zoiks66

Great. Thanks for responding.

I have an UnRAID server where I’m looking to cut LSI 9300-16i and 9300-8e HBA’s (flashed to IT Mode) connected to 25 SATA hard drives down to a single HBA to free a PCI slot, and I’m wondering if the Broadcom 9500-8i HBA along with SAS expanders will allow me to do this without creating a bottleneck. My plan would be to connect this 9500-8i to a PCIe 5.0x8 motherboard slot, and then use a single port 8X SFF-8654 to dual port 4X SFF-8643 cable to connect this HBA to an Adaptec AEC-82885T SAS expander located in the same PC case as this HBA. 4 of the internal SFF-8643 ports of the SAS expander would connect to 16 SATA hard drives located in the same PC case (Fractal Meshify 2 XL). The 2 external SFF-8644 ports of the SAS expander would connect to the same 2 external ports of another SAS expander of the same model, located in a different PC case (another Fractal Meshify 2 XL). That 2nd PC case currently contains 6 SATA hard drives, but that number will grow over time. The 2 SAS expanders would be connected to Molex only for power and not connected to a PCI slot on a motherboard. Would the 9500-8i HBA be able to run that many SATA hard drives without creating a bandwidth bottleneck, and do you know of any issues I might have or of a better way for me to get by with only a single HBA? Thanks.