HP Smart Array E200

[ldoodle]

Hiya

I'm looking at getting one of these with the 128MB BWWC, but am confused by the interface speeds. It states it's 150MBps for SATA but 300MBps for SAS.

That's not physically possible is it, as both types of drive plug into the same ports - there isn't seperate ports for SATA and SAS?

If it is the case, what sort of performance can I expect for a 4 drive RAID 5 array?

[Terry Hutchings]

The speed difference is due to the difference in the drive technologies (SAS vs. SATA). Smart Array controllers are designed to provide a more robust feature set (Raid 5, hot plug functionality, LED's, etc.) than embedded soft raid controllers. For now, these controllers support 1.5 Gb transfers with SATA drives.

It's difficult to say what kind of performance you would get with a 4 drive raid 5 without knowing what type of drives you'll be using.

[ldoodle]

If it's down to the disk technology, if I used SATA-II drives I should get 3Gbps, as I would obviously used 3Gbps drives.

Unless there are 2 seperate controllers on the card; SAS and SATA. If so, then I can understand the 1.5Gbps limitation, but if it's a single SAS/SATA chip, I don't see how it could work a 3Gbps for SAS but 1.5Gbps for SATA.

Would be using Seagate 'home-use' drives. This is only for a small home server machine.