Hardware question: are modern ATA 100/133 HDDs downward compatible ?

Originally posted by MILAMBER: Actually, the system bus has absolutely nothing to do with the IDE hard drives data transfer rate, even though with the IDE format, hard disk preformance is somewhat related to processor power. That's what's cool about SCSI, because the SCSI technology processes all the data transfer by itself without having to bleed off the system processor. In answer to your question, yes, you can use any ATA 66/100 hd on a DMA 33 board. If you can though, I would strongly recomend going up to an ATA 100 compatable board. It dramatically boosts preformance. For some DMA 33 boards, you can get bios updates which will bump it to ATA 66. Be warned that if that is possible though, you have to use a special IDE cable to get ATA preformance out of your drive.

I was using the term "bus" to mean the IDE bus speed. Sorry if I confused anyone My friend wasn't sure, but never fear I will find someone else who is knowledgable.

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Holy Avenger of the OHF and part time Pinguindiebjäger

[Wurm]

Yes they are and you should have no problems....IF YOUR BIOS CAN HANDLE THAT BIG OF A DRIVE!! Update your BIOS before putting in your new drive!

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Note to IW mods and admin, I send people here when they have Baldur's Gate and IWD problems (I'm one of the gaming mods) So fairs, fair.

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