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Revised March 23, 2006 - firmware upgradeFive Bay Port Multiplier eSATA Enclosure
A review of the WiebeTech SilverSATA V five Bay SATA Enclosure (SISV-0-BND-1)
By Arthur Whalem
WiebeTech is shipping the SilverSATA V five bay external eSATA Serial ATA enclosure model SISV-0-BND-1 ($1099.95). This SilverSATA V bundle includes the enclosure shown above plus the PCI-11 PCI-X host adapter which supports SATA hard drives on a PC or a Macintosh. The SilverSATA V enclosure requires a SATA host adapter with port multiplier (PM) capabilities, also known as SATA PM.
The top of the SilverSATA V enclosure and the front drive bay section are a metallic light grey, while the bottom front and the sides are a silver aluminum color. This gives the enclosure a nice two tone effect. The enclosures dimensions are 7" wide, 7.5" high (with the handle down) and 10.7" deep. It weighs 11 pounds 5 ounces empty. If you install five 3.5" SATA hard drives into the WiebeTech SilverSATA V eSATA enclosure it will weigh approximately 20 pounds. The SilverSATA V has a heavy duty 200 watt switching power supply with two 40x40x20mm fans installed in the front and the rear of the power supply. It also has two rear 60x60x15mm case fans. Five removable hard drive trays are provided inside the enclosure. Each tray has a drive activity light and separate power lights are provided on the top front of the enclosure. In addition, an enclosure power light, fan detector light and a temperature light are all provided. The SilverSATA V enclosure and the SATA host adapter support SATA I and SATA II hard drives. You provide your own SATA hard drives in this configuration. However, WiebeTech also sells the SilverSATA V enclosure with SATA hard drives pre-installed. Configurations available include an 800GB unit with five 160GB drives (SISV-800) for $1614.95, 1.25TB with five 250GB drives (SISV-1250) for 1894.95, a 2TB with five 400GB drives (SISV-2000) 2889.95 and a 2.5TB with five 500GB drives (SISV-2500) for 3379.95. The SilverSATA family of enclosures includes the SilverSATA V which is the subject of this article along with the single bay SilverSATA I and the dual bay SilverSATA II.
SilverSATA Family Photo
The SilverSATA V enclosure shown on the right in the image above is designed to be utilized with high-capacity computing requirements such as editing uncompressed HDTV, audio, with a server or for any application where a five bay eSATA enclosure would be helpful.
System Requirements
Macintosh OS X, Windows 2K, XP, Server 2003.
Supports PCI-X 133, PCI-X 66, PCI-66 and PCI-33 bus speeds.
Requires SATA host adapter with PM (included in bundle).
Requires up to five SATA 3.5" hard drives.
SilverSATA V Connections
The WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure requires a SATA PM compatible host adapter to work with an Apple PowerMac or a PC. As none of my existing SATA host adapters have port multiplier capabilities, the WiebeTech SATA PCI-11 host adapter was used for all tests in this
article with the SilverSATA V enclosure. You can view the rear image of the SilverSATA V enclosure on the right. Only one external eSATA connection is available on the back of the enclosure. The backplane circuit board provides connections for up to five SATA hard drives to mount on the front of the board while on the rear of the board only one eSATA connection is available. With the only connection option on the rear of the enclosure being the port multiplier port, this enclosure will not work with Macintosh SATA host adapters that do not support Serial ATA Port Multiplier Technology. The WiebeTech PCI-11 PCI-X host adapter used in this review, does not provide boot capability, does not pass through SMART drive temperatures or status, has some problems with deep sleep and has no on screen SATA mounting feedback like the FirmTek host adapters provide. I am hoping that FirmTek will develop a PM host adapter that could be used with the SilverSATA V enclosure to remove these limitations. However, the PCI-11 host adapter does work with the SilverSATA V enclosure. As you can see in the image above, you plug a power cord into the internal switching power supply and a PM host adapter connects to the single eSATA connection on the back of the enclosure. If you purchase a dual core PowerMac G5 model which was released in October of 2005, the PCI-11 PCI-X host adapter will not work. The new PowerMac G5 Dual-Core or Quad-Core only provides PCI Express expansion slots. Several companies including WiebeTech are working on releasing a PM host adapter card that will support PCI Express expansion slots.Interface
The WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure has an abundance of lights for providing user feed back. Activity lights are provided on the top of each drive tray. These lights show when each drive is active and connected to the computer. You can see the LED indicators in the image below.
