Second hard drive: What does this mean???

  • Thread starter Thread starter Higgins
  • Start date Start date
H

Higgins

Treat me as stupid, because I obviously am. (I'm much more familiar
with laptops than desktops.)

Clever me. I decided add a second hard drive (removable) in my office
desktop, a Compaq Deskpro 6000 series (old: Pentium 2). There's a
spare drive bay, after all.

But I open it up but there's no place to plug in the drive. Only one
connector on the ribbon cable leading to my hard drive; only one on
the ribbon cable leading to my CD-Rom drive (with a much smaller
connector to the board); no other obvious places to plug in. There is
a spare power connector, however.

So I decided to RTFM and it says:

"Two 40-pin keyed IDE data connectors (one for each controller) are
provided on the system board. Each connector can support two devices
and can be configured independently for PIO modes 1-4, DMA modes 1-2,
or Ultra DMA modes 0-2. In standard configurations with an IDE drive
the hard drive is attached to the primary connector and the CD-ROM (if
installed) is attached to the secondary connector.

NOTE: Both controllers support UATA mode 2 (33 MB/s). If a second
drive is to be operated in UATA mode 2 off the same controller the
standard 40-conductor cable must be replaced with an 80-conductor
cable (available as an option) is required. Running two drives in UATA
mode 2 with the standard 40-conductor cable produces CRC errors (due
to electrical crosstalk) that will cause the BIOS to switch to UATA
mode 1 (25 MB/s)."

I'm pretty confused. An 80-pin cable fits into a 40-pin connector on
the board??? Can I buy a new ribbon cable with secondary connector on
it?? Or what else do I need to do???

And no, I can't call my IT folks. IT's a midnight upgrade...
 
Higgins said:
But I open it up but there's no place to plug in the drive. Only one
connector on the ribbon cable leading to my hard drive; only one on
the ribbon cable leading to my CD-Rom drive (with a much smaller
connector to the board); no other obvious places to plug in. There is
a spare power connector, however.
Click to expand...

The connector on the ribbon cable for the CD-ROM drive should be the
same size as that for the hard drive. Unless it's a really old
proprietary CD-ROM...

I'm pretty confused. An 80-pin cable fits into a 40-pin connector on
the board??? Can I buy a new ribbon cable with secondary connector on
it?? Or what else do I need to do???
Click to expand...


Just because the cable is 80-conductor, that doesn't mean that the
connector has 40 pins. In the case of IDE, it's 40-pin either way.

If you have an available IDE connector on the motherboard, then get a
cable and plug the new drive into that. Otherwise, you can get a
replacement IDE cable with 3 connectors. (An IDE channel supports 2
devices)

-WD
 
Treat me as stupid, because I obviously am.
(I'm much more familiar with laptops than desktops.)

Clever me. I decided add a second hard drive (removable) in my office
desktop, a Compaq Deskpro 6000 series (old: Pentium 2). There's a
spare drive bay, after all.

But I open it up but there's no place to plug in the drive. Only one
connector on the ribbon cable leading to my hard drive; only one on
the ribbon cable leading to my CD-Rom drive (with a much smaller
connector to the board); no other obvious places to plug in. There is
a spare power connector, however.

So I decided to RTFM and it says:

"Two 40-pin keyed IDE data connectors (one for each controller) are
provided on the system board. Each connector can support two devices
and can be configured independently for PIO modes 1-4, DMA modes 1-2,
or Ultra DMA modes 0-2. In standard configurations with an IDE drive
the hard drive is attached to the primary connector and the CD-ROM (if
installed) is attached to the secondary connector.

NOTE: Both controllers support UATA mode 2 (33 MB/s). If a second
drive is to be operated in UATA mode 2 off the same controller the
standard 40-conductor cable must be replaced with an 80-conductor
cable (available as an option) is required. Running two drives in UATA
mode 2 with the standard 40-conductor cable produces CRC errors (due
to electrical crosstalk) that will cause the BIOS to switch to UATA
mode 1 (25 MB/s)."
Click to expand...
I'm pretty confused. An 80-pin cable fits
into a 40-pin connector on the board???
Click to expand...

Its actually an 80 CONDUCTOR cable, which still has 40 pin connectors.
Can I buy a new ribbon cable with secondary connector on it??
Yep.

Or what else do I need to do???
Click to expand...

Jumper the hard drives correctly for that different config.

Being a Compaq it likely expects the drives to be jumpered for Cable
Select. If the manual doesnt say, you can check how the original hard
drive is jumpered and jumper the new one for cable select too if it is.
And no, I can't call my IT folks. IT's a midnight upgrade...
Click to expand...

Just watch out for the witching hour and your coach/PC
can turn into a pumpkin like Cinderella's did.
 
It can be quite hard to work out how to route that 80 way cable around your
box so that the pin ones are in the right place. Practice by folding an old
one or a strip of card/paper. Then when you have it right copy the folds
onto the new cable. That way you don't keep bending and rebending your data
critical cable.
 
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