Description
2 Ports 3Gbps SATA II with NCQ, Port Multiplier in ExpressCard/34 1X host!
This ExpressCard/34 Host can upgrade your Notebook computer to have two SATA II Channels. The board provides a 1X 2.5Gbps ExpressCard/34 interface on the host side and dual, fully compliant SATA II 3Gbps ports on the device side to access Serial ATA mobile external and internal storage devices such as hard disk drive, ZIP drive, CD-ROM, CD-RW, DVD-ROM.
Uses SiliconImage SiI3132 chipset
Note: Supported by Apple Mac Drivers in OS X 10.4+
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48 bits LBA can Break Capacity-Limit to Support HDD larger than 137GB.
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Supports 1-lane 2.5Gbps ExpressCard/34.
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Compliant with PCI Express Specification, revision 1.0a
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Hot-plug capability.
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Supports SATA II transfer rate of 3.0Gbps.
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Fully compliant with Serial ATA 1.0 specifications.
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Supports two independent Serial ATA channels.
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Independent Link, Transport, and data FIFO.
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Independent command fetch, scatter/gather, and command execution.
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Supports Legacy Command Queuing (LCQ).
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Supports Native Command Queuing (NCQ).
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Supports Non-zero offsets NCQ.
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Supports Out of order data delivery NCQ.
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Supports FIS-based switching with Port Multipliers.
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31 Commands and Scatter/Gather Tables per Port.
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Completely with drivers for Windows NT, Windows 2000, Windows XP and Windows Server 2003.
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Supports 64bit / 32bit Windows Vista.
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Supports Mac OS X v10.4. See SiliconImage SiI3132.
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Linux 32bit / 64bit drivers support for Fedora Core2, Fedora Core3, Fedora Core4, RHEL 4.0, RHEL 4.0 Up1, SuSE 9.0 SP1 RC5, SuSE Pro 9.3. See SiliconImage SiI3132.
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Fully RoHS compliant.
Product Tour
Customer Review
This is my first use of an eSATA interface and after hearing that have been problems with the SiL3132 chipset with both Macbook Pro's with 4GB RAM and Macs with multi-interface enclosures, it was with some trepidation that I ordered the card, located and installed the very latest SiL 1.1.11u drivers (driver page is here). Atlast Solutions were very helpful, demonstrating a high commitment to customer satisfaction and support.
My system configuration is;
Unibody Late 2008 Macbook Pro with 2.8GHz Core Duo and 4GB Ram running Mac OSX 10.6.2.
This model has the Expresscard slot (later model Macbook Pros now have an SD card slot in place of the Expresscard).
I used the eSATA interface with an Icybox IB361-STUS-BL SATA/USB2.0 (dual interface) enclosure and 250GB SATA disk (Spinpoint 5200)
After installing the drivers I powered down the MBP, installed the card, connected the IcyBox and rebooted.
I was pleased to find that everything worked as I hoped. I didn't get a kernel panic and the drive worked very well when I used it to edit a video (I used the eSata disk as scratch disk).
It also behaved better than the USB2.0 interface awaking from sleep and when turning on after reboot.
In conclusion I am very happy at the moment. This is a good value card that appears to be very reliable.
From a speed comparison the results from Xbench show the eSata interface on the Icybox to be much faster than the USB2.0 (as expected).
(Disk Test
A) Sequential
These tests measure typical throughput to the drive.
a) Uncached Write - measures writing in 4K and 256k blocks until a 100MB file is filled
b) Uncached Read - measures reading in a 100MB file in 4K and 256K blocks
B) Random
These tests will be more impacted by the disks's seek time
a) Uncached Write - measures writing in 4K and 256k blocks in random locations into a 100MB file
b) Uncached Read - measures reading 4K and 256k blocks at random locations in a 100MB file)
USB2.0
Disk Test 44.39
Sequential 42.09
Uncached Write 53.11 32.61 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 52.70 29.82 MB/sec [256K blocks)
Uncached Read 23.26 6.81 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 70.26 35.31 MB/sec [256K blocks)
Random 46.95
Uncached Write 18.74 1.98 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 88.59 28.36 MB/sec [256K blocks)
Uncached Read 89.40 0.63 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 106.96 19.85 MB/sec [256K blocks)
eSATA Interface
Disk Test 65.57
Sequential 93.51
Uncached Write 100.99 62.00 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 99.85 56.50 MB/sec [256K blocks)
Uncached Read 69.37 20.30 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 118.41 59.51 MB/sec [256K blocks)
Random 50.49
Uncached Write 19.51 2.07 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Write 93.88 30.05 MB/sec [256K blocks)
Uncached Read 97.15 0.69 MB/sec [4K blocks]
Uncached Read 142.40 26.42 MB/sec [256K blocks)
Russ, warwick, November 2009
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