Viewing IDE Device Information
IDE Tool displays one interface tab for each IDE device on your system, as seen in .
To view the settings for a particular IDE device, select the corresponding tab.
 | IDE Device Names |
|---|---|
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IDE devices are generally identified as hda(master on the primary IDE controller), hdb(slave on the primary IDE controller), hdc(master on the second IDE controller), and hdd(slave on the second IDE controller). (There may be more, following the same naming convention, on computers with more than two IDE controllers, although this is uncommon.) |
For each device, the following information is displayed:
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Model This is the device model. It typically reveals the manufacturer and model number of the device. Devices other than hard drives are typically labelled as such (eg. "TOSHIBA DVD-ROM SD-M1212" or "HP CD-Writer+ 7100").
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Firmware This is the version number of the firmware on the device. Most people will not need to know which firmware version they are running.
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Serial No. This is the serial number of the device. This may be useful for warranty purposes or for technical support.
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Geometry (Only for hard drives.) This displays the number of cylinders, heads, and sectors on the device.
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Cache This is the amount of cache on the device.
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Status This shows the power mode status, which can be unknown, Active/Idle, standby, or sleeping.
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DMA Mode This shows whether DMA is Enabled or Disabled.
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IO Mode This shows whether your I/O mode is set to 16-bit or 32-bit.
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IRQ Unmask This shows whether the drive is allowed to unmask other interrupts.
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Multisector This shows whether the drive is allowed to send data from multiple sectors per interrupt.
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On Reset This shows whether the drive preserves some settings (DMA Mode, Multisector, and IRQ Unmask) when the drive is soft-reset.