depending on the drive, you have to use the Ontrack Drive Manager that comes with it or you can download from the website. Maxtor, Segate, etc...
The thing about the Drive Manager that comes with the drives is that if you have a ATA100 and use the Drive Manager to set it up. You do not have any problems with getting the fastest transfer rates out of the drive and across the bus. If you use the driave management in WIndows (you name it) you do not always get the peak performance.
ATA66 ATA100 and ATA133 should pretty much be setup with the drives software that comes with it.
The bus driver can make some difference also, such as the VIA 1in4 drivers. My ASUS motherboard allows me to install 8 ATA100 drives on the motherboard and then use expansion cards for more if I needed them. RAID is something to consider if your motherboard is ready for it out of the box, it also makes a difference.
anyway... just an FYI...
Here is the link to TechRepublics website, from there you can find some good links to performance sites and such.
Also stay ontop of industry dirt and tweaks for just about all Microsoft applications and OS-es and many others.
http://www.techrepublic.com