Appletom, the nomenclature for these hard drives is confusing. ATA is a standard and specification for the hard drive interface. Serial ATA (SATA) and Parallel ATA (PATA) describe physical connection methods. All PATA and SATA drives are "ATA" drives.
Also confusing is "IDE" and it's derivatives and uses. IDE stands for "Integrated Drive Electronics", which simply means that the hard drive has it's own on-board controller on a circuit board. With just this definition, all PATA and SATA drives are IDE. However, the abbreviation IDE is also used by some to indicate the Parallel ATA connection standard. In fact, the acronym "PATA" was created to replace this second, very confusing use of IDE. As if that wasn't enough, "EIDE" is sometimes used to refer to the ATA spec. Ideally, this use of EIDE and the use of IDE in place of PATA should be stopped, but will probably hang around for a while longer.
Also, round cables versus flat (ribbon) cables are not the way to differentiate between protocols. It is the *connector* that matters, not the way the wires between the connectors are arranged. What you read on the Internet is about 90% likely to be wrong, including this statement! :-)
