DMA

[Fish]

I have a Dell 4100 with a 40 GB HD. I notice in Device Manager that I have an option of having DMA enabled. What does this do and do I want that? If you need more info before you can tell me, let me know what you need. Thanks.

[hiredgoonz]

DMA is a transfer protocol faster than the old PIO method...I think it stands for direct memory access...and if your drives support it, it is almost always better to have it enabled...

[BigBlue66]

Hi Fish,

Yep, go ahead and enable the DMA, then reboot. If everything in your system supports it, then the DMA option should still be ticked when you check on it.

It's supposed to free up some CPU resources for accessing the harddrive. Your system sounds like it's a fairly new one, so the mobo, harddrive, etc. should support DMA. If not, I think the worst you will see, is that the DMA option will be unticked when you check on it, after rebooting, of course.

Cheers,

BB 66


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He who laughs last, thinks slowest.

[Fish]

Thanks guys, I checked DMA,but, didn't notice any difference. So was wondering if it was smart or not. I'm the guy that goes around checking/unchecking things and finding out what they do. If it still boots, it must be good. If not, I come here and get the big boys to help out http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif Best way I have learned is to screw it up, then when I have to fix it, I'll never screw that up again! http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/biggrin.gif Have a good one gentlemen.

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[Paleo Pete]

How do you think I learned? Exactly the same way. I guess I got lucky, I never did anything that made my machine totally useless, and that's a good thing, because when I knew just enough to be dangerous, this forum didn't exist, and in fact I didn't know internet computer help forums did exist at all...

But that didn't stop me from asking "what does this do?" After a couple of books and a large number of websites, I started clicking everything in sight...fortunately I just never clicked Apply after clicking the wrong one...

My obsolete computer collection is another story, I build them just to try things out on. If I scrap one, it's usually less than $10 invested, so I go for it...so far I have 3 dead XT motherboards, a 486 board that failed the smoke test, and who knows how many cards that will never work again until I manage to find docs so I can reset the jumpers back to something that resembles normal... http://www.PCGuide.com/ubb/rolleyes.gif

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[bdools]

fish Dma stands for Direct Memory Access its a fast way
of transferring data through to the memory to free up
the cpu .example the hard disk controller uses dma to
read data from the hard disk and store it directly into ram'
Ps fish my mate says "when you fiddle rome burns" but not
with computers its the only way you can learn.