Are all SATA cables created equal?

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I picked up a bunch of blue SATA cables from my work because they will go nicely in my build. But they are cheapies from Dells. Will this matter or is it like HDMI cables where if it works it works.
 
Not quite, no.

There's 3 standards, SATA1, 2 and 3 so there's core difference. If you use a SATA1 cable on a SATA3 drive and mobo, it will work but you won't be getting full speed.

Likewise, cheaper cables are possibly prone to interference and if you're running longer cables you can run into weird issues like drives disappearing, data transfers timing out, that kind of thing.

Realistically, it's probably not going to be an issue, but 'technically' there are differences.
 
HoneyBadger said:
Not quite, no.

There's 3 standards, SATA1, 2 and 3 so there's core difference. If you use a SATA1 cable on a SATA3 drive and mobo, it will work but you won't be getting full speed.

Likewise, cheaper cables are possibly prone to interference and if you're running longer cables you can run into weird issues like drives disappearing, data transfers timing out, that kind of thing.

Realistically, it's probably not going to be an issue, but 'technically' there are differences.
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Agreed

if possible, use shorter rather than longer, high quality, well shielded SATA cables of the appropriate SATA standard (ie SATA 3)
 
I've had sata cables that connected poorly and caused drives to randomly drop out.

My current favourite cable is Akasa Super Slim, they they make a good connection and being flexible the plugs take less strain if working with limited space. Always use the shortest cable length I can thats still practical.
 
You can also get some with locking end connectors (little lever-thing you have to pull to release from the socket), or the more cheaper variant without.
 
Really? Surely if the connection is present with no faults it'll do whatever speed after all it's just wire? This sounds similar to the myths that expensive HDMi and coax cables made a difference when in reality you could use cheap 10 meter 3 quid cables with no negative effect.
 
I've got SATA cables in some of my systems that are many, many years old (even some that came with an old A8N-SLI motherboard from around 2004) that still run SSDs with full throughput and without any problems at all.

However I've also dug cables out of my stash that visibly seem fine but they just haven't worked at all or have caused issues with drive detection at BIOS. Just try it out and see. Although the risk there is that the cable causes data corruption, but I've never experienced that...doesn't mean it can't happen though.
 
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willhub said:
Really? Surely if the connection is present with no faults it'll do whatever speed after all it's just wire? This sounds similar to the myths that expensive HDMi and coax cables made a difference when in reality you could use cheap 10 meter 3 quid cables with no negative effect.
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Cheap or improperly made HDMI cables can have a detrimental effect on the video signal being passed.

It doesn't result in bad or worse image quality, but the likelihood of a fault increases. Faults are very obvious visually, and that is the point that is being made.

When a digital protocol has cable faults, the issue is very obviously there.
 
Fairly sure (ready to be proven wrong) but there is no such thing as sata 1,2 and 3 cables, they are all the same and will transfer data at the same rate.

You do have the build quality, shielding and length to take in to account though.
 
the cheapie dells you quote are likely to be good quality, the last thing dell want is people reporting faults (which they would have to attend and fix)as costs them more in the long run
 
lude1962 said:
the cheapie dells you quote are likely to be good quality, the last thing dell want is people reporting faults (which they would have to attend and fix)as costs them more in the long run
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They are made by FOXCONN. But it was the age I was worried about i.e. SATA 1,2,3.
 
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