Toys arrived - technical help sought

[ciphergoth]

Toys that arrived today:

- Pocket DV cam and 512 Mb flash card (only a toy video camera but will still be fun)
- USB 4-port hub (I was running out of ports)
- DVD +- rewriter (good for backups and for making my own DVDs)
- 120 GB SATA hard drive

(This on top of toys that arrived the other day, viz two DDR mats and PS2 - USB adapter)

The hard drive does not have the connectors I'm used to. I thought that SATA was like any other upgrade to the IDE standard, where the connectors stay the same and the drive and controller talk the best protocol that they both know. Now I have no idea how to plug my new hard drive in, or even how to give it power. Anyone know the story?

Comments

[skx.livejournal.com]

Sata is a new kind of drive interface serial based.

If you want to use it then ideally you'll have a motherboard with the correct sata port on it, or an PCI expansion card which will do the same thing. (Also you'll need the cabling to string the two together).

Sata card and cable costs around 15 quid; A quick google search landed this one from Dabs - you might be better off buying one local though...

[ciphergoth.livejournal.com]

Balls.

So is this the excuse I've been waiting for to buy myself more computer? And if so, should I just go mad and buy a case, video card etc rather than taking the old machine apart?

[lovingboth]

Depends on the spec of the one you've got at the moment, really, as well as what you want to do on it.