usb's replacement

Tivoli

saw a thread call usb replacement, and before i opened it i thought i was about to read about the new connectivity method

so anyone know...

we had usb which was amazing compared to serial
then it became useless for the current file sizes
and out came usb 2, i remember the day i plugged my usb key into a usb2 pc, fook me
but what next, nowadays we are regularily copying and pasting 700mb avi files, think we coud do with 40x(ing) it again

John mac

eSATA! Maybe

8T8

John mac is right eSATA is about the best you can get.

There are a few external enclosures like this one that can take internal IDE or SATA HD's and turn them into USB2 or eSATA.

The harder part is finding controllers as eSATA isn't too common yet on motherboards, you can add-on cards like this PCI-e SATA controller that has one eSATA port on it. Or even use this CardBus eSATA 2 port device with a Cardbus PCI adapter to get yourself two ports.

As for a other options well there is Firewire 800 not as good as eSATA but still a step up over USB2 however FW800 doesn't work right under XP without some fiddling with the drivers it will just drop down to FW400 mode last I heard. FW800 enclosures aren't too common either but can be acquired as they are used in the Mac community.

Not sure what's going on with USB 3.0 the spec for USB3 was supposed to make an appearance ironically around now but that was years ago, last I heard and this is by no means 100% accurate is that USB2 is good enough, cheap, wide spread and USB3 is on ice.

With eSATA making an increasing appearance integrated into motherboards I suspect eSATA will fill the gap required for high speed external storage and keep any USB3 standard a bit while longer in the cooler.

zilog_jones

I thought any SATA controller could handle eSATA with an adaptor? There's adaptors which just connect an internal SATA cable and SATA-type power cable to a eSATA socket on a back plate yoke.

Owen

zilog_jones wrote:

I thought any SATA controller could handle eSATA with an adaptor? There's adaptors which just connect an internal SATA cable and SATA-type power cable to a eSATA socket on a back plate yoke.

AFAIK, you're right. My external enclosure came with an eSATA backplate, all I had to do was put this in place of an expansion slot blank, and then connect it to any SATA socket on my mobo.

greglo23

i've got one of the Akasa's and its insanely fast at 1500 Megs per sec. just got my 500 Gig Samsung Sata 2 for it and it works like a charm.well worth the money.

zilog_jones

Can eSATA drives be hot-swapped or anything? Do they come up as removeable drives in Windows?

8T8

Forgot those yeah it's possible to get eSATA to SATA adapters though hard to aquire can't find them anywhere close to home plus they also limit the cable length to 1 metre. However for a good while before eSATA started to get off the ground manufacturers where shipping brackets and enclosures with the regular SATA connector which is not compatible with the eSATA connector.

If anyone has any brackets that give you external ports with your motherboard I'd double check that they are SATA or eSATA.

eSATA does support hot swapping though of course all the hardware in the chain such as the enclosure must support this so be aware most enclosures may not especially low cost ones.

In the case the drives will show up in the systray removable storage section under Windows for "warm swapping" you tell the OS your disconnecting the drive before powering it off.

Tivoli

8T8 wrote:

Forgot those yeah it's possible to get eSATA to SATA adapters though hard to aquire can't find them anywhere close to home.

maplins have them in blanchardstown, thay are in the drawer under the stand with all them sort of cables, if you ask the guys they wll never have heard of it, it is on their system as an "sata to sata2 connector"

reson i know
i have an asus p5v, it got raid on one internel sata port and the esata port, so i had 2 sata drives, connected one internally, and the other out a pci slot and into the esata port, messy but works fine

8T8

Tivoli wrote:

maplins have them in blanchardstown, thay are in the drawer under the stand with all them sort of cables, if you ask the guys they wll never have heard of it, it is on their system as an "sata to sata2 connector"

reson i know
i have an asus p5v, it got raid on one internel sata port and the esata port, so i had 2 sata drives, connected one internally, and the other out a pci slot and into the esata port, messy but works fine

Thanks for the tip Tivoli I tried Maplins website but of course nothing came up so I thought they didn't have them, useful to know someone at least has them locally.

Found them on Maplins website as well now that I know they are mislabelled as SATA2 to SATA2 cables if anyone else is interested.

greglo23

there are 2 types of esata cables. the one that comes with the Akasa is esata to sata which just connects to one of the sata connectors on the motherboard or to the external ports on the supplied brackets which come with some boards. the other type is esata to esata but i havent found a pci card for one of those yet. the drive does show up in explorer plus in the systray and also a little dialog box pops up saying esata hot plug or something like that. cant check at the moment cause 15 year old daughter on bebo so reduced to laptop :rolleyes:

8T8

greglo23 check my first post there are controllers there with dedicated eSATA ports on Lindy.ie

They also sell eSATA to eSATA cables & the eSATA to SATA kind.

greglo23

thanks for that 8T8. a cardbus one would be handy for the laptop. i have one of each of the cables already so with the card i'll be well set.