A7M266 OK With ATA/133 in Win98SE?

[Bongolation]

I have an A7M266 that I'm setting up for recording. I should like to use a
couple of ATA/133 drives, but I do not see in the A7M266 docs that his is
supported (only ATA/100 is mentioned).

In passing, someone here said that this board did support ATA/133, but I
have not been able to find the old message, as it was in a thread about
something else.

Can anyone confirm ATA/133 compatibility for me?

Is there anything I have to do in terms of BIOS upgrade or setup tweaks?

I am using Win89SE in this installation. Does the OS matter in this
question?

Thanks for any help!

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[BoB]

The ata133 hard drives will run on that chipset, but at ata100,
however since no hard drive ever uses much of the bus speed,
except during a burst(when reading to/from the cache), the ata100
will not slow it down.
Large hard drives above 132 gigs, will be the problem! Your bios
must support, and W98se has a problem with even smaller drives.
Another minor issue is W98se only supports fat32, NTFS(ntfilesystem) is
reccomended for all partitions of 32 gigs or more!

 

[mrdancer]

The ata133 hard drives will run on that chipset, but at ata100,
however since no hard drive ever uses much of the bus speed,
except during a burst(when reading to/from the cache), the ata100
will not slow it down.
Large hard drives above 132 gigs, will be the problem! Your bios
must support, and W98se has a problem with even smaller drives.
Another minor issue is W98se only supports fat32, NTFS(ntfilesystem) is
reccomended for all partitions of 32 gigs or more!

Hmmm, I've been running several 80GB HDDs and a 120GB HDD w/ no partitions
for the last year and a half or so, no problems with Win98SE. And I've
been running Win98SE on a 40GB HDD for several years prior to that w/ no
problems.

I know it's not a good idea to not run partitions, but I also know that
partitions can make things messy if GoBack (which I'm using) ever gets
corrupted. Besides, I keep all important stuff on the 80GB, which I clone
to the other 80GB periodically. Plus, for this system, I don't need the
extra performance that partitions afford.

I just wonder how much of the "NTFS is better than FAT32" scare is due to
forcing consumers to upgrade their systems in the name of profit......

 

[BoB]

Hmmm, I've been running several 80GB HDDs and a 120GB HDD w/ no partitions
for the last year and a half or so, no problems with Win98SE. And I've
been running Win98SE on a 40GB HDD for several years prior to that w/ no
problems.

I know it's not a good idea to not run partitions, but I also know that
partitions can make things messy if GoBack (which I'm using) ever gets
corrupted. Besides, I keep all important stuff on the 80GB, which I clone
to the other 80GB periodically. Plus, for this system, I don't need the
extra performance that partitions afford.

I just wonder how much of the "NTFS is better than FAT32" scare is due to
forcing consumers to upgrade their systems in the name of profit......

"As drive sizes and the sheer number of files on a partition increases,
NTFS's performance does not degrade. On partitions or directories with
several thousands of files, FAT32 operations slow to a crawl."
http://www.anandtech.com/guides/viewfaq.html?i=63

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/columns/russel/october01.asp

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/tr...prodtechnol/winxppro/reskit/prkc_fil_duwx.asp

a.. Using the default cluster size (4 KB) for large volumes, you can
create an NTFS volume up to 16 terabytes. You can create NTFS volumes up to
256 terabytes using the maximum cluster size of 64 KB. NTFS also supports
larger files and more files per volume than FAT.
b.. NTFS manages disk space more efficiently than FAT by using smaller
cluster sizes. For example, a 30-GB NTFS volume uses 4-KB clusters. The same
volume formatted by using FAT32 uses 16-KB clusters. Using smaller clusters
reduces wasted space on hard disks.
I used fat32 with windows xp for almost a year! VBG

 

[Bongolation]

The ata133 hard drives will run on that chipset, but at ata100,
however since no hard drive ever uses much of the bus speed,
except during a burst(when reading to/from the cache), the ata100
will not slow it down.

I think you lost me here.

So, I was misinformed and the A7M266 does _not_ support ATA/133?

