SATA
Serial AT Attachment has had several revisions:
| Revision | Speed | Range |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1.5 Gbps | 1 meter |
| 2 | 3 Gpbs | 1 meter |
| 3 | 6 Gbps | 1 meter |
| 3.2 | 16 Gbps | 1 meter |
eSATA (or external SATA) connectors match the SATA version but have cable runs of up to 2 meters.
SATA connectors have two slots: a small 7-pin connection for data transfer and a larger 15-pin connection for power.
SATA cables are one-to-one cables, meaning a single power cable and a single data cable is connected to the device and to the storage drive, without the ability for splits.
PATA
The Parallel AT Attachment, Parallel ATA, or simply ATA standard is an older connector that used ribbon cables to connect devices to a computer.
The original name of PATA was Integrated Drive Electronics, which was a Western Digital invetion. The second generation was the Enhanced IDE (EIDE).