I've not used Debian with a SATA drive, but I've used the last three versions of Slackware with SATA drives. To make a long story short, if the kernel doesn't have SATA support compiled in, the drive won't be recognized. In some kernels, especially 2.4.x, the system will hang. So, if the Speakup kernel doesn't have SATA support, you'll have to make a custom kernel and use it to install. SATA is in the SCSI section, under low-level drivers for some odd reason. That means that a SATA kernel also needs SCSI disk support. The SATA drive will show up as a SCSI disk. Once it is set up, it works fine.
