Why only two U ATA (IDE) connectors on a mobo?

[inflames988]

ive never seen a mobo with more than two IDE connectors...starting to wonder if theres some reason behind it? Myself, i use all IDE drives. My mobo doesnt support sATA and id rather get IDE anyway as they are cheaper, and fast enough for me. Is there a reason there are only two connectors per mobo? I mean i know there are controller cards and stuff too, but why dont they give u 3/4 to begin with?

[HyperTF]

each of the two connectors allow you to have 2 devices on each channel, a master and slave device for each, so allowing for 4 devices in total. It is just a legacy thing... it was how it began and it served its purpose for users and has stayed that way, i guess in the future if anything they might phase them out all together going down the SATA route but that wont be for a while yet.

[inflames988]

Originally Posted by HyperTF each of the two connectors allow you to have 2 devices on each channel, a master and slave device for each, so allowing for 4 devices in total. It is just a legacy thing... it was how it began and it served its purpose for users and has stayed that way, i guess in the future if anything they might phase them out all together going down the SATA route but that wont be for a while yet.

ya i know u can have 4 things total, just didnt know why they didnt give more controllers. that makes sense though sATA is taking over as far as storage, but hasnt caught on in CD drives. supposedly there is some reason people dont use sATA cd drives...and also i dont think any drives can really go faster then 52x, but im sure theyll find ways around it in the future.

[HyperTF]

it's interesting, I have a sata drive in my build as primary and as I have my drives mounted 'front in'... the sata cable sticks out, and as it is quite stiff i have to push against it with the side of the case when I put it back together... not really ideal but I have little choice.. where as my IDE cable tucks around quite nicely... I don't think the SATA cables are quite as secure in feel as IDE... i don't like things wobbling in my cases.

[inflames988]

Originally Posted by HyperTF it's interesting, I have a sata drive in my build as primary and as I have my drives mounted 'front in'... the sata cable sticks out, and as it is quite stiff i have to push against it with the side of the case when I put it back together... not really ideal but I have little choice.. where as my IDE cable tucks around quite nicely... I don't think the SATA cables are quite as secure in feel as IDE... i don't like things wobbling in my cases.

ya-but sATA sure saves space. those ribbon cables kill ur air flow, i like rounded ones better but sATA is still much smaller.

[HyperTF]

Yep, you have a point there...

[glc]

There have been quite a few motherboards with 3 or 4 IDE controllers. 2 was the mainstream. You can always add a PCI card for more.

[bailey]

the promise controler cards work great and they were free too, came with the drives, I have 8 ide devices in my system internal.

[inflames988]

yeah, since i got my rig i wish i had spent a little more on the mobo. its a quality board, works great, but its kinda a budget board--no sATA and only 3 pci slots. Ive seen those controller cards come with retail hard drives, really good deal if u ask me. Right now im deciding between adding a sound card and tv tuner, which will take up all my space, or trying to save another slot, just in case. I do like to put whaveter extra drives i have hanging around in my comp just for backing up or whatever, but i stll have space for one more since i only have one optical (took the other out--one dvdrw was all i needed, and the other one looked terrible w/ my case), and my 250 gig is in external enclosure. Im getting another 80 gig, trying to decide if i should put the 250 as internal, or leave it how it is and put the 80 internal