With growing pressure form OEM clients like Dell and HP, Taiwan's
optical drive manufacturers have started to introduce more SATA equipped drives. According to DigiTimes, the volume of SATA DVD-ROM
drives and DVD burners could exceed that of ATAPI models by the second half of this year.
While ATAPI has been popularly used
in optical disc drives (ODDs), SATA (serial ATA) stands a good chance of replacing the former as the mainstream interface standard for
DVD-ROM drives and DVD burners in the second half of 2007 due to increasing adoption of the latter by global OEM/ODM clients such as Dell
and Hewlett-Packard, according to ODD makers in Taiwan.
Many international OEM/ODM clients have requested for use of SATA in place
of ATAPI for new DVD-ROM drive and/or DVD burner models sent for product certification over the past four months, the sources pointed
out. As a result, the total shipment volume of SATA DVD-ROM drives and DVD burners is likely to exceed that of ATAPI models in the second
half of the year, the sources indicated.
While this isn't the first time DigiTimes has made these claims about SATA, ATAPI
drives are definitely on the way out. If you'd like to read more, head on over to DigiTimes.
