How can I achieve this?

[SLICK RICK]

I have a Asus P4P800 Deluxe MB and what I would like to do is to have my DVD-Rom, CD/RW, and DVD/RW drives all connected to my Mother Board. I previously had only my DVD-Rom and CD burner connected to the secondary IDE channel and had an external DVD burner. Now that I recieved my internal NEC DVD burner, I disconnected my CD burner and placed the NEC there. My question is "How would I go about having all 3 connected?". I dont know if some of you may mention this but I'll say it in advance, the reason I dont have it connected as a slave to my primary IDE channel is because I was told that it is not wise to have a hard drive and an optical drive on the same channel. But if you think otherwise, let me know what you think.

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

How about an additional IDE interface card in a PCI slot?

[SLICK RICK]

I was looking at some at Newegg.com but it seemed that they were all for hard drives. Could be wrong though.

SLICK RICK

[SLICK RICK]

bugster,

I think this is what I need.

http://www.siig.com/products/ide/features/Ultra_ATA133PCIv2.html

SLICK RICK

[SLICK RICK]

Not trying to be ignorant here, although that solves my problem (I was already considering that option), I am curious to know if I can achieve this with my mother board only.

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

Not trying to be ignorant here, although that solves my problem (I was already considering that option), I am curious to know if I can achieve this with my mother board only.

SLICK RICK

If your motherboard has only 2 IDE channels, then NO, you will need an additional controler card.

[SLICK RICK]

I also have 2 Raid connectors, but correct me if I am wrong, they are only to be used with hard drives. But is there a way to use them as additional IDE connectors?

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

I also have 2 Raid connectors, but correct me if I am wrong, they are only to be used with hard drives. But is there a way to use them as additional IDE connectors?

SLICK RICK

Ahh, in that case, why not use the RAID connectors for your Hard Drives, it should be possible to use them as simple IDE rather than RAID if you don't install the RAID drivers, if thats what you want, then use the other two IDE connectors for your DVD and CD devices.

[SLICK RICK]

So, it would be alright to use the primary and secondary IDE connectors for optical drives, and use the primary and secondary raid connectors for the hard drives. I already have two 200GB hard drives on the primary raid connector. So should I move it to the secondary and then move my C: drive to the master position on the primary raid connector. After doing this, will windows still boot up correctly?

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

If I undertsand you correctly, just leave your HD on the Raid connectors and put the optical drives however you want/need them, on the other IDE connectors.

From what I know of onboard Raid solutions (not too much I admit), you get 2 'normal' ide connectors (use these for your optical drives), and 2 'RAID' IDE connectors. These should operate as normal IDE connectors if you want them too, just don't install the RAID drivers. If you want RAID, and Raid 0 does help performance in disk heavy situations, then you can do that too.

Hope this helps.

[SLICK RICK]

But if I dont install the raid drivers then the MB does not even recognize that it has 2 additional connectors. It shows up in my device manager as "SCSI and RAID controllers".

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

But if I dont install the raid drivers then the MB does not even recognize that it has 2 additional connectors. It shows up in my device manager as "SCSI and RAID controllers".

First off, do you want to use the RAID feature or not.
If you do, no problems that I can see.
If you don't, well, why did you buy this mobo in the 1st place? Anyway, install the raid drivers and see if you can put 1 HD on each of the two raid connectors. This is using the raid drivers but without raid features. I don't know your exact mobo so can't say if this will work. But why not go with Raid anyway.

[SLICK RICK]

First off, do you want to use the RAID feature or not.
If you do, no problems that I can see.
If you don't, well, why did you buy this mobo in the 1st place? Anyway, install the raid drivers and see if you can put 1 HD on each of the two raid connectors. This is using the raid drivers but without raid features. I don't know your exact mobo so can't say if this will work. But why not go with Raid anyway.

