[G4] SATA vs. ATA (was posting,please?)

[Alex]

On Tuesday, May 4, 2004, at 20:55 Canada/Eastern, Al Poulin wrote:

> [...] please describe the differences between SATA and ATA.

ATA implemented over a serial (rather than parallel) interface.

See the following links (roughly, in increasing order of complexity)

<http://www.computerworld.com/hardwaretopics/storage/story/ 
0,10801,79769,00.html>
<http://www.seagate.com/newsinfo/technology/sata/faq/index.html>
<http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/device/storage/serialATA_FAQ.mspx>
<http://www.smithdot.net/ 
display.php?category=hardware&article=intro_serialata.txt>

I'm sure you'll find plenty more if you google it.

> Can SATA drives run in Macs built for ATA?

By adding a SATA card.

> If I want to upgrade hard drives in my QuickSilver G4 733 in a couple  
> years, will I need to install a new PCI card?

A couple of years? I couldn't tell you what things are going to be like  
in 6 months, much less in a couple of years. I suspect that parallel  
ATA drives will still be available, because there is a huge installed  
base for them. As a rule, I'm skeptical about the benefits of upgrading  
computers older than 4 to 5 years; better to invest into a more  
powerful new machine.

f