Tech News
← Back to articles

ATAboy is a USB adapter for legacy CHS only style IDE (PATA) drives

read original related products more articles

If you don't want to build your own, the hardware can be purchased here: https://obsoletetech.us/products/ataboy-an-open-source-legacy-ide-usb-bridge

ATAboy is designed for retro computing enthusiasts, data recovery experts, and archivists. Read and write the oldest of IDE hard drives, without the need for an "in-between" vintage computer!

ATAboy is a user-friendly bridge that allows classic IDE (PATA) hard drives to be connected to a modern computer over USB as a standard USB Mass Storage device. While cheap, modern adapters usually only work with newer "LBA" type drives, ATAboy works all the way back to the earliest CHS only, PIO Mode 0, ATA disks. (It will also work with newer LBA type IDE disks, but that's not really what it's designed for.) ATAboy features an "Award BIOS inspired" user friendly UI for drive configuration and setup.

When connected:

The IDE drive appears to your computer like a normal USB Mass Storage Device

No special drivers are required (Windows, Linux, macOS supported)

The device translates USB Mass Storage commands into IDE read/write operations

Hardware Requirements

To get started, you will also need:

Any 40‑pin IDE (PATA) hard drive with jumpers set for MASTER/SINGLE only!

... continue reading