Quick Question

[dublish]

I was just wondering as i am getting a new rig, my old seagate that runs at 5400rpm(40gb) and the new one which will run @ 7200rpm(80gb) are the two compatable because of the speed difference?

Many thanks in advance,

Dublish.

[GG-]

They will almost certainly be compatible. The disk speed has no barring on compatibility. The only issue would be if one drive was SATA and the other was ATA. This is easy to recognize as the ATA drive will only accept the wide ribbon type cable while the SATA drive uses a very small narrow cable. If you happen to have one of each of these types of drives your new main board will likely be able to accommodate and support both but on separate channels, so you should still be able to get them both up and running together.

Hope this helps

Cheers

I was just wondering as i am getting a new rig, my old seagate that runs at 5400rpm(40gb) and the new one which will run @ 7200rpm(80gb) are the two compatable because of the speed difference?

  Many thanks in advance,

                                     

                                            Dublish.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

[Firefoxx]

Old (not sold anymore) drives ran at 4200rpm, some current drive run at 5400rpm, most drives at 7200rpm, and a few drives run at 10000rpm. This is for desktop drives. Notebook drives typically come at 4200, many at 5400, and very few at 7200. Server drives come in 7200, 10000, and 15000.

Only thing you (usually) need to be concerned about with a modern desktop drive is whether the interface is the same as the one in your computer, Parallel ATA or Serial ATA.

[dublish]

Thank you men, but how do i find this out (the parallel ATA or Serial ATA part)?the cable is a grey ribbon, black plug into the drive ,spare grey plug going into nothing,black plug into M/B. The cable(ribbon)feels unlike the cables from my floppy and cd/rw much more thinner and not as flexable for want of a better word,shall i take out the H/D and look at the sticker i cant see it now its awkward to get at (ram etc) its a micro mainboard so everything is on top of each other, thanks again.

[Firefoxx]

If it's a wide ribbon, like your floppy, then it's Parallel ATA. Serial ATA is a small thin cable, like a strand of flattened pasta.

[dublish]

ok thanks firefox. Is there any difference between the two drives ata, sata the latter being more popular right?

Edited June 29, 2005 by dublish

[francois]

If it's a wide ribbon, like your floppy, then it's Parallel ATA.  Serial ATA is a small thin cable, like a strand of flattened pasta.

and most of the time, "red pasta"

seriouly, ata cable are large and sata are small and look more like a cable.

I recommend for ata device as well as floppy to use "round" cable for connecting to get a better air-flow inside the case

francois

[h90]

a little bit of topic, but when you buy a new HD, buy a HD cooler as well (take a more expensive one, the cheap one are very fast broken).

And keep the warranty things for the HD. Either modern HD are more sensitive or something in Thailand is killing them.

[Firefoxx]

SATA is the newer standard, and is set to replace PATA completely in a year or so. Even notebooks use it. Advantages are higher bandwidth (not that current harddisks can utilize it fully), easier connections, hot-swapping, and advanced instructions (TCQ/NCQ). Currently, the PATA and SATA versions of the same drive are nearly the same price.

If you want to go the SATA route, you can buy a PCI SATA card to add to your computer for about 1,200 baht. This way when you upgrade your computer you can use the existing harddisk.

My mainboard came with red SATA cables, but my SATA card came with black cables.

If your case has adequate cooling in the harddisk area, a harddisk cooler is unneccessary (and much less effective). It's better to just buy a good case with adequate cooling, but then that might not be an option for some.

As for warranty, Thai retailers use the "sticker" (or "void") warranty system. Everything depends on the sticker on the product, nothing else matters, so there's no warranty information to keep.

Edited June 29, 2005 by Firefoxx