Sata card, please advice

[PeterSmiles]

I have in mind to buy the following Sata card to expand the amount of Sata ports in my server.

It is used with Windows Home Server V1, so drive extender is used instead of raid set up.

My current MB has 5 sata 6Gb ports, and my understanding is that with adding this card I will have 11 ports, which function identical as the 5 ports fixed on the MB.

Please have a look and advice if I'm correct.

AAR-2610SA Adaptec AAR-2610SA ADAPTEC AAR-2610SA

http://www.amazon.com/AAR-2610SA-Adaptec-ADAPTEC/dp/B000MJ84UM

[NeverSure]

That is old.

Do you need 6 ports? I bought a PCI express 2 port (I needed 1 port) PCI that will run on Win 7 and back for just $40.

"PCI Express Low Profile SATA III (6.0Gb/s) Controller Card X 2 controllers"

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16816104015

[PeterSmiles]

Yes I need at least 5 ports, and it needs to run on Windows Home server 2003.

I know this is old, but try to find any 6 port expansion cards. These are refurbished and go for 30$.

I only not sure why it has port number 0 .

[DogNo1]

I'm curious about what you are hooking up to the five external SATA cables. Incidentally, in computer speak the first in a series is often numbered "0.". 1=2, 2=3, etc. Regarding the card, I would only buy it with the option of returning it if it doesn't work with your motherboard and peripherals, unless, of course you willing are to take a chance of losing your $30. It's not a lot of money. Good luck.

Edited December 11, 2013 by DogNo1

[dave_boo]

FWIW, the card uses Unix style numbering (where 0 is the first device).

I would also be concerned about running that card; it is PCI-X. Do you have any free PCI ports? If you do, please note that maximum speed will be a bit over 100 MB/s...as long as you are not using any other PCI device. There is also a 2TB array limit (1 TB max drive size) with this card.

[PeterSmiles]

FWIW, the card uses Unix style numbering (where 0 is the first device).

I would also be concerned about running that card; it is PCI-X. Do you have any free PCI ports? If you do, please note that maximum speed will be a bit over 100 MB/s...as long as you are not using any other PCI device. There is also a 2TB array limit (1 TB max drive size) with this card.

I discovered the limited size also yesterday, so that card isn't suitable for me as I want to hook up 6 x 1.5Tb disk.

In the mean time I found some other card with 8 ports, but I'm not really a computer nerd.

Could anyone tell me if this card is suitable for me, as I want to use it in non-raid since I use the drive extender from Windows home server, and I'm not sure if that is possible with every raid card .

http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/servers/proliantstorage/arraycontrollers/smartarrayp400/

My motherboard is https://www.asus.com/Motherboards/E35M1M/

[rakman]

FWIW, the card uses Unix style numbering (where 0 is the first device).

I would also be concerned about running that card; it is PCI-X. Do you have any free PCI ports? If you do, please note that maximum speed will be a bit over 100 MB/s...as long as you are not using any other PCI device. There is also a 2TB array limit (1 TB max drive size) with this card.

Assuming it works with 1TB drives (931GB nominal size) you can make 3 raid 10 "luns" the use windows dynamic disk to stripe the 3 luns into 1 volume.

that would give you 3 TB of space. Or, you can use each drive as a separate jbod drive, again use windows to stripe them together in a raid 5 configuration.

Most PC's only have a 32 bit PCI slot, the card is a 64 bit path, and most 32 bit pci slots are 33 Mhz or possibly 66 Mhz. So you'll find the card is probably a bit worse than the motherboard disk channels.

But if you're looking for sheer size, it would be ok.