SATA drive and PATA-only motherboard

Mon Jan 12 14:19:55 UTC 2009

Hi Hugh,

I had a similar problem - a new MoBo with four SATA ports and old PATA
boards. I had a PCI HD controller with 2 IDE ports (hence 4 drives,
but preferred the SATA. Anyway, I got a couple of SATA to IDE
converters and everythings hunky dorey now (or will be once I install
an OS on the system...).

In response to your points:

Yes, the terminology is very confusing.

I think "SATA to IDE" means converting a SATA board to an IDE (PATA)
controller and "IDE to SATA" means converting an IDE (PATA) drive to a
SATA controller. Don't take that as gospel.

You can find suitable converter cards (which plug right onto the IDE
drives themselves - SATA drives will probably connect via a SATA
cable) at a numbers of stores - I go for the small hobby type stores
myself. The going price seems to be about $20.

I think Tiger Direct has what you are looking for. See:

"http://www.tigerdirect.ca/applications/SearchTools/item-details.asp?EdpNo=1567086&CatId=1455"

Regards, Colin

On Sun, Jan 11, 2009 at 10:18 PM, D. Hugh Redelmeier <hugh-pmF8o41NoarQT0dZR+AlfA at public.gmane.org> wrote:
> SATA drives are cheaper and larger these days.
> I want to use SATA drives with computers without SATA controllers.
> I don't want to add a PCI card SATA controller because I'm short of PCI slots.
> I don't want to use USB-to-SATA (or is that SATA-to-USB) because I expect that
> would be a large performance hit.
> So I'd like to use a SATA-HDD to PATA host adapter.
>
> Does anyone have any experience with these?
>
> Here's what I've discovered so far:
>
> - terminology is unclear.  Does SATA to IDE mean that the drive is
>  SATA or IDE (PATA)?
>
> - some converters appear to be bidirectional (i.e. they will work as
>  SATA HDD to PATA host converter or as a PATA HDD to SATA host
>  converter).  But the documentation is ambiguous.  Is this possible?
>  Likely?
>
> - a normal PATA controller socket supports a cable with two drives
>  connected: master and slave.  The vast majority of converters seem
>  to take one PATA socket to connect only one SATA drive.  Is this
>  intrinsic to the protocols or just what the market wants?
>
> - The SATA HDD to PATA controller converters seem to have female PATA
>  connectors so they plug directly into the socket where an IDE cable
>  would normally go.  It would make sense to me that if they supported
>  only one SATA drive, they could connect to the master or slave
>  connector of an IDE cable instead if the gender were male (like an
>  IDE drive).  Besides, the converters appear to be mechanically
>  awkward to plug into a motherboard (the motherboard IDE sockets are
>  often closely packed).  Why do they make adapters this way?
>
> - Canada computers sells an adapter.  Their site has very little
>  documentation and spotty inventory:
>    http://www.canadacomputers.com/index.php?do=ShowProduct&cmd=pd&pid=019312&cid=CA.742.630
>  So does XpressCanada, but that seems to be a front for Canada
>  Computers (same head office).  The price is lower but you have
>  to get it shipped, so the cost isn't lower:
>    http://www.xpresscanada.com/index.php?do=ShowProduct&cmd=pd&pid=019312&cid=CA.742.630
>
> - Deal Extreme has a bunch of converters.  It is very hard to tell how
>  well they work.  (DX is a great source of cheap junk but I'm not
>  confident that their quality control is great.)
>
> ================ "Bilateral" ================
>
> These can connect SATA HDD to PATA host or vice versa.  They call
> these "bilateral".  These have two SATA connectors: one for a HDD and
> one for host.  Only one SATA may be connected a time.  If HDD is
> connected to SATA, then the PATA is for host; if host is connected to
> (other) SATA, then the PATA is for HDD.
>
> Most of these seem bulky.
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.1067
>        "Ide-to-Sata 2-Ways Adapter".  Board is inside a box.
>        Not clear why they didn't say "bilateral".
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.5458
>        "SATA-IDE Bilateral Converter Board"
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.7533
>        "SATA-IDE Bilateral Converter Board"
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.3576
>        "DE to SATA 2-Port Adapter Card"
>        Description says that it handles two drives but a user review
>        says this isn't the case.
>        Apparently "bilateral".
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.5496
>        "Bidirectional IDE-SATA Converter"
>        Apparently "bilateral".
>
>
> ================ one PATA HDD to one SATA host ================
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.706
>        "SATA to IDE Converter Driver".  Seems to work with IDE drive,
>        SATA host.  No power plug conversion.
>        "Apparently the fact that the last word is "driver" rather than
>        "host" is supposed to" tell you that the disk is IDE.
>        But some comments suggest the opposite.  Who knows.
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.12537
>        "SATA to IDE Hard Disk Mini Vertical Bridge Adapter Card"
>
> ================ one SATA HDD to one PATA host ================
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.728
>        "SATA to IDE Converter Host".  SATA for HDD.
>        One comment says that "IT WORKS IN BOTH WAYS!!"
>        No power plug conversion.
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.1759
>        "IDE (40-Pin) to SATA Hard Disk Converter"
>        No power conversion.
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.8825
>        Parallel PATA to Serial SATA Hard Disk Converter.
>        Comments suggest that the speed must be limited to UDMA/33
>        Note: comments were from mlord, probably the same Mark Lord
>        who was the original author and maintainer of the Linux Kernel
>        IDE subsystem.  http://www.linuxsymposium.org/2008/view_bio.php?id=2652
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.11163
>        SATA HDD to IDE converter.  Appears to convert power too.
>        Seems to be suitable to slap on the back of a drive.
>        sold out
>
> ================ two SATA HDD to PATA host ================
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.14666
>        "2-SATA Port to IDE".  This must be for
>        SATA HDD and IDE (PATA) host since two
>        host connections makes no sense.
>        Or it could be misdocumented and be bilateral
>
>
> http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.18786
>        "2-Port SATA HDD to 40-Pin IDE Master/Slave with Power
>        Adapter Cable".
>        Sounds just like what I need.
>        Scary box label disagrees with site blurb and with pictures:
>                    Specifications & features
>                        One 40pin IDE port
>                        one serial ATA port
>                        one 4pin power connector
>                        converts sevial ATA TO paraller ATA
>                        supports ATA100/133
>                        compliant with serial ATA specifications
>                                MADE IN CHINA
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