IDE trouble

[Vonshudo]

My motherboard only has 1 ide connector and both my optical drive and hdd use only ide cables. So I don't know how to connect both to the motherboard.

Motherboard: GIGABYTE GA-P35-DS3R LGA 775 Intel P35 ATX Intel Motherboard - Retail
drive: LITE-ON Black 20X DVD+R 8X DVD+RW 8X DVD+R DL 20X DVD-R 6X DVD-RW 12X DVD-RAM 16X DVD-ROM 48X CD-R 32X CD-RW 48X CD-ROM 2MB Cache IDE 20X DVD±R DVD Burner - OEM
hdd: Seagate Barracuda 7200.10 ST3320820A 320GB 7200 RPM 8MB Cache IDE Ultra ATA100 Hard Drive - OEM

[900RR]

do you have an IDE cable with 2 plugs? if so put the HDD at the end plug and set the HDD to master and optical to slave. It might slow down your HDD though, you might be better off buying an SATA HDD


here's an IDE cable, the bottom plug goes to mobo, and the top two go to hdd and dvd, hdd at the end

[Vonshudo]

alright well the way my case is set up, there is no way to connect the end to the hdd and the middle to the optical drive. The only way of connecting both is if the optical drive is connected to the end and the hdd is connected to the middle one. So is there anyway to switch the roles of the end and middle connectors from slave and master? If not I guess ill just buy a SATA optical drive... Thanks

[Nitestick]

you can put the optical drive on the end it's just not something a "textbook technician" would do. supposedly there are issues that can arise from having them the other way around but i have never encountered any. in fact if i remember correctly i currently have mine backwards on my home pc (not at home right now). the only issue you would realistically have was if you were trying to use the cable select feature.