Recommend Me A PCIe Sata III card

[Immitem]

Simple request.

I often write elaborate posts explaining what I want and why but this should be simple enough. I have a z620 with only 2 Sata III ports and I need more. I also need it to reliably handle being written to and read frequently and under heavy load as I run simulations and render. Too many reviews point to cheap models frequently dropping out under above average load.

What do you recommend?

P.S. I need at least 4 ports on the card and will not be using/needing RAID support.

Thanks!

 

[marko55]

What size PCIe slot do you have available?

 

[Immitem]

What size PCIe slot do you have available?

An open-ended PCIe x8 Gen 3.

 

[marko55]

Best performance value, and 8 ports: https://www.amazon.com/SAS9211-8I-8PORT-Int-Sata-Pcie/dp/B002RL8I7M/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1509019476&sr=8-2&keywords=9207-8i

This is an enterprise class HBA. I recommend this all day long for your, in that machine. "IT" mode means its purely an HBA (no RAID). If you find one that is flashed with the "IR" firmware, it can also do RAID 1 & 0. These use the same LSI chip that HP uses on their Z series workstations that have on-board SAS chips. If you buy from eBay, just ensure you're getting an "LSI" model and not a Dell/IBM rebranded card.

You'll also need a SAS-to-SATA fan out cable (or 2 if connecting more than 4 drives) in order to connect your drives: https://www.amazon.com/Cable-Matters-Internal-Mini-SAS-Breakout/dp/B012BPLYJC/ref=sr_1_1_sspa?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1509019586&sr=1-1-spons&keywords=sff-8087+to+sata&psc=1

I'm an LSI guy through and through for all the RAID adapters and HBAs I use. They're the best, period. This is why every other RAID card manufacturer (Adaptec, Areca, all the server OEMs) use LSI ROCs on their RAID cards & HBAs. LSI just codes their firmware on their cards and in my experience always perform better than the 3rd party adapters that use LSI ROCs.

There are super cheap options like the one below also. I've used these before too but experienced flaky issues. These also only have x2 PCIe connectivity so roughly 1000MB/s (1GB/s) throughput to the motherboard. As long as you're only connecting HDDs (assuming max 200MB/s per drive) that should be fine but if you're gonna connect SSDs then stay away from these. The LSI HBA from above utilizes x8 lanes totaling around 4000MB/s.

https://www.amazon.com/IO-Crest-SI-PEX40062-Controller-Green/dp/B00AZ9T41M/ref=sr_1_12?s=electronics&ie=UTF8&qid=1509019616&sr=1-12&keywords=pcie+to+sata

 

[Immitem]

Best performance value, and 8 ports: https://www.amazon.com/SAS9211-8I-8PORT-Int-Sata-Pcie/dp/B002RL8I7M/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1509019476&sr=8-2&keywords=9207-8i

Freaking awesome man!

One quick question: I am dual booting W10/CentOS 7, will this thing flake out when switching between the two?

Thanks!

 

[marko55]

Best performance value, and 8 ports: https://www.amazon.com/SAS9211-8I-8PORT-Int-Sata-Pcie/dp/B002RL8I7M/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1509019476&sr=8-2&keywords=9207-8i

Freaking awesome man!

One quick question: I am dual booting W10/CentOS 7, will this thing flake out when switching between the two?

Thanks!

I wish I could answer this from first hand experience but I'm not sure. The HBA does load its firmware and present its drives BEFORE the BIOS so anything that happens after BIOS initialization shouldn't be any the wiser on where the connected drives are being presented from. Just install the drivers in CentOS and see if its seeing the card or not.

 

[samer.forums]

Get modern PCIe 3.0 cards not PCIe 2.0

you might fall in Drivers problems and maybe will not work on windows 10. also newer chips on PCIE GEN 3.o are faster and better.

these Gen 2 cards are OLD VERY OLD

 

[marko55]

Get modern PCIe 3.0 cards not PCIe 2.0

you might fall in Drivers problems and maybe will not work on windows 10. also newer chips on PCIE GEN 3.o are faster and better.

these Gen 2 cards are OLD VERY OLD

I get your point here but the PCIe version has ZERO weight on driver/OS support. I can say from first hand experience that the SAS2 LSI cards work on Windows 10. Win 10 has a driver built in. LSI (Broadcom) just released a new version of the driver for Cent OS last year, which isn't "old", and the 9207 is still a current card from Broadcom. Take for instance that the 9211-xi was phased out and not even on their website. The 9207 is just a lower cost, SAS2, PCIe 2.0 option. The SAS2 cards are gonna be MUCH cheaper than the new SAS3 cards and still work great.

 

[samer.forums]

Get modern PCIe 3.0 cards not PCIe 2.0

you might fall in Drivers problems and maybe will not work on windows 10. also newer chips on PCIE GEN 3.o are faster and better.

these Gen 2 cards are OLD VERY OLD

I get your point here but the PCIe version has ZERO weight on driver/OS support. I can say from first hand experience that the SAS2 LSI cards work on Windows 10. Win 10 has a driver built in. LSI (Broadcom) just released a new version of the driver for Cent OS last year, which isn't "old", and the 9207 is still a current card from Broadcom. Take for instance that the 9211-xi was phased out and not even on their website. The 9207 is just a lower cost, SAS2, PCIe 2.0 option. The SAS2 cards are gonna be MUCH cheaper than the new SAS3 cards and still work great.

it has weight on being ultra old cards released in windows XP times , and could not have win10 support or UEFI Bios support etc ...

PCIe 3.0 has been around for more than 5 years now ... why get older than 5 years cards ?

he should look for newer cards for better support. maybe you will find some with good prices , look further.