The LED indicators on the SilverSATA V only work when the enclosure is connected to a powered computer through a PM compatible SATA host adapter. The top left Power LED indicates the enclosure is turned on and connected to the computer. No lights display if the unit is turned on and not connected to a computer. The temperature light turns on if the enclosure temperature exceeds 55C. In addition, the fan detector light turns red if a fan fails or is disconnected. The hard drive LED indicators light up when the drive in the labeled bay (1-5) is detected by the host adapter. Removing a hard drive from one of the bays will turn the LED off for that particular bay.
Installing a SATA hard drive into the SilverSATA V enclosure is easy. You simply insert the white plastic key in the hole under the activity light on the SATA hard drive
tray. This will cause the front tray lever to drop and disconnect the tray from the enclosure. Next, remove the tray and screw the SATA hard drive into it. To insert the hard drive into the SilverSATA V enclosure you simply slide it into the enclosure using the tray guides. The tray guides start at the lip on the enclosure which makes installing hard drives in the SilverSATA V a simple task.
Compatibility, Mounting & Design
The design of the WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure does not allow for individual SATA hard drive connections. The cut away image below displays the rear inside view of the SilverSATA V enclosure behind the SATA hard drive backplane. A single five inch SATA cable attaches to the rear of the enclosure from the SATA backplane. With this type of mounting a single cable is used to connect up to five SATA hard drives. The 200 watt switching power supply is an I-Star TC-1U20 which is the same model also used in the WiebeTech TrayDock eSATA enclosure. Three 4 pin molex connectors supply power for up to five hard drives which can be mounted on the backplane of the SilverSATA V. Two YS Tech 60x60x15mm model FD126015LE rear case fans are powered by two small 3 pin connectors on the rear of the backplane circuit board. If the fans fail or become disconnected the fan detector light comes on.
Rear Exposed Backplane View
If you take all of the trays out of the WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure and look inside the SATA hard drive bay, you can view the backplane that the hard drives connect to. As shown in the image below, five SATA backplane connectors are mounted at the rear of the hard drive bay. Four slots are cut into the backplane circuit board to help exhaust warm air from the hard drive bay out to the rear of the enclosure. You can see the dual 60mm case fans through the circuit board openings.
Internal Backplane View
The backplane circuit board uses a Silicon Image Sil3726CB Serial ATA II Port Multiplier chip. The SiI 3726™ is a 1-to-5 Serial ATA (SATA) Port Multiplier designed to provide high speed connections between a single SATA host adapter and five SATA devices. In this review, firmware 1.0115 was installed on the Silicon Image Sil3726CB SATA Port Multiplier chip. The SiI 3726 takes advantage of 3Gbps host links and FIS-based switching host controllers, like the Silicon Image SiI 3124, to provide fast read and write performance. According to the Kill-a-Watt electricity usage monitor, the SilverSATA V enclosure uses 18 watts when the enclosure is turned on but empty. Adding a single Maxtor 300GB SATA hard drive adds 10 watts while idle. Once five Maxtor 300GB hard drives are mounted inside the enclosure the power usage increases to 70 watts while idle. When a five drive striped RAID set begins copying lots of data the power usage rises to between 78-82 watts.
In this design, the drive cage is surrounded by an aluminum frame. Fans remove warm air from underneath the drive cage and from behind the backplane out to the rear of the enclosure. The 200 watt power supply is mounted in the bottom of the enclosure under the backplane board and extends for 8" to the rear of the enclosure. A 40x40x20mm fan mounted below the drive trays, pulls air from underneath the drive cage and blows it into the power supply chamber. Eight inches away at the rear of the enclosure, a second 40x40x20mm fan vents the warm air from the power supply chamber out to the rear of the enclosure. In addition, two 60x60x15mm fans are mounted in the rear chamber for venting warm air out of the back of the enclosure. The image below displays an exposed bottom view of the internal power supply with airflow directional arrows.
