Thursday, 21 May 2015 00:00

So what’s better SCSI or IDE/Ultra ATA?

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What is SCSI?

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SCSI (Small Computer Systems Interface) — is the most popular interface for physically connecting and transferring data between computers and peripheral devices.

First SCSI devices appeared as far back as in 70-ies, when Shugart Company began its R&Ds in the sphere of hard disk new interfaces connections.

Today a SCSI is one of the standards (to be more precise – a set of standards) of internal interface and cedes only to IDE interface in terms of popularity. The main difference from IDE, which is supported by a limited number of specific peripheral devices, is that a general interface SCSI was developed to support different types of internal and external devices. This implies that it is possible to connect internal drives and various external peripheral devices with the help of SCSI adapter: scanners, streamers, plotters, printers and so forth. Perhaps it is the primary advantage of SCSI over IDE. The following are the key advantages of SCSI interface: high speed rate; it is independent of the system bus; connection of 7 to 15 different devices to one channel. Unfortunately, it has a number of disadvantages as well: high cost and relative difficulty in installation and setup.

There is a prevalent opinion among the experts that it is better to use SCSI in graphic system, servers and computers processing large volumes of data. There are the following types of SCSI: Wide SCSI, Ultra Wide SCSI and others, different in terms of data width and types of connector.

So what’s better, SCSI IDE/Ultra ATA?

I doubt that anyone can give an unambiguous answer to this question. Every interface has its own filed of application. For instance, with the help of SCSI adapters you can connect a large number of devices to one channel (7 or 15 devices per channel, whilst only two per channel via IDE/ATAPI), but does the simple user really need it that often? How often do we have more than 2 hard drives on our PC? Besides that, every motherboard has inbuilt IDE controller a priori, while you need to purchase the SCSI adapter additionally. Of course, there are motherboards with inbuilt SCSI controller, yet their price is much higher.

SCSI standard hard drives cost much higher than IDE drives. However even the most rapid IDE storage devices work way slower than SCSI and their fault-tolerance is indeed inferior. From the very beginning the SCSI devices have been developed to work on server where faultless performance and data integrity are the most important factors of work. And as we have discussed above, on top of all SCSI supports not only storage devices but also professional periphery and, first of all, professional scanners, plotters and other devices.
Nevertheless, it is still better to use IDE for office purposes since it is cheaper and simpler in terms of setting up.

Last modified on Thursday, 21 May 2015 17:15
Data Recovery Expert

Viktor S., Ph.D. (Electrical/Computer Engineering), was hired by DataRecoup, the international data recovery corporation, in 2012. Promoted to Engineering Senior Manager in 2010 and then to his current position, as C.I.O. of DataRecoup, in 2014. Responsible for the management of critical, high-priority RAID data recovery cases and the application of his expert, comprehensive knowledge in database data retrieval. He is also responsible for planning and implementing SEO/SEM and other internet-based marketing strategies. Currently, Viktor S., Ph.D., is focusing on the further development and expansion of DataRecoup’s major internet marketing campaign for their already successful proprietary software application “Data Recovery for Windows” (an application which he developed).

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