Hard-drive interfaces....

[Diabetic]

Hey folks, I'm a bit of a newbie when it comes to hard-drives. Thing is, I've nearly completed my new gamer build, just need a few more parts. I currently have an 80GB Maxtor ATA133 (I think) hard-drive: 6Y080L0.

I want to increase my storage capacity when I get my new build put together, and am looking at an 80GB SATA II Western Digital drive. This will give me a total of 160GB, which should be more than enough for both my 3D modeling work AND games.

I'm just wondering whether I would be able to run SATA II and ATA133 drives at the same time? And also, will my mobo support it: Gigabyte K8N SLi nForce4 SLi PCI-Express Motherboard.

(and a last question, how much better is SATA compared to ATA)

- Any help you can give on this subject would be great.

Cheers,
Ali.

 

[FlashDude]

That will work for sure, It would be easier to make the ide hdd the master and install the OS on it then install the sata/raid drivers in a windows environment for the sata hdd. Then you will have the best of both worlds. If you want the os on the sata then you will have to make a boot/driver cd for the sata because the mobo won't even know its there.

 

[PZEROFGH]

Yes it will work, sata isnt that much better then IDE. It's like AGP and PCIE16 then only reason to upgrade to PCIE16 is because there are no more AGP cards being made so you cant upgrade easily.

 

[Diabetic]

Right, ok, last question. For now I'm using a PC with a Socket 754 mobo that supports SATA I, until I'm ready to switch over to my new 'gamer build' would my SATA II drive work in the current setup? Or will it just not be compatible.

 

[Apokalipse]

SATA II is backward compatible with SATA

 

[Diabetic]

Ok, sweet, I assume it will just run a bit slower, yes?

 

[Apokalipse]

yes, when just getting bursts of information. the speed of the drive read/write process for constant output will depend on the drive itself

 

[Diabetic]

Alright, and this seriously is the last question now.... (most probably )

How hard is it to install a SATA hard drive? Is it gonna require a lot of fiddling with cables and such or is it similar to installing a graphics card, just slotting it in and hooking up the power?

 

[Apokalipse]

SATA drives are easier to plug in, you just need to install SATA drivers if you don't have XP SP2
your motherboard will come with SATA drivers on the disc if it has SATA

 

[Diabetic]

I got WinXPSp2 so all should be good.

This is wierd though, so the computer doesn't recognise SATA Hard-drives unless you have an OS / correct drivers installed? IF this is the case how do you install Windows on an all SATA computer setup? If the drives aren't recognised until drivers are installed into your operating system surely their isn't anywhere to actually install that OS to from a fresh partition?