Exposed Bottom Airflow Image
Stability
A five drive RAID mounting stability test was the next task tested with the WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure. Five Maxtor 300GB SATA hard drives were used in a striped RAID set configuration in this test. The five drive RAID set was dismounted from the desktop and all five SATA hard drives were ejected and placed back in the enclosure in a different order. This was done twenty times. Sometimes this was done with the enclosure power off while the RAID was dismounted, but usually the power to the enclosure was left on. In 19 out of 20 tests the Maxtor five drive striped RAID set mounted on the desktop with no problems. During one test the RAID would not mount. Turning the enclosure off and then back on reset the hardware and the RAID mounted without a problem.
The connection between the SilverSATA V and the PC-11 host adapter can be sensitive. If the SilverSATA V does not detect the host adapter its blue power lights will not turn on. It appears that the SilverSATA V can become confused at times when the enclosure is turned off and back on. You will know if this occurs as the two blue lights on the top left of the enclosure will not come on once you power up the enclosure. When this occurs, I found I could usually correct the problem by pulling all of the the drive trays out by two inches, turn the enclosure off and on (blue lights should display now) and then re-insert all of the drive trays. In a few instances, a restart was also required. This connection issue may happen in situations where power is dropped between the card and the enclosure. If a good eSATA connection is in place between the enclosure and the SATA host adapter, the enclosure blue lights will turn on (when the enclosure is turned on) and the RAID will usually mount in less than 29 seconds.
When using the SilverSATA V with a Sonnet Temp X4P (PCI-X) or a Sonnet Tempo E4P (PCIe) the connection issues were significantly less, but did not disappear. I found that re-inserting the SilverSATA V eSATA cable into another port on the host adapter and turning the SilverSATA V off and on usually turned the blue lights on.
CoolingIn the cooling tests, the WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure was tested with a 1.4 TB striped RAID using five Maxtor 300GB SATA hard drives with a PowerMac G5 2.0GHz Dual and the PCI-11 PM host adapter. The five drives were worked very hard duplicating a 4.2GB folder of video files several times simultaneously. In addition, DiskTester sequential writes were also used to keep all five hard drives active for 90 minutes. I was unable to use Hardware Monitor 3.2 to monitor temperatures as the WiebeTech PCI-11 PM host adapter does not allow SMART drive data to be passed on to the computer. As an alternative, I connected three thin temperature probes to the hard drives and one to the top of the SilverSATA V drive cage for monitoring temperature generated by the 5 drive RAID. At the end of 90 minutes the Maxtor drives reported temperatures of 96 to 100 degrees Fahrenheit. The next process of the cooling test was to leave the enclosure turned on with the hard drives mounted for an hour, but with no usage other than temperature monitoring. I wanted to see how well the hard drives might cool down inside the SilverSATA V enclosure. After resting for an hour, the Maxtor hard drives reported temperatures of 93 to 98 degrees Fahrenheit.
Based on these tests, hard drives mounted in the SilverSATA V will probably operate between 93 and 100 degrees when used over an extended period of time. Without the ability to use Hardware Monitor, temperature monitoring is much more difficult and less accurate. The SilverSATA V enclosure can pass SMART temperature data to the computer, but the PCI-11 PM host adapter does not provide that function. When you connect the SilverSATA V to a Sonnet Temp X4P (PCI-X) or a Sonnet Tempo E4P (PCIe) Hardware Monitor will display the hard drive temperatures on your computer screen.
Exposed Top Airflow Image
The cooling power of the SilverSATA V enclosure is awesome. Keeping a five drive RAID below 101 degrees while working the hard drives as fast as you can is not an easy task. The more drives you place close together, the easier it is for hard drive temperatures to rise quickly. The dual rear 60x60x15mm 12v Y.S. Tech case fans, model FD126015LE do a very good job of keeping the enclosure cool. They have a direct air path to the five hard drives through the backplane rear openings. In addition, the two 40x40x20mm 12v Y.S. Tech fans model FD124020MS are mounted in each end of the power supply. These two 40x40x20mm fans spin at 5000 RPM and move 5.6 cubic feet of air per minute each. Individually they have a manufacturer rated sound level of 22.5 dBA. These cooling components work together to provide a very nice environment for the hard drives mounted inside the WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure.
