# how do I set the sata drive in bios



## ratface (Jul 22, 2004)

the drive is a samsung 120 gig sata drive. The MB is an abit IS7. If anyone is familiar with this board there are two connections for sata and two for IDE drives. If my memory is right the first channel can be configured maaster/slave/master/slave, the second master/slave/master/slave. Below these is an option to configure the sata drive. I only want to drives, the sata and DVD/CD. 

Should I be conf. both drives as master?
Should the unused channel be disabled?
Should raid be turned off?

I have tried many configurations and only get more confused. It seems no matter what I cant't get the CD/DVD recognized?

appreciate any insight, thks


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## Praetor (Jul 22, 2004)

- SATA has no master/slave so ignore that
- Dont disaable unused channels
- Unless you've got a crapload of harddrives, dont enable RAID


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## charly (Jul 27, 2004)

as long you have just one sata plugged in there's no real raid active.

plug your samsung to the ata connector, and your cd/dvd to the ide channel.
set your bios to boot from raid (sata).


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## tristan (Jul 28, 2004)

are you plugging the cdrom into a sata port (with the ide adapter?)? also, abit mobos need their bios updated in most cases for I know many cases where they didnt work untill bios was updated.


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## Praetor (Jul 28, 2004)

> are you plugging the cdrom into a sata port (with the ide adapter?)?


Who said anything about plugging in the CD drive into the SATA port (btw the SATA/PATA convertors dont work so well for opticals...odd)


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## tristan (Jul 28, 2004)

He is talking about sata, he didnt specify if he wants them both goin sata or if it matters.


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## Praetor (Jul 28, 2004)

He's only got one SATA drive, the Samsung  The CDROM is oldschool PATA  so it does matter which drive goes where... it just doesnt matter if the optical is set as master or slave since it's the only device on the chain


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## tristan (Jul 28, 2004)

ABIT motherboards come WITH an IDE to SATA converter remember? But, only come with one. Since his HD is sata i was assuming he was using the converter with his cd rom. Just seems like he is trying to utalize just sata.


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## Praetor (Jul 28, 2004)

> ABIT motherboards come WITH an IDE to SATA converter, but only come with one


CDROMs dont work so well with those convertors 



> Since his HD is sata I was assuming he was using the converter with his cd rom. Just seems like he is trying to utalize just sata.


Ah i see your perspective  'course it wouldnt yield any benifits and a crapload of hassle so that would definitely be ill-advised


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## tristan (Jul 28, 2004)

I wouldnt use it with sata personally but maybe hes trying to cut down on wiring. Never know.. They are supposed to work, but yes many have problems. An updated bios is pretty key with this also.


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## Praetor (Jul 28, 2004)

> They are supposed to work, but yes many have problems


I've ran that funky convertor thingy on a bunch of boards with a very small percentages of success (and when it did work, i was nervous as hell )


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## tristan (Jul 28, 2004)

Heh.. i believe it. Ive heard enough about it to not even care to try with mine. Im making my own round cables out of flat IDE's right now to cut back on clutter. lol


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## Praetor (Jul 28, 2004)

Round cables arent that great and I'd advise against it: the spec wasnt designed with such tightness/bunchingness of the internal wires and the signals have the potential to get scrambled (meaning it has to resend, meaning slower xfers). 'sides round cables are ugly!  Spend your time and fold the flat cables ... you'd be surprised how slick they look


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## tristan (Jul 28, 2004)

I think they are ugly, and restrict way too much air. Some round cables can have problems but there are quite a few that dont have any at all (poorly produced ones). Guess just research helps...

http://www.slcentral.com/articles/01/6/flatvsround/


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## Praetor (Jul 28, 2004)

> Some round cables can have problems but there are quite a few that dont have any at all (poorly produced ones).


Yes but typically in stores they dont really have "branded" ATA cables do they? It's trial and error mostly 



> I think they are ugly, and restrict way too much air.


That's why I said fold them


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