Expand via SAS Controller or Ditch On-board SATA for SAS

[Busthead]

Hello, I'm running four SATA drives via on-board connections. I'd like to add two more drives via a SAS9211-8I. Should I connect the two new drives to the SAS9211-8I and keep my existing drives connected to the mobo or move all six drives to the SAS9211-8I?

My mobo supports SATA 3Gb/s. My drives are WD30EZRX.

Thx

 

[danb35]

Should I connect the two new drives to the SAS9211-8I and keep my existing drives connected to the mobo or move all six drives to the SAS9211-8I?

Whichever you prefer; there's no real reason to prefer one over the other. The HBA will support 6 Gb/sec speeds, but the disks won't exceed 3 Gb/sec anyway.

 

[MatthewSteinhoff]

The 9211 has twice the throughout of the motherboard (6Gb/s versus 3Gb/s).

With just six drives, that probably doesn't matter.

Cheers,
Matt

 

[Chris Moore]

or move all six drives to the SAS9211-8I?

Just my personal preference, but I like having all my drives on a single controller. The previous answers are perfectly valid and I have previously had my drives split between different controllers. I think they are faster now that they are all on one. The time to complete a scrub has dropped by almost an hour.