Acoustics
The SilverSATA V enclosure has four fans. When they are running they create some wind sounds while keeping the hard drives cool. If the enclosure is five feet away behind the PowerMac G5 Dual 2.0GHz, I can hear the SilverSATA V fans working away while the PowerMac G5 is in sleep mode. Once the PowerMac G5 is turned on the SilverSATA V fan noise masks all noise made by the PowerMac G5 while in "reduced" energy mode. Once the PowerMac G5 energy setting is moved to "highest" you can hear the PowerMac G5 power supply "chirp" sounds over the SilverSATA V fans. The WiebeTech SilverSATA V is not quiet. It sounds like it would work well in a server room. The noise is mostly wind sounds with some minor metallic overtones.
If you disconnect the two 60mm fans in the rear of the SilverSATA V, the enclosure overall fan noise is a little less but still substantial.
The two 40mm power supply fans produce the majority of the fan sound. If you wanted to make the SilverSATA V quieter, the power supply enclosure would need to be opened to replace the two 40mm fans with quieter fans like the 40mm Papst 412FM ($16.95). Unfortunately, this would void the power supply warranty and most users will probably not be willing to make this modification on their own. The two 60mm fans are actually fairly quiet and move a lot of air. Even one of the 60mm fans moves more air than many of the external enclosures I have used. The SilverSATA V comes with 39" (1 meter) eSATA "I-type"cables which allow you to place the enclosure three feet away from the Macintosh. However, as this is a hot swap enclosure you may want it within arms reach. The fan noise is not bad initially but over time it can become tiresome. If a quiet enclosure is needed for audio mixing the SilverSATA V may not meet that requirement.Sleep
The SilverSATA V enclosure was tested with the WiebeTech PCI-11 PM host adapter for Apple Macintosh OS X 10.4.5 sleep compatibility. When the hard drives were dismounted from the PowerMac G5 2.0 Dual before being placed in sleep mode, the PowerMac was able to go to sleep and wake without the RAID mounted. Disk Utility was able to mount the RAID after returning from sleep. Leaving the SilverSATA V RAID mounted on the desktop and putting the computer to sleep also worked properly when the computer woke from sleep the SilverSATA V was available for use. The PCI-11 PM host adapter was installed in the PCI-X 133 (slot 4) with no jumper pins on the card and the Mac Drivers used were Sil3124 0.42.4 on a PowerMac G5 2.0GHz Dual with 10.4.5. The PCI-11 PM host adapter allowed the PowerMac G5 to go to sleep without any problems.
No Boot Capability
One feature that all of the FirmTek SATA host adapter cards have in common including the SeriTek/1eVE4, is the ability to boot from each port on the host adapter. I am not aware of any other SATA host adapter for the Macintosh that has this feature. That said you should know that the PCI-11 PM host adapter does not have boot capability. Many users are finding that the PowerMac G5 Quad has lots of processor power but that the SATA hard drive bus can hold back performance. I have found that booting from a four or five drive RAID can substantially increase PowerMac G5 performance. If FirmTek releases a PM host adapter with boot capability, it may allow the SilverSATA V enclosure to boot a PowerMac G5 Quad.
