Second drive w/Cakewalk--How to...?

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UtahBites

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Greetings,

I was hoping to draw on the kick @$$ experience of this site, as I’m having some problems effectively setting up a second IDE drive to work efficiently (with Cakewalk 9, anyway).
Win 98se is installed on my C: drive, as is Cakewalk. I am using CW exclusively for mixing (importing 44.1khz wav files from a vs1680) and some of our songs have up 40 tracks PER SONG, so the more tracks I can play, the better! I bought a 40GB Ibm drive (7200 rpm) thinking that it would improve efficiency, since it would not be utilized by anything except CW9. (side note: unfortunately, my BIOS limits the effective drive size to 33 GB, but that’s another issue IBM’s website and utilities were unable to resolve, and I don’t DARE to Flash my BIOS, as I’ve never tried that before!!)
I’ve tried to change all the “temp” files directory in Cakewalk to the D: drive, but can’t get anywhere near as many tracks to playback as I can on the C: drive (?). I suspect the BIOS issue as the problem area, but yet…I am able to copy/paste/swap files between drives in other programs PLUS, I’ve ran some diagnostic software to compare both drives' performances, and can’t see any red flags.
…So how are YOUR dual IDE drives configured w/Cakewalk??
Would I benefit to install Cakewalk on the d: drive, instead of c:?

Thanks to all…I trust in you more than the computer places around here to help me out w/this!

FWIW, Here is my setup:
Duron 700mhz (not overclocked)
Epox 8kta2 (via kt133) award 4.5 BIOS (ata100)
3 x 128MB RAM (pc133)
Win98se
WD 20GB primary c: drive on IDE 1 (ata 100, 7200 rpm)
IBM 40GB secondary d: drive on IDE 1 (ata 100, IDE, 7200 rpm)
CD-rom, primary on IDE 2
CD-burner secondary on IDE2
Soundblaster 128 PCI
Geforce2mx video (32 mb)

PS …With my i/o setting at 512, I can play up to 15 tracks simultaneously…and at 1024, can playback around 25 tracks…so far. Does anyone have a setting HIGHER than 1024?!?? :eek:

Thanks in Advance!!!!
 
In general you want everything to be on your C: drive except your wave files.

Therefore, the only directory that should point to your D: drive is the Cakewalk data directory (Options -> Audio -> Advanced).

Also, look to see that you have DMA enabled on your D: drive.

Also your configuration is incorrect. You want to configure the HDD's as the masters on your IDE controllers. So your config should be something like:

IDE1 --- C: = master; CD-RW = slave
IDE2 --- D: = master; CD-ROM = slave

Lastly, make sure you are using an 80 ribbon cable (ATA66/100) to connect your HDD's.

Try some of the above and let us know if you're still having problems.
 
Thanks VERY much for your help Dach...I will definitely try that IDE master/slave configuration tonight!
The DMA settings I know are fine, as well as the new ata cable I bought specifically for the ata 100 drives.
Anyway...thanks again.
UB
 
Did you have any luck with that? I have a similar problem. My D drive is a 7200 fireball. When i set it up as my data drive anything I record has pops and clicks. If I use my old 5400 C: as the data drive - no problems.
 
Actually Waysid, I never did set up my secondary D: drive as the master.

I still have it as the slave to the C: drive on IDE 1.
The reason is that I haven't been able to find cable(s) that will reach and allow me to do that...and I'm just too damned chicken to flash my BIOS and upgrade it to resolve my 40GB issue with Award 4.5... :o

What I do is use the D: drive only to store all my .bun files (before backing them up to CDR). I have my CW9 temp directories set up on my C: drive which prevents any real problems with data transfer issues for my secondary drive.

I erase my .wrk files AND temp files after each use (I only work on a couple songs at a time) and then I defragment overnight so it's all sparkly clean for next use.
So far *knocking on wood* I've had no problems...in fact, I have actually mixed smaller songs (10-15 tracks playback of 44.1khz wavs) with the temp files on my D: drive with no problems...but I don't push my luck too often just to be safe.
best o' luck.

ub
 
Yeah I am going to have to do something similar to what you are doing. I am starting to think my new Fireball 7200 might actually be defective, but I don't really want to gamble and buy another drive.

Thanks for the info
Chris
 
pops/clicks...?

Chris...If you're getting pops/clicks, it may be a number of issues...I'd first check my CW9 i/o settings, as well as the IDE cables. Also, I'm not familiar w/Maxtor drives...but it seems to me that there was a reason I bought IBM over the Maxtor--performance/reliability wise...say, don't they have at least a 1 or 3 year manufact. warranty on those things???

What kind of soundcard/OS are you using?
Is it an ATA-33/66/100 drive?--Are your DMA settings correct?
What about your bios--I know mine is outdated and caused a problem. I had to go to IBM's website and find a workaround in lieu of flash upgrading for my 40GB drive to recognize over 33GB. The data transfer issue will never be truly resolved for me until I work up enough gonads to flash upgrade the BIOS...but, it might be a cold, dark day in hell (errr, I mean Utah) before THAT happens!
 
I have an IBM 10Gig and a Maxstor 20Gig hard drive, both are 7200rpm and I have had no problem. Win 98, PII 400MHz, 760Meg Ram.

But I have read somewhere in a post that there can be problems mixing two speeds of hard drive?
 
problems with second drive

I have narrowed down my problems considerably.

I am using Win 98 on a PIII733 with 256mb. Both of my drives are now on a Promise ATA100 disk controller.

dskbench is reporting read/write speeds of ~20mb/s on my 5400 ATA66 drive (C) and read/write speeds of ~32mb/s on my 7200 ATA 100 Fireball AS (D)

All my software is on C all my audio goes to D. I have now found that regardless of program (SONAR, GuitarStudio2, SoundForge)...if I record a wav to the C drive it works fine...if I record to the D drive the wav has pops, crackles and clicks.

I am basically out of ideas....I could understand if the transfer rates on the D drive were crap. One last interesting note is that if I enable write caching in SONAR, the problem improves somewhat.....does this give anyone any clues.

Chris
 
One more thing:

The promise ATA 100 has two IDE channels. I am now running my 5400 and CDrom on one and the 7200 on the other. Previously I was running the 5400 and CDrom on my mobo disk controller and the 7200 on the promise and had the same problems.

One nice little side effect of this is that when I moved the 5400 to the promise controller, the read/write rates for it improved.
 
Chris,

I have no experience with the Promise cards (sorry).

Certainly strange, indeed. I suppose that if it isn't the Win98 DMA issue (Note: if all else fails, always blame Bill Gates) it could be a limitation with your motherboard/BIOS...Have you tried upgrading ALL of your drivers for sound/video/mobo/etc?
(I ask because I resolved a playback issue in CW9 after upgrading my video driver).
Yup, I said video driver.

Seems to be safe, you may be limited to saving your bun files on the D:, using the C: for your temp files and then backing up your work elsewhere so you can sleep at night...?

hmm...

:confused:
 
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