[H] Wondering?

[DSinc]

Does Win7 and/or Win8.1 still see/acknowledge the old 36-pin ATA/PATA 
(ESDI) connectors on an old m/b?
I am trying to help my Older Brother (OB) get modern. SATA is a foreign 
term to him. He has read it, but that is
about all. His m/b (Gigabyte GA-M51GM-S2Gis OLD! Fine. But it does have 
4 SATA connectors (0-4) so I'm
thinking he MAY be able to do an SSD - even in IDE-mode. His current 
BIOS is 'F4' which may be pretty weak(?)
The User Manual never mentions AHCI, and, any discussion about SATA 
seems to focus on RAID. Suspect this
m/b may have been a 'gamer's' m/b back when RAID was the 'bee's knees.' 
Whatever, past history.
His cpu is an AMD Athlon 64 3500. He has 2GB of RAM. Yes, I know 4GB is 
the current minimum.
I am trying to avoid a 1200 road trip to his home to do surgery on his 
old PC! OB sees himself as a sorta expert, believes
he can do anything, does not understand why I ask so many questions. 
Internal PC BS is a "take it to the shop' kind
of deal. Problem is, he recently relocated and does not have a new 
'take-it-to' option' so I am his only path forward.
Thanks,
Duncan