SATA and DATA drives - what are they???

Whare are they and whats the difference between SATA and DATA drive.

My old pc has a SATA drive but new ones have the DATA Drive

Are they basically the same or is there a difference if so what.

You buy a new pc and it tell you your HD is say 1tb but its split into 2 500 on the C drive and 500 on the DATA drive.
what ever you do or save always semes to go the the C drive ( unless you programme it to go to other drive)
so why is it split into 2 drives and what do they mean

Like a few people on heri know how to use my pc so far and thats it. Not all of us are experts or know what all the jargon means

I thought both SATA and DATA were two different hard drive types, but got muddle up between SATA and IDE. SATA and IDE are two different hard drive types, and depending on how old your computer is would determine whether it has a SATA or DATA hard drive. Nonetheless, that doesnt answer your question. Maybe the DATA drive is just referring to a secondary drive that you can use for storage such as backups?

If the system is 1 TB, it may have one drive installed with two partitions, or two seperate drives installed. I think the 'DATA' drive is just a reference for another drive used for backups/storage purposes perhaps?

thanks Dan, so there must be a reason why they were SATA and are now DATA - love to know what the letters stand for - ill try n google and see if i can answer my own Q !

Originally Posted by dan-ger-ous

SATA and IDE are two different hard drive types, and depending on how old your computer is would determine whether it has a SATA or DATA hard drive.

! I meant SATA or IDE at the end, i got confused myself. I'll try looking around for any furthur info.

Hmm SATA hard drives are now called DATA harddrives? First time i've heard that. I tried googling, and other than data recovery hard drives i didnt find anything specific to 'data drive'.

ok found this on yahoo answers

What is the DATA hard drive?
Hi,

I have a quick question about hard drives. My computer has two hard drives, one says says the brand of my laptop and the other one says "DATA (D", does that mean that if my first hard drive gets full, then it will start to storage stuff in the new DATA hard drive?

I'm sorry if this is an extremely easy questions to some, but I just don't get it and i'm worried because i don't have much space left.

Anyone?

Thanks in advance.

basically similar question to mine and an answer from someone

You obviously have an Acer computer

Basically they partition the computer up that way so if you ever need to reinstall the OS, you don't lose your "data" (that is, the stuff on the DATA drive.

It will NOT automatically put stuff on the 2nd drive if the 1st one is full. You're supposed to separate your files yourself into programs and data.

* 1 year ago

Yes i do have an Acer pc so maybe its an Acer thing! but sounds like SATA DATA are similar things they are both for backing up Data.
so sounds like if your pc goes say belly up you should be able to get into the SATA or DATA drive where your OS is ???
But if they are just for backup why are they so big, why do they partition the 2 drives in almost half - which sort of makes you think you only have 500gb to use ad the SATA or DATA drive is for you OS and data rather than just your every day files etc.

Would that be correct or am i talking rubbish!
Im still a bit confused.com by this

Cant find anything else on google to say what the difference is. But being a Woman i need answers ! i need the WHY factor

Originally Posted by Linny40

Cant find anything else on google to say what the difference is. But being a Woman i need answers !

Generally followed by "NOW YOU B@ST@RD", or is that just my house

if as you say the drive is partitioned into two pieces, one for programs and the other for files, folders, photos, etc. then 500G does sound too much for programs, now that you have piqued my interest, i must go to my friend google and search, if i find anything, i will get back to you linny

Ah right... I have an Acer Laptop aswell so i'll just throw everything at you that i know about this Linny.

I'm definitley with you on the part where you ask why have a back up drive thats equal to half the size of the drive or partition used to installed the Operating System? In my opinion i can never use all the storage on the data drive as it is. But i also wouldnt want it any other way. Say if you are installed a program or suffer from a failed OS due to some severe driver issues, then you should have the piece of mind that your data is still stored in a safe place and that it can be accessible even after a system crash. But there is another argument, say if you have a failed hard drive that has two partitions? Then your just out of luck, even if you have a second partition, the partition itself was made and used on that same hard drive. So its best if you actually have a second hard drive in your system and use it for back ups only. Another tip i can give is for example having tons of music and pictures. Instead of having two different sets of copies on both the C and D drive, i just create a shortcut on the C drive to the files on my D drive, so i dont end up wasting vital storage space that can be used for something else.

As for the SATA and DATA drives. I think its hardware vs terminology here.

Here is a SATA and IDE hard drive:

and here are the cables used to connect the two different types of hard drives to your system:


You notice that the SATA hard drive itself has a more compact connection lead as its much smaller than the old IDE ribbon cable. So thats your TWO different types of hard drives

So i hear you say "what on earth is a DATA drive then dan?!?"

I guess its just a term given to a hard drive that is used specifically for backups, so that would mean no operating systems should be installed on there, simply just drag and drop files onto this drive to minimise the risk of losing your data permanently.

Its like going to a store and saying can you show me a DATA drive please?
They will say, well what do you mean? what kind of hard drive are you looking for? are you looking for a USB pen drive for storage or ....?

Most computers or should i say all will come with a SATA hard drive installed because of advances in technology, SATA drives can cope with transferring data at much higher volumes and at a greater speed.

I hope that clears things up for you Linny.

Cheers Dan yes sort of. Well i have an external HD that everything gets backed up onto - on all pcs - except the lappy, but thats hubby and his work in via microsoft outlook so his emails etc can be accessed on any pc Plus anything on his lappy i can get to from my homegroup as we are all now on win 7 so i can actually copy stuff into a file on the E H D.

Linny is there one or two hard drives in the pc?
if its two hard drives then one will be the C drive which is the primary and by default will save everything to itself unless as you already stated you tell it to go elsewhere and the next will be D drive.
They've probably named it the data drive themselves. Cant imagine it being one hard drive partitioned as this would be utterly pointless if the drive was being used for storage and backups at the same time.
But also if the drive is partitioned then the first partition will be C and second D.
I would open the pc and see how many hdd's are inside or else check out the specs on manufacturers website using the service code, P/N number or serial on the side of the machine.
It should say something like 2 500g western digital Hdd's or something along those lines or if its one hdd it'll just say 1 TB

When i go into my computer it says 3 Hard drives ( ones the H which is my external) It says 2 hard drives one Acer (C) and one DATA (D) ( thats my pc but they are all acers so probably all say same. But ill look up the spec on the acer site
Thanks Axxxo



Looked on the Acer website and cant find mine but on the side of my pc it says Acer Aprire AX3812, Windows 7 core 2 quad processor, 4GB DDR2, 1TB HD (which must means it has 1 HD and 2 partitions) DVD super Multi drive - i should imagine both my other acers are similar spec although the HDs not so large!