Is this normal for an NF4 IDE setup?

[mj3zero]

I just switched from an i865 P4 setup with 3 PATA disks and 2 DVD drives to an NF4 setup. I had to add a PATA IDE card because of the NF4 only having 2 PATA channels. I have my boot disk on IDE 1 and the 2 DVD's on IDE 2. My other disks are on the IDE card.

The query I have is this - when I am using the DVD or DVD-RW I am getting a constant lit IDE led. The system doesn't seem any slower but opening up folders on the drives can have a slight pause - this definitely wasn't there with the P4 setup.

Anyone advise ? Is it just the NF4 chipset or is it something else? Would going to Sata for my HDs make it go away ?

Cheers
mj

 

[[TR]SweetSpotOz]

.

 

[InQ]

I had something odd as well on my NF4 setup with my PATA HDD. When writing a DVD from my PATA HDD (IDE0) to my DVDRW (IDE1) the burn rate got to around 12x and wouldnt go any higher plus the buffer kept going up and down like a yo-yo. Burning from my SATA HDD to the DVDRW was fine, got the full 16x and the buffer never went below 95%.
The culprit turned out to be the NF4 IDE drivers, i found this by uninstalling them and using the default XP drivers...no more problems.

So what i'm trying to say, is if u arent already try using the default XP IDE drivers and not the NF4 drivers, it may help.
And maybe try the DVD/DVDRW on different IDE cables (its the DVD and DVDRW drives that are pausing not your IDE HDDs i take it?).

 

[mj3zero]

Reverse the IDE cable. I think.

As in, it's on back to front, left to right way.

Not mobo - CD.

I think you may be referring to a floppy cable that's installed with pin 1 at the wrong end Not that. The IDE led works fine, it's just working overtime when I'm doing certain things. Device manager has my DVDs as UDMA2 and my Primary HD as UDMA5. No problems there, and the system runs fine, there is just an element of lag when I'm using the drives that wasn't there with the P4 setup.

The main difference between the 2 is that the P4 used an onboard Highpoint for the extra disks whilst the NF4 setup has a Silicon Raid 133 card. It may well be the card's location, but with the setup of the a8n32sli I'm snookered because I'm using am 1800xt which obscures pci 1 and most of pci 2. Or it could be the Sil' drivers, or the Nforce drivers.

I guess that I'm subconsciously trying to justify going Sata

mj