Windows 7: A Comment on SATA connectors...

For about the third time in a year I've had various, hard to diagnose problems that turned out to be related to SATA connectors. The slightest bit of dust or corrosion creeping into these 7-pin connectors can cause inconsistent problems that may take days to figure out.

Don't get me wrong - SATA is a great improvement over the old IDE technology - much faster. BUT the SATA connectors - compared to IDE - are cheaply made. They will still wobble somewhat - even after being completely plugged in. This was not so with the IDE connectors - they wouldn't budge once connected.

Whoever designed the SATA plug must be a computer repair tech!

Anyone else had issues with SATA connectors - or is it just me?

As of yet I have not experienced one bad sata plug/chord.

I have replaced more ide cables over the years than I can count.

your not alone buddy!
each time i did a wire tuck, the sata cable for my hdd came out, and i had to pull out cables to get to it.
buy a few sata cables with metal clips that hold them in, you wont regret spending the 20-30 bucks mate.

There have been several threads here at SF that have turned out to have bad / defective SATA cables. Plus the plastic support for the 7 pins is fragile. See the bottom HD in this pic. #2

Must be you. I have 9 drives in my machine and not one issue with SATA cables or connections on the drives, and I sometimes have to shove my hand in the tiny space between the drives to get to the connections and have fears that I may one day snap a connector or two.
old, pic with only 8 drives,

Never a problem here. In my current build I made sure I used cables with the clip in the connectors.

Thanks for all the replies. I agree - the ones with the metal clips are better. I should have mentioned that. The ones that were problematic had no metal clips.

Zepher - ONLY 8 drives - is that all?

Ya, controller cards are kinda pricey.
I have all 9 onboard SATA ports used and the IDE port.

SATA connectors are much better as compared to the IDE tech. Always use good SATA cables which has Silver Lockable Clips on both ends they lock and wont budge unless you press the button and about the dust thing we all have to keep our PC clean once in 3 months at least.

I have been having problems with SATA drives connected to my Asus P6T Deluxe V2 motherboard where I loose my D Drive every 2 or 3 months. At first, I thought it was because I used the cheap cables that came with the motherboard.

I installed more expensive cables and the problem still persisted. Next, I purchased the real good cables that have the Silver Lockable Clips on both ends, the problem persisted and I lost D Drive after a couple months. This time I thought the only thing that could be wrong was that I had a bad hard drive, so I purchased a new larger hard drive to replace the original. Two months later, I loose my D Drive again. At this point, I am lost and don't know why this is happening. Does anyone have a suggestion as to why this is happening and how I can fix it so it doesn't happen again? I built identical PC's for my wife and I, but my wifes PC has only had the problem once, where I have had it happen 5 times on my PC. Any help is appreciated.

Note: The BIOS settings are ok, but the hard drive is not visible on the on screen post messages.