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/specpage.html?CAB-RB420

But frankly, with devices as cheap as they are, you're probably better off
just consolidating devices, getting combined DVD/CDRW etc and big HD's.

 

[Larry]

Search eBay for "Promise Ultra100 TX2", can be had for as little as $15-20!
Requires an open PCI slot, but very easy to setup. Not sure these cards
will support ATAPI devices though, like optical drives. It's best that

you

They support it Have one of those cards on this machine with two opticals on
it might require a firmware upgrade. Something I did when I got the board.
Larry

keep opticals on the motherboard IDE channels, and leave all the HDs on the
Promise controller, can handle up to four HDs. If that's not enough, just
add another card!

HTH

Jim

 

[Dorothy Bradbury]

You may also want to stay away from onboard RAID for critical data,
whilst many find it fine - there are many who find otherwise. So worth
verifying experience with your particular motherboard & BIOS version,
particularly paying attention to the actual recovery process required

Plenty of cheap ATA/SATA RAID cards about, altho personally I
prefer the 3ware only if you want to use RAID re proven reliability.
The 3ware 2-port SATA cards are cheap, not much more than the
Highpoint 4-port cards yet frequently cited as problematic.

A pity 3ware doesn't drop the price of it's 4-port cards, since it now
has a range which extends all the way beyond 8-port into 12-port cards.

 

[Mike Walsh]

When I got a new 52x CD writer I tried it on my Promise ATA100 card. Performance was poor. It might have been running in PIO mode; maybe the card does not support DMA mode 2. Hard drives performance in DMA mode 5 is excellent on the same card.

Search eBay for "Promise Ultra100 TX2", can be had for as little as $15-20!
Requires an open PCI slot, but very easy to setup. Not sure these cards
will support ATAPI devices though, like optical drives. It's best that

you

They support it Have one of those cards on this machine with two opticals on
it might require a firmware upgrade. Something I did when I got the board.
Larry

 

[Larry]

I really don't notice a difference one optical on DMA2 mode and the other on
DMA5 mode copies CD's in less than 8 minutes for most data CD's Plays
various games excellent for me at least.

Larry

When I got a new 52x CD writer I tried it on my Promise ATA100 card.

Performance was poor. It might have been running in PIO mode; maybe the card
does not support DMA mode 2. Hard drives performance in DMA mode 5 is
excellent on the same card.

 

[kony]

I really don't notice a difference one optical on DMA2 mode and the other on
DMA5 mode copies CD's in less than 8 minutes for most data CD's Plays
various games excellent for me at least.

Larry

That might be because the optical drives don't support any faster than
ATA33... very, very few even support ATA66.

 

[DaveW]

You need to buy a PCI IDE expansion card.