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[Martin_1962]

IDE is still the most common optical drive interface on new systems, despite attempts to move forward. This is mainly due to SATA optical drives still holding a premium (as most are PATA with an adapter - the performance of the adapter is not an issue on optical drives).  The OEM bumf I get sent fortnightly (used to be a systems integrator) suggests the industry (integrators, not manufacturers) is undecided on which way to go with optical - it will be a brave chipset manfacturer who pulls IDE support (it would probably have to be Intel).

Yes, true. I bought a new board (Asus M2N-SLI Deluxe) and it only has 1 IDE channel. Consequently I have had to ditch all my IDE drvies except my CD/DVD burner. I imagine that is a first step to going totally SATA2 and it's an nVidia chipset.

I'm sure the industry will switch totally to SATA2 eventually, but will be at least a year or 2 before you see the first SATA only boards come out i reckon. I don't think pulling the plug totally on IDE is going to make too many people or companies unhappy... after all, whats the price of an all-in-one optical drive these days? £30 roughly. Ok, that may add up for large scale IT systems, but its better than a kick in the teeth.

My optical drive was around 40 but it was Pioneer, replaced and earlier Pioneer which cost a lot more than that!!!!

[supermop]

Yeah, originally it was about £200 for a DVD-RAM drive. Then prices crashed to a rough average of £30. Haven't seen an all-in-one drive for more than £40 for a good few months now.

[TheBoy]

Yeah, my first DVD writer was £299.  Pioneer ones have been under £30 for years now - my aging 108 was under £30, must have had that for ages now...

I reckon only Intel have the balls and marketing clout to do away with IDE, and they are still busy trying to get the industry to take up the far superior BTX layout.