How main-stream is SATA?

[DerelictDev]

Currently my setup is using the old ATA ide controllers for everything, cd-rw, dvd-rom, hd's. I love SATA not only because of the faster speed but because its so freaking small and compact compared to the nasty bulky standard ide cables and evern the newer rounded ones.

My motherboard has 4 ATA controllers and 2 SATA, the issue i have about using the SATA is i need to enable it in bios to work and once enabled everytime i start my computer, it has to load a separate SATA chip to initialize and pick up connected drives, which prolongs the boot time quite a bit. My other issue is that windows XP doesnt automatically use SATA to load windows, but requires drivers from the mobo manufacturer to be installed during the setup to be operational = pain in the ass.

Its been a couple years since SATA hit and me being behind the times am wondering how much improvement has their been?
Are their any mobos on the market that use SATA as primary controllers instead of the generic ATA and boot quickly.
Also do DVD-roms, cd-roms, cd-rws, etc use SATA yet? Im going to build myself a new computer in about 2 months when school starts up again and want to have a SATA only system. I dont want any clunky ide cables anywhere, just a bunch of small SATA controllers and small cables. Any info would be appreciated thanks!

 

[Tostada]

NF3 and NF4 chipsets have SATA built in. XP SP2 will automatically boot from SATA on these boards. You don't need extra drivers unless you're booting from SATA RAID.

SATA still hasn't caught on as far as optical drives. The only ones I've seen are by Plextor:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi...axPrice=&SubCategory=5&Submit=Property

I don't know if there are even any motherboards out there that have a BIOS smart enough to boot from a bootable disc in an SATA drive.

But, the Plextor 716 is the best DVD burner out there, so the SATA version of that would be nice for an all-SATA system.

 

[DerelictDev]

Interesting, im hoping that sooner or later everything could make the switch onto SATA. Im going to have to look into if those motherboards would be able to recognize an optical drive connected to SATA, if so then im probably going to buy something like this in the upcoming months to build a new system.

 

[ViRGE]

Originally posted by: Tostada
NF3 and NF4 chipsets have SATA built in. XP SP2 will automatically boot from SATA on these boards. You don't need extra drivers unless you're booting from SATA RAID.

SATA still hasn't caught on as far as optical drives. The only ones I've seen are by Plextor:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi...axPrice=&SubCategory=5&Submit=Property

I don't know if there are even any motherboards out there that have a BIOS smart enough to boot from a bootable disc in an SATA drive.

But, the Plextor 716 is the best DVD burner out there, so the SATA version of that would be nice for an all-SATA system.

NF4 implementations can vary, so even being an NF4 board isn't enough. Gigabyte for example has a flawed implementation of SATA on their NF4-SLI boards where it won't properly recognize/boot from SATA hard drives at all, and supposedly SATA optical drives are completely out of the question(i.e. no-workie). However, as I understand it, NF4 boards should be able to SATA optical boot, as long as RAID mode is disabled for the SATA channel the disc drive is on.

 

[DerelictDev]

Wow thanks for that info, i love my current gigabyte board so i was already thinking about buying a GB for my future comp. This also makes sense b/c i did buy a SATA hd awhile back and it died on me when trying to install windows on it... It became corrupt almost instantly and i wasnt able to ever load windows using SATA. I gave up on it and sold the RMA and bought an regular ATA one. Maybe my current board also has a flaw in SATA and it wasnt just the hd's fault.