Take it easy, I was just asking a few questions. You say you dont know my exact mobo but I stated that in the very first sentence in my opening post and it is also listed in my COMPUTER DETAILS. The reason I bought this mobo in the 1st place is because "Thats the one I wanted to buy". You seem as though you are getting a little pissed, I appreciate you trying to help but maybe we should just let someone else pick up on this. All I was asking was "Is it possible to add a third optical drive to my mobo" if not I just have to buy a IDE interface card. By the way, if anyone wants to give any other advice. Here is a link to my mobo if needed.

http://usa.asus.com/products/mb/socket478/p4p800-d/overview.HTM

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

Sorry if I came across pissed or anything, it was not intended. When I say I don't know your mobo, I mean I don't have personal experience of using it, not that you havn't told me which one it is. Seems to be a little misunderstanding between us here, so easy to do when communicating online, sorry for that.

I know you want to add a third optical drive to your mobo, but am still not 100% sure of your current setup. Is it something like this:

Boot HD (C on Master Ide controller
2 Optical drives on secondary Ide controller
2 HD in Raid (0 0r 1) on 1 of the 2 IDE Raid connectors.

The only mobo I have ever owned which had onboard raid (a Promise chipset I think it was) allowed the Raid connector to be used as normal IDE channels if you wanted. It had its own Raid Bios where this could be configured. If yours allows this, then simply use the 2nd Raid connector for your third optical drive and away you go.

[SLICK RICK]

bugster,

I figured you did not intend to come off in that way. You are exactly right in your assumption on my setup. This is the first system that I have ever built (just finished about a month ago) so forgive me if I dont understand some of the things you may mention. I guess what it is all getting down to is can the raid controllers act as additional IDE controllers or can I have my C: drive connected to one of my raid controllers so that I can use both of my IDE controllers for optical drives only. Right now I am not even sure what kind of raid I am using. I have my two 200GB hard drives connected to the primary raid connector, but I use them as 2 seperate hard drives. On the secondary raid connector I have nothing connected.

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

I guess what it is all getting down to is can the raid controllers act as additional IDE controllers or can I have my C: drive connected to one of my raid controllers so that I can use both of my IDE controllers for optical drives only.

I have my two 200GB hard drives connected to the primary raid connector, but I use them as 2 seperate hard drives.

SLICK RICK

In that case you are not using RAID at all. With a raid system like this you can have either raid 0 or raid 1. Raid 0 'stripes' the data across both disks, so the OS would see one large HD. With Raid 1, the data is 'mirrored' on both disks, so the OS would see (apparently) only one of the two HD's. Use Raid 0 for speed, raid 1 for data security (if one disk crashes, you have a copy on the other disk). As your OS sees both hard drives, there can be no Raid configured.

In that case, plug your 3rd optical drive into the second raid connector and everything should be fine. If for some reason the raid channels won't handle an optical drive, plug your C: drive in here and your 3rd optical drive in to the newly freed connector.

[SLICK RICK]

bugster,

Thats what I did, I connected my third optical to my secondary raid controller and it did not recoginize it at all. So, should I try it like this,

primary IDE= masterVD-Rom..............slaveVD burner
secondary IDE= master:CD burner
primary Raid= master: C: drive
secondary Raid= master: 200GB HD..........slave:200GB HD

Does this look like it will work?

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

That looks good to me, give it a go.

[SLICK RICK]

OK, will try and let you know how it goes.

SLICK RICK

[SLICK RICK]

Well it worked, but I recieved a message stating something like " The number of times you are allowed to install XP has been exceded" and that I need to enter a new product key. But this is the only computer that I have installed xp with that disc. So now I have to contact microsoft for a new product key.

SLICK RICK

[bugster]

Well it worked, but I recieved a message stating something like " The number of times you are allowed to install XP has been exceded" and that I need to enter a new product key. But this is the only computer that I have installed xp with that disc. So now I have to contact microsoft for a new product key.

SLICK RICK

Bummer, don't you just hate M$!!!

[SLICK RICK]

Yep, but its finished now. Contacted M$ and recieved a new number.

Thanks bugster.

SLICK RICK

[Solarjetman]

If you don't want to worry about that number of install limit, use Norton Ghost or some similar utility to make a backup right after you activated windows. As long as you do not drastically change the hardware, it will work fine if you ever want a fresh install. You will not need to reactivate.

What I do is have one backup of a non-updated install (nothing more done than an install from CD) and one current backup. Every month or so, I will reload my current backup, update all the programs, then back it up. That way, I always have a fresh install of Windows ready when needed.

In essence, that current backup is what my computer would be like if I installed from CD then ran all the available updates. Saves lots of time.