[RESOLVED] IDE Ribbon Cable Length

[JackTFECow]

I have been working on a case design that requires my IDE cables to be in the nebighorhood of 36 inches. Does anyone know what the max length of the cables can be without signal loss? Also if there is a way to make them even longer (some kind of repeater?) I would appreciate any info you can give. I have the cable and crimpers and I have done cables as long as 13 inches but I was never sure just how long they can go.......

[protechpc]

36 inches is fine for an IDE. There are 48" IDE cables available as well. If you can make your own -- good for you, you can save some money. Then again, the pre-made ones are pretty cheap.




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[Jeff the Brit]

Hmmmm ... not quite sure about that ... I've not tried any >18 inch ribbon cables myself, but I was under the impression that there was a maximum length.
A couple of links to look at :

http://www.storagereview.com/welcome...iguration.html

http://www.maxtor.com/products/Diamo...p_jumpers.html

[3fingersalute]

We stock 36" IDE cables, and that is all we use for builds. I have seen 48" before, and have seen the ribbon cable and crimper kits that you can buy, and if I remember correctly, it said you can build them up to 72" or something.

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[Cyberwiz]

I have also been wanting to make custom cables for my computer. For some reason they make the 18" cables with the two drive connectors 6" apart and that only leaves you with 12" to goto the IDE port with. That is fine in a mini-tower or mini-desktop case but in a medium to full tower and you have both drives right next to each other, you don't need the 6" - 8" gap between connectors like the make on the cables.

I was going to make mine 24" long but have the connectors between the drives only 3" apart so it is easier to work with and leave the remaining 21" free to reach to the IDE port.

But I am not sure about length limits on ATA66/100 IDE cables with the 80 conductors/40 pin headers. Every other wire is not connected to anything and they act to prevent crosstalk between the data wires.

Also on ATA66/100 cables... It does matter what direction the IDE connectors are crimped onto the wire. If you do it backwards it usually does not work. Also some of the ATA66/100 cables I have seen has a single wire that is cut out between two of the connectors to break the signal on that line.

Maybe I have been of some help... but I have only done just a little research into ATA66/100 cables so I might be wrong on some of my info. In any case I would like to know of any other basic info to know for IDE and ATA66/100 cables.

Later

[Damned Angel]

[QUOTE]Originally posted by Jeff the Brit:
Hmmmm ... not quite sure about that ... I've not tried any >18 inch ribbon cables myself, but I was under the impression that there was a maximum length.
A couple of links to look at :

http://www.storagereview.com/welcome.pl/http://www.storagereview.com/gu ide/guide_ide_configuration.html

http://www.maxtor.com/products/Diamo...p_jumpers.html[/ QUOTE]

ummmmm......according to the maxtor article, a ide cable is also known as a parallel cable......

is a parallel cable not the one you use to hook up a printer???

I for one have never heard a ide cable referred to as a parallel cable before I read maxtor's whitepaper on the subject.



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She may have only been a prostitute, but she had the prettiest face I ever came across

[carrienscott]

<font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, Verdana, Geneva, Arial" size="2">ummmmm......according to the maxtor article, a ide cable is also known as a parallel cable......

is a parallel cable not the one you use to hook up a printer???
</font>

I think they just meant it is parallel communication. The drives use more than one of the 40 wire to talk to eaach other and the system. That's were the parallel part come in.


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