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Power and signal cables for internal drives
Your computer uses cables to connect IDE, SATA, and SCSI devices to the power
supply and to the system board. (See "System board internal connectors" on page
78 for the location of system-board connectors.) Review the following information
before connecting power and signal cables to internal drives:
v The drives that are preinstalled in your computer come with power and signal
v When you install a drive, make sure that one of the drive connectors of the signal
v If you have only one IDE device on a cable, it must be set as a primary device.
v If two IDE devices are used on a single cable, one must be designated as the
The following cables are provided:
v Power cables: Four-wire power cables connect the drives to the power supply.
v Signal cables: Signal cables are typically flat cables, also called ribbon cables,
cables attached. If you replace any drives, remember which cable is attached to
which drive.
cable is connected to the drive and that the connector at the other end of the
signal cable is connected to the system board.
primary device and the other as the secondary device; otherwise, the computer
might not recognize some of the IDE devices. The primary and secondary
designation is determined by switch or jumper settings on each IDE device.
At the end of these cables are plastic connectors that can be attached to
different drives; these connectors vary in size. You can use either a four-wire
power cable or serial ATA power cable with serial ATA drives, but do not use both
at the same time (use one or the other).
that connect parallel IDE, SATA, SCSI, and diskette drives to the system board.
Two or three types of signal cable come with your computer:
– IDE: The wider IDE signal cable has three connectors. One of these
connectors is attached to the drive, one is a spare, and the third is attached to
the primary IDE connector on the system board.
The CD-ROM drive is attached to an ATA 100 signal cable. ATA 100 signal
cables are color-coded. The blue connector is attached to the system board.
The black connector is attached to the primary IDE device. The gray middle
connector is attached to the secondary IDE device.
– Diskette drive (optional): The narrower signal cable has two connectors.
One is attached to the diskette drive, and the other is attached to the diskette
drive connector on the system board.
– Serial ATA: The narrower, black signal cable has two connectors. One is
attached to the SATA drive, and the other is attached to the connector on the
system board. Each SATA drive comes with a cable. If you install an additional
SATA drive, you will need an additional cable. SATA signal cables should be
connected to the system board connectors (SATA 1 through SATA 4) in
numerical order, starting with SATA 1.
– SCSI: The Ultra320 twisted ribbon cable connects the internal Ultra320 SCSI
hard disk drive to the mini-PCI SCSI connector. This cable has three
additional connectors for attaching more internal SCSI devices.
Chapter 4. Customer replacement units
53
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Troubleshooting
