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ATA Full Form

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Abstract

Advanced Technology Attachment is a continuation of the IDE drive that indicates how a gadget cooperates with ATA drive. For PC Cards, any ATA obedient gadget ought to act as a standard disk (for instance ATA Flashcards). Specialized Committee T13 of the National Committee on Information Technology Technical, is accountable for all interface guidelines linking with the ATA interface incorporating ATA and ATA with Packet Interface.

Preface

Advanced Technology Attachment has survived for quite a long period with the name of Parallel Advanced Technology Attachment. After the launch of Serial Advanced Technology Attachment, ATA was complementary named to Parallel Advanced Technology Attachment. ATA is recognised as a standard physical interface used to authorise a link with storage devices alike hard-drive, optical drive, solid-state drive, and CD-ROM to the Motherboard. ATA standards provide the permission of up to 18inches cable only which makes ATA function from inside. It is built without using an external controller to create a link with portable storage devices.

ATA makes accessible for using a strong speed as it is the intensely accepted and low-cost interface. Thin wires and cable bus are its fundamental components. The ATA acquisitions are inversely adaptable. This implies that with ATA interfaces that have existed for a long period, every new version of ATA or upgraded ATA drives can be utilised.

Background

In 1986, the first form of ATA was created by a company named Western Digital. At first, the attachment only worked with Hard Disks, but ultimately, a continued norm came to existence to work with various other devices, commonly, those using removable media. Basically,  such devices include CD-ROMs, tape drives, and large capacity Floppydrives like the Zip drives and SuperDisk drives. When in around 2003, SATA was made acquainted, this arrangement was renamed to Parallel ATA. 

Another important development in the history of ATA was made by the movement of programmed input/output to direct memory access. Of the mentioned methods for transferring and accessing data in computer devices, PIO was not working well, demanding a considerable amount of handling by the computer’s CPU. This implied frameworks based around ATA devices, for the most part, performed disk-related exercises considerably more casually than PCs utilizing SCSI or other various interfaces. Yet, DMA enormously diminished the preparing time the CPU needed to use to peruse and compose the disks.

ATA Standards

  • ATA, ATA-1, and IDE:

First created by Control Data Corporation, Western Digital and Compaq it had an 8-bit or 16-bit interface with an exchange rate up to 8.3 MBps and with PIO modes 0, 1, and 2 support. Today, ATA and ATA-1 are no longer in use. 

  • ATA-2, EIDE, Fast ATA, Fast IDE, or Ultra ATA:

ATA-2 commonly termed as EIDE, or Fast ATA or Fast IDE, is a code accepted by ANSI in 1996 under report number X3.279-1996. ATA-2 presented new PIO methods of 3 and 4, with an exchange rate of up to 16.6 MBps, DMA modes 1 and 2, LBA backing, and supports drives up to 8.4 GB. Today, ATA-2 is also no longer in use. 

  • ATA-3, and EIDE:

ATA-3 is a standard endorsed by ANSI in 1997 under report number X3.298-1997. ATA-3 included extra security characteristics and the new S.M.A.R.T function. 

  • ATA-4, ATAPI-4, and ATA/ATAPI-4:

ATA-4 is a standard certified by ANSI in 1998 under-report NCITS 317-1998. ATA-4 incorporates ATAPI packet commands and presents UDMA/33, also termed as ultra-DMA/33, or ultra-ATA/33, which underpins the information exchange rate of up to 33 MBps.

  • ATA-5 and ATA/ATAPI-5:

ATA-5 is a standard authorized by ANSI in 2000 under-report NCITS 340-2000. ATA-5 includes support for Ultra-DMA/66, which is fit for supporting the information transfer rate of up to 66 MBps and can distinguish between 40 or 80-wire links.

  • ATA-6 and ATA/ATAPI-6:

ATA-6 is a standard allowed by ANSI in 2001 under-report NCITS 347-2001. ATA-6 included aid for Ultra-DMA/100 and has an exchange rate of up to 100 MBps.

FAQs on ATA Full Form

1. What is Ultra ATA?

Ans: Ultra ATA is a form of AT Attachment standard, which supports information exchange rate of 33.3 MBps. For utilizing this high speed, computers should also be furnished with Ultra DMA, that is, an obligation which supports quicker information exchange rate with hard disk drives.

2. What is Serial ATA?

Ans: Serial ATA is a computer bus interface that combines host bus connectors to mass storage capacity gadgets, like, hard disk drives, optical drives, and solid-state drives.

3. How is SATA Different from ATA?

Ans: SATA represents serial ATA and is an innovatively progressed ATA drive with a couple of focal points. Which is having information transfer rates coming to and exceeding 600MB/s, SATA is a lot quicker and more productive than the 133MB/s abilities of ATA drives.

4. What is Meant by DMA?

Ans: Direct Memory Access is a procedure that permits an input/output gadget to send, or to get information precisely from the central memory, by avoiding the CPU, that helps to accelerate memory tasks. This procedure is guarded by a chip termed as a DMA controller.