Cable select
Cable select
Cable select is a technology used in IDE drives to automatically configure the master and slave settings on the drives, eliminating the need for manual configuration with jumpers. When enabled, the drives will communicate with each other to determine which one will be the master and which will be the slave.
What does Cable select mean?
Cable select is a feature of some computer motherboards, storage controllers, and disk drives that allows the user to connect multiple devices to a single IDE or SATA cable. The cable select feature automatically detects the order of the devices on the cable and assigns the correct drive letter to each device. This eliminates the need to manually set the jumpers on each device to specify its drive letter.
Cable select is typically used with IDE and SATA hard drives and optical drives. It is not compatible with other types of devices, such as Floppy drives or tape drives.
To use cable select, simply connect the devices to the cable in any order. The motherboard or storage controller will automatically detect the order of the devices and assign the correct drive letter to each device.
Applications
Cable select is an important feature in Technology today because it simplifies the process of connecting multiple devices to a single cable. This can be especially useful in systems with a limited number of available cables or in systems where the devices are difficult to Access.
Cable select is also used in some RAID configurations. In a RAID Configuration, multiple hard drives are combined to create a single logical drive. Cable select can be used to simplify the process of connecting the hard drives to the RAID Controller.
History
Cable select was first introduced in the early 1990s with the release of the IDE (Integrated Drive Electronics) interface. The original IDE interface did not support cable select, so users had to manually set the jumpers on each device to specify its drive letter. This process was time-consuming and error-prone.
In 1995, the ATA (Advanced Technology Attachment) specification was released. The ATA specification included support for cable select. This made it much easier to connect multiple devices to a single IDE cable.
The SATA (Serial ATA) interface was released in 2003. SATA is a newer interface than IDE, and it includes support for cable select. SATA is now the most common interface for connecting hard drives and optical drives to computers.