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SATA 3.0Gb/s and 1.5Gb/s compatibility

idata
Employee
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I'm using ASUS P5PE-VM motherboard which has Intel 865G chipset. It supports SATA 1.5Gb/s interface (also known as SATA I). I need to buy a 1TB hard drive but nowadays only 3.0Gb/s (SATA II) disk drives are available in the market so I have to buy one.

I was told that hard drive interface and compatibility are set by the chipset (e.g. Southbridge) which is in my case is Intel ICH5. I found that this chipset has only 1.5Gb/s interface. Now I need to know if it's possible for me to connect a drive with SATA II 3.0Gb/s interface. Also I want to know if such 'HUGE' 1TB capacity can be recognized my motherboard or chipset? Is there any way to upgrade chipset with software rather than changing the whole motherboard?

http://dlcdnet.asus.com/pub/ASUS/mb/socket775/P5PE-VM/e2609_p5pe-vm.pdf ASUS P5PE-VM

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idata
Employee
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maybe u can try buying a sata 2 pci card and plugging the hard drive into that

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idata
Employee
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Some Seagate SATA drives have a jumper setting to force them to operate in SATA-150 mode (sata-1)

Do NOT rely on a SATA-300(sata-2) HDD to auto-detect and function properly on a motherboard that knows only sata-1, sometimes if the OS freezes for no reason at all and you have a sata-2 hdd but without the jumper set, try setting it and see how it goes. I was hit by this weirdness of some seagate HDDs once.

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.jsp?locale=en-US&name=Serial_ATA_Jumpers_and_Cabling&vgnextoid=4a02242cb043e010VgnVCM100000dd04090aRCRD http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.jsp?locale=en-US&name=Serial_ATA_Jumpers_and_Cabling&vgnextoid=4a02242cb043e010VgnVCM100000dd04090aRCRD

http://www.seagate.com/images/support/en/us/cuda_sata_block.gif

WARNING: this jumper setting is valid only for Seagate SATA HDDs. (NOT MAXTOR, not someone else). If your drives are made by someone else search for an equivalent setting, do not assume this to be universally valid or you risk frying your drives.

EDIT: Oh, and btw, the jumpers used are very small, not the usual size of jumpers seen on a motherboard/IDE hdd. If you get a hdd better make sure it either has a jumper already or ask the seller for a free one. Take care not to lose it, it's roughly about 2 x 2 x 4 millimeters. Sneeze on it and it's gone.

Edit2: Jumper settings for Western Digital sata-2 drives to force them into sata-1 mode:

http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=1337 http://wdc.custhelp.com/cgi-bin/wdc.cfg/php/enduser/std_adp.php?p_faqid=1337

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