All Aboard! P4 with 200 MHz FSB and the i875P Dual DDR400 Chipset

The Basics: Serial ATA

As opposed to the classical UltraATA standard, Serial ATA no longer works simultaneously through multiple data circuits and is instead content to use a total of four circuits. Pairs of connections are better protected from kinks and twists than the plain ribbon cables. This means that Serial ATA can be used with very high clock frequencies - similar to other serial protocols, such as USB and FireWire, or the usual connections between the northbridge and southbridge of a chipset, such as HyperTransport (AMD) or V-Link (VIA). At 150 MB/s, the maximum theoretical data transfer rate is at a good level, even though this is hampered by the PCI bus: here, a maximum of 133 MB/s is possible at 33 MHz and 32 Bit.

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