Anyone enabled NCQ on a Hitachi Deskstar 250GB SATA-II?

keyser · 11 May 2006 at 19:33

I'd like to know how you got on and if there's much point is using NCQ at all..

I'm pleased with the drive.. I'll be even happier if they never break

(I've bought another for backups and transfering all my music to lossless!)

On a side note.. I think I installed the SATA / IDE controller drivers that came with nForce4 Ultra.. even though at the time they said they're not certified. I seem to recall reading that this wasn't recommended(?) If I update the SATA driver through device manager, would this fix any issues I may have/get?

Dutch Guy · 12 May 2006 at 14:40

I just enabled it on my RAID-0 array of two 250Gb T7K250 drives but have no idea if it is faster or not.

I also installed the nForce4 drivers, again without issues.

charlievarley · 12 May 2006 at 21:25

raid 0 on ide is a risk in my eyes

if you loose a drive you loose all ya data all 500 gigs

raid 5 is a better option if you can afford the extra drive

GeezerButler · 12 May 2006 at 22:39

I tried it out on my RAID-0 array (2xDeskstar 250GB) on my Abit AT-8 (ATI Crossfire with ULi 1575 controller). Made no real difference to HD-Tach benchmarks and found load times on Far Cry were longer with NCQ on.

I think NCQ has a bigger impact in multi-tasking environments and server applications and in those environments having a larger number of drives in the array would help as well.

Have you found any imporvements DutchGuy?

keyser · 12 May 2006 at 23:06

ok thanks, i might use it, haven't decided yet. a few months ago I only had 16gb.. now I've got x2 250gb! I guess I should be happy with that

keyser · 17 May 2006 at 13:57

I enabled SATA2 using the feature tool, however I've no idea how I enable NCQ, even to try it out. I can't see an option in the SATA controller in device manager for NCQ - everything is greyed out anyway. Could someone point me in the right direction please?

Should I perhaps reinstall nForce drivers?