New SATA spec promises faster data transfers and slimmer laptops

SATA accounts for 98 per cent of the hard disk market

The Serial ATA (SATA) Revision 3.0 specification has been released by the Serial ATA International Organization (Sata-IO) and promises double the data speed across the board to 6Gbit/s.

The new standard will allow data transfers for up to 6Gbit/s between devices on the motherboard, double the speed of SATA 2. The new standard is fully backwards compatible with previous versions of the standard so motherboard manufacturers can introduce it without backwards compatibility issues.

“As speed becomes critical to today’s storage, the SATA Revision 3.0 specification doubles the maximum transfer speed enabled by technology, paving the way for a new generation of faster SATA products,” said Knut Grimsrud, SATA-IO president and Intel fellow and director of storage architecture.

“SATA-IO members will be able to design for their customers' products with the speed they crave, without compromising the quality and performance they’ve come to expect from SATA technology.”

Other changes include new connections that allow smaller Low Insertion Force (LIF) optical drive connectors to be used, which will lead to shrinkage in some laptop designs since they can use smaller, faster storage devices.

"The SATA interface has developed into the de facto standard HDD interface in computing applications," said John Rydning, IDC's research director for hard disk drives.

"The new SATA Revision 3.0 specification builds on the current market success of SATA, and will help to solidify SATA as the predominant storage device interface technology for the foreseeable future."

IDC estimates that since its introduction in 2001 SATA now accounts for 98 per cent of the hard disk market.