Hardware Developer Documentation: (ATA Devices)

PATH Hardware Developer Documentation > Device Managers and Drivers > ATA Devices

ATA stands for AT Attachment, a standard interface used with storage devices such as hard disk drives. ATA drives are also referred to as integrated drive electronics (IDE) drives. The internal hard disk drives in most Macintosh models are ATA drives.


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		There is no Inside Macintosh documentation for ATA devices. Information about developing ATA device drivers for the Mac OS is available in the ATA Device Software Guide and ATA Device 0/1 Software Developer's Guide. ATA Device Software Guide This developer note describes the system software that controls ATA devices installed in a Macintosh computer. This note also provides information for ATAPI (ATA Packet Interface) CD-ROM and PCMCIA (Personal Computer Memory Card International Association) devices. The developer note includes reference sections for the ATA Driver and the ATA Manager, version 3.0.

		ATA Device 0/1 Software Developer's Guide [PDF] This developer note describes the Macintosh ATA Device 0/1 system software that provides support for two ATA devices on a single ATA bus. It also defines the changes that application and driver clients need to be aware of to take advantage of the ATA Device 0/1 architecture. Prior to the introduction of the ATA software described in this note, Macintosh products were restricted to a single device per ATA bus. Software support for two daisy-chained devices on an ATA bus is a new feature incorporated into the ATA Manager software. A two-device configuration on a single ATA bus is called an ATA Device 0/1 configuration, as defined in the ATA-3 specification.