More Than 4 IDE Devices..

edited June 2003 in Hardware
I've currently got a DVD drive, CD-RW Drive, and two hard drives, taking up both of my available IDE spots on my motherboard (an ASUS P4PE). I was wondering what I'd have to do if I wanted to add another hard drive. Do I have to take the DVD drive out or something? I wouldn't think so, but don't know...
«1

Comments

  • edited June 2003
    You can add an pci IDE card to your system.
  • dydxdydx Cymru, UK
    edited June 2003
    Ye. PCI controller will let you add another 4 devices.

    The other option is a new motherboard with a built in RAID controler that support 8 drives out the box.


    mD
  • EMNEMN
    edited June 2003
    Yes. To add more device you'd need either a PCI IDE controller or a SATA controller with SATA->IDE converters or a SCSI controller (for SCSI devices). You can easily add a lot more drives to your machine with either of the above. But a simple HTP Rocket Raid PCI controller from newegg will probably be the best choice.
  • XyphusXyphus South Bend, Indiana
    edited June 2003
    Or use one of the motherboards that offer RAID... Such as the KR7A-133R (or older boards like the KT7A-RAID, etc... choose your flavour) Then you will get a total of 4 IDE channels with 2 devices each.. Grand total of 8 devices... :)
  • dydxdydx Cymru, UK
    edited June 2003
    Or use one of the motherboards that offer RAID... Such as the KR7A-133R (or older boards like the KT7A-RAID, etc... choose your flavour) Then you will get a total of 4 IDE channels with 2 devices each.. Grand total of 8 devices...

    Dont get those boards, useless for your P4. Try something like the P4B533 with RAID, if that is, you decide to upgrade your motherboard rather than get a PCI IDE controler.


    mD
  • LIQuidLIQuid Raleigh, NC
    edited June 2003
    I would just get a PCI card, no use in upgrading a whole damn motherboard just to add a HD or 2.

    I recommend a High Point Tech card, they are nice and thats what Abit uses in their motherboard when they integrate Raid and such.
  • Omega65Omega65 Philadelphia, Pa
    edited June 2003
    Originally posted by LIQuid
    I would just get a PCI card, no use in upgrading a whole damn motherboard just to add a HD or 2.

    I recommend a High Point Tech card, they are nice and thats what Abit uses in their motherboard when they integrate Raid and such.

    Ditto!

    Grab a HPT RocketRaid card or if you can find one, an Abit or Iwill HPT370 Raid card.

    Wassup LIQuid!
  • LIQuidLIQuid Raleigh, NC
    edited June 2003
    nothing much Omega! :) That HPT card is still running smooth btw :)
  • edited June 2003
    you better make sure you will have enough power to run all the devices
  • RMFRMF
    edited June 2003
    Strange....very strange indeed.

    I have an ASUS A7V333 motherboard with 2 raid slots which i can't use for anything at all. The reason i suppose i can't use them is that the jumper that corresponds to the raid controller on my motherboard is set to disable. If i set it to enable it will look for an array on every boot which can increase my boot times to a minute and a half.

    I would love to be able to hook up the 2 spare 40 gig HDD's i have lying around here but i just can't handle the boot time with raid enabled. Does anyone know if theres a solution for this?
  • dydxdydx Cymru, UK
    edited June 2003
    Why do you turn the computer off.

    Leave it on, problem solved.



    mD
  • RMFRMF
    edited June 2003
    Originally posted by dydx
    Why do you turn the computer off.

    Leave it on, problem solved.



    mD
    I usually do, but i have to reboot now and again as i am sure you do yourself, and i just can't be bothered with all of the hassle of going through the "no array found" errors or whatever it says untill i get it to boot normally from my C drive.
  • dydxdydx Cymru, UK
    edited June 2003
    Never had any problems like that with RAID controlers enabled here with Abit boards. Have you checked the RAIDs BIOS for settings that could counter this problem.

    I only reboot when theres new hardware to install. Shame they dont make hot pluggable CPUs and RAM for desktops eh?


    mD
  • RMFRMF
    edited June 2003
    Originally posted by dydx
    Never had any problems like that with RAID controlers enabled here with Abit boards. Have you checked the RAIDs BIOS for settings that could counter this problem.

