Infographics
History of SATA
Member Stories
In Memoriam
Member Archive
Infographics
View the SATA 20th Anniversary infographic page here.
History of SATA
SATA was introduced to the world in February 2000 through the efforts of APT Technologies, Dell, Intel, Maxtor, and Seagate. The specification offered a faster and more efficient data transfer, and many in the industry saw how SATA provided a groundbreaking method of data storage and IT operations. The technology was strong enough to attract over 80 members within four months and the initial standard showed no signs of stopping its rapid growth. In 2004, SATA-IO officially incorporated and by 2008 SATA had close to 100% of the desktop PC market share.
Over the years, thousands of products from cables and connectors, HDDs, SSDs and optical drives to peripherals and test and validation tools have been certified. Now, twenty years after its inception, SATA remains one of the most stable and economical solutions for near- and long-term storage, used by both consumers and enterprise users.
Since 2004, the mission of SATA-IO has been to support the SATA specification. Some of the revision highlights follow:
| Revision Number | Speed | Release | Highlights |
| SATA Revision 1.0a | 1.5 Gb/s | January 2003 | |
| SATA Revision 2.0 | 3 Gb/s | April 2004 | |
| SATA Revision 2.6 | February 2007 |
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| SATA Revision 3.0 | 6 Gb/s | August 2008 |
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| SATA Revision 3.1 | July 2011 |
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| SATA Revision 3.2 | August 2013 |
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| SATA Revision 3.3 | February 2016 |
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| SATA Revision 3.4 | June 2018 |
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| SATA Revision 3.5 | June 2020 |
[INCLUDE 1.0 SPEC PRESS RELEASE]
Images of the first native SATA drive, courtesy of Robery Dixon
Member Stories
Thanks to all of our members who contributed memories from the last twenty years. We've collected a few of the responses below. Any members who would like to contribute more are welcome to email administration@sata-io.org or contribute to the 20th Anniversary Members Wiki on the SATA-IO members-only website.
General reminiscence
A couple of weeks ago it suddenly occurred to me that as we entered 2020 that 20 years ago we were right in the middle of the SATA work. I mentioned it to Jim and thought a 20th anniversary celebration was in order, especially since SATA has lived for twice as long as our original 10 year goal!!! I found some old emails from late 1999 so this would be about the times we were meeting in dark Maxtor warehouses!!! - Tony Priborsky
Development
I got in really in Phase II. As I recall Maxtor was the first company in after APT and Intel. - Tony Priborsky
Products, demos, and testing
I recall the IDF where we promised a demo at the end of the IDF presentation, and the punchline for the demo was that the presentation was being driven by a system running a dongled prototype SATA drive, so folks had been seeing the demo all along. Unfortunately, I wasn’t’ able to find that IDF presentation in my archives as it appears to be earlier than the extent my archives go back. - Knut Grimsrud
We had the prototype dongles just barely reading and writing the day of a WinHec conference. Pete Deyring and Knut were at the conference and we shipped something last minute for Knut to give a demonstration. It was just some reads and writes using a test program. Microsoft made a statement afterward that they would never support Serial ATA (back then we all swore we would never let it be called SATA).
Two months later there was an IDF, I believe in Santa Clara. We had the dongles running all the current operating systems and Knut gave a presentation. At the end of the presentation he said that the demo was that his powerpoint presentation was made using the Serial ATA dongles. Microsoft then made a press release that said “See what we did to enable Serial ATA.” All of SATA was predicated on making it so there was no software modifications necessary and we had achieved that. - Scott Richmond
I was APT’s representative to the SATA digital committee from very shortly after the start. I was also the first one to make a SATA prototype work.
The prototype was a Xilinx FPGA with a FibreChannel phy. It was a parallel to serial converter and then back from serial to parallel. One of the people from Quantum dubbed them the dongle/anti dongle, which stuck for quite a while.
I don’t remember the date, but I worked from my home in the hills outside of Boulder Co. I had the dongles mostly working, but was having trouble with the PIO Read Multiple command which was used by the Win 98 installation program, so I couldn’t successfully install Windows. I had compiled the FPGA with a bug fix and was going through the install in my home office. My 20 year old son was standing in the doorway talking to me. When the install got past the read multiple command and I knew that I would have a successful install I got giddy. I had worked long and hard on this project and it was such a great feeling to have it work. My son looked at me and said “Dad, I have seen Windows 98 install lots of times.” - Scott Richmond
Comraderie
In the early days we used to have a tradition of giving each other spoof awards. This is the award Pete Deyring gave me during the early days of the initial primary definition efforts. - Knut Grimsrud[PHOTO NEEDED]
In Memoriam
| Frank Chu | Gene Milligan |
| Klaus-Peter Deyring | Mark Evans |
| Marc Noblitt | |
Member Archive
This list acts as a thank you to all those members of SATA-IO who have contributed to the growth of the specification and the ecosystem in the last 20 years. Thank you!
