SERIAL ATA - important for cooling?

dan · Post by **dan** » Sat May 08, 2004 10:09 am

my SOYO TISU uses the i815ep step B chipset. it is so ancient it's only usb 1.1 and ATA-100, NOT serial ata and usb 2.0.

anyhow i could BUY a serial ATA PCI card, but would I enjoy significantly improved airflow with a Serial ATA cable over PCI cable?

Also there does not appear to be any DVD+/-RW/CD-RW 8MB cache
that I know of that uses Serial ATA -- everyone uses standard ATA.

Lastly, i've heard others state that when you use serial ATA HD as your primary HD (which is what i would do) it is difficult to boot off the serial ATA, and windows XP installation disk doesn't "see" the HD.

I'm not going to spend $200 on windows Xp pro only to discover that it can't find my serial ATA HD! -- no refunds on opened software!

nutball · Post by **nutball** » Sat May 08, 2004 10:24 am

dan wrote:Also there does not appear to be any DVD+/-RW/CD-RW 8MB cache
that I know of that uses Serial ATA -- everyone uses standard ATA.

I don't know about the 8MB cache bit, but Plextor very recently announced a 12-speed DVD+/-RW/CD-RW drive which will have a native SATA interface. The model number is 712 something I think. It was pictured on the front-page of their corporate web-site (www.plextor.com) when I visited it this morning.

I think this might be the first SATA DVD/CD writer drive. The prices I've seen didn't look too outrageous (£130 RRP I think), given the specs.

Lastly, i've heard others state that when you use serial ATA HD as your primary HD (which is what i would do) it is difficult to boot off the serial ATA, and windows XP installation disk doesn't "see" the HD.

As for this bit, Windows boots from SATA drives quite happily, though I guess it might depend on the mobo and BIOS (I think my mobo presents the on-board SATA controller as a SCSI device). As for installing Windows on an SATA drive there are a number of ways to do this. The neatest (in my view) is to make a new Windows install disk with the SATA drivers embedded (slipstreaming I think this is called). Then the install goes whoooop straight on with the SATA drive as the only one in the system. No copying, messing about, nothing.

boardsportsrule · Post by **boardsportsrule** » Sat May 08, 2004 11:14 am

i think i know whatcha talkin about..when you install windows for the first time on a SATA drive, you may have to press F12 or something and "add" the drivers that camewith the sata controller...i had to atleast on my DFI infinity nf2

ForTension · Post by **ForTension** » Sat May 08, 2004 12:00 pm

Actually it's F6, same as if installing on RAID controllers.

boardsportsrule · Post by **boardsportsrule** » Sat May 08, 2004 12:34 pm

yea, 12 is a multiple of 6

oops...knew it was F something

Post by **Ralf Hutter** » Sat May 08, 2004 1:50 pm

dan wrote:but would I enjoy significantly improved airflow with a Serial ATA cable over PCI cable?

Absolutely, positively, unequivically NOT!!.

Just use regular flat ribbon IDE cables and fold them neatly out of the airflow.

Look at the pics of my Tualeron system that I posted in this thread. Note the flat IDE cables folder completely out of the way of the airflow. Practice makes perfect, but it's even easy to do a perfectly functional job even if you've never done it before.

Bluefront · Post by **Bluefront** » Sat May 08, 2004 4:14 pm

Not exactly true Ralf.....I bought a serial controller card for an older machine that has two external connections, as well as two internal. During some experimenting I mounted a drive on the outside rear of the case. Works neat and you can boot from it.

Completely eliminates any internal airflow restrictions caused by cables.

loren_brothers · Post by **loren_brothers** » Sat May 08, 2004 4:46 pm

Ralf Hutter wrote:
dan wrote:but would I enjoy significantly improved airflow with a Serial ATA cable over PCI cable?

Absolutely, positively, unequivically NOT!!.

Just use regular flat ribbon IDE cables and fold them neatly out of the airflow.

Pooh....I think you have stepped into the realm of 'dogmatic response' there Ralf

. I appreciate the fact that you like to "fold cable-gami" and have every right to do so, but I think your bias is starting to cloud your arguements a bit.

A far, far better response might have been: "For the average user: YES, but if one takes the time to 'fold them neatly out of the airflow' then you might see some increase in airflow." (the "might" was added to show that variables do exist.) Remember that we are discussing SATA cables here, not rounds or unfolded ribbon cables.

My response to Dan: "In the majority of normal installations: YES!"

But in the end: different strokes for different folks.

(no foul meant Ralf. Okay?)

dan · Post by **dan** » Sat May 08, 2004 9:27 pm

hi

my response to loren_brothers and Ralf Hutter is that while i can easily see how if everything is serial ata you would enjoy a net benefit,

if your HD is Serial ATA (assuming you can boot off the HD) but your CD-RW uses flat ribbon ATA-100 it doesn't change the number of cables in your system so it's not clear to me it would result in a net benefit in airflow.

it's rather disappoint that besides that one obscure model by Plextor, NO cd-rw/dvd-rw is serial ATA

nutball · Post by **nutball** » Sun May 09, 2004 8:15 am

Well I've run the SATA cable in my box behind the motherboard, so no airflow issues there

I guess it's possible to to the same with ribbon cable if you have Ralf's l33t cablegami skills, but for mere mortals such as myself SATA was just plain easier.

I'm sure that given time SATA CD/DVD drives will become ubiquitous, but that of course doesn't solve the problem now. You can get SATA -> parallel adaptors that plug into the back of parallel devices, CD/DVD drives included, but they're a bit of a kludge and seem to require their own power lead, so probably aren't worth the effort.

SERIAL ATA - important for cooling?

SERIAL ATA - important for cooling?

Re: SERIAL ATA - important for cooling?

Re: SERIAL ATA - important for cooling?

Re: SERIAL ATA - important for cooling?