PCA Forums

Being that I have to buy a longer ribbon for my newest mobo install with my server case (wasn't a problem with last mobo due to location), I'm wondering if I should get two ribbons instead so that each cd device has its own cable instead of sharing one. I havent had problems with them sharing, just wondering if two are better as I have 2 IDE connectors on the mobo that I can use (SCSI HDDs so that's not a problem).

I've read where some say each cd device is best with its own cable, is that true?

Putting the drives on their own IDE channel is better than running them in a Slave/Master setup.

I think it would be better for burning from you CDROM to your burner on the fly.

dadx2mj is correct.

IDE on a single channel can only read/write to one device at a time ... so doing an on-the-fly copy from CD to burner would be like this:
CD reads data ... burner writes data ... CD reads data ... burner writes data ... etc.
With 2 IDE channels you can read from channel 1 and write at the same time on channel 2.

It's not a biggy anymore nowadays with most burners using burnproof but it was a serious problem prior to burnproof, causing lotsa coasters with both drives on the same IDE channel.

Well, they're going on two seperate cables as the cable is long enough if it doesn't loop between the 2 drives (otherwise not) and I have plenty of extra IDE cables.
They were set up as primary/slave when on the same cable (channel) so now, do I leave it that way or should I then jump the one now slave to a primary too?

That (if there's nothing else on the same channels) or Cable Select, which I find the easiest to do.

Cable select can have problems. I know it works on UDMA66/100/133 cables but I don't think regular IDE cables work right. Jumper each as a master.

OK, thanks guys.