Round IDE Cables

Hi All,

Has anyone noticed an increase in computer performance since switching to the round IDE cables? I was reading a comment on Circuit City's web site about the Antec Cobra A26 ATA-133 IDE Cable, and the buyer said that his computer used to freeze up until he bought this particular cable.....Now it runs much smoother.

I might buy one myself, but I wanted to hear if there were any other opinions about it/them before I commit.

 

The point of round cables is to allow better airflow through the case. So it could be possible that slightly better airflow could help heat related problems in a system that was on the edge.

 

Ok, thanks guys.

It sounds like the flat 80-conductor cables would be a better buy. Is that what the vendors are shipping now when you purchase a new hard drive?

 

Hi Pete,

I didn't know that drives could be purchased that way.....Sounds a little risky not having a warranty.

 

I must have clicked on the wrong Google link then.

 

Went to SATA and never looked back.

 

Scott Smith,

SATA is fine as an individual drive, or adding one to an ATA drive; it's definitely not as simple as ATA when adding a ATA to a SATA, or adding a SATA to another SATA.

Been playing with several drives on my multiboot setup (two OS on two part's. on the same drive) and always seem to need recovery console to get multiple drives booting again when the SATA originally booted. Often have had to do a repair install, when adding an IDE to a SATA, to get things going. The hangup seems to be with the BIOS wanting to make an IDE the boot drive, or not knowing what to boot in the case of SATAs.

Not an insurmountable problem, but more time consuming than the old ATAs.

I certainly like the small SATA cables, but really haven't had any problem with the ribbon cables we've used for years.

 

AFAIK, hard drives don't come with cables. They come with the mainboard and they always come with flat cables. The reason for that is that a standard flat ribbon cable is much cheaper than a round one and a mainboard vendor can simply "qualify" a cable and ship it with all of their mainboards.

I think the quote about round cables "saving" some guy's system is hogwash.

I haven't used flat cables in about 4-5 years. Round cables are extremely convenient and you can buy them in lengths are suitable to your needs. For floppies, I buy a short single connector cable that works perfectly. No more folding and stuffing flat cables into weird places to keep them out of the way.

Best of all, they look quite cool!

Gary

 

I bought a 60g Maxtor last year that included a ribbon cable, screws, and software......Diamond Max I think it was.

 

You beat me to the 'post' button, Pete. I've never bought a retail drive in all my years of tinkering. If someone told me that they come with blow-up dolls, I might have to believe them.

 

I just recieved 2 floppy drives from Newegg.com and they were bare bone drives too.....No screws, cable, nothing but the unit itself.

I didn't know that they would ship that way though.

 

Is you Mobo configured for sata drives, or did you have to add adapter cards to the ata HD's?

 

Over the years you accumulate quite a number of the screws and cables, etc. IMHO, it would be a waste of money to spend $33 on a retail floppy drive vs. a $9 OEM one.

I've gone OEM on a bunch of components over the years (drives, cpus, optical drives, even video cards - sometimes) and it's worked out very well and has saved me a bunch of money.

I've never seen an OEM mainboard and for expensive video cards I'd go retail to get the warranty - which is sometimes not supported by the mfr. anyway.

Gary

 

I agree. I really only needed one new ribbon cable for a friends HP pc that came without the floppy drive (floppys are getting scarce on new pc's anymore). Luckily, I found a used one for a dollar at the local pc repair place close by.