Editing Atari Mega STE (section)

=== Storage ===

==== Floppy disk drive ====

The Mega STE includes a single internal 3.5-inch floppy drive. Early production units shipped with a '''720 KB double-density''' drive; later units include a '''1.44 MB high-density''' drive capable of reading both DD and HD media. The floppy controller is the WD1772 (clocked at 8 MHz regardless of CPU speed setting) with DMA transfer to main memory.

==== SCSI hard disk ====

The 2 MB and 4 MB models shipped with an internal SCSI hard disk — typically a '''Seagate ST-157N''' (48 MB) or similar SCSI drive.<ref name="seagate">{{cite web |url=http://www.verycomputer.com/10_587e9c5649cc406d_1.htm |title=Seagate ST-157N Hard Drive in Mega STe |publisher=verycomputer.com |date=1993-08-06 |access-date=2026-03-27}}</ref> The SCSI interface is provided by an '''ACSI/SCSI adapter daughterboard''' that bridges the Atari Computer System Interface (ACSI) DMA port to a standard SCSI bus. This daughterboard connects internally; the external ACSI DMA port on the rear panel remains available for additional ACSI peripherals.

The 1 MB base model did not include a hard disk, SCSI adapter, or high-resolution monitor.

==== Hard disk driver software ====

The internal SCSI disk requires driver software loaded at boot time. Atari shipped '''AHDI''' (Atari Hard Disk Interface) as the standard driver. Third-party alternatives include '''HDDriver''' (by Uwe Seimet) and '''CBHD''', both of which provide improved performance, larger partition support, and broader device compatibility.