using the floopy cable on hdd

[ndnsoulja]

hey, how is it going? i just realized that the cable i use to connect one of my harddrive is the kind that u use to connect my floppy drive. does that make sense. like the type of cable i use is the kind that i think your suppose to use to connect the floopy drive. so is that bad or does it matter? if u notice the harddive connector is missing a pin in the middle of the cable but the floppy drive does not. so can someone tell me if thats bad or does it matter at all? thanks

[I.M.O.G.]

The floppy and ide connectors are different sizes. The floppy cable also has a twist in it.

There are 40 wire and 80 wire IDE cables, and you might be talking about a 40 wire IDE cable. ;)

[DayUSeX]

yes you are thinking of a cdrom cable, and yes those are bad, you do not get the best performance. Use a proper hard rive conector.

[Diggrr]

ATA33 drives use a 40 wire ribbon with 40 (or sometimes 39) connector holes.
ATA66, 100 and 133 drives use a 80 wire ribbon cable, with 40 connector holes.
Floppies use a 34 wire ribbon cable.

For anything more modern (ATA 66 and above), an 80 wire cable should be used to stop data corruption from happening at the the higher speeds that they run. Whether the drive is missing a center pin or not, doesn't matter as long as the pins all have a hole to go into.

LS-120 drives are a different story altogether, as they are IDE, and have 40 pins (and it looks just like a floppy drive, but uses a powered eject).

I use 80 wire ribbons on every drive that has 40 pins, CD, DVD, LS-120, etc.. so they all have the best cables available, and the cleanest data stream.

[I.M.O.G.]

For anyone who is wondering what the difference is between 40 and 80 wire cables - 80 wire cables have non-transmitting wires running between active wires, creating a more reliable cable with less likelyhood of errors due to crosstalk in the cable.