new hdd

[eifion]

My motherboard is an Abit BF6, (which I love) but only supports ATA33 speed hard drives.

I'm thinking of putting a bigger drive in it, and was wondering would an ATA66 speed drive still work, just not at it's full potential, or would it not work at all?

also, what's the situation about compatability the other way round? i.e. will and ATA33 drive still work on a ATA66 mobo?

[Ygor]

Yes to both. Also, there are pci cards from Promise and Abit that will allow you to use an ata 66 at it's full potential if you have an open pci slot.

[eifion]

thanks Ygor. I can now shop with confidance http://sysopt.earthweb.com/forum/wink.gif

[Szech]

My understanding is that the hard drive doesn't even attain ATA33 speeds except in a burst. So I doubt that getting a card to upgrade to ATA66 would help much in terms of speed, unless you wanted redundant data storage.