Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!zephyr.ens.tek.com!gvgpsa!gold!grege From: grege@gold.GVG.TEK.COM (Greg Ebert) Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware Subject: Re: info on hard disk & controller Message-ID: <1174@gold.GVG.TEK.COM> Date: 16 Jul 90 22:49:10 GMT References: <1171@gold.GVG.TEK.COM> <5307@plains.UUCP> Distribution: comp Organization: Grass Valley Group, Grass Valley, CA Lines: 24 In article <5307@plains.UUCP> jarvi@plains.UUCP (Trent Jarvi) writes: > >Could you be so kind as to exlain what an IDE is? >The dealer said it was mumbo*NEW*mumbo*FAST*mumbo*jumbo > > IDE - Integrated Drive Electronics. Wow!!! Conner Peripherals put *ALL* the disk controller logic (data separator,serial<->parallel,buffering,etc) onto the drive itself. An IDE drive only needs a trivial interface card, which some manufacturers build into their motherboards. The ASIC I designed at AST Research had IDE support on it. If you get a system with an internal IDE interface, all you add is the drive and a 40 pin connector. No more hard disk controller board. IDE drives are upward compatible from the 16-bit AT style controllers and are software-transparent to DOS, etc. Why get such a drive ? Well, you'd NEVER, NEVER wan't to replace an existing AT controller with an IDE setup, because you gain nothing. My guess is that IDE drives were created for portable systems with tight power and slot-count requirements. Also, you wont get the performance of an ESDI/SCSI controller. Now, if you're a hardware hacker and want to add a hard-disk to some sort of specialty equipment, this beast is the answer to your prayers.