Hi all,

 

I have a couple of days ago replaced an old IDE drive with a larger SATA one.

 

As I my motherboard has only 2 SATA ports I purchased a cheap PCI adapter to get an extra 2 SATA ports (chipset VIA VT6421A).

 

To my surprise the data transfer speed to my TOWER has gone down dramatically. I used to get a constant speed of about 25-30mps whereas I now get between 6 and 10mps!  

 

I was wondering whether it could have something to do with having purchased a very cheap PCI adapter because I can't really find an explanation for it.

 

I have gigabit router and network adapter in all my pcs.

 

Cheers,

 

Nestor

 

 

Hi all,

 

I have a couple of days ago replaced an old IDE drive with a larger SATA one.

 

As I my motherboard has only 2 SATA ports I purchased a cheap PCI adapter to get an extra 2 SATA ports (chipset VIA VT6421A).

 

To my surprise the data transfer speed to my TOWER has gone down dramatically. I used to get a constant speed of about 25-30mps whereas I now get between 6 and 10mps! 

 

I was wondering whether it could have something to do with having purchased a very cheap PCI adapter because I can't really find an explanation for it.

 

I have gigabit router and network adapter in all my pcs.

 

Cheers,

 

Nestor

 

 

It might... the PCI bus is probably shared with the network interface chipset.

if you let is know what Mobo you are using then we might give you more info

but as Joe L. already said ... if the pci bus is shared then you might see these things happening

 

 

Thanks for your quick reply guys.

 

My unraid system is mounted on an old Dell Optiplex GX280 (small mini-tower), specs available here:

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/opgx280/en/ug/specs02.htm

 

It has 1gb RAM.

 

Regards,

 

Néstor

 

from your manual

 

Small Mini-Tower

 

full-height cards supported

 

PCI connectors three

 

connector size 120 pins

 

connector data width (maximum) 32 bits

 

PCI Express

 

connector one x1 and one x16

 

connector size 36 pins (x1) and 120 pins (x16)

 

connector data width (maximum) one PCI Express lane (x1) and 16 PCI Express lanes (x16)

 

you should have bought one of these

 

SATA2 Serial ATA II PCI-Express RAID Controller Card (Silicon Image SIL3132 or jmb363 chip based)

 

the SIL3132 you can find at monoprice

 

http://www.monoprice.com/products/product.asp?c_id=104&cp_id=10407&cs_id=1040702&p_id=2530&seq=1&format=2

 

and i see them on ebay also regulary...

 

the JMB363 is easy to find on EBAY

 

there is a thread in the good deals forum where they are available for 8 us$

 

they fit in the PCIE X1 slot

Thanks for your quick reply guys.

 

My unraid system is mounted on an old Dell Optiplex GX280 (small mini-tower), specs available here:

http://support.dell.com/support/edocs/systems/opgx280/en/ug/specs02.htm

 

It has 1gb RAM.

 

Regards,

 

Néstor

 

 

Nestor - one of the most important things in being able to answer these types of support questions is obtaining a syslog.  There are stickies at the top of the forum requesting this be done.  It is highlighted in the wiki.  It is hard to read more than a few posts and not see this requested.  I am not trying to beat you up, but wondering if you had seen these requests?  Do you have any suggestions to make this more clear.  I can't tell you how many requests for help come to the forum and the response is to send the syslog.

 

Although people are answering your question based on your machine config (also a good thing to post or include in your sig), there may yet be problems that would be apparent with a review of the syslog that are contributing/causing the problem.  Suggest you post it.

 

Thanks for your help!  And welcome aboard!

Sorry about it bjp999, point taken!

 

Find attached the syslog, I hope it reveals some useful information.

 

Regards,

 

Nestor

syslog.txt

Here is the reason you are running so slowly...

 

Feb  3 17:34:51 Tower kernel: Probing IDE interface ide0...

Feb  3 17:34:51 Tower kernel: hda: ST3250823A, ATA DISK drive

Feb  3 17:34:51 Tower kernel: hda: host max PIO4 wanted PIO255(auto-tune) selected PIO4

 

Your data disk1 is operating in (PIO) Polled IO mode. Now, it is possible it is so old it will not support DMA modes, but I doubt it.

 

You probably have either a defective cable to it, or, a "round" cable (not rated for high speed use), or an old 40 conductor cable designed for CD drives and not for disks.   It needs an 80 conductor cable.  Typically they have a gray, blue, and a black connector.  Make sure you use the connectors on the end if you only have one drive connected.

 

Joe L.

 

Thanks Joe.L,

 

I have just checked the cable and at least it is the "black, grey and blue" type. Anyway I will replace it with another one and report the result back.

 

What I find odd is that the system was performing perfectly with the very same cable before I put the SATA PCI adapter and replace one of the IDE drives with a SATA one (attached to the PCI adapter).

 

Regards and thank you very much again,

 

Nestor

 

 

I have now replaced the IDE cable and it didn't make a difference, the data transfer speed is still very poor.

 

I am almost certain that the reason is the crappy PCI SATA adapter I am using as it was working perfectly until I installed it...

 

 

I have a couple of days ago replaced an old IDE drive with a larger SATA one.

 

Assuming you had two IDE disks at same cable. after you replaced one with SATA, Do you adjust master/slave

selection on the only IDE disk in your system right now?

 

http://www.seagate.com/ww/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=81d0198cdc9ef010VgnVCM100000f5ee0a0aRCRD&locale=en-US&reqPage=Legacy

Hi again and many thanks for all the replies.

 

I decided to upgrade my hw (case, power supply, motherboard, cpu, ram) and everything runs smoothly now. My new motherboard has enough sata ports so I don't need to use that lousy PCI sata adapter so I guess that's why everything is OK now).

 

It is great to see such a supportive community.

 

Regards,

 

Nestor