Port Multiplier RAID PerformanceIn this test, a PowerMac G5 2.0GHz Dual running Mac OS X 10.4.5 was used with the WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure and the PCI-11 PM host adapter in slot 4. A five drive Maxtor 300GB striped RAID set was created in the SilverSATA V enclosure using Disk Utility RAID functions. DiskTester 1GB read and write tests were performed using a run area test so that this article could display how the 1.4 TB formatted RAID performs. DiskTester is a Terminal application that measures the combined performance of a volume and the Mac OS X operating system. Using the command: ./disktester run-area-test --transfer-size 131072 --iterations 3 --test-size 1024 --delta-percent 10 DriveName, puts DiskTester to work testing how the RAID will perform when empty, 10% full 20% full and so on. The same tests were also done using the same hard drives with the SeriTek/1VE4 and SeriTek/1eVE4 host adapters and an Addonics Storage Tower with a Super Micro CSE- M35SB
5 bay drive cage mounted inside. The object of this test was to see if a definitive performance difference could be detected between using a standard single port per drive host adapter versus the port multiplier method used by the SilverSATA V. Three iterations of the DiskTester results were averaged and recorded for each enclosure tested.Maxtor 5 Drive Striped RAID - PM VS Single Cable per Drive
| PCI-11 PM | Slot 4 | SeriTek 1eVE4 | Slot 4 & 3 | |
| Area Full | write | read | write | read |
| empty | 220.6 | 236.7 | 326 | 296.5 |
| 10% | 219.8 | 240.5 | 320.2 | 292.1 |
| 20% | 220.6 | 210.4 | 313.8 | 285 |
| 30% | 219.4 | 240.4 | 307 | 278.2 |
| 40% | 221 | 240.4 | 291.6 | 265.4 |
| 50% | 220.9 | 240.1 | 282.5 | 257 |
| 60% | 221.1 | 237 | 262.4 | 239.7 |
| 70% | 219.4 | 231.3 | 253.3 | 230.2 |
| 80% | 206.9 | 198.4 | 229.8 | 209.8 |
| 90% | 181.4 | 182.2 | 202.9 | 185.9 |
| Average | 215.11 | 225.74 | 278.95 | 253.98 |
Dual 2.0 in PCI-X slot 4 and compared to using the SeriTek 1eVE4 and 1VE4 in slots 4 & 3.
As you can see in the chart above, using a single SATA cable per drive setup performed over 29% better on average and over 40% better when empty while writing data to the RAID. Using the port multiplier method with a single cable provided significantly slower performance. While using a port multiplier is the latest SATA development it may have some trade offs. If you are going to create a five drive RAID, using the single cable per hard drive method with a FirmTek host adapter will provide faster performance.
What About a Four Drive RAID?
In order to see how the test above would compare using a four drive RAID the same exact test was performed but this time with one less Maxtor hard drive.
Maxtor 4 Drive Striped RAID - PM VS Single Cable per Drive
| PCI-11 PM | Slot 4 | SeriTek 1eVE4 | Slot 4 | |
| Area Full | write | read | write | read |
| empty | 220.6 | 229.5 | 259.7 | 241 |
| 10% | 210.7 | 232.1 | 256.8 | 234 |
| 20% | 214.2 | 228.8 | 250.2 | 229.9 |
| 30% | 206.7 | 224.8 | 243.8 | 226.8 |
| 40% | 205.2 | 199.3 | 231.5 | 213.7 |
| 50% | 191.7 | 205.6 | 223.1 | 208.8 |
| 60% | 183.3 | 192.7 | 206.4 | 194.1 |
| 70% | 171.3 | 183.9 | 199.9 | 186.1 |
| 80% | 158.6 | 158.7 | 181.8 | 168 |
| 90% | 142.3 | 146.2 | 160.1 | 149 |
| Average | 190.46 | 200.16 | 221.33 | 205.14 |
Dual 2.0 in PCI-X slot 4 and compared to using the SeriTek 1eVE4 in slot 4.
In the results above, the four drive striped RAID set is still faster using a single cable for each SATA hard drive but not by as much. The average write speed is 16% faster using the FirmTek host adapters without port multiplier. The average read speed is much closer. To carry this example further a three drive striped RAID set was also tested in the same manner below.
Maxtor 3 Drive Striped RAID - PM VS Single Cable per Drive
| PCI-11 PM | Slot 4 | SeriTek 1eVE4 | Slot 4 | |
| Area Full | write | read | write | read |
| empty | 166.9 | 179.8 | 189.9 | 180.5 |
| 10% | 162.7 | 182 | 186.4 | 177.6 |
| 20% | 154.8 | 176.8 | 179.6 | 174.5 |
| 30% | 154.5 | 165.8 | 178.4 | 170.2 |
| 40% | 143.6 | 161.5 | 170.7 | 161.1 |
| 50% | 142 | 156 | 165.4 | 156.2 |
| 60% | 129 | 140.7 | 154.3 | 145.2 |
| 70% | 128.5 | 139.7 | 147.9 | 140.3 |
| 80% | 116 | 130.4 | 135 | 127.8 |
| 90% | 103.8 | 107 | 118.5 | 112.6 |
| Average | 140.18 | 153.97 | 162.61 | 154.6 |
Dual 2.0 in PCI-X slot 4 and compared to using the SeriTek 1eVE4 in slot 4.
