SATA Connections

[mbaldw]

Hi folks,

does anyone know whether there are any problems associated with connecting a SATA II hard drive to a SATA I motherboard socket?   I was under the impression that they were backward/forward compatible, but having looked on a couple of websites it seems that they sell SATA I - SATA II cables.   Would I need one of these, or could I just hook the new drive up with a standard SATA II cable?

Cheers,
Marc.

[Buffalo2102]

They are backward compatible, although with some SATA II drives you need to set a jumper to tell them to run at SATA I.  There is no difference in the cables AFAIK.  I suspect the cables you have seen are part of some marketing ploy, much like the expensive, "high quality" HDMI cables you can buy, when a bog-standard cheap cable will do the job just as well (unless you are running long distances).

[mbaldw]

Great - thanks Buffalo.

Cheers,
Marc.