my hard disk shows its using PIO not DMA

[MushroomNZ]

Hi
i have wondows XP sp3
AMD dual

my BIOS shows DMA is supported ( its set to DMA auto) but when i look
in the hardware configuration is says DMA when available , but PIO is
used.

how do i get it to use DMA access for the disk ?

thanks

 

[Rich Barry]

Check out this post.
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/147161-45-forcing-mode-primary-hard-drive

 

[MushroomNZ]

that did it

thanks

Check out this post.
http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/147161-45-forcing-mode-primary-hard-drive

 

[Jose]

that did it

thanks

If it used to be set to DMA and changed itself to PIO it did so for a
reason (disk hardware subsystem usually).

You should try to change them in Device Manager first then see if they
switch back by themselves, figure out what the problem is and fix it.

If you change the registry to simply ignore the situation, that may
exacerbate the real problem by hiding it.

Clues will be in the Event Log...

 

[John Wunderlich]

Hi
i have wondows XP sp3
AMD dual

my BIOS shows DMA is supported ( its set to DMA auto) but when i look
in the hardware configuration is says DMA when available , but PIO is
used.

how do i get it to use DMA access for the disk ?

thanks

Microsoft has a KB article on this:

"IDE ATA and ATAPI disks use PIO mode after multiple time-out or CRC
errors occur"

<http://support.microsoft.com/kb/817472>

HTH,
John

 

[MushroomNZ]

there were some disk errors coming out of hibernation.

nothing too terrible,
but i changed the threshhold so that it doesnt go to PIO
as easily

 

[MushroomNZ]

i saw that when i was researching the problem.

that webpage writeup for the hotfix says it was fixed in SP2 and i
have SP3 .

PC does run faster now that its fixed