[Echo Talon]

to tell the difference look at the cable, ATA uses the "old school" fat thin wires to connect the hard drive to the motherboard... SATA uses a thin rectangular shaped cord to connect the drive to the Motherboard. :)

Fat thin cords at the top are ATA 100/133 cables, the thin red cables on the bottom are for SATA. :)

[Aliska]

You've got to be kidding. My tower is heavy and I am not about to open it up. My old one was WORSE. Without help, I could have BROKEN something getting the case unscrewed, the thing slid out after that. It is a MAJOR EVENT to haul it into the shop. Once it is open, I MIGHT be able to tell the difference between the hard drive and the mother board.

I doubt if I'll ever get the time, but if I were younger, I would try to learn the hardware part of it. I've watched guys do it, just get out a couple screwdrivers and 5 minutes and my old hard drive was out of my old computer (never crashed, wanted to save it). But if they add hardware, they have to tinker with the bios, find the right drivers, get them installed correctly. Sometimes that can take longer and you are on their clock :-(.

I kind of envy people who are confident enough to build their own computers and buy their parts off the shelf, just what they want. I wouldn't know what tower to start with and I don't know if my current one has room for any more internal hard drives.

I tried learning DOS and what some of this is, but I would rather put my energy into getting the most out of my software.

I love these little passport external hd's. At least I can figure THOSE out, and you have to watch what you are doing when you are copying files. I have messed up more than once.

ATA, SATA, now I know what the are supposed to LOOK like, but I don't know the difference or what the letters stand for. I'm not ashamed to admit it either.