The drive size is not an issue in this case.

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[BoB]

It does not matter. ata100 is good enough!

I think you lost me here.

So, I was misinformed and the A7M266 does _not_ support ATA/133?

The drive size is not an issue in this case.

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[Robert B. Clark]

I think you lost me here.

So, I was misinformed and the A7M266 does _not_ support ATA/133?

The drive size is not an issue in this case.

The A7M266 does not support ATA/133 rated transfer speeds.
An ATA/133 hard drive will operate at ATA/100 speeds on an A7M266.

The perceived throughput difference is negligible.

 

[mrdancer]

"As drive sizes and the sheer number of files on a partition increases,
NTFS's performance does not degrade. On partitions or directories with
several thousands of files, FAT32 operations slow to a crawl."

Wow! I wonder what kind of systems they were using? I've around 120k files
on my system (according to the latest NAV scan) w/ no partitions and it
still runs pretty darn quick. ;-)

Maybe it just runs quick 'cuz it's a cheesy 1.4 Tbird..... =)

I can't think of any directories where I might have several thousands of
files, except maybe Windows or System folders.

http://www.anandtech.com/guides/viewfaq.html?i=63

http://www.microsoft.com/windowsxp/expertzone/columns/russel/october01.asp

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/tr...prodtechnol/winxppro/reskit/prkc_fil_duwx.asp

a.. Using the default cluster size (4 KB) for large volumes, you can
create an NTFS volume up to 16 terabytes. You can create NTFS volumes up to
256 terabytes using the maximum cluster size of 64 KB. NTFS also supports
larger files and more files per volume than FAT.
b.. NTFS manages disk space more efficiently than FAT by using smaller
cluster sizes. For example, a 30-GB NTFS volume uses 4-KB clusters. The same
volume formatted by using FAT32 uses 16-KB clusters. Using smaller clusters
reduces wasted space on hard disks.
I used fat32 with windows xp for almost a year! VBG

I admit I have NTFS on my XP box, but only because I use that system for DVD
stuff....

 

[Bongolation]

The A7M266 does not support ATA/133 rated transfer speeds.

Sigh. So I was misinformed here in message?:

An ATA/133 hard drive will operate at ATA/100 speeds
on an A7M266.

The perceived throughput difference is negligible.

This is depressing.

I paid extra for ATA/133 drives over ATA/100 drives based on the above
information. The system is a pure digital recording box where every little
bit of speed counts.

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[BoB]

We have several folders of mp3's, after sorting into a-l and m-z and cutting
out the country, they were only 4-8K songs per folder, about 60 gigs worth!
Sorting by detail is a bear, with ntfs.

 

[BoB]

Sigh. So I was misinformed here in message?:




This is depressing.

I paid extra for ATA/133 drives over ATA/100 drives based on the above
information. The system is a pure digital recording box where every little
bit of speed counts.

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The processor, motherboard and memory(ram) will slow it down so much,
you won't notice the difference, however you'll always have better hard
drives to upgrade with! 7200rpm and 8 meg cache help a lot more than
ata100/ata133 crap.

 

[Bongolation]

7200rpm and 8 meg cache help a lot more than
ata100/ata133 crap.

Well, in that case, I'm covered. These are 7200RPM/8M cache drives.

Unfortunately, they are Maxtors and I would have preferred to have bought
WDs due to better warranty, but I can live with it at the prices I paid, I
guess.

Thanks for your help.

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[Robert B. Clark]

Sigh. So I was misinformed here in message?:




This is depressing.

I paid extra for ATA/133 drives over ATA/100 drives based on the above
information. The system is a pure digital recording box where every little
bit of speed counts.

Don't sweat it.

If you bought a new retail HDD, it's likely to be a 7200 RPM, 8MB cache
model (recent Maxtors, WDs, Seagates). If you're upgrading from a 5400
RPM, 2MB cache HDD, you will likely see a performance gain due mostly to
the increased spindle speed and, to a lesser degree, the larger cache.

The bus transfer speed just isn't that important past a certain point--the
bottleneck is the hard drive mechanics, not the transfer speed.