Plugged in, plays, and off to races.
This Startech 8P6G-PCIE-SATA-CARD is modeled after LSI HBA and provides SAS-style cabling and reliable drive connections.
This is a SATA card, it does not support SAS.
Pros:
• Works natively with macOS (I'm using Monterey), no additional driver required.
• Also Windows and Linux support.
• Adds 8 ports, JBOD.
• Supports SMART.
• Includes SFF-8087 mini-SAS to SATA data cables, which will work with any SATA drive.
• Cables included are standard SATA length, 0.5 meter.
• Supports SATA port multiplier for additional ports.
• Ports run at drive speed as expected, no glitches.
Cons:
• Not bootable, UEFI does not see connected drive EFI partitions.
Notes:
• Supports any size drive per SATA spec (this question is perennial).
• Drive power cabling not included.
• I am using longer 1 meter SFF-8087 cables for a large case with no problem.
• I am using a Bewinner port multiplier, ADP6ST0-J05 SATA3 4-port Expansion Card: 1 source port, 5 drive ports, which expands by 4 ports for a total of 12 drives connected to this Startech.
• Using a port multiplier means upstream link capacity is shared with all downstream drives: plan your storage layout accordingly. I am seeing drives run at speed over (e.g., 130+ MB/s sustained) to spinning drives over the multiplier.
Final words:
• This Startech is solid going in.
• Before getting this card, I've tried two other PCIe SATA cards with typical SATA cabling (non-SAS) and both were totally unreliable, not detecting drives on some ports, CRC errors on detected ports, caused drive data corruption.
• I also tried an LSI 9207-8i which is completely reliable and bootable, but it's not batively supported by macOS, which I need.
| Wireless Type | Radio Frequency |
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