| Accusys Inc. | Exceltek Electronics (HK) Ltd. | LucidPort Technology, Inc | Shenzhen Longsys Electronics Co., Ltd. |
| Achronix Semiconductor | ExpertIO, Inc. | Luxshare-ICT Co. Ltd. | Shenzhen Luxshare Precision Industry Co., Ltd. |
| Acon Advanced Connectek Inc | Faraday Technology Corporation | LyCOM Technology, Inc. | ShenZhen TIGO Semiconductor Co., Ltd. |
| Actel Corporation | FCI | Macpower and Tytech Technology Co., Ltd. | Shenzhen Tronixin Electronics Co.,Ltd. |
| Adaptec, Inc. | Finisar | Mad Dog Multimedia | Shenzhen Unionmemory information system Limited |
| ADATA Technology Co., Ltd. | FirmTek, LLC | Magnum Semiconductor | Shinwa Sangyo Ltd. |
| Addonics Technologies | Fixstars Corporation | Marvell Semiconductor | Siemens AG |
| ADTEC Corporation | Flexstar Technology | Maxim Integrated Products, Inc | Sierra Logic, Inc. |
| Adtron Corporation | Flextronics International (Taiwan) Ltd. | Maxiotek Corporation | SIIG, Inc. |
| Advantest America Inc. | Formation, Inc. | Maxtor | Silicon Image, Inc. |
| Aeluros | Foxconn Interconnect Technology, Ltd. | MediaTek Inc. | Silicon Integrated Systems Corp. |
| Agere Systems Inc | Freeport Resources Enterprises Corporation | MegaChips Corporation | Silicon Motion, Inc. |
| Airconnect Solutions (Asia) Ltd | Freescale Semiconductor, Inc. | Memoright Corporation | SiliconStor Inc. |
| Alcor Micro, Corp. | Fujikura/DDK | Mentor, a Siemens Business | SK hynix |
| Algoltek, Inc. | Fujitsu Computer Products of America Inc. | Mestec Technologies | SkyCABLE Enterprise Co., Ltd |
| Allion Labs, Inc. | Fujitsu Technology Solutions GmbH | Micron Technology, Inc. | Skymedi Corporation |
| ALPS Electric Co., Ltd. | Genesis Technology USA, Inc. | Microchip Technology Inc. | Skyviia Corporation |
| Alta Engineering | Genesys Logic Inc. | Microsoft Corporation | SMART Modular Technologies |
| Amco Tec International Inc. | Global Unichip Corp. | Miltope Corporation | SMK Corporation |
| AMD | Glory Mark Electronic Ltd. | MiraDeed Technology Corp. | Socionext Inc. |
| Amphenol Corporation | Golden Bridge | Mitac International Corporation | Soft Mixed Signal Corporation |
| Annapurna Labs Ltd. | Granite River Labs Inc. | Mitsubishi Kagaku Media | Solid State Storage System |
| Anritsu Company | Greatland Electronics Taiwan Ltd | MOAI ELECTRONICS CORP | Solid State Storage Technology Corporation |
| Apacer Technology Inc. | GREEN HOUSE CO., LTD | Mobius Microsystems | Somagic, Inc |
| Applied Micro Circuits Corp. | Greenliant Systems | Molex Incorporated | Sonetek Technology Corp. |
| Areca Technology Corporation | Guidance Software, Inc. | MoSys Inc | Sonnet Technologies, Inc. |
| Ariba Technology Co., Ltd | Guizhou Huaxintong Semiconductor Technology Co., Ltd. | Motorola | Sony Optiarc Inc. |
| ARIO Data Networks | Hagiwara Solutions Co., Ltd. | Myung Information Technologies Co., Ltd. | Space Shuttle Hi-Tech Co., Ltd. |
| Aristos Logic | Haoguo Xing Ye Share Co., Ltd (Sea World Enterprise) | National Technical Systems | Speed Tech Corp. |
| ARKUS Inc. | HCL Technologies Ltd. | NEC Corporation | SSMEC |
| ARM | HDL Design House | Neltron Industrial Co., Ltd | STEC |
| ARTEK INC. | Hewlett Packard Enterprise | NetCell Corporation | STMicroelectronics Inc. |
| ARTRAY, INC. | HGST | Netcom Technology (H.K.) Co., Ltd | Storage Vision Co., Ltd. |
| ASAP International Co., Ltd | High Top Precision Electronic Co. Ltd. | Netlist, Inc. | StorArt Technology Co., Ltd. |
| ASICS World Service, LTD | Highly Reliable Systems | Newtech Co., Ltd. | Sunext Technology Co., Ltd. |
