Patent ID: 7346711

Claim:
A method for detecting whether an IDE drive is connected to an intelligent drive electronics channel within a computer, comprising: writing data to a drive head register destination for the IDE drive; in response to writing the data to the drive head register destination, reading the drive head register destination; detecting whether the data read from the drive head register destination matches the data written to the drive head register destination; in response to the data read from the drive head register destination not matching the data written to the drive head register destination, returning that the IDE drive is not connected to an intelligent drive electronics channel; in response to the data read from the drive head register destination matching the data written to the drive head register destination, reading the status register destination; reading a status register destination for the IDE drive; detecting whether data read from the status register destination has a first predefined value; upon the data read from the status register destination not having the first predefined value, returning that the IDE drive is connected to the intelligent drive electronics channel; upon the data read from the status register destination having the first predefined value, reading a cylinder low register destination and a cylinder high register destination of the drive; detecting whether data read from the cylinder low register destination and the cylinder high register destination matches a predefined signature; and in response to the data read from cylinder low register destination and the cylinder high register destination matching the predefined signature, returning that the IDE drive is connected to the intelligent drive electronics channel.