Configuring your Hard Disk Drive (Master, Slave, or Cable Select) – Setting the Jumper
- If this is the only HDD in your computer, set the pin setting to Master.
- If this is the second HDD in your computer, set the pin setting to Slave.
- If this is the second HDD in your computer, and the first drive is set to Cable Select, set the pin setting to Cable Select.
What do the hard drive jumper settings mean?
Each hard drive setting is used by the Computer's BIOS to tell the system where the hard drive is located and what priority it has in relation to the other drives. Most hard drives and computers that were manufactured after 2002 probably do not need to have the hard drive jumper settings changed - this includes all SATA drives.
How do I set the hard disk jumper to master?
Set the hard disk jumper as Cable Select or Single. Connect the drive using the Master connector on the primary IDE cable. Set the first CD/DVD drive jumper to Master (alternatively, Cable Select can be used if you set the second CD/DVD drive selection to Cable Select). Connect the drive using the Master connector on the secondary IDE cable.
What is a jumper in a computer?
What is a Jumper? Jumpers allow the computer to close an electrical circuit, allowing the electricity to flow on a circuit board and perform a function. Jumpers consist of small pins that can be covered with a small plastic box ( jumper block ), as shown in the illustration.
What is a jumper on an ATA hard drive?
As shown in the picture, ATA hard drives have jumpers with three sets of two pins. Moving a jumper between two pins changes the drive from primary drive, secondary drive, or cable select. Some documentation may refer to setting the jumpers to on, off, closed, or open.
What is a jumper setting?
In electronics and particularly computing, a jumper is a short length of conductor used to close, open or bypass part of an electronic circuit. They are typically used to set up or configure printed circuit boards, such as the motherboards of computers. The process of setting a jumper is often called strapping.
What is the jumper and why you need it?
Answer. In a computer, a jumper is a pair of prongs that are electrical contact points set into the computer motherboard or an adapter card . When you set a jumper, you place a plug on the prongs that completes a contact. In effect, the jumper acts as a switch by closing (or opening) an electrical circuit.Apr 25, 2019
What does a jumper look like?
A jumper is a long-sleeved item worn on the top half of your body, and like a sweater, is usually considered knitted or crocheted, but also seen made of jersey fabric or cotton too. Jumpers and sweaters can usually be dressed up or down, depending on the fabric and style of the design.
What is a jumper cable?
A jump wire (also known as jumper, jumper wire, DuPont wire) is an electrical wire, or group of them in a cable, with a connector or pin at each end (or sometimes without them – simply "tinned"), which is normally used to interconnect the components of a breadboard or other prototype or test circuit, internally or with ...
What do the jumper pins on the back of a hard drive do?
These pins are called jumpers, and are used to enable specific types of settings. They’re not used so much with modern hard drives, except in some special circumstances. If you’re under a certain age, ...
How do jumper pins work?
The jumper pins are similar to the pins on the I/O plate on a motherboard. You enable particular settings by placing a jumper shunt onto specific pins—creating an electrical circuit between them. The settings these jumpers enable are hard-coded onto a drive’s programmed printed circuit board. So what do jumpers do?
Do most drives have jumpers?
Well, most drives don’t have them at all. On those that do, they enable a few specialized settings. Exactly what the pins do depends on your drive and its manufacturer. For example, Western Digital’s full-sized SATA hard drives let you use jumpers to set the following parameters:
Can you ignore jumper pins on a SATa hard drive?
Western Digital’s instructions for jumper pin settings on some SATA hard drives. Unless you have need of those specialty settings, you can safely ignore the jumper pins on your drive. It will work fine without them on pretty much any computer made in the last ten years.
What is a jumper in a computer?
Jumper. Jumpers allow the computer to close an electrical circuit, allowing the electricity to flow on a circuit board and perform a function. Jumpers consist of small pins that can be covered with a small plastic box ( jumper block ), as shown in the illustration. Below the illustration is a picture of what jumpers may look like on your ...
What is a jumper shunt?
Tip. A jumper may also be referred to as a jumper shunt or shunt. Jumpers manually configure computer peripherals, such as the motherboard, hard drives, modems, sound cards, and other components. For example, if your motherboard supported intrusion detection, a jumper can be set to enable or disable this feature.
Is a jumper on or off?
Some documentation may refer to setting the jumpers to on, off, closed, or open. When a jumper is on, or covering at least two pins, it is a closed jumper. When a jumper is off, covering only one pin or the pins have no jumper, it's an open jumper. Caution. When changing the jumpers on any device, the device and your computer needs to be turned off.
Where are the jumpers on a CD drive?
The jumpers for hard disk (s) and CD/DVD drives are located on the back of the drive. The jumper is a small metal slider covered by a rectangular piece of plastic. Jumpers for hard drives are designed to slide over and connect the two metal pins together so that electricity can flow between them.
Can you use CS on a second hard drive?
If Cable Select (CS) is used on the first device, then the second device on the same cable must also use CS. Set the first hard disk jumper to Master (Cable Select can be used if you set the second hard drive selection to Cable Select). Connect the drive using the Master connector on the primary IDE cable.
What are the two drives on a cable called?
The two drives on the cable are called "master" and "slave.". You want your existing hard drive (which contains the operating system and all of your current data) to be the " master" and the new hard drive to be the "slave.".
Do you need to set jumpers for master and slave?
The drive should have instructions on them that tell you how to set the jumpers for master and slave. So read the instructions and set the jumpers. If you are using SATA drives, you do not need to set jumpers for master and slave because each drive gets its own cable.
