PCI SATA card for SNAP only - Ok?

[bmoney]

Hi,

 

I currently have all my PCIe x1 & x4 slots filled w/controller cards and wanted to add external SATA drives for backup etc... Is there any issue adding a standard PCI 2-port card to my system just for SNAP?

 

Downsides:

I assume the cheap-o 2 or 4-port monoprice.com cards here will not handle >2TB drives?

 

It is my understanding that the speed would be limited to ~1.5Gbps but these drives would not be used for parity check etc...

 

 

Likewise, when do unRaid users add drives to their array?  After the current array of drives are 70% / 80% /90% full ?

 

thanks.

B.

[Rajahal]

There should be no problem with doing as you propose.  I'm currently testing the monoprice SIL3132 2 port PCIe x1 cards for 3TB support on many different motherboards, and the results are all positive thus far.  I expect the PCI version of the card would also work with 3TB drives, since it uses the same SIL3132 chipset, but I don't have one at the moment so I can't test it.

 

You are correct that SATAI speeds are sufficient for a single drive since the drive won't use up that much bandwidth anyway.  Any drive mounted with SNAP will not be included in the parity check or a parity rebuild, so no bottleneck worries there.

 

As for your final question, everyone is different.  Some users get antsy when they have less than 1 TB of free space left.  I'm a bit more of a procrastinator.  I currently have only 250 GB free space, which is 2.7% of my entire array, and I won't start drive shopping until I've got less than 100 GB left.  My data only grows by about 5 - 10 GB per day, so I'm in no real rush.  I suggest just choosing your favorite hard drive and waiting for the deal that really calls to you.  If you are a Twitter user, follow me @unRAJ and the deals will come to you

[bmoney]

Any luck with 3TB drives with the SIL3132 card installed on the Biostar A760G+ MB?

 

Many thanks for the help!

 

[Rajahal]

Haven't gotten to that board yet, but it is on my list to test!