Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

[Max Waterman]

Hi,

I'm looking into getting another drive and have noticed I've run out of 
SATA ports (and EIDE, as it happens).

So, I'm looking at a PCI card for SATA and went back to look at that 
Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8 card - I've had my eye on it for a few years, or 
perhaps it was a previous version of the same thing, I'm not sure.

Anyway, I'm worried that it isn't the correct bus type for my computer. 
I'm confused by the PCI-X and PCIe types, and I don't have access to my 
computer over Christmas.

My motherboard is some consumer level MSI board, and I just added an 
nVidia graphics card on the same bus (it used one of the two longer slots).

Could someone with better knowledge of such things hazzard a guess?

Thanks,

Max.

Re: Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

[Iain Rauch]

> I'm looking into getting another drive and have noticed I've run out of
> SATA ports (and EIDE, as it happens).
> 
> So, I'm looking at a PCI card for SATA and went back to look at that
> Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8 card - I've had my eye on it for a few years, or
> perhaps it was a previous version of the same thing, I'm not sure.
> 
> Anyway, I'm worried that it isn't the correct bus type for my computer.
> I'm confused by the PCI-X and PCIe types, and I don't have access to my
> computer over Christmas.
> 
> My motherboard is some consumer level MSI board, and I just added an
> nVidia graphics card on the same bus (it used one of the two longer slots).
> 
> Could someone with better knowledge of such things hazzard a guess?

I'm sure you will have PCI on your board, but it's unlikely that you have
PCI-X. You can use the PCI-X card in a PCI slot, but the speed will be
reduced.
If you have PCIe slots (which is likely if the board is less than a couple
of years old), you are better to use them as they are faster than PCI/PCI-X.


Iain

Re: Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

[Max Waterman]

Iain Rauch wrote:
>> I'm looking into getting another drive and have noticed I've run out of
>> SATA ports (and EIDE, as it happens).
>>
>> So, I'm looking at a PCI card for SATA and went back to look at that
>> Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8 card - I've had my eye on it for a few years, or
>> perhaps it was a previous version of the same thing, I'm not sure.
>>
>> Anyway, I'm worried that it isn't the correct bus type for my computer.
>> I'm confused by the PCI-X and PCIe types, and I don't have access to my
>> computer over Christmas.
>>
>> My motherboard is some consumer level MSI board, and I just added an
>> nVidia graphics card on the same bus (it used one of the two longer slots).
>>
>> Could someone with better knowledge of such things hazzard a guess?
>>     
>
> I'm sure you will have PCI on your board, but it's unlikely that you have
> PCI-X. You can use the PCI-X card in a PCI slot, but the speed will be
> reduced.
> If you have PCIe slots (which is likely if the board is less than a couple
> of years old), you are better to use them as they are faster than PCI/PCI-X.
>   
OK, so it sounds like my suspicions were correct - I have PCI/PCIe.

You say I would be better to use PCIe, but the card is PCI-X. Can I use
PCI-X in a PCIe slot?

Max.
>
> Iain
>
>
>   

Re: Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

[Iain Rauch]

> OK, so it sounds like my suspicions were correct - I have PCI/PCIe.
> 
> You say I would be better to use PCIe, but the card is PCI-X. Can I use
> PCI-X in a PCIe slot?

No, but if you would like better performance (and can afford it), a PCIe
card is the better option. Depending on your usage and requirements, PCI-X
will be fine, but as mentioned it may not physically fit in your particular
motherboard. You need to check what slots you do have as PCIe come in a
variety of sizes also.


Regards,

Iain

Re: Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

[Brad Campbell]

Iain Rauch wrote:
>> OK, so it sounds like my suspicions were correct - I have PCI/PCIe.
>>
>> You say I would be better to use PCIe, but the card is PCI-X. Can I use
>> PCI-X in a PCIe slot?
> 
> No, but if you would like better performance (and can afford it), a PCIe
> card is the better option. Depending on your usage and requirements, PCI-X
> will be fine, but as mentioned it may not physically fit in your particular
> motherboard. You need to check what slots you do have as PCIe come in a
> variety of sizes also.

That is painfully true. I have a board with a pair of 16x and a pair of 1x slots.
It also has 2 PCI-X slots and I was about to purchase the board you mention in the subject line, but 
after a bit of digging I came up with these little beauties instead.

http://www.startech.com/item/PEXSATA24E-4-Port-PCI-Express-x4-SATA-II-Card.aspx

I'm using them in a server, so I used a PCI graphics card to free up both PCIe 16x slots and popped 
two of these in. They appear to be nicely supported and go like stink.

