ATA100 cable - question (short)

[hallam2003]

Ok, quick question, straight up answer please. If i use an ATA 100 HD, do i absolutly have to have the ATA100 cable for it to work. I'm not sure if my mobo comes with it, hopefully so, or I'll have to make a quick trip to the store, i was told it came with the ATA 66 cable, with this work, even just for a couple days, untill i can get to the store. I was told that the wrong cable will cause corruptions and overall drive failures.

Hallam

[Lebo]

An ATA66 cable will work. You can easily tell the difference between it and an ATA33 cable, basically it has 80 wires so looks more crowded than ATA33 which has 40 wires.

[Fingers]

Your mobo will come with the right cable. If your getting an ATA66 mobo, there's really no need to use a cable specified as ATA100, even if it's a ATA100 hard drive.

[otheos]

ATA100 and ATA66 use the same 80wire 40pin cable. ATA33 uses the older 40wire 40pin cable. If the number of wires isn't enough to tell the ATA100/66 and the ATA33 apart, the former has coloured conectrors (black for the motherboard, blue for primary and grey for secondary, or similar combination).

If your mobo has ATA66 or ATA100 support then it came with the 80wire 40pin cable (aka ATA66 cable). There is no such thing as ATA100 cable, as it is the same as the ATA66.

[Nighthawk]

I think that the ATA-100 hard drive will use a 40-conducter wire (I ran a 66 on this), though it'll be slow. It could cause data corruption, but if you're only using it for a few days you should be OK.

[hallam2003]

whew! thanks guys, ordered all my parts for my new system the other day, then got to thinking, and ****, do i need an ATA 100 cable?? it's good i can use it for at least a few days, as i live at least 50 miles from the nearest store that would carry such a part. but i'm still not clear, one person stated that the ATA66 and ATA100 are the came cable(basically), but another said insinuated that i sould get the ATA100 within a few days. is the general idea that they are the same cable, and there isn't any need at all to get a cable specified as ATA 100???

Hallam

[Richard_Cranium72]

The standard cable will work with a ata66 or 100 HD but won't allow full speed.

The easy way to tell the ata/66 cable is it is very stiff and has a BLUE end that goes to the mobo.

Prices in most stores is nearly $16.00 ,, here's a link to get 2 cables for $12.95 and a RAID card..

http://www.compgeeks.com/details.asp?invtid=SIDERAID66

[Fingers]

While I'm not sure if this necessarily corrosponds to ATA66 or ATA100, most of the new 80-conductor IDE cables seem to only have holes for 39 pins on the motherboard IDE connector. If you try to connect one of these cables to an IDE header with all 40 pins, you're going to bend or break off one of the pins on your mobo.

This kind of aggrevates me, because I bought a couple of really nice "rounded" 80-conductor IDE cables from coolerguys.com, but I can't use them on my ATA66 mobo. http://www.sysopt.com/forum/frown.gif

The last mobo I bought was ATA100 capable, and it only had 39 pins on the mobo's IDE headers.

[Lebo]

The general rule with installing any hardware items to your motherboard is "More than a gentle push is too much". I have ignored this in the past an bent a few pins(only broke one).

There is absolutely no problem running an ATA66/100 on an ATA 33 ide connector. You could leave it there for the rest of it's life with no problem, however you would not gain the advantage of the ATA66/100 controller.

You should by now be able to reecognise an ATA66/100 data cable. Before plugging it in to your mb, make sure you are not trying put it into ide 1 or ide 2 (these are clearly marked on all mb's) and you wont have a problem.

[Roy]

Important Note ~ The BLUE connector MUST plug into the motherboard. It is the one that ties alternating wires to "ground" and establishes the shielding for the ribbon.

[hallam2003]

ok guys, thanks for the info. My mobo came today(3 days ahead of schedule!!) and it has one of each cable, and i can tell the difference too. Just waiting for some other parts to come in. The case and the processor might be helpfull http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif


Thanks again
Hallam