[ZOM 77]

does anyone have any experience with non mac ata pci cards in a mac?

i have a dual 533 powermac running 10.3.5
and i have a 200gb hard drive i need to hook up,

i know the sonnet tempo 133 would work ,
but its 100$ and i have to order it online,

comp use has a belkin ata 133 for 50$

does anyone know if that would work?

i might just buy it and try,
but i dont think it will work . . .

just curious if anyone else has tried it ,
or has any recommendations ?


thanks

- motech

[Homer1946]

Some card types, like USB and FireWire, will pretty much always work as they are the same cards Mac or PC. Ethernet is in this category but with more misses since they usually require 3rd party drivers and not all chipsets have Mac drivers.

Then there are cards that have complex onboard firmware to drive them. They often have to do things at boot before any OS has been loaded. This cards require their firmware to be specific to Macs or PC's. These include ATA cards and Video cards among others.

So a PC ATA card should not work in a Mac. If it does it will only be after boot and thus you would not be able to boot from any attached drive.

-R

Originally posted by ZOM 77:
does anyone have any experience with non mac ata pci cards in a mac?

i have a dual 533 powermac running 10.3.5
and i have a 200gb hard drive i need to hook up,

i know the sonnet tempo 133 would work ,
but its 100$ and i have to order it online,

comp use has a belkin ata 133 for 50$

does anyone know if that would work?

i might just buy it and try,
but i dont think it will work . . .

just curious if anyone else has tried it ,
or has any recommendations ?


thanks

- motech

[Homer1946]

Originally posted by Homer1946:
Some card types, like USB and FireWire, will pretty much always work as they are the same cards Mac or PC. Ethernet is in this category but with more misses since they usually require 3rd party drivers and not all chipsets have Mac drivers.

Then there are cards that have complex onboard firmware to drive them. They often have to do things at boot before any OS has been loaded. This cards require their firmware to be specific to Macs or PC's. These include ATA cards and Video cards among others.

So a PC ATA card should not work in a Mac. If it does it will only be after boot and thus you would not be able to boot from any attached drive.

My solution to your problem has been to look around for a good deal on empty FW hard drive case. (I usually hae an old external CDRW or some such lying around). The real gold is that little FW to IDE interface card hidden inside. Most of these little cards will see the bigger drives and FW gets around the limit of your onboard ATA100 bus. If you look you can find just the little interace cards or adapters for around $30 online, but you have to LOOK. You could also get a cheap USB 2 card (some of the dirt cheap ones work well) and a cheapo USB 2 case (cheaper than FW) and do the same thing. (For ex, I have a SIIG Combo USB 2/FW/10-100 Enet card and it works great and is like $25.)

Anyway, thats my idea of an option.

-R