PCA Forums

ordered this to play with:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6813128358

also picking up a 300GB velociraptor. looking forward to a boost in speed with that.


does anyone know what the advantage (or point) of having two different SATA controllers is on these boards? my asus is the same way...there are two dedicated ports for RAID, but then six other SATA ports that use an Intel Matrix controller for RAID as well. i believe they all go through the same southbridge chip, so not sure what the point of separating them is (I/O), other than just making it "easy" to find them on the board and give them pretty colors?

Perhaps like you stated for the users Aesthetics & Not sure besides the aspect that if they were on the same controller they would conflict no?

not sure. i didn't find much with a basic search on the topic. the two stand-alone ports can be in IDE/AHCI/RAID modes. the other six...you configure with the Intel Matrix management software. I think each provide a few different RAID options, but just a bit strange to me. they have always been made like this i think, i just never thought about it before.

Word of advise: use IDE emulation on your SATA controller unless you plan on using RAID.

There's little performance loss versus AHCI nowadays, and a world of compatibility hassles to avoid. No SATA driver hassles.

good to know, thanks. i would still like to mirror my boot drive, if possible, but for the rest i will go with IDE emulation.

My alternative to a RAID mirror is an external HDD and I image my boot drive on a schedule to it once a week.

i have been testing out the newest version of acronis and like the new features they added. of course, basic imaging is key, which is still there. that'll be my go-to solution now after messing around with so many other ones.