On 3/30/2010 11:31 AM, Dr Skip wrote:
> I've got what may be a hardware or architecture issue that I'm at a loss
> for even where to start looking.
>
> I'll start with some questions. Hopefully the answers will show me the
> error of my ways.
>
> 1) Will SATA drives and interfaces work with whatever speeds are
> available and negotiate? In other words, if a drive (or 2) are different
> speeds than the speed of the controller (capability) will it still work
> well (via negotiation), or do they have to match.
>    
As far as I know, they can be mixed and will internally do what's 
necessary to run. Remember, SATA are one device (drive) per cable. The 
mother boards generally have numerous connectors, and each one is 
independent. My Intel DP965-LT motherboard has connectors for 6 SATA, 
and one IDE (can be 2 drives, and they don't have to match)
> 2) Will a SATA controller support more than 2 channels, or is it
> possible to design it such. That isn't possible with PATA master/slave.
>    
Each connector 1 drive.
> 3) With XP, if one used Linux (clonezilla for instance) to clone the
> first drive (C), then installed it as a second (D), both vol IDs would
> be the same. This works (in other words, it boots and reads/writes) but
> will the system exhibit transient problems, conflicts, etc?
>    
I dual boot XP and Ubuntu 9.02. This is 2 300G SATA, XP mainly resides 
on first partition of one (C) (SDA1), and
  Ubuntu on the first partition (SDB1) of the other drive. But they 
could both be on the same drive. Install is straight forward,
just determine where your XP and data is, and don't format those areas.

My second machine has WINME and Ubuntu, similar to above  and they 
coexist well there with 2 IDE drives.

Trying to use a SATA to IDE convertor on the first machine with 2 IDE 
hard drives and 2 DVD drives was problems. It's possible, but
not the greatest. Startech tech support sent me a custom driver for 
their converter, worked, but the dual boot wasn't the greatest. Went out 
and
got 2 Maxtor 300g SATA drives that have been great.
> In a nutshell, the system in question has 2 SATA drives of a faster
> variety than orig. It appears to have 4 channels on the primary
> controller (CD is on it too), and all works well until the second cloned
> drive is on for a while. Eventually some access causes it to drop one or
> both drives out of DMA mode to PIO mode. This indicates windows got an
> error reading. I've just tested #3 by changing the drive ID, but no joy.
> Perhaps someone has greater insights on this?
>    
Don't know, do you have the latest BIOS and drivers?
> It could be a limitation of the architecture of the particular hardware
> design perhaps, a speed issue, a vol ID issue, or something else. It
> might also be a spinup issue. Both new drives are from the same mfg as
> the orig, but are 3Gb/s rather than the orig 1.5Gb/s.
>
> BTW, DMA mode gives about 100+MB/s performance, PIO<8MB/s. It isn't an
> option...
>
> Does this sound familiar to anyone? ANY pointers as I grope around
> without bus analyzers or driver source code?
>    
I have used only Intel motherboards for some years with no problems like 
that.
> Thanks in advance.
>
> -Skip
>
>    
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