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SATA Port Multiplier

post #1 of 21
4/9/10 at 12:38pm
Thread Starter 
I just recently found this SATA port multiplier which appears to take 1 SATA port from the motherboard, and turn it into 5 SATA ports. Or am I reading it as 5 inputs? My goal is to take my Gigabyte GA-EP45-UD3P motherboard which has 6 SATA ports controlled by the main southbridge chipset, and turn it into more ports. I would need

1 dedicated for my OS drive
1 for the SATA multiplier. (5 Drives)
4 for the remaining drives. (4 Drives)

Something similar to this sketch.

Something that would allow me to accomplish having more SATA Hard drives, without an expensive raid controller ($100+), and without loosing the bandwidth.

I want to have as many storage drives as I can, as I am running out of space. I have a raid 5 array that contains 4.5 TB. Would it be worth while to just add more drives and create that diagram with a sata port multiplier somehow? Or what other suggestions can you make without me changing my motherboard, changing to 2tb drives,or adding an expensive raid controller so that I can increase my HDD storage capacity.

Thanks for your time, and any/all responses are greatly appreciated.
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post #2 of 21
4/9/10 at 12:52pm
your bandwidth will be severely limited with that thing. get a decent sata PCIE 1x card.
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post #3 of 21
4/9/10 at 12:53pm
NAS or File Server.
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post #4 of 21
4/9/10 at 12:59pm
Thread Starter 
Quote:
Originally Posted by Kevingreenbmx
your bandwidth will be severely limited with that thing. get a decent sata PCIE 1x card.
If you can get one on the cheap? (less than 100 bucks)

Quote:
Originally Posted by DuckieHo View Post
File Server.
That's not going to be on the cheap now is it?
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post #5 of 21
4/9/10 at 1:09pm
there is no way to do that because bandwidth will be very limited. Get a sata raid controller card if you can
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post #6 of 21
4/9/10 at 1:16pm
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Quote:
Originally Posted by kevingreenbmx View Post
your bandwidth will be severely limited with that thing. get a decent sata PCIE 1x card.
This.


Just to give you an idea (which this is not at all what actually happens but it is easier to explain it this way):
If all of your drives run at 80MB/s and you have that all going through a single SATA. That would be 5 x 80 which is 400MB/s.... SATAII only does 300 so you will have a server bottleneck.

Get a nice PCIe X1 card and use that instead.
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post #7 of 21
4/9/10 at 1:21pm
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-008-_-Product

there you go, 4 extra ports for $22

edit: ok, so two are e-sata but it still gives you 2 extra internal ports.
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post #8 of 21
4/9/10 at 1:39pm
Quote:
Originally Posted by kevingreenbmx View Post
your bandwidth will be severely limited with that thing. get a decent sata PCIE 1x card.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Lord Xeb View Post
This.


Just to give you an idea (which this is not at all what actually happens but it is easier to explain it this way):
If all of your drives run at 80MB/s and you have that all going through a single SATA. That would be 5 x 80 which is 400MB/s.... SATAII only does 300 so you will have a server bottleneck.

Get a nice PCIe X1 card and use that instead.
I love how you tell him to buy a PCIe x1 card because of bandwidth - but conveniently forget the fact that PCIe 1.0 (which is all cheap SATA cards will support - they aren't PCIe 2.0 compliant) only supports 250MB/s/lane. So you actually get MORE bandwidth from a single SATAII connection on the motherboard than you get from an x1 PCIe card.

Having said that, don't go with a port multiplier option. They are bad. Get a proper HBA and use that instead - the Supermicro AOC-SASLP-MV8 is around $100 and supports 8 ports in a PCIe x4 slot. It's a much better bet than port multipliers, which usually don't play well with Intel controllers, and are pretty flakey even with Silicon Image ones.
Edited by the_beast - 4/9/10 at 1:43pm
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post #9 of 21
4/9/10 at 1:44pm
Thread Starter 
Alright, Well I've contacted both Gigabyte and Intel and I've been told that port multipliers don't work on my chipset. So what would be a PCIe/PCI Card that I would be able to use, for less than 100 dollars that would provide me with the bandwidth I need.
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post #10 of 21
4/9/10 at 1:50pm
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16816103058

or

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16815121009

are probably your best bets for around $100
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