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Serial ATA Hard Drives.

Discussion in 'PC Hardware' started by browner, 2007/10/02.

  1. 2007/10/02
    browner

    browner Inactive Thread Starter

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    I'm new to this form of Hard Drive, always had IDE. My computer although not over the hill has the option on the motherboard to use either. I want to upgrade my hard drive to Serial ATA (Just for future Proofing really! Looking at a new machine around Xmas time). Alot of the drives that I'm looking at talk about Serial ATA II, is this an updated variation? Is this compatible with all SATA Boards or is there an eliminate of back wards compatibility? I'm using a Shuttle FB61 Mainboard.

    Many thanks for any info.

    Gary
     
    browner,
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  2. 2007/10/02
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    Generally speaking most SATA II drives are compatible with SATA 1 controllers by changing a jumper on the drive - best check on the drive manufacturer's web site for confirmation that the drive in which you are interested has the jumper. SATA II Drives running at SATA II require a SATA II controller on board - or on plug in card.

    SATA II is the second generation of SATA and is much faster - in practice you may not see the difference :)

    http://searchstorage.techtarget.com/tip/1,289483,sid5_gci992442,00.html

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_ATA
     
    PeteC,
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  4. 2007/10/02
    browner

    browner Inactive Thread Starter

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    Last edited: 2007/10/02
    browner,
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  5. 2007/10/02
    PeteC

    PeteC SuperGeek Staff

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    I can't see anything on the Novatech site or on WD site that there is a jumper to set the drive to SATA1 :confused:

    I have a 500Gb Samsung SATA II drive - was flavour of the month not so long ago and have physically checked the drive and it does have a jumper to set to SATA 1 .....

    http://www.dabs.com/productview.asp...Id=11154&PageMode=1&NavigationKey=11154,50429

    BTW - does your power supply have SATA power leads? - not all SATA drives take the std Molex power plug - the Samsung does not. No doubt converters are available.
     
    PeteC,
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  6. 2007/10/02
    Christer

    Christer Geek Member Staff

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    Don't worry too much about SATA I and SATA II in terms of speed. The difference between 150 MB/s and 300 MB/s is moot since the internal maximum burst rate barely stress an ATA 133 interface (or even an ATA 100 interface).

    Christer
     
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  7. 2007/10/02
    Chiles4

    Chiles4 Inactive

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    Ditto to what Christer said. The throughout caps are theoretical - in reality, the drives don't get near that fast to even matter.

    I wouldn't upgrade to SATA for the sake of upgrading to SATA. That's kinda what I did and was disappointed. I found no speed improvement over a fairly new IDE drive. As a matter of fact, I had the same model drive in both flavors and the IDE drive benched better than the SATA one.

    Other bummers:

    Sata connectors have no latch (there are a few exceptions - WD?) so they can be dislodged WAY easier than IDE.

    Some SATA drives (*cough*Hitachi*cough) can only be toggled between SATA and SATA II via a utility program.

    IDE is a "proven" technology. SATA performance can depend on the mfr. of the SATA controller on your mainboard. Some are even downright flakey. The dope on my board is to not use the SATA II controller on my mainboard because it is just that...flakey. Or to mess around with different driver revisions in an attempt to fix the flakiness.
     
    Chiles4,
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  8. 2007/10/03
    browner

    browner Inactive Thread Starter

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    Thanks for all the info! May Take a look at the Samsung Drive! If it has the jumper on it. I have seen power convertors so i think that covers that issue. Only looking at the SATA option incase i put a new machine together in the future, as i guess a lot of the newer mother boards don't have the IDE interface ( could be wrong!) and i wouldn't need to buy another hard drive!!
     
    browner,
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