Activating faster hard disk UDMA modes on GX110

Hi, Dave:

If you check the IDE controller in device manager, you should see the transfer mode setting and the current transfer mode. If the latter reads PIO mode, then that is why your drive is running at UDMA 2.

I'm not sure from your system specs whether the IDE controller in that system is ATA-100. The other variable in the equation is the drive itself.

Device Manager has DMA checked and says it's actually running at UDMA mode 2 (33MB/s). 

However the onboard Intel 82801AA controller is supposed to be good for mode 4 (66MB/s), the cable is 80 conductor, and the drive is supposed to be good for mode 5 (100MB/s).  The HDD is the only device on the first channel.  So I'm wondering why it's running at half speed?

Dave:

Ok, I should have suggested you check to make sure the jumper is set to cable select. This is the default for Dell systems.

Another idea, check out the Intel Application Accelerator, to see if it will work with your chipset. This is like a chipset driver on steroids and often improves IDE performance. 

I rejumpered to CS and installed IAA.  I also tried Seagate's UATA100 utility.  No speedup according to HDTune.  Transfer rates are still around 23 MB/s. 

I'm wondering if this may be the best a 5400 rpm drive can sustain regardless of interfacing.  If interfacing were the bottleneck, I would expect to see a pretty constant 33MB/s. 

I plan on changing a 5400rmp Seagate to a 7200rpm "DeathStar" in one of my GX110s.  It will be interesting to see how that tests out, although I still wouldn't expect this 33% speedup to push the 33MB/s barrier.

Dave:

Wow, I'm surprised. Yes, the GX110 is a bit of a clunker by today's standards, but still.

Let me know if another drive gives you better performance.

Maybe my expectations were inflated.  Check this out:

http://www.realworldtech.com/page.cfm?ArticleID=RWT061801032003

Transfer rates around 25MB/s seem to be the norm, except the 7200 rpm @ ATA 100 test managed to sustain about 33 MB/s.

Dave:

Hey, this is a old system. Can't expect to win Indy with a 60s Impala. :emotion-16:

Ha ha! I'll settle for not holding up traffic on the way to the 7-11.  I'm only looking for cheap tweaks that make a noticeable difference.  Upping RAM to 512MB was certainly one.  A USB 2.0 board made working with external storage a lot nicer.  A  faster CPU (now 800Mhz) might not help so much.

1.4Ghz Tulatin makes a difference but its not worth the price.

http://www.duhvoodooman.com/powrleap/370T/370T.htm

Tualis are cheap enough but the adapters aren't.