Serial ATA

[AnthraX]

Alright, SATA has been around for a while now, but I still don't know much about it. I remember reading stuff about it when it first came out and maybe you guys could answer some of my questions.

First, is SATA hot swapable? Can I take my 250GB WD hard drive to my other computer and would it work just fine?

Second, what's the deal with hitting F6 during XP installs? Is it necessary? I've done it with and with out, and it didn't make a difference.

Lastly, at school I built 6 new computers this year, with SATA hard drives. On like 2 or 3 of them, there is the "Safetly remove devices" thing in the task bar. It's that little window for removing drives like USB drives. Any reason for that?

 

[Nitestick]

the removeable drive thing is because the drives are hot swappable. most of the time it is necessary to install the drivers but i think in some cases it isn't because the SATA controller kind of emulates itself as an IDE controller. if that is the case i suppose it would explain the absence of the removable drive thing at the bottom.

First, is SATA hot swapable? Can I take my 250GB WD hard drive to my other computer and would it work just fine?

i'm not quite sure what you think hotswapping is. you should only hot swap drives using a removable drive rack otherwise they may be damaged by not removing the power plug cleanly