Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
Although SATA didn't immediately replace PATA, most systems sold following SATA's
standardization included SATA interfaces alongside PATA interfaces. Over time, SATA has
predominantly replaced PATA as the de facto standard internal storage device interface found in PCs,
and most current systems lack PATA support. However, some motherboards and devices with PATA
support are still available, and where repairs are considered they will likely remain available at a
minimum level for some time.
SATA Standards and Performance
Development for SATA started when the Serial ATA Working Group effort was announced at the
Intel Developer Forum in February 2000. The initial members of the Serial ATA Working Group
included APT Technologies, Dell, IBM, Intel, Maxtor, Quantum, and Seagate. The original group
later became known as the Serial ATA II Working Group, and finally in July 2004, it became the
Serial ATA International Organization. These groups have released the following SATA
specifications:
• The first SATA 1.0 draft specification was released in November 2000 and was officially
published as a final specification in August 2001.
• The first SATA II Working Group extensions to this specification, which made SATA suitable
for network storage, were released in October 2002.
• SATA Revision 2 was released in April 2004. It added the 3Gbps (300MBps) signaling speed.
• SATA Revision 2.5 was released in August 2005. It added Native Command Queuing (NCQ),
staggered spin-up, hot plug, port multiplier, and eSATA support.
• SATA Revision 2.6 was released in March 2007. It added new internal Slimline and Micro
cables and connectors as well as modifications to NCQ.
• SATA Revision 3.0 was released in 2009. It added the 6Gbps (600MBps) signaling speed.
• SATA Revision 3.1 was released in 2011. It added improvements in power management,
hardware control, and a Queued Trim Command for improving SSD performance.
• SATA Revision 3.2 was released in 2013. It adds a new interface called SATA Express,
which uses SATA commands over a PCIe hardware interface for transfer speeds up to 16Gbps.
You can download the specifications from the Serial ATA International Organization website at
www.serialata.org
.
Since forming, the group has grown to include more than 200 contributor and
adopter companies from all areas of industry.
Systems using SATA were released in late 2002 using discrete PCI interface boards and chips.
SATA was integrated directly into motherboard chipsets in April 2003 with the introduction of the
Intel ICH5 chipset component. Since then, virtually all new motherboard chipsets have included
SATA.
The performance of SATA is impressive, although current hard drive designs can't fully take
advantage of its bandwidth. Solid State Drives (SSDs), on the other hand, can and do take advantage
of all of the bandwidth that SATA has to offer and are the driving force for the introduction of even
higher bandwidth standards. Three main variations of the original standard use the same cables and
connectors; they differ only in transfer rate performance. SATA Express, in contrast, uses new cables
and connectors for dramatically increased throughput.
Table 7.9
shows the bandwidth specifications;
devices supporting the second-generation 300MBps (3Gbps) version became available in 2005, and
devices supporting the third-generation 600MBps (6Gbps) versions became available in 2011.