In the three drive striped RAID test above the single SATA cable per drive method of mounting was still 16% faster while writing data to the RAID, but the read rate was very close to the results produced by the port multiplier method using the PCI-11 host adapter.
The PCI-11 PM host adapter will work with many older PowerMac models. By placing jumpers on the card, I was able to successfully test it with an older PowerMac G4 400. While the PCI-11 card has some short comings, it is the least expensive port multiplier capable SATA host adapter
that I have used that will also work with legacy PCI Macintosh models. In addition, the PCI-11 has a single external port and three internal ports. A cable can be used to access the internal ports and snake it out of an empty PCI slot so that you can have additional external SATA PM ports available. When you consider that the WiebeTech PCI-11 four port SATA PM host adapter retails for only $139.95 you start to see its value. The PC-11 only works with SATA PM systems now but WiebeTech is working on upgrading the drivers so that it will also support direct cable SATA connections. Using the PCI-11 in Slot 4 vs Slot 3
When used with a PowerMac G5, no jumpers are necessary for any of the PCI-X slots. In a PowerMac G5 PCI-X model, slot 4 is a PCI-X 133MHz bus while Slots 2 and 3 share a PCI-X 100MHz bus. I wondered whether using the PCI-11 port multiplier host adapter in slot 4 or slot 3 of the PowerMac G5 would provide a measurable performance difference. The PCI-11 port multiplier host adapter was installed in each slot of a PowerMac G5 2.0GHz Dual and tested using DiskTester. The results are shown below.
Maxtor 5 Drive Striped RAID - PM in Slot 4 VS Slot 3
| PCI-11 PM | Slot 4 | PCI-11 PM | Slot 3 | |
| Area Full | write | read | write | read |
| empty | 220.6 | 236.7 | 219 | 240.5 |
| 10% | 219.8 | 240.5 | 213.9 | 241.3 |
| 20% | 220.6 | 210.4 | 214.1 | 241.4 |
| 30% | 219.4 | 240.4 | 212.6 | 241.3 |
| 40% | 221 | 240.4 | 214.1 | 240 |
| 50% | 220.9 | 240.1 | 213.4 | 239.9 |
| 60% | 221.1 | 237 | 212.1 | 234 |
| 70% | 219.4 | 231.3 | 211.5 | 233.7 |
| 80% | 206.9 | 198.4 | 201.8 | 200.9 |
| 90% | 181.4 | 182.2 | 177.7 | 185 |
| Average | 215.11 | 225.74 | 209.02 | 229.8 |
Dual 2.0 in PCI-X slot 4 and compared to using the same card in slot 3.
With only a 2-3% difference between the results, it appears that placing the PCI-11 PM host adapter card in slot 4 versus slot 3 on a PowerMac G5 does not provide a substantial performance gain when using five SATA hard drives.
Storage Expansion
In the next test, I wanted to determine if the PCI-11 PM host adapter could be used with other host adapters to increase the size of a RAID above five drives. If so, what would the performance be? When testing the PCI-11 it was discovered that while it would mount a Hitachi 160GB hard drive model HDT722516DLA380 it would not create a RAID with it. Trying to do so caused Disk Utility to freeze. This was not a problem when using the Sonnet Temp X4P (PCI-X) or a Sonnet Tempo E4P (PCIe) SATA host adapter with the SilverSATA V. When using the PCI-11 host adapter with the Maxtor 300GB hard drives, I was able to create a striped RAID set. In this test, five Maxtor 300GB SATA hard drives were mounted in the SilverSATA V using the PCI-11 host adapter, while four 160GB Hitachi SATA hard drives were mounted in the TrayDock eSATA with a FirmTek 1eVE4 four port host adapter.
