IDE Cable

[jhay_e03]

what will happen if i connect the IDE cable in wrong way. instead i connect the slave connector to DVD-ROm i connect it to the motherboard, and i connect the connector to DVD-rom instead of motherboard...

hope you understand my explanation.

any advice pls

thanks

[quaxo]

Um, nothing bad.

[Crafty]

what will happen if i connect the IDE cable in wrong way. instead i connect the slave connector to DVD-ROm i connect it to the motherboard, and i connect the connector to DVD-rom instead of motherboard...

I didn't understand a word of that. Are you saying that you are not going to connect the ide cable to the motherboard? If so, how do you think the drives will work!!

[Dias de verano]

I think the OP means that :-

"On an IDE cable, the three connectors are designated

Motherboard
Slave
Master

What will happen if I do not stick to this?"

Quaxo answered,

Um, nothing bad.

Depending on what kind of cable is used, that answer can be correct or totally wrong.

1. A standard 40 wire IDE cable ... fine.

2. A later 80 wire IDE cable ... reduced performance or disk(s) not recognised.

3. A "cable select" cable... as for (2).

[quaxo]

No, my answer is not totally wrong.

The OP gave a very vague question and received such as an answer.

By "nothing bad", I was simply saying that nothing permanently damaging will happen to the drives.

[Dias de verano]

By "nothing bad", I was simply saying that nothing permanently damaging will happen to the drives.

That is quite true. However, if you force an IDE connector upside down into a disk drive , you can permanently ruin the disk drive (a pin gets broken).

[patio]

II=====================================II=========II

MBoard                                                           Slave                      Master

[quaxo]

By "nothing bad", I was simply saying that nothing permanently damaging will happen to the drives.

That is quite true. However, if you force an IDE connector upside down into a disk drive , you can permanently ruin the disk drive (a pin gets broken).

Well, then they'd be a fool for doing so, wouldn't they? 

[Dias de verano]

Well, then they'd be a fool for doing so, wouldn't they? 

They'd be fools indeed if they did it knowingly. It does happen; it has happened to someone on here. The symptom is very slow operation (pin 21, which enables DMA transfer, is the one that gets broken).