Five connector ide cable question

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Scorpionjwp

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I have gotten a catalog in the mail from cyberguys about two months ago and I was puzzled about this strange ide cable.

It has bugged me for the two months to understand how a ide cable can have 5 connections on it. I was taught in taking my A+ course, that the ide cable only supports 2 devices. The two being: master, slave hd's and the third being for connection to the mb.

First I thought it was a typo in the catalog and I thought it was mislabeled ide, thinking it was a scsi cable. Well I called cyberguys today to find out more about this strange cable.

I got alittle info, only that it was for hard drives made in 1995 and earlier. No other info was told except that, I have googled to an answer, but no hope on that.

Now how is it possible for 1 ide cable to have four hd's on it, what am I missing here?
I know learning on computers that the mb controllers only supported two devices on each channel, how can four be supported?

This has puzzled me since I started getting the cyberguys catalog, I am very interested into knowing this answer.
 
I've seen floppy cables with 5 connectors. Some old 5 1/4" floppy drives used to take a different type of connector, so the cables had 1 plain end, and 2 pairs of connectors (both styles), and 1 of each pair could be used. Perhaps there was something similar for hard drives.
 
only 2 id devices are supported, however with 5 connectors it is easier
to connect to the drives if they are in weird positions without having to contort the cable as much.
 
Ok I called up cyberguys yesterday and was told it supported 4 ide hd's. The hd's supported was for drives made in 1995 or earlier. That is all the info I got, I also got an impression from my mentor out at my school, that some earlier hd's could be on a cable that has 5 connections. This mentor has quite alot of pc experience behind him, so I know he is not talking crap.

I am saying if hd's were able to support a ide cable that had 5 connections on, I know the fifth connector is for the mb, how does the mb hd controller or add on controller figure it out. I thought it only supported 2 hd's not 4.

This is what I am trying to get at, an answer to help me understand this more clearly would be really helpful.
 
does it actually fit on an ide drive? or is it a 50 pin scsi cable?

*edit
Also, you'd think that if old ide drives could support 4 drives a channel, why didn't they keep that functionality
 
it states a little down the page:

* Additional connectors give your customers flexibility of where to position their drives.
* Allows two internal IDE hard drives to be connected to a controller card
* Fully tested and certified to meet or exceed industry standards
* High quality Internal quad IDE Hard drive ribbon cable
* Red line on side to indicate pin one.

Sounds like all it gives you is choice on where to position your drive. Definatly would not use it for a modern drive.

Doctor X
 
Scorpionjwp said:
Ok guys I am not dreaming this up, here is a link to what the cable looks like.

http://www.cablesunlimited.com/products/Prod_Individual3.aspx?groupcode=I1106
Click to expand...

Ok from that website:
"Features :
* Additional connectors give your customers flexibility of where to position their drives.
[size=+1]* Allows two internal IDE hard drives to be connected to a controller card[/size]
* Fully tested.....etc."

Edit: DrX - you are a little faster on the keyboard..

==>Lazn
 
Ok, I'm just stupid.

Everyone has answered my question with this cable.
Since it allows drives to be placed in any position, I'll get a few because my pc mods require my drives to be mounted in weird configs.
 
Lazn_Work said:
Ok from that website:
"Features :
* Additional connectors give your customers flexibility of where to position their drives.
[size=+1]* Allows two internal IDE hard drives to be connected to a controller card[/size]
* Fully tested.....etc."

Edit: DrX - you are a little faster on the keyboard..

==>Lazn
Click to expand...
:D
Doctor X
 
I mean I will only Connect two hd's to this cable. My configuration in my pc mods are weird so I will mount 2 drives accordingly.
 
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