Mobo for S-ATA II

A simple question I believe:
Will todays S-ATA mobos fully utilize the advantage of the coming S-ATA II HD:s?
Or do we have to buy new mobos again ...?

Before I answer, I'd be concerned now with someone-anyone-actually shipping S-ATA I drives. Those are still coming. S-ATA II is over the horizion.

And yes, you will have to buy a new board. But the dirty little secret of S-ATA is you'll have to even to get the benefit of the first generation drives.

Here's the deal: So far as I know, no chipset in production today includes S-ATA support in its core architecture. The only one I'm uncertain about is the new Intel Granite Bay boards. I know for a fact that the 845 boards, nForce2, KT400, and various SiS and VIA P4 chipsets don't have S-ATA support included in the core chipset.

This means a S-ATA plug on current motherboards is just an adapter sitting on top of an old-fashioned IDE bus. Even if you have an S-ATA drive, and even if it can generate 150MB/sec of burst, the moment it gets to the motherboard tracings it goes back to 100 or 133MB/sec.




BHD

Thanks BHD!
I think I understand ...

Todays mobos don´t take ful benefit of S-ATA I - not even the
Granite Bays I understand. It´s not until the Southbridge (?) handles the burst you will utilize 150 MB/sec.
S-ATA II should give 350 MB/sec - then, would that mean another
chipset again - or, the day when mobos arrive where the Southbridge handles the burst - will 350 MB/sec be covered from the start? Will the Springdale do this?

I think these mobos will arrive later this year (when?) and the
S-ATA II in spring next year - this is really why I´m puzzled.

I really need a new PC machine - and I was aiming for a Granite Bay, but I´m hesitating if there will be a soon breakthrough for the "true" S-ATA:s.

Please - I need advice ...

BaldHeadedDork said:

Before I answer, I'd be concerned now with someone-anyone-actually shipping S-ATA I drives. Those are still coming. S-ATA II is over the horizion.

And yes, you will have to buy a new board. But the dirty little secret of S-ATA is you'll have to even to get the benefit of the first generation drives.

Here's the deal: So far as I know, no chipset in production today includes S-ATA support in its core architecture. The only one I'm uncertain about is the new Intel Granite Bay boards. I know for a fact that the 845 boards, nForce2, KT400, and various SiS and VIA P4 chipsets don't have S-ATA support included in the core chipset.

This means a S-ATA plug on current motherboards is just an adapter sitting on top of an old-fashioned IDE bus. Even if you have an S-ATA drive, and even if it can generate 150MB/sec of burst, the moment it gets to the motherboard tracings it goes back to 100 or 133MB/sec.




BHD

Click to expand...

From what I understand, (like my MB) the MB's that have SATA have a secondary controller (mine is a Promise SATA), as well as the onboard IDE. This would then allow use of the SATA independent of the onboard IDE...