| Aska Technologies | HighPoint Technologies, Inc. | Niketech Electronic Corporation | Sunnytek Information Co., Ltd |
| Asolid Technology Co., Ltd. | High-Top Precision Electronic CO., LTD. | Northstar Systems Corp. | Sunplus Innovation Technology Inc. |
| ASUSTeK Computer Inc. | Hitachi - LG Data Storage Korea, Inc. | Novatek Microelectronics Corp. | Super Micro Computer |
| ATI | Honda Tsushin Kogyo Co., Ltd. | Novus Labs, LLC | Suyin Corporation |
| ATP Electronics, Inc. | Horng Tong (HOMETOM) Enterprise Co., Ltd. | nSys Design Systems Pvt Ltd | Suza International France |
| Avago Technologies | HUA CHENG TECHNOLOGY CO LTD. | Nvidia Corporation | Swissbit AG |
| Avery Design Systems | Hua Ya Plastic & Metal Co. Ltd | NXP Semiconductors | Synopsys |
| Axell Corporation | Hunan Goke Microelectronics Co., Ltd. | OCZ Storage Solutions Inc. | SyntheSys Research, Inc. |
| Bafo Technologies | Hunan RunCore High-Tech Co., Ltd. | Omneon Video Networks | Tai Twun Enterprise Co., Ltd |
| Beijing Zettastone Technology Co., Ltd. | Hyperstone | Oracle | Taiguen Enterprise Co., Ltd. |
| Bell Microproducts | IBM Corporation | ORICO Technologies Co., Ltd | Taisol Electronics Co., Ltd |
| BiTMICRO NETWORKS, Inc. | IIX Consulting | Orient Semiconductor Electronics, Ltd. | Taiwin Electronics Co., Ltd. |
| Biwin Semiconductor (HK) Company Limited | Ikanos Communications Inc. | Other World Computing | Tamagawa Denki, Ltd. |
| Biwin Storage Technology Co., Ltd. | Imation Corp. | Oversea Win Technology (HK) Limited | TC&C Electronic Co., Ltd (Suntecc Inc) |
| Bizlink Technology | INDILINX Co., Ltd | Pacific Digital Corp. | T-CONN Precision Corp. |
| Blancco Oy Ltd | Infineon Technologies | Paist Design Group, LLC | TDK Corporation |
| Broadcom Limited | Infortrend Technology, Inc. | Panasonic Corporation | TE Connectivity |
| Buffalo Inc. | INISTOR | Parade Technologies | TEAC Corporation |
| C I Design | Initio Corporation | PDE Technology Corporation | Team Group Inc. |
| Cadence Design Systems | Innodisk Corporation | PerfectVIPs, Inc. | Tech - Technologist Purchasing |
| Catalyst Enterprises Inc. | Innopower Technology Corporation | Pericom Semiconductor | Tektronix, Inc. |
| Centon Electronics, Inc. | Innostor Technology Corp. | PHILIPS & LITE-ON DIGITAL SOLUTIONS CORP. | Telechips Inc |
| CEVA | Integrated Device Technology | Philips Consumer Electronics B.V. | TeleCommunications Systems, Inc. |
| CHANT SINCERE CO., LTD | Intel Corp. | Phison Electronics Corp. | Teledyne LeCroy |
| Cherng Weei Technology Corp. | IntellaSys Corp. | Phoenix Technologies Ltd. | TennRich International Corp. |
| Chipidea Microelectonica SA | IntelliProp Inc. | Phylinks | Texas Instruments |
| Chrontel Inc. | Interelectronix | Pioneer Corporation | Top Yang Technology Enterprise Co., Ltd. |
| Ciena Corporation | International Microsystems Inc. | PLE Technology Co., Ltd | Toshiba Corporation |
| Ciprico Inc. | IO Interconnect | Plextor LLC | Toshiba Memory Corporation |
| Circuit Assembly Corp. | IOGEAR | PLX Technology | Total Technologies |
| Cisco Systems, Inc. | Iomega | PMC-Sierra, Inc. | Tragant Handels-und Beteiligungs GmbH |
| CMS PRODUCTS, INC | I-PEX CO., LTD | PNY Technologies, Inc. | Trimax Electronics Co., Ltd. |
| Comax Technology, Inc. | Iriso Electronics Co., Ltd. | Power Quotient International Co., Ltd. | TTA |
| Component User Industry Co., Ltd. | ITE Tech. Inc. | Prolific Technology Inc. | ULi Electronics Inc. |
