The IDE (integrated drive electronics) bus is also called
the ATA (advanced technology attachment) bus. This is an older
standard for connecting hard disks and CD/DVD drives to the
southbridge of a chipset. IDE is a parallel interface that
transmits 16 bits (2 bytes) of data for each clock cycle.
Due to the parallel nature of the IDE bus, an IDE cable is
usually thick and rigid. This reduces airflow inside a computer
case, and it is also difficult to connect and disconnect
components.
Due to the master/slave method, an IDE interface can only
control up to two disk drives. Most PCs have two IDE interfaces,
and hence the maximum number of disk drives in a PC is normally
4.
The IDE bus is now being phased out by the SATA bus.
Copyright © 2006-05-10 by Tak Auyeung
