need a smart Computer guy

[fmctm1sw]

And, too, the pics show what sure as hell looks like a 40 wire ribbon cable, small slow drive. Should be changed.

I thought the 40-wire (up to ATA100) was OK - ATA133 needs 80-wire for extra grounding to prevent interferance. His IDE cable should be fine for a couple of optical drives, shouldn't it?

I think the 40 pin cables were good to ATA-33. A lot of people still use the 40 pin cables on CD/DVD drives.

[Cobra]

What is the difference between ATA100 and ATA133 cables then?

[dblue]

i go all my drives to work thanks for all the help guys

[Cobra]

Good to hear that.

[Capmaster]

What is the difference between ATA100 and ATA133 cables then?

None that I'm aware of. But then, you wanted a "smart computer guy" and that rules me out

[reboot]

If you look closely at the pics, you see a darker grey cable at the bottom (under his green arrow pointing to P3). It's 80 wire, and will be connected to the hard drive.
The 40 wire (light grey) one, goes to CD.

[gmatov]

Cobra,

If you have an ATA expansion cardand don't mind experimenting, and the card has HDDs on it, rather than ODs, change the cable to 40 wire.

I think you will get a message, after it detects devices, something like "No 80 wire cable detected, defaulting to ATA 33."

In fact, I think the first time I saw that was when connecting to IDE0, on the MoBo.

Cheers,

George

[BJ_M]

you can do ata66 on a 40 pin also

[Cobra]

http://www.mikeshardware.com/howtos/howto_connect_ide_hd.html

Yep, you're right. ATA66/100/133 all need the newer 80-wire cable. Why do companies sell ATA100 cables and ATA133 cables separately then (www.ebuyer.com being one example)?

I thought ATA66 could use a 40-wire cable too, but not according to that site.

[BJ_M]

ata66 will work on a 40 pin , but some bios 's prevent it ..

the cable has to be in spec also (less than 17" i think)