PCI vs PCIe to SATA cards

thirteenthcor

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So I've now run out of Mainboard-side SATAII Ports (6 Bays and 6 Ports full).

I want to keep those 3.5 Drive bays full for storage (eventually working up to 1TBX2 RAID0 + 4X2TB Simple Volumes) But relocate my OS to a SSD and another pair of small laptop RAID0 7200 drives elsewhere in my case.

My issue is this:

I've been looking at PCI/PCIe to SATA controller cards to increase my SATA port capacity, but I have no idea what the differences I am going to notice between using a PCI and a PCI"e" port for the controller. What I DO know right now is that the PCIe cards are significantly more expensive per-port than the PCI cards. I also know in general technical terms that PCI-Express outperforms PCI in terms of bus-rate etc..

I guess then the short of it is that I'm concerned about my Read/Write rates and want to know if I'll notice any significant degradation (actually none at all is desired obviously) in transfer rates in relation to either card. Does the difference between PCI and PCIe translate at all to HDD/SSD/RAID0 transfer rates? I'm happy if I can get 200+Mb/s on my two RAID0s and SSD using a PCI card.

Also, I am looking to run one RAID0 array with 2 drives off whatever controller I get, hardware or otherwise.

Examples:

PCI:

http://www.amazon.com/Vantec-6-Port-SATA-Host-Card/dp/B002PX9BX2/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1330455938&sr=8-2

The form-factor of this following one would be ideal for me:

http://www.amazon.com/Neewer-Serial-Adapter-SIL3114-Cables/dp/B0058M903S/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1330455938&sr=8-3

Now PCIe:

http://www.amazon.com/Syba-Express-Ports-Controller-SY-PEX40008/dp/B002R0DZWQ/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1330455999&sr=8-1

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815158090

Obviously the ones above is quite a lot more for the same amount of ports, than the PCI one.

Can anyone shed some light on this?
 
Solution
Conventional PCI is slower than PCI-e. The speed depends on which PCI standards your motherboard and controller implement; the speed will be the slower of the two.

From Wikipedia, the speed limits of various types of PCI:
133 MB/s (32-bit at 33 MHz)
266 MB/s (32-bit at 66 MHz or 64-bit at 33 MHz)
533 MB/s (64-bit at 66 MHz)

The last PCI slot I saw was 32-bit at 66 MHZ.

The term "SATA II 150" in the first product is suspicious. SATA II is 300 Mb/sec. The second product also states "Data transfer rate up to 150MB/s. " I suspect that this is a case of you-get-what-you-pay-for.
Conventional PCI is slower than PCI-e. The speed depends on which PCI standards your motherboard and controller implement; the speed will be the slower of the two.

From Wikipedia, the speed limits of various types of PCI:
133 MB/s (32-bit at 33 MHz)
266 MB/s (32-bit at 66 MHz or 64-bit at 33 MHz)
533 MB/s (64-bit at 66 MHz)

The last PCI slot I saw was 32-bit at 66 MHZ.

The term "SATA II 150" in the first product is suspicious. SATA II is 300 Mb/sec. The second product also states "Data transfer rate up to 150MB/s. " I suspect that this is a case of you-get-what-you-pay-for.
 
Solution
Are you looking for a raid card or a sata port card? Also the sata ports are sata3 or sata 2? I wanted to add some sata3 ports to my motherboard since it only had two so I bought this ;

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16815318001&Tpk=sata3%20pci-e%20card

I haven't used it for a raid setup but it works great for the sata3 SSD that is connected to it.
If you have a spare Pci-e x1 slot then that is what you want to use for additional sata ports so that you will get the full bandwith of what ever card you decide to get.
 

thirteenthcor

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Originally just for a SATA drive and maybe a X2 RAID0.. But from all the research I've been doing it looks like it might just be a better idea to upgrade my mobo to better suit my needs, considering a decent, headache-free SATA controller card can cost upwards of 100 bucks.

With that in mind this looks like a much better investment than a SATA card:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813128509

Thanks for all the advice!