KK266 MB, Ultra 100 Hard drive

[Daniel ~]

I'm using W2K, anyone know how to activate the Ulrta 100 (Non Raid) Features for my Hard drive.?

 

[el]

Howdy a couple of questions first!

U running SP2?

In the bios under Intergrated peripherals is UDMA Controller enabled?

Go to System Properties to the IDE Controller and make sure UDMA is checked not PIO.

Hope this helps

 

[Daniel ~]

Thanks el, it does say Ultra DMA. I guess I'm look for somthing that says Ultra 100 mode?

 

[el]

when you first boot does it say mode5?

 

[Daniel ~]

No it says mode 4.When set up on my promise Ultra 100 it said Mode 5 at boot.

 

[Taylor]

Hi Daniel- I'm returning my kk266, in fact I posted this, tho no one has commented yet- because after you read the book, you find out that when they say dual ata-100 they mean only if you buy the raid board. It does say , in the book, that for the non-raid board it only supports ata-33 or 66.

I haven't yet taken it back, and if someone knows of a way to enable ata-100 on the non-raid board, I'll go ahead and keep it, despite the onboard temp sensor not being tall enough to contact the cpu housing. I'm going with an omega HH thermometer/ thermocouple wire setup anyway

hope this helps, and hope someone has a solution- Taylor

 

[Daniel ~]

Taylor (Jun 24, 2001 03:59 p.m.):
Hi Daniel- I'm returning my kk266, in fact I posted this, tho no one has commented yet- because after you read the book, you find out that when they say dual ata-100 they mean only if you buy the raid board. It does say , in the book, that for the non-raid board it only supports ata-33 or 66.

I haven't yet taken it back, and if someone knows of a way to enable ata-100 on the non-raid board, I'll go ahead and keep it, despite the onboard temp sensor not being tall enough to contact the cpu housing. I'm going with an omega HH thermometer/ thermocouple wire setup anyway

hope this helps, and hope someone has a solution- Taylor

Hello Taylor:

I just ran some benchies that might interest you.:
I running W2K KK266 non RAID, 1.0 CPU @ 1.5 (Clock 136, Clock Ratio 11.0)

I first ran on board Ultra in SySoft Sandra 2001 (my normal setup.)

20260

Then I setup my Promise RAID Ultra 100 card with one drive connected (Same as above)

20190

As you can see there is no real difference in performance, VERY slightly favoring the On board Ultra ATA.

This leads me to concluded that most likely ATA Ultra 100 is in effect. This may (Likely) have been corrected in a newer BIOS update. I'm using the May 15th BIOS.

I would also like to say that you have purchased a very fine board, indeed the finest Motherboard I have ever seen. It's rock solid for me at a 50% O/C. I really don't think you will do better with another board...but I've been wrong before":O}

 

[el]

btw what kinda drive is it?

 

[Daniel ~]

el (Jun 25, 2001 07:54 a.m.):
btw what kinda drive is it?

IBM 20 Gig Ultra 100, been good so far! ":O}

 

[guppie]

I've read a couple posts today regarding the KK266 mobo. Do you have to somehow activate the U100 feature? Or does auto-detect that for you? Some say mode 5 and some say it wont way it at all? So how can you be sure that your actually getting U100 or not? I have 2 U100 7200 RPM HDDs and I'm waiting for my KK266 mobo to come in... Should I do a clean install of Win2K? Do I need to do all that crap for USB filtering and VIA 4in1 drivers and stuff like they recommend on fullon3d.com? Any heads-up is good news as it will reduce the amount of potential headaches... Also, I keep seeing problems with the SBLive! sound card. Is this still a problem? Should I just sell it and use the onboard sound? Or keep the SBLive. Another piece of hardware is just another headache imho even tho the SBLive kicks ***. Its not like I'm trying to setup an audio studio - just playing games and surfing the net.

