3 Hard Drives???(newbie question)

[Gandalf on Crack]

Uh, I am in the market to buy my 3rd Hard Drive, and I look at my ata cables and see it only has 2 ports for hard drives, which basically boggles me on how to get a 3rd drive running.
If anyone can explain the process of getting a 3rd HD on IDE, please go ahead....

[silent]

you need a pci controller, many retail packaged drive have one inside (with a stick saying so)
this way you can add 2,4,6,8 or even 12 harddrives with one single card
you'd probably be looking at something like this (http://www.promise.com/product/product_detail_eng.asp?productId=87&familyId=3) or if you want a sata drive then it's sata equivalent. There are many manufacturers and these controller cost ~20$ I'd say :)
you OS will pick up the harddrive and access it in a normal way, you could even boot from it if you'd like

[mobiux]

Each port will support 2 ide drives.

So you can have a total of 4 per machine.

Not counting any SATA ports you may have.

for example:

http://picha.kondoor.com/images/3.jpg

[’m‚³‚ñ]

Originally posted by mobiux
Each port will support 2 ide drives.

So you can have a total of 4 per machine.

Not counting any SATA ports you may have.

for example:

[3MG]http://picha.kondoor.com/images/3.jpg[/IMG]

Very nice illistration. That is how I have my main machine setup. :) Only I have some drives on my SATA headers as well. ;)

[Poop]

Total of four IDE devices per machine that only has two IDE channels :D

Some newer boards on the market have more than two IDE channels (MSI for instance..) so you can add more drives. At any rate, the best way to add more drives regarding your scenario would just be a cheap ATA/133 controller card. You can usually find them for about $30-$40 at CompUSA, or online.

[’m‚³‚ñ]

Originally posted by Poop
Total of four IDE devices per machine that only has two IDE channels :D

Some newer boards on the market have more than two IDE channels (MSI for instance..) so you can add more drives. At any rate, the best way to add more drives regarding your scenario would just be a cheap ATA/133 controller card. You can usually find them for about $30-$40 at CompUSA, or online.

I would suggest staying away from 'cheap controller cards'. You can find dual channel IDE RAID cards for under $20. :D More bang for the buck. ;)

[mobiux]

If you currently have 2 HD's and one optical drive, then you can just hook the optical and your slowest HD on the same ide channel.

It's transfer rate will come down, but if you don't want to spend any money, you shouldn't have to.
Just get a dual device ide cable and adjust the jumpers on the drives accordingly.

[wmbjr]

Originally posted by Poop
At any rate, the best way to add more drives regarding your scenario would just be a cheap ATA/133 controller card. You can usually find them for about $30-$40 at CompUSA, or online.

How is speed effected when using one of the PCI IDE controller cards? Is it reduced compared to running through one of the IDE controllers attached to the motherboard? Thanks for the info.

WB

[Ice Czar]

not at all
the PCI bus is 133MB/s (for the typical 32bit 33MHz)
so your throughput isnt effected at all
your typical ATA HDD (SATA or PATA) can only do about 30>50MB/s sustained throughput, and burst rates are theoretically 100>133MB/s (150 for SATA) but in reality far less

in addition to the options posted above there are IDE switchers, where you can hook up more devices per channel, (however you cant dynamically access them all at the same boot session, you need to shutdown and then switch)

http://www.romtecusa.com/