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Development process, notices,

advantages and disadvantages of


IDE interface
IDE (Integrated-Drive-Electronics) interface is a widely used external interface primarily
used to connect hard disk and CD-driver which employs 16 bit data parallel transmission
mode with features of small size and rapid data transmission speed. One IDE interface
can connect only two external devices.
--Source from http://www.powerdatarecovery.com/data-recovery/ide-interfaces.html

IDE, short for "Integrated Drive Electronics", originally refers to hard disk driver that
integrates hard disk controller and drive, cutting down hard disk electric cable number and
length, enhancing data transmission reliability, easing the production of hard disk as the
manufacturer no longer needs to concern the compatibility with controllers produced by
other manufacturer. For user, the installation of hard disk becomes more convenient and
easier. IDE interface technology has been developing and improving performance since
its emergence and made it irreplaceable by other hard disks thanks to the low cost and
high compatibility.
Evolution
IDE interface in the early stage has two transmission modes: PIO (Programming I/O) and
DMA (Direct Memory Access). Though occupying litter system resources, DMA requires
extra driver or set, resulting in low acceptance. As the increasing demand for speed later
on, operating system begins to support DMA directly owing to the excellent execution
efficiency and manufacturers have issued faster and faster DMA transmission speed
standards. From 430TX chip set of Intel, it provided support to Ultra DMA 33, offering the
maximum data transmission rate of 33MB/sec. And soon the later ATA 66, ATA 100 and
ATA 133 proposed by Matrox were provided with 66MB/sec, 100MB/sec and 133MB/sec
maximum data transmission rate respectively. It is noteworthy that the ATA 133 standard is
not extensively supported in the industry. Among hard disk manufacturers, only Matrox
employs ATA 133 standard while IBM, WD and Seagate adopts ATA 100 standard. And
among chip set manufacturers only VIA, SIS, Ali and nVidia supports ATA133 standard
with Intel only supporting ATA 100.
Notice
All IDE standards are excellently compatible with downward standards, for example ATA
133 is compatible with ATA66/100 and Ultra DMA33, ATA 100 is compatible with Ultra
DMA 33/66.
Special attention should be paid that special 80-core IDE ribbon cable must be used for
ATA 66 and its above IDE interface transmission standards, which was increased by 40

ground wires to improve signal stability in comparison to ordinary 40-core IDE ribbon
cable.
IDE stands for one type of hard disk. However, in practical applications, people are
accustomed to calling the earliest IDE ATA-1 which has been eliminated and was derived
into ATA, Ultra ATA, DMA and Ultra DMA. Currently, hard ware interface has transferred to
SATA and IDE interface will soon or later quite the stage.
Advantages and disadvantages of IDE:
Advantages: low cost, high compatibility, high cost performance
Disadvantages: slow in data transmission, short cable length, few connecting device

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