SATA or Serial ATA is an interface standard that connects host bus adaptors to mass storage devices like hard disk drives (HDD), optical drives (CD-ROM), solid-state drive (SSD). Simply SATA is used to connect internal and external storage devices like HDD, CD-ROM, or SSD to the computer. SATA standard is created in 2000 as the successor of the Parallel ATA (PATA). After that time SATA evolved and updated with new versions.
| SATA Version | Speed | Data Transfer Rate |
|---|---|---|
| SATA 1.0 | 1.5 Gbit/s | 150 MB/s |
| SATA 2.0 | 3.0 Gbit/s | 300 MB/s |
| SATA 3.0 | 6.0 Gbit/s | 600 MB/s |
SATA 1.0 provides 1.5 Gbit/s speed which is about 150 MB/s data transfer rate.
SATA 2.0 provides 3.0 Gbit/s speed which is about 300 MB/s data transfer rate. SATA 2.0 is compatible with the SATA 1.0 standard which means SATA 1.0 devices can be connected to the SATA 2.0 interfaces but the SATA 1.0 standard is executed and the speed is 1.5 Gbit/s and the transfer rate is 300 MB/s.
SATA 3.0 provides 6.0 Gbit/s speed which is about 600 MB/s data transfer rate. Even this may see very high speed and data transfer rate regular SSD storage can transfer or read/write about 500 MB/s. SATA 3.0 is backward compatible with the SATA 2.0. But while working with SATA 2.0 devices the speed decreases to 3.0 Gbit/s and the data transfer rate decreases by 300 MB/s.