Hi All,

 

 

      I'm using Unraid Pro 5.0-Beta12a and I've been considering adding a cache drive. I've read the different topics on this yet I haven't found info on adding one on the IDE connector of the mother board with a Sata Array. Can this be done? Would it slow things down? Would anyone ever want to do this? Just wondering as it would open up 1 more Sata connector for me to use for storage. 2 to 3 more TB is a big deal. Well to me it is. As for transfer speeds I'm getting along without it now. Yes it's slow but oh well. Transferring from my old windows server and knowing that I'm creating something special for my place with organization of my files and not having gobs of folders is fantastic. Setting up my XBMC Live computers library will be a cinch this time around.

 

Thank you for your time,

Chris 

Yes you could...

Should you? I would not if it was me.

It depends on the  drive and the controller also.

If it is an old ATA33 or an ATA66 The IDE drive wont give you any performance boost.

If it is ata100 or 133 yo might see a slight performance boost. in theory that is the speed of sata1

 

if the drive is old and has a lot of miles, its reliability will be questionable and possibly close to its end of life.

if the drive is one of the last IDE's made, it is still old.

 

keep in mind, the IDE drive is not protected by the array.

 

so.. my theory: You would not get much if any performance increase from some older drives, and those that do, still have a good chance of having data corruption now or in the near future.

 

but then again.. it might last 10 more years ... you never know.... the question is the possible boost worth the gamble?