Information on Ribbon Cables on Hard Drives

IDE ribbon cable close-up.

Ribbon cables on hard drives are integrated device electronics cables, or just IDE cables for short. They are a flat 80- or 40-pin cable, often gray in color with a red stripe to mark the first pin.

Function

Ribbon cables are used to transfer data from a hard drive to a computer's motherboard and back again. One end connects to the port on a hard drive, as can the connector in the middle of the cable, and the other end connects to the IDE slot on a motherboard.

Identification

40-pin cables and 80-pin cables are the same size with the same connector, but they differ in the number of pins (and wires) that are present in the cable. 80-pin IDE cables are faster and more current than 40-pin cables. You can easily differentiate between the two by counting the number of wires on the cable.

Considerations

It is important to install a ribbon cable correctly. Newer versions will likely have a blank pin and a groove to guide the connection so that mistakes cannot be made. Older versions, however, require that you line the first pin up properly.

Potential

The overall potential speed of a hard drive attached via ribbon cables will be dependent upon the type of the ribbon cable used (40-pin or 80-pin) and the number of devices on each ribbon cable (two maximum).

References

• Mike's Hardware: Connecting IDE Hard Drives
• The PC Guide: Installing the Hard Drive IDE Cable