does adding a second hard drive slow you down?

[Randy]

does adding a second hard drive slow you down?

i was going to add a 4 gig for backing up when i reformat. but willl it slow my system?

[HalfLifer]

Yes, if you use the same IDE channel.

[downhill]

Not a bit. I'm as fit at 47 years old as I was at 45.

[Randy]

so use a seperate channel? if i use it as a slave will it slow me down?

[Matt615]

If they are on the same IDE channel then they will slow eachother down, no matter which one is master and slave. If they are on different channels then everything will work the same.

[Dakota]

I was having a proble.....

Ooops! Sorry. I thought this was the hardware forum.

[drdoug99]

if they are both ATA-100 or both the same ATA speed, why would it slow down? If you put a ATA 66 with a ATA100 on the same channel, I know that defaults it to ATA66 for both drives...but does it slow down if both are the same speed?

[Norm]

Originally posted by drdoug99
if they are both ATA-100 or both the same ATA speed, why would it slow down? If you put a ATA 66 with a ATA100 on the same channel, I know that defaults it to ATA66 for both drives...but does it slow down if both are the same speed?

NO !!

Put simply...

The speed of 2 drives on the same cable will default to the drive with the slowest speed.

If they are the same speed, they default to the same speed

In the case of the 4GB drive mentioned, I would assume it is slow (being older), and therefore if put on the same cable with a faster drive, the speed will default to the speed of the 4 GB drive.
But it can be used for backing up, then disconnected, and the speed will return to the faster drive.

[Randy]

Originally posted by Norm
NO !!


But it can be used for backing up, then disconnected, and the speed will return to the faster drive.

good i dea thats what i will do.

should i partition my new40 gig to improve gameplay?
mods/mouse move this to hardware forum please.

[onetrueday]

Originally posted by Matt615
If they are on the same IDE channel then they will slow eachother down, no matter which one is master and slave. If they are on different channels then everything will work the same.

Please dont tell me you're assuming they're both ata100. Yes, if you have two drives on the same ide channel it will slow you down. However, the difference is so small it's not worth mentioning.

To concur with what was already mentioned, the 4gig will slow you down because it's not ata100 or ata66. If you have a spot open on the second IDE channel, it could be set as the slave with a burner. It would certainly make a nice little backup hard drive, but I wouldnt run any programs from it. Considering it's that old, I would wonder how much longer it would have.