raid card recommendations

[R3d]

Hey guys,

I've been looking at getting my home server setup finally, what i need mostly though is a decent raid card.. thing is though i have 8 x 500gb sata hdd's that need to go on it.

if anyone has some recommendations more so budget minded then full blown(would rather not have to spend $1000)

thanks in advance

 

[jdogg707]

I like the Highpoint RockerRaid 3540. I have 13 X 1TB hard drives on it now and they work perfectly. Has RAID 6 and a few weeks ago Newegg was throwing in a free 30GB Vertex with them.

 

[goodcooper]

I just got my dell perc 5i from eBay... If you're on a budget and <= 8 drives, it's a steal
Posted via [H] Mobile Device

 

[R3d]

can sata drives be hooked up to sas raid cards? if i were to pick up a SAS raid card would i need to get a different set of cables for the sata drives to work on that controller?

this is the one i was looking at:

Highpoint Rocketraid 2684 SAS/SATA RAID PCI-EX4 Low Prifile Controller RAID 0/1/5/10/50/JBOD
http://ncix.com/products/index.php?sku=35899&vpn=ROCKETRAID 2684&manufacture=Highpoint Technologies

 

[DougLite]

You'll need a SFF8087 to SATA breakout cable.

 

[jdogg707]

The 3540 I mentioned came with the breakout cables.

 

[R3d]

by the looks of it on newegg it has the 4 sas connectors that break out to 4 sata connections per cable? so i can have 16 sata drives hooked up then?

just wanna make sure as that card is damn pricey lol

 

[veritas7]

Yes, just make sure they come with the cables. If not, they're somewhat pricey.

 

[jdogg707]

Yea, 16 drives and it includes cables. Don't skimp on the RAID controller if you want to have a setup you can build on.