SCSI vs. Serial ATA

[Helder Conde]

Hi folks,

I am planning to purchase VT. I´m now deciding on what computer configuration is best if I want to use all VT functionality (live switching, uncompressed editing, etc).

Although NewTek suggests SCSI drives, which we all know are very fast, I´ve seen some very impressive results with Serial ATA drives. These SATA drives are cheaper and have, AFAIK, very high transfer rates, similar to SCSI´s. However, I don´t know about seek times, specially with full drives.

My question to you guys is: is there anyone using SATA drives here instead of SCSI? NewTek, do you believe I can go SATA and live happy with my decision?

Supermicro has some Dual Xeon motherboards based on Intel E7505 Chipset, both with onboard SCSI (Supermicro X5DA8) and SATA controllers (X5DAL-TG2). Does anyone have experience with these motherboards?

I thank yoy guys in advance for your attention and helpful support.

Regards,

Helder Conde
BRAZIL

[eon5]

http://vbulletin.newtek.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2867&highlight=sata

http://vbulletin.newtek.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=4984&highlight=sata

http://vbulletin.newtek.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=4444&highlight=scsi

http://vbulletin.newtek.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=2396&highlight=scsi

http://vbulletin.newtek.com/showthread.php?s=&threadid=3291&highlight=scsi

[Helder Conde]

Hi,

Thanks for your answer. It seems to be that SCSI is a production-proven technology and that´s the reason why most people trust it more. I´m among them. SATA, being quite new, still has to prove it´s worth the change.

However, in the long run, I feel that SATA will prove that it´s trustworthy as well, and might bring costs down. And I feel this will happen quite fast...

Most good motherboard manufacturers are making some new motherboards with onboard SATA controllers, instead of SCSI. This is a interesting move. Let´s see how the market will react to this in the following years.

Thanks again,

Helder Conde
BRAZIL

[Gordon]

Hi Helder;
I just finished testing Seagate SATA and have been quite disappointed with the performance even compared with PATA drives, (aka: EIDE). With the 3Ware 8 channel SATA controller and 3 drives or more, SATA tops out at 3 real time uncompressed streams of video when used with the Toaster. The disk test and auto config report amazing speed of 168MB/sec but this does NOT equate to a large number of real time uncompressed streams.

While I still maintain that the 3Ware 7000 series of cards with standard EIDE drives provide very good value for the dollar, the SATA does not because it costs more and results in less performance.

[mgrusin]

That's disappointing, and strange considering that tests at Storagereview.com show that the SATA drives are substantially faster than the PATA ones from the spindle to the edge... I wonder where the bottleneck is?

-MG

[Gordon]

It may be just the Seagate drives though. At some point I will try other SATA drives and see if they perform any better.

[mgrusin]

Keep us posted! Thanks very much for the testing, I'm sure many people are interested in the results.

-MG