| Copan Systems | ITT Cannon, Ltd. | Promise Technology, Inc. | ULINK Technology |
| CoreSolid Storage Corporation | J.S.T. Mfg. Co., Ltd. | ProStor Systems, Inc. | UNIC Memory Technology Co., Ltd. |
| CPR Tools Inc. | Jabil Circuit, Inc. | PT. HIT Electro Mechanics Indonesia | Unicorn Electronics Components Co., Ltd. |
| CRU-Dataport | Jacobs Parts Inc. | P-TWO Industries Inc. | Unigen Corporation |
| CRUZ Systems | Jalink Technology Inc. | QLogic Corporation | University of New Hampshire InterOperability Lab |
| Cypress Semiconductor | Japan Aviation Electronics, Ltd | Quanta Storage Inc. | USI (SH) Co., LTD |
| Dallas Semiconductor | JDSU | Quantum Corp | VIA Technologies Inc. |
| DataStor Technology Co., Ltd. | Jei Wei Electronic Co., Ltd | Ranoda Electronics Pte. Ltd. | Viking Technology |
| Delkin Devices, Inc. | JESS-LINK PRODUCTS CO., LTD. | Rapid Conn, Inc. | Virtium Technology Inc. |
| Dell, Inc. | Ji-Haw Industrial Co., Ltd | RATOC Systems, Inc. | ViXS Systems, Inc. |
| Delphi Connection Systems | JMicron Technology Corporation | Realtek | VMC Consulting |
| Denali Software, Inc. | Joinsoon Electronics Mfg. Co. Ltd. | Renesas Electronics Corporation | VSO Electronics Co., Ltd. |
| DensBits Technologies Ltd. | Kano Technologies | Renesas Technology Corporation | Wavecrest |
| Der An Electric Wire & Cable Co., Ltd. | Keen Top International Enterprises Co., Ltd. | Rise Moral Tech Limited | Weihai Honglin Electronic Co., Ltd. |
| Dialog Semiconductor | KEL Corporation | Ritek Corporation | WELI SHENG TERMINAL INDUSTRIAL CO., LTD |
| DongGuan City MingJi Electronics Co., Ltd | Keysight Technologies | RITEUP Co., Ltd. | Western Digital Corporation |
| Dongguan ShuangYi Electronic Technology Manufacturing Co., Ltd. | KEYW Corporation | RMI - Raza Microelectonics, Inc. | Wieson Technologies Co., Ltd. |
| Dongguan Yizhao Electronic Co. Ltd. | KingSpec Electronics Technology Co.,Ltd. | ROHM Co., Ltd. | Wilder Technologies, LLC |
| DoTop Technology, Inc. | Kingston Digital Inc. | S34A, Inc. | WIN WIN PRECISION IND., CO., LTD. |
| Drapho Electronics Technology Co., Ltd. | KnowledgeTek, Inc. | Samphone Electronic Co., Ltd. | WINGSONIC LTD. |
| Dynabook Inc. | Knowlent Corporation | Samsung | Winpoint Electronic Corp |
| Ease Software, Inc. | KYOCERA-ELCO | SAMTEC INC | Wintec Industries |
| Efficere Technologies | LaCie | San Shing Electronics Co., Ltd | Wipro Limited |
| ELECOM CO., LTD. | Landwin Electronic Corp. | SANDFORCE INC. | Workbit Corporation |
| Electronics Testing Center, Taiwan | Lattice Semiconductor Corporation | SanDisk Corporation | Xilinx, Inc. |
| Emulex Corporation | Lenovo Japan, Ltd. | Sanko Electronics Co., Ltd. | Xinshun Hardware (Shenzhen) Co., Ltd. |
| ENE TECHNOLOGY INC | LG Electronics Inc | Santa Electronics Inc. | Xyratex Technology Ltd |
| Energy Full & Hi-Top International Ltd. | Lin Shiung Enterprise Co., Ltd. | Seagate | Y.C. Cable USA, Inc. |
| Energy Full Electronics Co., Ltd | Linpo Industrial Ltd | Seiko Epson Corporation | Yangtze Memory Technologies Co., Ltd. |
| Entery Industrial Co., Ltd. | Lite-On Technology Corporation | Semtech-Snowbush IP | YEONHO Electronics Co, LTD |
| Entorian Technologies L.P. | Logic Devices Inc | Sensata Technologies | YM Electric Co., Ltd |
| EqualLogic | Logitec Corporation | SerialTek | Zarlink Semiconductor |
| Essencore Limited | Longwell Electronics Inc. | Shanghai Zhaoxin Semiconductor Co., Ltd. | Zetera Corporation |
| ETRON Technology, Inc | LOTES CO., LTD | Shenzhen Lianlianfa Technology Co., Ltd. |