Is there a best configuration for master/slave drives?

[ComputerJinxed]

I was just wondering among 2 hard drives and 2 optical drives, if there is an optimum way to connect the ide cables to ensure efficiency/life/stability/etc. of the drives?

My old computer for a while had the main drive as slave, and master with the cd drive... then it got switched around arbitrarily a few times due to hard drive malfunction/replacement/upgrade (over the years). Now that I'm building a new system, I was just curious if it'd be best to set main drives as master and the optical drives as slave, or if it makes no difference at all.

[doctorgonzo]

Generally, you want to keep drives that will be used simultaneously on different channels. That's because only one drive on a channel can be active at a time, but two channels can be active simultaneously.

Thus, if you have a DVD-ROM and a DVD-burner and you are going to be doing a lot of direct copies between the drives, keep them on separate channels. If you are going to be burning a lot of DVDs from one particular hard drive, keep that HD and the DVD burner on separate channels. And so on.

You should keep your C drive as the master on the primary IDE channel; many motherboards require this, and even if you can choose which drive to boot from it's just easier to troubleshoot that way.

[flanzig1]

If you are getting a recent mobo, the prefered way to go is with SATA drives. Many new mobos only provide one IDE connector just for CD/DVD drives with HDs being SATA.

[Cricket]

I agree with flanzig1, if you're going to be building a new computer you're going to want to go with SATA hard drives, not IDE. Leave the IDE controller for optical drives. Using SATA hard drives means you don't have to worry about drive configuration anymore (just which optical should be master and which should be slave on the IDE channel).

Cricket

[ComputerJinxed]

Thanks, good thing I asked! Hmm, going to have to really consider which goes where, BUT--

Uh oh! Better check the mobo specs, because I was planning on using my old hdd's which are both PATA. The new mobo is SATA (SATA 1 only to be precise), but now I need to check there are enough IDE slots on it!




edit: Whew! Asus A8N5X looks like it's got 2 IDE ports and 2 SATA's...

Quick follow up questions:

How prominent are SATA2 HD's becoming? It looks like they're on there way to becoming the new mainstay for HD's... but I still see a good amount of ATA's and SATA1's (which is a good thing for me). I just hope I made a good choice since this new build will need to last me at least 2-3 years.

And more importantly, would I get compatability issues when I decide to add a new SATA drive so that I'll have both ATA and SATA at the same time? (I read somewhere that there were some issues, but that could've been just for my model or a different model...)

[blue60007]

What size/speed are the old drives? If they are older slow drives (ie, under 7200rpm/8MB cache) or very small, you might be better off replacing them with a faster, larger capacity SATA drive.

[ComputerJinxed]

They're the standard 7200rpm/8mb ide's.. ata 100 I think. WD and Maxtor, bought within the past couple of years. I'm hoping to keep using them for at least a couple more years.

[kram 2.0]

There should be no conflict as a result of attatching Serial ATA and Parallel ATA (IDE) hard drive at the same time. You can continue to use the older hard drive while keeping an eye for newer ones. You can always run multiple HDDs given adequate power from the PSU.

kram

[Cricket]

Seeing as you're going to be using IDE hard drives along with optical drives, I would normally just put the hard drives on the primary IDE channel and the optical drives on the secondary IDE channel. But if you're looking for an optimum set up, then I would set them up like this...main IDE hard drive on the primary IDE channel set to master or CS (depending on the type of IDE cable you're using...40 wire IDE cable would use the master/slave jumper setting, 80 wire IDE cable would use the CS jumper setting). Secondary IDE hard drive on the secondary IDE channel set to slave or CS. Set the burner (CD/DVD burner) to master or CS on the secondary IDE channel and the reader (CD/DVD drive) to slave or CS on the primary IDE channel.

Cricket

[Panama Red]

Cricket has described the reputedly best configuration for maximum performance. But, to me, that's in the same category as Raid 0. The difference in performance is negligible and the cabling is a nitemare! The easiest way is put the hard drives on IDE 0 and the opticals (CD drives) on IDE 1. Then you can use the standard IDE cables that come with the motherboard. Disk to disk burning may be a tad slower but with today's high speed cpu's and gobs of memory, you won't know the difference. That's how I assemble all my custom builds - CS jumpering on the hard drives w/80 wire cable and Master/Slave jumpering for the opticals on a 40 wire cable. The opticals can be CS also if you use an 80 wire. Your choice, max performance or ease of assembly.

[ComputerJinxed]

Thanks everybody .

My parts will arrive within a day or two, I can hardly wait and whenever I think about it I get all tingly .