Motherboard Question

[Tc3er]

Hi, I am building a computer and have run into a small problem with the motherboard. It only has two IDE connector s, but I have three CD/DVD drives and a hard-drive all trying to connect in the mobo, is there any way this can be done?

[pointone]

Yes. Each IDE cable has 2 connectors on it. 2 cables with 2 connectors on each means you can connect 4 IDE devices in the system. What you need to pay attention to is the jumper settings... and do you really need 3 CD drives?

What I suggest is you put the hard drive alone on the primary IDE channel with a master / single jumper setting. You put two of the CD drives on the secondary channel (the better two) and jumper the better one as master, the other as slave (or use cable select if you know how).

The reason I say only use two CD drives is because if your hard drive is ATA-100 or 133, it can only operate at this speed if the other drive on the channel is also capable of it. Usually, CD drives aren't capable of these speeds (someone, please correct me if I'm mistaken). Putting a slower CD drive on the same cable with your faster hard drive will slow down the hard drive and you'll lose a lot of performance. If you absolutely need to have all three CDs, put the best / newest one you have as a slave with the hard drive on the primary channel.

[Tc3er]

Sorry, I have two CD drives and one DVD Drive. Can I connect the hard with the dvd drive as a master slave?

[pop pop]

If there is an impact on the HDD performance, I wouldn't do it that way. I'm not positive there is,t I just don't know. IF you insist on having three opticals, there's an alternative. Is one of the CD drives new and returnable? If you insist on having three optical drives, I would return it and get an external USB/firewire.

Planning the configuration--one of the very first steps before you buy components.

[Sylvander]

Each of those 2 IDE connections [the Primary and the Secondary] can have two drives connected to it [each jumpered as Master or Slave].
Hence you can have:
Primary Master [HDD]
Primary Slave
Secondary Master
Secondary Slave

So far as I know there are no hard and fast rules about how to connect each, but:
1. It's a good idea to have the HDD you intend to boot from connected to the Primary and jumpered as Master. The [drive jumpered as] Master should ideally be on the end of the cable and the slave in the middle.
2. Avoid connecting slow devices [DVD/CD drives] to the same IDE cable as fast drives [HDD's], because the fast may have to wait while the slow drive completes a task. You aren't going to be able to avoid this because you have 3 slow drives, so one will need to be on the same cable as the HDD.
3. Have rewriters or recorders as masters and readers as slaves to those.
So what kind and how many of each do you have?

Oops, got in late.
That's what comes of having a teenage daughter demanding assistance! :D

[risk_reversal]

Of course you could get an ATA add-in card which would fit into your pci slot and this would add more ATA channels and in this way you could accomodate the 3 opticals and HDD.

Alternatively, if your mobo supports raid, it could be possible for you to make use of the controller from the raid such that you could run up to 2 HDDs as separate and independant. Much as I have done in my setup, dets as below