SATA: how many drives

Hi all, I just noticed something. I have a Sil1332 SATA controller with two ports on. I used to be under the impression that SATA works on the principal of one drive per controller. But looking at my dmesg, I see the SATA controller offers hde, hdf, hdg and hdh. Does this mean I can put use two drives per port, i.e. four in total? How does it work? I've only ever seen cables for one drive per port. If it is indeed two drives per port, does it have the same problem as IDE - that it can talk to only one drive at a time. Or is it more independant, like scsi? Thanks -- Kind regards Hans du Plooy Newington Consulting Services hansdp at newingtoncs dot co dot za