IDE

insignia33

OK can someone explain this to me real simply.

What is the difference between IDE and ATA

The lecturer says basically IDE was developed by western digital and they wouldnt share, so other harddrive companies got together copied the idea and made their own version: ATA.

And thats (kinda) backed up by this guy here:

http://www.duxcw.com/digest/guides/hd/hd3.htm


but of course, wikipedia has something else to say

The ATA interface itself evolved in several stages from Western Digital's original Integrated Drive Electronics

OK I know 'evolved' could be a nice way of saying "other companies saw the idea, they couldnt use it, so they created their own better version", but I somehow doubt thats what it means.

and then we have kioskea which says

Despite the official name "ATA", this standard is better known by the commercial term IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics)

And that just completely throws a spanner in the works.

I dont know.

Can someone who actually does know break this down and explain real simply how and where IDE and ATA came from and what the differences are.

Im just not getting this at all

wil

Afaik ATA was essentially the cable link, whereas IDE covers the whole disk controller interface.
They are nowadays pretty much interchangable synonyms for the cable interface, as the IDE controller is onboard the disk drive.
You need a IDE or ATA ribbon cable to connect. Same thing
ATA was rechristened PATA when Serial ATA was developed.

ATAPI is a protocol that allowed SCSI commands to be used over ATA interface and is incorporated in ATA and used by PATA CDroms etc and designated as ATAPI/ATA, so now CDROMS and DVDROMS could be connected using the same ATA cable

So today you have the newer SATA (serial ATA) interface or older parallel ATA PATA/ATA/EIDE/IDE/ATAPI-cdrom interface

Allyall

http://www.pcmag.com/encyclopedia/term/50811/sata

IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics) was the original name, then they standardized on ATA (Advanced Technology Attachment) as being a broader standard that included additions like CD-ROMs and such. When SATA ( Serial ATA ) came out, people started using PATA (Parallel ATA) to refer to the older parallel connected bus (those using ribbon cable), to be more specific than the term ATA, which can refer to either. Both are part of the ATA standard, and use the same logical command sets, but SATA obviously has a different electrical interface. Both types of drives (SATA and PATA) are IDE devices.

SATA, PATA and IDE
SATA is the faster serial version of the original parallel ATA (PATA) interface. Both SATA and PATA are "integrated drive electronics" (IDE) devices, which means the controller is in the drive, and only a simple circuit is required on the motherboard. Although SATA is an IDE technology, "IDE" refers to PATA (for details, see IDE and AHCI). See mSATA.

insignia33

OK sorry to be a pain but can you just explain this part here real simply

IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics) was the original name, then they standardized on ATA (Advanced Technology Attachment) as being a broader standard that included additions like......

I thought IDE was when they stopped using disk controllers (say like on a ST-506) and combined the controller and drive into one package.... hence Integrated Drive Electronics.

But reading the above makes it sound like IDE is a standard...??

Or am I missing something here?