 

[Me]

Daniel ~ (Jun 24, 2001 05:19 p.m.):

Taylor (Jun 24, 2001 03:59 p.m.):
Hi Daniel- I'm returning my kk266, in fact I posted this, tho no one has commented yet- because after you read the book, you find out that when they say dual ata-100 they mean only if you buy the raid board. It does say , in the book, that for the non-raid board it only supports ata-33 or 66.

I haven't yet taken it back, and if someone knows of a way to enable ata-100 on the non-raid board, I'll go ahead and keep it, despite the onboard temp sensor not being tall enough to contact the cpu housing. I'm going with an omega HH thermometer/ thermocouple wire setup anyway

hope this helps, and hope someone has a solution- Taylor

Hello Taylor:

I just ran some benchies that might interest you.:
I running W2K KK266 non RAID, 1.0 CPU @ 1.5 (Clock 136, Clock Ratio 11.0)

I first ran on board Ultra in SySoft Sandra 2001 (my normal setup.)

20260

Then I setup my Promise RAID Ultra 100 card with one drive connected (Same as above)

20190

As you can see there is no real difference in performance, VERY slightly favoring the On board Ultra ATA.

This leads me to concluded that most likely ATA Ultra 100 is in effect. This may (Likely) have been corrected in a newer BIOS update. I'm using the May 15th BIOS.

I would also like to say that you have purchased a very fine board, indeed the finest Motherboard I have ever seen. It's rock solid for me at a 50% O/C. I really don't think you will do better with another board...but I've been wrong before":O}

Hi Daniel ,
I am thinking about buying the raid or the non-raid board and i need your help to decide. I want to know did you put any active cooling on the south bridge? Also do you have any soundblaster problems? I need to buy a heatsink and fan and im not sure what to buy. I plan on buying a 1.333 chip and overclocking it to 1500 or higher. What do you think i can get out of this chip using a kk266-r with really good cooling i.e case fans etc.
I am currently using crucial cas 2 pc133 ram and 300watt name brand PSupply
Also i heard anything pass 1500 will give problems.

 

[el]

no cooling needed on the south bridge and with 042601 bios all the sb problems have been solved. one guy was still having problems with the sb but I think it was more of a drivers conflict or maybe IRQ problems as the 042601 solved most of these problems. you should check out coolerchips and the wbk for 21 bucks.

 

[Daniel ~]

guppie (Jun 26, 2001 07:29 p.m.):
I've read a couple posts today regarding the KK266 mobo. Do you have to somehow activate the U100 feature? Or does auto-detect that for you? Some say mode 5 and some say it wont way it at all?
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In W2K you need to go into device manager and select IDE ATA/ATAPI controllers and then select the primary and secondary controllers one at a time an select "DMA if available" for each. At boot is will give your hard drive as DMA 4 or 5. Mine says 4, I speculate that this is because I'm not using raid, but rather a single drive. It does recognize my Promise Ultra 100 UDMA as 5. To be honest I'm not sure what's what as the on board out performs the Promise, VERY SLIGHTLY.
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So how can you be sure that your actually getting U100 or not? I have 2 U100 7200 RPM HDDs and I'm waiting for my KK266 mobo to come in... Should I do a clean install of Win2K? Do I need to do all that crap for USB filtering and VIA 4in1 drivers and stuff like they recommend on fullon3d.com? Any heads-up is good news as it will reduce the amount of potential headaches...
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
By bench marking your drive in Sysoft Sandra. Yes you need to in stall the 4in1 drivers. I always go for a clean install. there are ways around this, but I like knowing it's fresh without any hold over problems from the past.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Also, I keep seeing problems with the SBLive! sound card. Is this still a problem? Should I just sell it and use the onboard sound? Or keep the SBLive. Another piece of hardware is just another headache imho even tho the SBLive kicks ***. Its not like I'm trying to setup an audio studio - just playing games and surfing the net.

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I never even installed my SBL! I like the on board just as well, so can't say about troubles folks are having with theirs. I DO recommend the May 15th BIOS update on the Iwill site also the 4.32 4in1 drives. This has worked well for me.

