UltraDMA Test 1

[osuman]

I have a WD 7200rpm drive that should be running at ATA66. I have the proper cable and drivers installed, or so I think. However, on a Performance Test 3.0 my hard disk speeds are all considerably slower than a comparable system. It doesn't give specifics about the drive in the other system but it does have over 500megs of ram as opposed to my 128, should that make a difference? Anyway, if anybody knows why this would be or if there is a program that will specifically test to see if the drive is running at ATA66, I would appreciate your response.
Thanks

 

[dm7941]

Sisoft Sandra can give you a benchmark that will pretty well tell you if you are running in DMA mode. If you are running Win9x you need to make sure you have the DMA box checked in the settings for the drive in question in the device manager. If there is no DMA checkbox, make sure you have the correct Bus Master IDE drivers for your controller. Most motherboards come with updated drivers that you can install. If you have the correct drivers, and the DMA box is checked then you should be running in the fastest mode. Check those things and then run your benchmark. It should show a large speed increase!

Also a note for anyone else, Win9x DOES NOT CHECK DMA BY DEFAULT. The vast majority of computers I work on are not running in the best hard drive mode, and are SLOW because of it. You can get a HUGE speed increase by just checking that DMA box. Don't assume it's working right, check it. You will be pleasantly rewarded!


David Moore
dm7941@sbc.com

 

[osuman]

Thanks a lot for the suggestion. This appears to have been the problem. The disk performance increased between 50 and 100% on the benchmark depending on the type of test. Thanks again.