A+ All-In-One question and Answer Anomaly

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Hi,

I'm reading Mike Meyers' A+ All-In-One certification book (6th Ed) and I think I've come across a mistake but I'm not sure. Can anyone confirm?

In Chapter 9 'Hard Drive Technologies' in the question and answer section, question 5 asks; 'John has purchased an ATA/66-capable hard drive for his ATA/66-capable system. However, he notices that he forgot to get the special 80-wire cable. If he installs the ATA/66 drive with a 40-pin EIDE cable what will happen?'

Firstly, in the question the cable is referred to as an '80-wire' and a '40-pin' cable. As far as I know both 40 and 80 wire cables have 40 pins so asking what will happen if a 40 pin cable is used is irrelevant.

Secondly, the answer states; '5. A. ATA/66 drive will work fine with a 40 pin cable - they just won't run at ATA/66 speed. However, on page 314, paragraph 1 it is stated that '... the only risky action is to use an ATA/66 controller and hard drive with a non ATA/66 cable. Doing so will almost certainly result in nasty data losses!'

Either way, it's confusing and I'm not sure what the actual answer should be or whether a 40 or 80 wire cable is being referred to in the question.

The 7th Ed of the book changes the question to ATA/100 and the answer is basically the same.

 

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The hard drive would still work but fall Back to ATA 33 speeds 33mb/s due to noise.

http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/printpage/Everything-you-Need-to-Know-About-ATA-66-ATA-100-and-ATA-133-Hard-Disks/45

 

Thats is a great article, thanks for linking it!

 

there are few mistakes as there are in most books, I dont think I have read one yet that is 100% accurate.

Mike Myeres has an eratta page which addresses the mistakes in his book and believe me there are more than one in 6th edition. This probably isn't down to the author but down to whoeve ghost writes the book or editing person.

If I remember correctly. There is a mistake in speed of ram table which is very obvious and one in the cpu section which is obvious too.

Why are you studying the 6th edition by the way? you do know that the 601 & 602 have been retired.