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PC Hardware in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition
book

PC Hardware in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition

by Robert Bruce Thompson, Barbara Fritchman Thompson
July 2003
Beginner to intermediate content levelBeginner to intermediate
874 pages
38h 13m
English
O'Reilly Media, Inc.
Content preview from PC Hardware in a Nutshell, 3rd Edition

Configuring ATA Devices

Each ATA interface (often called a channel) can have zero, one, or two ATA and/or ATAPI devices connected to it. Every ATA and ATAPI device has an embedded controller, but ATA permits only one active controller per interface. Therefore, if only one device is attached to an interface, that device must have its embedded controller enabled. If two devices are attached to an ATA interface, one device must have its controller enabled and the other must have its controller disabled.

In ATA terminology, a device whose controller is enabled is called a Master; one whose controller is disabled is called a Slave. In a standard PC with two ATA interfaces, a device may therefore be configured in any one of four ways: Primary Master, Primary Slave, Secondary Master, or Secondary Slave.

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Publisher Resources

ISBN: 059600513XErrata Page