pctechguide.com

  • Home
  • Guides
  • Tutorials
  • Articles
  • Reviews
  • Glossary
  • Contact

IDE Interfaces

One of the earliest and most significant standards introduced into PC hardware was IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics), a standard which controls the flow of data between the processor and the hard disk. The IDE concept was initially proposed by Western Digital and Compaq in 1986 to overcome the performance limitations of earlier subsystem standards like ST506 and ESDI. The term IDE itself is not an actual hardware standard, but the proposals were incorporated into an industry-agreed interface specification known as ATA (AT Attachment). The parallel ATA standard evolved from the original IBM Advanced Technology (AT) interface and defines a command and register set for the interface, creating a universal standard for communication between the drive unit and the PC.

One of the major innovations introduced by IDE was the integration of the disk controller functions onto the disk drive itself. The separation of the controller logic from the interface made it possible for drive manufacturers to enhance the performance of their drives independently – there were no performance-boosting features incorporated into the ATA interface itself. IDE drives connect straight to the system bus with no need for a separate controller on the bus, thereby reducing overall cost.

IDE

The mass acceptance of the IDE standard hinged on its ability to serve the needs of the market in terms of two important criteria: cost and compatibility. Over the years, these two factors have been more significant to mainstream PC users than high performance and as a result IDE rapidly became established as a mass market standard.

Since the implementation of the ATA standard, the PC has changed dramatically. The IDE specification was designed to support two internal hard disks, each with a maximum capacity of 528MB, and in 1986 this upper limitation seemed to be beyond all imaginable requirements for PC users. But within ten years, faster processors and new local bus technology (VLB and PCI) were introduced, and this combined with increasingly demanding software made the IDE interface into a performance bottleneck.

  • What Is The System Bus?
  • ISA Bus – Industry Standard Architecture
  • Local Bus Interfaces
  • PCI Bus Interfaces
  • What is AGP and AGP Pro?
  • Internal Interfaces Summary
  • PCI-X Interfaces
  • PCI Express Interfaces
  • IDE Interfaces
  • EIDE Interfaces
  • Hard Disks – What IS ATA and Ultra ATA?
  • Serial ATA (SATA) interface guide
  • SCSI Explained – With Pictures
  • SCSI Interface Evolution
  • Fibre Channel Interfaces
  • Hard Disks – What is Serial Storage Architecture?
  • I/O Interface Standards
  • How It Works: The Idea and Technology Behind USB
  • IEEE 1394 Interfaces
  • USB 2.0 Intefaces
  • FireWire 800 Interfaces

Share this:

  • Click to share on Twitter (Opens in new window)
  • Click to share on Facebook (Opens in new window)

Related

Filed Under: Interfaces

Latest Articles

Midi Sound Cards

The Musical Instrument Digital Interface, or MIDI, has been around since the early 1980s. It was developed to provide a standard way of interfacing music controllers such as keyboards to sound generators like synthesisers and drum machines. As … [Read More...]

How To Power Search With Google

When most people think of using a search engine, the name "Google" is usually synonymous with getting the most relevant results. There are other search engines available, but Google still holds the lion's share of the market. There are also ways to craft a particular search to really narrow down the … [Read More...]

The Galaxy Tab 3 Lite

  Best Viewing Experience To give you a maximum entertainment, Tab 3 Lite designed a high resolution screen. This means sharper text, brighter images, no status bar that would block the view, and wide viewing space that can make it a delight to use and watch. Light and Slim … [Read More...]

Artificial Intelligence is Shaping the Solar Energy Field

The global market for solar power is expected to be worth $194.75 billion by 2027. As demand for solar energy solutions rises, solar product … [Read More...]

9 More Great Microsoft Word Hacks to Boost Productivity

We mentioned a few great Microsoft Word hacks in our last post. We wanted to follow up and share some more that can help improve productivity. … [Read More...]

7 Great Microsoft Word Hacks to Bolster Productivity

Today we are going to show you 24 Word tricks to get the most out of this text editor. Although there are many alternatives, Word is still the tool … [Read More...]

The Growing Importance of AI in Forestry Preservation

Artificial Intelligence as a key to environmental and forest industry preservation There are different types of Artificial Intelligence. On the one … [Read More...]

Machine Learning: the Future of the Hotel Industry

Do you operate a hotel chain and want to calculate budgets automatically? Does your hotel need to predict next week's purchase orders or how many … [Read More...]

5 Pieces of Technology to Boost Your Business in 2021

Let’s face it; running a business is not usually easy. Whether you are self-employed and running your own one-person operation or employing many … [Read More...]

Guides

  • Computer Communications
  • Mobile Computing
  • PC Components
  • PC Data Storage
  • PC Input-Output
  • PC Multimedia
  • Processors (CPUs)

Recent Posts

ActiveMovie Technology

ActiveMovie, a Microsoft API that was announced in March 1996, is receiving wide support in the computer industry as "the … [Read More...]

Motherboard USB Ports

Many modern-day motherboards provide a number of USB pin headers that allow connection to USB ports mounted on the front of the system case. A header … [Read More...]

Tape Storage Compatibility

In its early days, some MO disks were proprietary. Nowadays both the 3.5in and 5.25in disk types are governed by ISO … [Read More...]

[footer_backtotop]

Copyright © 2021 About | Privacy | Contact Information | Wrtie For Us | Disclaimer | Copyright License | Authors