Question about sata to ide converter

[Guigsy1]

i was thinking about getting a 250gb or greater 7200 SATA 3.0gb/s HD to use with my older mobo, that doesn't have an sata port. to overcome this, i was also gonna pick up a sata to ide converter. my question is what kind of performance losses will i have with the converter. i'm aware that it won't operate at 3gb/s. also, i know that there large side/rpm ide models available, but i'm looking to upgrade my mobo and cpu later on and would like to have the sata drive to use with the newer mobo. thanks for any advice in advance

 

[mailpup]

I don't know the answer to your converter question but have you considered using a PCI to SATA controller card instead? You will get 1.5GB/s.

 

[Rik]

I believe the adapter you speak of will work at 1.5GB/s but it will use both master and slave to do it which means you will not be able to plug anything else into the ata channel. Your second channel will still work but you will be limited to 1 device in one, and the normal 2 deviceds on the other!!!!

As Mailpup says, a pci sata card will be easier and probably cheaper to run!!!!

Neither method will give you more than 1.5GB/s tho!!!!

 

[Nodsu]

Hum.. 3Gbps/s vs 1.5Gbps makes absoluely no difference considering that even the best hard drives can only do maybe some 0.8Gbps at best. Not to mention that you are connecting via an ATA port that is 133MB/s max (~1Gbps)

People should really get over the Big Numbers syndrome..

 

[Guigsy1]

so it looks like the PCI SATA card would be the best option, if i were to go this way, would i be able to make this drive my boot drive? i was reading one of the reviews of a card and they guy said that he had to use a floppy to make it bootable, but my floppy bit the dust a long time ago and i don't feel like wasting my money to get new one and using it this one time.

 

[Rik]

As long as the card states its bootable and you set your bios to boot from other devices then it should all work fine!!!!

 

[DesChut3s]

I've had past experiences with these SATA peripherals. They can truly become a real pain in the ****. Yes, you do have to have a FDE[Floppy] drive in order to use any SATA setup(except SATA to IDE) for Windows XP. I'm not sure about Linux or Mac, but during Windows setup you're required to load a driver for the essential 'RAID' system. This MUST be done with a floppy. As much as people deny, floppy drives are still required; I highly recommend getting one. A whole $6.99 can't hurt.

So the difference between SATA to IDE and SATA PCI are exponentially different. I would [SERIOUSLY!] recommend getting a SATA PCI card, or even a SATA PCI-Ex4 card. It does make a considerable difference.

There's also the option of using an external SATA casing, which converts to USB or 1394. Good luck with that research.

 

[Guigsy1]

I'm not sure about Linux or Mac, but during Windows setup you're required to load a driver for the essential 'RAID' system. This MUST be done with a floppy.

i would only be hooking up 1 drive to the sata card, so i wouldn't be using a RAID setup.... does this require a floppy?

 

[nickslick74]

Generally yes, because Windows does not have drivers for sata drives. So you need to hit F6 during the install of windows (it will tell you) and install 3rd part SCSI drivers, which applies to sata, too. Since your drive is busy with the windows cd, you need to install the drivers from a floppy.

 

[Guigsy1]

hmmm.... i guess this leads me to my next question, which i was planning on posting in a different thread, but now seems more appropriate. First, let me say that i'm using windows xp home sp2. i was going to copy (or ghost) my current drive into a partition on the newer one and then use my current drive as storage and run my OS from the new drive. the main reason would be to run my os off the 7200 rpm drive instead of my current 5400 drive.

i'm not familiar with doing any of these operations, such as partitioning and ghosting. so, i guess my main question is would this be feasible? what kind of problems would i run into if i tried doing this? so, (i'm guessing) the drive connected via pci sata would have to be bootable, but it wouldn't have to have a fresh install on it, i was hoping that it would be as easy as ghosting it and then changing the boot order and then i'd be running off the new drive, unfortunately i think it won't be that simple.

also, if it is too much of a hassle, i would settle with keeping things as is and just using my new drive as storage

 

[Nodsu]

After ghosting Windows to the SATA, you have to do a repair install (loading the SATA drivers from the floppy).

 

[Rick]

If you used a SATA to IDE host adapter, you could avoid all of this mess. Windows just needs drivers for the SATA host controller, not the drive itself, since the drive is just like any other ATA drive aside from the SATA interface. This should allow 133 MB/sec theoretical bandwidth, which is still almost double that of most 200GB or so drives.

have you considered using a PCI to SATA controller card instead? You will get 1.5GB/s.

No, you won't get 1.5Gbps. PCI bandwidth is 133MB/sec maximum (A little over 1Gbps) and its shared between PCI devices.... You gain nothing by purchasing a PCI SATA controller except having to press F6 during your Windows install. However, you do lose speed, money.

Despite the speed different, I seriously doubt you could tell by feel alone anyway. It's a benchmark thing and as Nodsu pointed out, it just a big number epidemic... The only real use for more bandwidth is bursting, and bursting doesn't create a noticably faster experience.

 

[Guigsy1]

rick's post has me a little confused. you are suggesting a sata to ide host adapter and how does that differ from a sata to ide converter. if they are one in the same, what about the problems that rik brought up?

 

[Rick]

rick's post has me a little confused. you are suggesting a sata to ide host adapter and how does that differ from a sata to ide converter. if they are one in the same, what about the problems that rik brought up?

Converter.. adapter... These are all the same products. The premise is to take an IDE drive and connect it to a SATA host adapter.......

HOWEVER...

For some reason, I screwed up on this one. I told you get a SATA (drive) to IDE (host) adapter, but what I was actually thinking of was an IDE (drive) to SATA (host) adapter. I've never actually used a SATA (drive) to IDE (host) device so I couldn't recommend it and for this reason, I'd probably recommend a PCI SATA controller instead.

But, I have used IDE (drive) to SATA (host) adapters and they've worked very well in the past. They are very 'dumb' devices that require no special drivers etc.. So, I would assume a SATA (drive) to IDE (host) would work every bit as well, but it is very possible that such an 'adapter' may be more complex than an adapter including logic, requiring drivers and in a sense, being the equivelent to a PCI SATA host card... which would defeat the purpose. You might as well get a PCI card if this is the case.

Hopefully that makes sense. I;ve had a bit too much to drink tonight. :giddy:

 

[SNGX1275]

There are such things that plug into the back of the sata drive and make it an IDE drive. I know ones exist that make the change completely transparent to the BIOS and OS, so its fine.

 

[Rick]

There are such things that plug into the back of the sata drive and make it an IDE drive. I know ones exist that make the change completely transparent to the BIOS and OS, so its fine.

If that's the case, assuming there's no other unexpected pitfalls, that would be the way to go then.