SFF-8087 cables back-to-back as an extender?

[beeph]

I have an unusual situation with my new supermicro case. It is a TQ backplane, which came pre-cabled, 16 bays with 4 cables: 4xSata [at backplane] to SAS (one of the sff-8087) meant to plug into a HBA.

for one of these cables i want to connect another cable SAS to 4xsata to take advantage of some mobo ports, so i dont have to buy another HBA card.

basically i want to change
[backplane-> 4 sata -> sas -> HBA] to
[backplane -> 4 sata-> sas -> sas-> 4sata ->mobo]

I need to know A ) is this a good idea or going to cause problems
and B) what kind of cable to breakout the sas back to 4 sata? IE SAS female to 4xsata male.

Sorry if this is confusing. I know i could also just pull out one of the SAS to SATA cables and put in 4 SATA cables from backplane directly to mobo, but it's a big cabling mess already and i dont want to mess with it.

 

[nightshade00013]

The main problem will be finding one. From what I have seen all SATA and SAS cables are universal and always male.

The other problem is the total length. I would have to look at the specification but I have not seen any cables longer than two feet and 18 inches is much more common.

You say the backplane is "pre cabled" I have to guess that the cables are not hard connected, it will likely be cheaper to just buy cables the correct length that will do what you need to. If the backplane has a connector for each drive then you can just use regular SATA cables for the ones that you want plugged directly into the MoBo.

The "SAS" connectors that are the same size as SATA cables are interoperable so no need to do a fancy special cable job to make it work.

 

[beeph]

thanks nightshade, you understood my situation exactly. I guess I'll just re-cable the top row of drives instead. I got an SUPERMICRO 3U CSE-836TQ-R800B CHASSIS 16x TRAYS 2x 800W POWER SUPPLIES on ebay and the way the mobo mounts most of the cables arent long enough so I'm buying extenders for mobo headers, fan connectors, and this sas/sata, etc. A bit of a hassle but worth the effort.

 

[nightshade00013]

No problem, simple problem with a very simple solution LOL.

Hardware is the one place where I do VERY well. Generally I just mod stuff myself and make it work. I have added Molex connectors to SFF pc's that only have SATA power so I can add a couple fans in where they were not intended.

Also had a video card fan go out so instead of sourcing a replacement I just took the old fan out took the small shroud off and attached a real fan to it then reattached the shroud. Moved at least ten times the air the original one did and my cost was zero. That card is still living at my father's place in some old computer he found that the video was crap and sad to say that card is probably ten years old. Then fan went out about three years after I got it.