HomePage 4 of 7: How to check your DMA status & reset it if necessary
After left clicking "Properties", this screen will come up with 5 tabs at the top (red). (Screen Shot Below)
Go ahead and click the "Advanced Settings" tab (blue). On this screen it will show you what "Transfer Mode" (red) its currently in, you want it to say "DMA if available". ***Just because it says "DMA if available", doesn't mean the drive is in DMA mode!*** It also shows what the "Current Transfer Mode" is (green). The "Current Transfer Mode" is what you are going to look at %99.9 of the time. You never want it to say "PIO Mode"! The higher the mode #, the faster it goes. Ultra DMA Mode 5 is faster than Ultra DMA Mode 4 and so on. Ultra DMA Mode 5 is the fastest mode you can achieve for the hard drives. (Screen Shot Below)
It also tells you how the drives are configured with the IDE cables. Example, "Device 0" (purple) means that the drive is set at the "Master" position and "Device 1" (yellow) means that the drive is set at the "Slave" position.
Go ahead and click the "Advanced Settings" tab (blue). On this screen it will show you what "Transfer Mode" (red) its currently in, you want it to say "DMA if available". ***Just because it says "DMA if available", doesn't mean the drive is in DMA mode!*** It also shows what the "Current Transfer Mode" is (green). The "Current Transfer Mode" is what you are going to look at %99.9 of the time. You never want it to say "PIO Mode"! The higher the mode #, the faster it goes. Ultra DMA Mode 5 is faster than Ultra DMA Mode 4 and so on. Ultra DMA Mode 5 is the fastest mode you can achieve for the hard drives. (Screen Shot Below)
It also tells you how the drives are configured with the IDE cables. Example, "Device 0" (purple) means that the drive is set at the "Master" position and "Device 1" (yellow) means that the drive is set at the "Slave" position.