 

[Yomama]

Daniel,

I agree that this may be pointless since ATA100 basically just is a bigger pipethen 33 or 66, but at the currently achieved transfer rates ATA33 and may be ATA 66 are still sufficiently big, not to cause any performace degradation. The new Seagate Barracuda with 69MB/s transfer rate will be the first drive to possibly require better than ATA66.

Yo

P.s.: Some drives that are ATA 100 capable ship with ATA66 or ATA 33 enabled, but the drive manufacturers have tools to adjust that setting.

 

[Daniel ~]

Hi Daniel ,
I am thinking about buying the raid or the non-raid board and i need your help to decide. I want to know did you put any active cooling on the south bridge? Also do you have any soundblaster problems? I need to buy a heatsink and fan and im not sure what to buy. I plan on buying a 1.333 chip and overclocking it to 1500 or higher. What do you think i can get out of this chip using a kk266-r with really good cooling i.e case fans etc.
I am currently using crucial cas 2 pc133 ram and 300watt name brand PSupply
Also i heard anything pass 1500 will give problems.[/quote]

I attached a small fan (actually Gabe at Swifteck did this for me gratis).on the North bridge, Especially with a Water cooling system this should be done. I haven't tried or really seen the need to cool the South bridge. (Can anyone speak from experience on cooling the South bridge?)

My 1.0 goes 1512 now 11.0 X 137 FSB. Higher (1524) whacks out my nick, but I'm still toying. I've always water-cooled so can't say what temps you would see at these settings.

Sorry don't use my SBL! card, so can't say.

 

[Daniel ~]

Yomama (Jun 29, 2001 02:36 p.m.):
Daniel,

I agree that this may be pointless since ATA100 basically just is a bigger pipethen 33 or 66, but at the currently achieved transfer rates ATA33 and may be ATA 66 are still sufficiently big, not to cause any performace degradation. The new Seagate Barracuda with 69MB/s transfer rate will be the first drive to possibly require better than ATA66.

Yo

P.s.: Some drives that are ATA 100 capable ship with ATA66 or ATA 33 enabled, but the drive manufacturers have tools to adjust that setting.

Agreed, wonder which arm I'll have to give up to the Baracuda?":O}

 

[Nagorak]

Yomama (Jun 29, 2001 02:36 p.m.):
Daniel,

I agree that this may be pointless since ATA100 basically just is a bigger pipethen 33 or 66, but at the currently achieved transfer rates ATA33 and may be ATA 66 are still sufficiently big, not to cause any performace degradation. The new Seagate Barracuda with 69MB/s transfer rate will be the first drive to possibly require better than ATA66.

Yo

P.s.: Some drives that are ATA 100 capable ship with ATA66 or ATA 33 enabled, but the drive manufacturers have tools to adjust that setting.

That's right the new Barracuda is the first drive to get an INTERNAL transfer rate of 69 MB/sec, I'm sure the external transfer rate will be somewhat lower. I suspect the reason you are seeing very little performance difference between the two cards is NOT because the board is running at ATA 100 (if it says mode 4 that's ATA 66) but just because there is no real improvement for running at 100 over 66. Drives just aren't fast enough yet.

If lack of ATA 100 support and a RAID feature bother you, then just buy an Iwill SideRaid 100 card. It can be had for around $30-$40 (the same difference in price between a RAID and non-RAID motherboard), AND unlike one built-in to the motherboard you can continue to use the card with any motherboard you purchase. In my opinion it is a much better option than built-in RAID. Built-in RAID, like built-in audio and graphics are attached to the board and cannot be kept when upgrading. There's a reason why PCI cards were invented, after all ;-).

 

[goretusk]

my god people...great conversation but how can I follow it with all the "quotes" being put in?? leave the quotes out maybe? heh...anyway my two cents are this: there IS a jumper on the board for RAID/non-RAID...I don't know if that helps or not. From what I understand both versions have ATA100...if not then I'm glad I bought the Raid version . Waiting for it currently with my Tbird 1.2ghz...*drools*...GOOD LUCK ALL!

 

[Daniel ~]

Let us know how you do! Good Luck!