Seagate along with Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) has unveiled the world’s first public demonstration of next-generation high-speed data transfer ‘Serial ATA 6Gigabit/second’ for bandwidth-hungry desktop and laptop computer applications comprising gaming, streaming video and graphics multimedia.

To ease integration, the newly launched Serial ATA (SATA) 6Gb/second storage interface makes use of the same cables and connectors as previous SATA generations.

It offers the highest performance – burst speeds of up to 6Gigabits per second – for all PC applications, maintain backward compatibility with the SATA 3Gb/second and SATA 1.5Gb/second interfaces.

The third generation of the mainstream storage interface for desktop and notebooks also improves power effectiveness and betters Native Command Queuing, a SATA feature, to boost overall system performance and data transfer speeds of mainstream PC applications.
 
Joan Motsinger, Seagate vice president of Personal Systems Marketing and Strategy said, “The increasing reliance of consumers and businesses worldwide on digital information is giving rise to gaming, digital video and audio, streaming video, graphics and other applications that require even more bandwidth, driving demand for PC interfaces that can carry even more digital content.”

“The SATA 6Gb/second storage interface will meet this demand for higher-bandwidth PCs. Seagate has a long history of being first to market with new technologies such as Serial ATA, perpendicular recording and self-encrypting drives, and is pleased to be teaming with AMD to stage the world’s first public demonstration of SATA 6Gb/second storage,” Joan added.

Leslie Sobon, vice president of Product Marketing, AMD said, “AMD strives to deliver platform technology that our technology partners can use to create high- performance desktop and laptop PCs. The new SATA 6Gb/second technology not only incorporates the best features of previous SATA generations but also includes new enhancements. This innovation enables AMD to continue to evolve its technology platforms and to develop low-cost designs that our technology partners can use to improve their own PC and laptop products.”

The Seagate and AMD demonstration consists of double Seagate SATA disk drives – one a shipping Barracuda® 7200.12 3Gb/second hard drive and the other a prototype Barracuda 6Gb/second drive – in a desktop PC in order to show the performance difference between the two generations. The PC is powered by an AMD prototype SATA 6Gb/second chipset.

The Seagate SATA 3Gb/second drive runs at over 2.5Gigabits per second and the SATA 6Gb/second drive at 5.5Gigabits per second, with the performance of each storage interface displayed on the PC monitor.

In keeping with SATA-IO objectives for designing a low-cost interface for desktop and notebook PCs, SATA 6Gb/second maintains the low cost and low-power design requirements of previous SATA generations, and is designed to be backward compatible with SATA 3Gb/second connectors, cables and other hardware.