There is no need for a master or slave distinction with SATA drives because they each connect to the motherboard with their own SATA cable. Two IDE/PATA drives, on the other hand, could share the ...

cable to connect to the motherboard. See Centronics and SATA. THIS DEFINITION IS FOR PERSONAL USE ONLY. All other reproduction requires permission.

only one of which plugs into the motherboard. The remaining 40-pin or 44-pin connectors plug into the drives. Serial ATA (SATA) cables are also designed to connect storage devices to motherboards.

You need to connect two different power cords to use a disk drive with your computer. One SATA cable will be between the motherboard and the disk drive. The second SATA cable will be between the ...