Datasheet

Intel Desktop Board WX58BP Technical Product Specification

1.6.2 Serial ATA Interfaces

The board provides six Serial ATA (SATA) connectors, which support one device per

connector.

1.6.2.1 Serial ATA Support

The board’s Serial ATA controller offers six independent Serial ATA ports with a

theoretical maximum transfer rate of 3 Gb/s per port. You can install one device on

each port for a maximum of six Serial ATA devices. Unlike a Parallel ATA IDE, which

supports a master/slave configuration and two devices per channel, a point-to-point

interface is used for host to device connections.

For compatibility, the underlying Serial ATA functionality is transparent to the

operating system. The Serial ATA controller can operate in both legacy and native

modes. In Legacy mode, standard IDE I/O and IRQ resources are assigned (IRQ 14

and 15). In Native mode, standard PCI Conventional bus resource steering is used.

Native mode is the preferred mode for configurations using Microsoft Windows XP*

and Microsoft Windows Vista* operating systems.

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NOTE

Many Serial ATA drives use new low-voltage power connectors and require adapters or

power supplies equipped with low-voltage power connectors.

For more information, see: http://www.serialata.org/

For information about the location of the Serial ATA connectors, refer to Figure 10.

1.6.2.2 Serial ATA RAID

The board supports the following RAID (Redundant Array of Independent Drives)

levels via the ICH10R:

 RAID 0 - Data striping

 RAID 1 - Data mirroring

 RAID 0+1 (or RAID 10) - Data striping and mirroring

 RAID 5 - Distributed parity

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NOTE

In order to use supported RAID features, you must first enable RAID in the BIOS.

Also, during Microsoft Windows XP* installation, you must press F6 to install the RAID

drivers. For more information about installing drivers during installation, refer to your

Microsoft Windows XP* documentation.