Serial ATA also reduces the signalling voltage from the 5 volts used in P-ATA down to 0.5 volts, which reduces power consumption and electrical interference. This adds a capability that more expensive systems such as SCSI and Fibre Channel have had for a long time, though the future will tell how widely users exploit that aspect of the technology.

In addition, Serial ATA should give users the ability to hot swap hard drives. The SATA standard defines a cable with seven conductors (three grounds and four active data lines in two pairs) for the data connection. It is the successor of the legacy Advanced Technology Attachment standard (PATA, IDE, Parallel ATA). Parallel ATA uses a 16-bit wide data bus with many additional support and control signals, all operating at a much lower frequency. SATA host adapters and devices communicate via a high-speed serial cable over two pairs of conductors. To ensure backward compatibility with legacy ATA software and applications, SATA uses the same basic ATA and ATAPI command sets as legacy ATA devices. Serial ATA (SATA) is the next-generation interface for internal storage interconnect, designed to replace parallel ATA technology. It is a computer bus technology designed for transfer of data to and from a storage equipment.

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