Parallel ATA result, many near-synonyms for ATA/ATAPI and its previous incarnations are still in common informal use, in particular Extended IDE (EIDE) and Ultra ATA (UATA). After the introduction of Serial ATA (SATA) in 2003, the original ATA was renamed to Parallel ATA, or PATA for short. Parallel ATA cables have a maximum allowable length of . Because of this limit, the technology normally appears as an internal computer storage interface. For many years, ATA provided the most common and the least expensive interface for this application. It has largely been replaced by SATA in newer systems. The standard was originally conceived
Eagle Computer of the clamshell was the reset button, two RS-232 serial ports labeled "Serial A" and "Serial B", a Centronics parallel port labeled "Parallel A", a SASI port labeled "Parallel B", the brightness knob for the monitor, and the on/off switch. The keyboard was well-designed. The keys were black with white lettering. Besides a full typewriter keyboard, there was a complete ten-key number pad on the right, uncommon at that time. Labels on the "front" of the number keys of the typewriter keyboard, and all the keys of the number pad, denoted what function those keys performed in the command mode