    I only reboot when theres new hardware to install. Shame they dont make hot pluggable CPUs and RAM for desktops eh?


    mD
    Wow, that must be one stable system if you never have to reboot it. Maybe i should have you over to build my next PC for me:D

    Seriously though, i know there must be a way around it, and to be honest with you it's been so long since i gave up on the problem that i don't remember if i checked it in the bios. I'll have a look next time i put some RAM in or something..oh no wait, actually i'll look tomorrow, i reboot every day;)
  • EQuitoEQuito SoCal, USA
    edited June 2003
    Originally posted by RMF
    I would love to be able to hook up the 2 spare 40 gig HDD's i have lying around here but i just can't handle the boot time with raid enabled. Does anyone know if theres a solution for this?
    Look at your bios settings. You might have an option to ignore/disable 'boot from other devices'.
    That should reduce booting time
  • ClutchClutch North Carolina New
    edited June 2003
    Also check for un needed services running that slow down boot up time, if you are using xp then there are a lot of tweaks you can do. Also don't forget your psu like was mentioned before, better make sure it can handle adding more drives.
  • CCWCCW Suffolk, UK
    edited June 2003
    My system can have 22 attached :D

    14 on SCSI card, 4 on RAID controller, 4 on mobo :D muhahaha!
  • PyobliEPyobliE UK
    edited June 2003
    Bet it cant..... You got like a 800w Power Supply in it?
  • CCWCCW Suffolk, UK
    edited June 2003
    lol, well, obviosuly im saying i could could but have the cards to do it, i only have a 550watt, could buy a second 550watt and use a relay switch to "double them up"

    Craig
  • PyobliEPyobliE UK
    edited June 2003
    Originally posted by CCW
    My system can have 22 attached :D

    Just wanna clear this up: So your machine couldnt manage the above statement, so you admit to being a big fat lair? I just like things to be crystal clear or I cant sleep at night.....:p

    Disclamer: Im making no real reference to the size of shape of you waistband, just a saying.....
  • TexTex Dallas/Ft. Worth
    edited June 2003
    Actually his computer wouldn't need 880 watts of power.

    Since he can't house that many in THE CASE anyway you go to a rig like mine...

    You install the scsi drives in these. They are in a seperate case. The dualie server only has a 350 watt as its only pushing a single ide cdrom in its case.

    Tex
  • dydxdydx Cymru, UK
    edited June 2003
    Tex,

    Can you post the specifics of your disk setup plz?



    mD
  • TexTex Dallas/Ft. Worth
    edited June 2003
    What do you want exactly ?

    Make and model of scsi drive etc? There is only 11 running right now and a couple of those are getting shipped as I sold them and will have to be replaced.

    Those are actually for a pair dually servers. They run off a pair of 64bit LSI Elite 1600 cacheing u160 contrillers with 128mb ram on board and a i960 risc processor. The drives a are a mix of Atlas 10k III's and oldewr IBM u160's I had laying around. I scarfed all the stuff used off eBay mostly.

    Here is an atto for a 6 drive array of the Atlas 10k III's. The drives ran me 40 to 45 bucks a pop on ebay.

    The rack at the bottom above has redundant hot swappable load sharing 300watt PSU's btw..

    Tex
  • dydxdydx Cymru, UK
    edited June 2003
    Cheers Tex,

    Is it a RAID 0 or a 5?


    mD
  • TexTex Dallas/Ft. Worth
    edited June 2003
    The atto should answer that? (grin) Raid 5 suxs at writes. Its a joke and should never be user for 80 percent of the apps people use it for now. Raid 10 is the only way to go for redundancy. A single ide can kick expensive scsi raid-5's ass

    Here is an atto of the exact same drives in raid-5. See any differance? (grin)

    Tex
  • TexTex Dallas/Ft. Worth
    edited June 2003
    With raid-5, I cut the reads in half and the top writes were about what a hot ide gets on the first line of atto

    Tex
  • dydxdydx Cymru, UK
    edited June 2003
    The parity and whatnot probably have a hefty procecssing overhead.

    Ive got my SCSIs running independently at hte moment. Ill have to look into getting some RAID on the go.


    mD
  • TexTex Dallas/Ft. Worth
    edited June 2003
    Raid-5 has to make several reads to differant drives to get the parity which means the heads have to move back to make the write. When your judging str like atto does you kill it by making the heads move out of position. Without out it, then it keeps the heads positioned for the next read/write when reading/writing ing sequentialy if the disk is not fragmented.

    Tex
  • TexTex Dallas/Ft. Worth
    edited June 2003
    Ok we trashed this poor guys thread enough here it looks like guys.

    Tex
  • CCWCCW Suffolk, UK
    edited June 2003
    Originally posted by PyobliE


    Just wanna clear this up: So your machine couldnt manage the above statement, so you admit to being a big fat lair? I just like things to be crystal clear or I cant sleep at night.....:p

    Disclamer: Im making no real reference to the size of shape of you waistband, just a saying.....

    oh! calm down little girlie!

    my case could fit 14 HDDs but no more


    actually, i am a fat geek! :D u summed me up, dont see how im a liar

    Craig
Sign In or Register to comment.