Types of Hard Drives

There are three prominent hard drive types: IDE, SCSI, and SATA drives. Each hard drive has different strengths and weaknesses because they rely on different technologies. Each hard drive must connect to the motherboard to access the information and store information appropriately.

IDE drives

IDE drives, or integrated drive electronics, have a two inch wide ribbon cable which plugs into the mother board. They were the first hard drive technology commonly used in PC’s. It limited the connection to one motherboard and one hard drive.

SCSI drives

SCSI drives, or small computer system interface, is the most common peripheral device hard drive in use. It allows a physical connection through a ribbon cable but can connect to up to seven devices. This allows other computers, exterior disk drives, scanners, printers and other devices to connect to the SCSI configuration. Unfortunately, they are much more expensive than IDE technologies.

SATA drives

SATA drives, or the serial advanced technology attachment, was designed to replace IDE technology, and other parallel drive types. SATA devices connect with a high speed attachment that allows for faster data transfer and more reliable uploading and downloading.

Newer technologies are constantly developed, so eventually all of these technologies may fall by the wayside as faster, more reliable and easier to interface devices are designed. It is important to realize that drive types which are appropriate for use within a PC and exterior hard drives are not the same, because they connect and operate differently when attached to the computer's mainframe.