I also used a dual port SIL-3132 board in one of the PCIe 1x slots to fill out my 10 ports. It to is 
extremely well supported.

After I placed the order with Startech, I located identical boards under a "fujitech" branding 
(Cheap far-eastern supplier) which were/are *identical* in every respect excepting they only cost 
about $90 each. Cheap and reliable (I picked up a couple of extras as spares).

I was replacing 3 x Promise SATA150-TX cards (4 port) which are just flaky in multi-card 
configurations on anything other than an old PCI 33Mhz bus and I've been very happy with the results.

Sonnet also make a 4 port PCIe card using the same chip, but its almost twice the price and uses 
pretty much the same hardware.

These Marvell 7042 chips are great. Cheers Mark!!

You can use a PCI-X card in a PCI slot, but I believe you'll be disappointed with the results.

If you only need a couple of ports and have a PCIe 1x slot available, the SIL-3132 cards are 
available everywhere and are really pretty good.

Regards,
Brad
-- 
Dolphins are so intelligent that within a few weeks they can
train Americans to stand at the edge of the pool and throw them
fish.

Re: Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

[Justin Piszcz]

On Sat, 20 Dec 2008, Brad Campbell wrote:

> Iain Rauch wrote:
>>> OK, so it sounds like my suspicions were correct - I have PCI/PCIe.
>>> 
>>> You say I would be better to use PCIe, but the card is PCI-X. Can I use
>>> PCI-X in a PCIe slot?
>
> These Marvell 7042 chips are great. Cheers Mark!!
>
> You can use a PCI-X card in a PCI slot, but I believe you'll be disappointed 
> with the results.
>
> If you only need a couple of ports and have a PCIe 1x slot available, the 
> SIL-3132 cards are available everywhere and are really pretty good.

Only use them with slow drives, when I had used my Velociraptors, I got around
the maximum bandwidth with 1 disk hooked to each PCI-e x1, when I ran tests
on two of the PCI-e x1 cards, it cut the BW in half.  They are not fast enough
to handle to fast disks.  The Startech card though is great and you can fully
saturate it-- to get all available bandwidth from the disks.

Re: Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

[Wolfgang Denk]

Dear Iain Rauch,

In message <C571C6FB.BA32%groups@email.iain.rauch.co.uk> you wrote:
>
> If you have PCIe slots (which is likely if the board is less than a couple

But the Supermicro card is a PCI-X card - AFAIK there are no PCIe
versions available (yet?).

> of years old), you are better to use them as they are faster than PCI/PCI-X.

Ummm. It depends. Throughput can be hight, but I think latencies  are
higher,  too.  So the actual performance depends on your system load.
If you have enough small requests PCI-X may even be faster.

Best regards,

Wolfgang Denk

-- 
DENX Software Engineering GmbH,     MD: Wolfgang Denk & Detlev Zundel
HRB 165235 Munich, Office: Kirchenstr.5, D-82194 Groebenzell, Germany
Phone: (+49)-8142-66989-10 Fax: (+49)-8142-66989-80 Email: wd@denx.de
Living on Earth may be expensive, but it includes an annual free trip
around the Sun.

Re: Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8

[Wolfgang Denk]

Dear Max,

In message <494C12A3.6070904@fastmail.co.uk> you wrote:
> 
> So, I'm looking at a PCI card for SATA and went back to look at that 
> Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8 card - I've had my eye on it for a few years, or 
> perhaps it was a previous version of the same thing, I'm not sure.
> 
> Anyway, I'm worried that it isn't the correct bus type for my computer. 
> I'm confused by the PCI-X and PCIe types, and I don't have access to my 
> computer over Christmas.

The Supermicro AOC-SAT2-MV8 is a PCI-X card (64 bit, 133 MHz).

> My motherboard is some consumer level MSI board, and I just added an 
> nVidia graphics card on the same bus (it used one of the two longer slots).

The controller would probably go into the other of the "two longer
slots", assuming these are 64 bit PCI-X slots

BTW: I'm running a few such cards in some soervers; they are good.

Best regards,

Wolfgang Denk

-- 
DENX Software Engineering GmbH,     MD: Wolfgang Denk & Detlev Zundel
HRB 165235 Munich, Office: Kirchenstr.5, D-82194 Groebenzell, Germany
Phone: (+49)-8142-66989-10 Fax: (+49)-8142-66989-80 Email: wd@denx.de
He who hesitates is not only lost, but miles from the next exit.