
Software and Drivers 445
An HBA may optionally support a Command List on each port for overhead reduction, and sup-
port Serial ATA Native Command Queuing via the FPDMA Queued Command protocol for
each device of up to 32 entries.
An HBA may optionally support 64-bit addressing.
AHCI Encompasses a PCI Device
It contains a PCI BAR (Base Address Register) to implement native SATA features. AHCI specifies the
following features:
Support for 32 ports
64-bit addressing
Elimination of master/slave handling
Large LBA support
Hot plug
Power management
HW-assisted Native Command Queuing
Staggered Spin-up
Cold device presence detection ...