The nine drive SATA striped RAID set was created using Disk Utility. As the hard drive sizes are different, Disk Utility treats each drive as if it were the same size as the smallest hard drive in the RAID. The size of the nine drive SATA striped RAID set was 1.35TB. It is nice to know that you can create a striped RAID set using the standard one cable per drive method mixed with a port multiplier setup as was done here.
The nine drive RAID set was tested using DiskTester 1GB read and write tests while connected to a PowerMac G5 2.0 Dual. You can view the results below.
If the hard drives would have been identical models the results would have been even faster than the 389 MB per second write speed shown above. A RAID that stays above 300 MB per second even when 90% full is a great performer. A fast striped RAID set like this one can easily speed up the process of copying large video files. This nine drive 1.34TB striped RAID set was able to duplicate 4.25GB in 27 seconds using a PowerMac G5 2.0 Dual.
DiscussionThe WiebeTech SilverSATA V enclosure is a strong industrial design. It has a very nice array of activity and power indicators for providing user feedback. The trays slide easily into the enclosure and mount firmly. The cooling system is very good but the enclosure is not quiet. Securing the hard drives into the trays is a little more difficult than some other trays that I have used. The heavy duty collapsible handle on top of the SilverSATA V makes carrying the enclosure easy, while still allowing you to stack items on top of it. One important point to remember is that the SilverSATA V requires a SATA host adapter that supports a port multiplier. This will limit the usage of some existing host adapters with the SilverSATA V. As port multiplier host adapters become more of a standard this will be less of an issue. The performance tests completed in this article with the PCI-11 host adapter indicate that a port multiplier setup can be a little slower than the standard one cable per drive method. In fact, the single SATA cable per drive setup used in this article performed as much as 40% faster when the five drive striped RAID set was empty.
If you are looking for maximum performance with five drives on a PowerMac, a port multiplier may not be the best choice. However, the ability to use a single cable is a very nice feature. A port multiplier may not be as fast as the single cable per drive method when empty but it can accommodate more disks and in some cases it may out perform a four drive direct cable striped RAID set when the RAID is over 70% full. While the PCI-11 host adapter only has one external port, it has three more internal ports that can be used externally with the right cables and an empty PCI slot. This setup allows one host adapter to power up to four SilverSATA V enclosures which could mount up to twenty SATA hard drives. This is not possible with the single cable per drive method even with multiple SATA host adapters. When the need to expand disk capacity is greater than the need for absolute speed when the enclosure is empty, a port multiplier system will be a better choice than the single drive per cable method. Another situation that would give a SATA port multiplier system an advantage would be if the computer only has a single SATA port. If a MacBook Pro used the ExpressCard/34 slot to add port multiplier SATA connectivity, this would allow it to mount up to five SATA hard drives instead of just one. You may want to consider these features when deciding whether using a port multiplier is the best technology solution for your particular needs.
If I were the designer of the SilverSATA V enclosure, I would consider offering a version without the port multiplier. Next, I would retrofit the 40mm power supply fans with quiet running models. I would also modify the PCI-11 host adapter drivers to support SMART drive data and direct cable connections.
Pros
Macintosh OS X, Windows 2K, XP, Server 2003.
Silver aluminum finish.
Activity and power lights.
Mounts up to five external SATA drives.
Hot swappable.
Backplane design.
High quality internal 200W power supply.
Very well constructed.
Very cool operation.
Includes eSATA cable.
Supports SATA I and SATA II hard drives.
Can be used with RAID or individual drives.
Five Drive Maxtor 300GB striped RAID set achieved 220 MB/sec.
Performs faster than FireWire 800 in most situations.
Port Multiplier allows one cable for five drives.
PCI-11 PM host adapter works with legacy PowerMacs & PCs.
Cons
No power switch on front panel. (Only on the rear)
Fan noise is not quiet.
PCI-11 host adapter does not support booting.
PCI-11 does not pass SMART drive data to computer.
PCI-11 did not work properly with Hitachi 160GB.
Port multiplier may be slower than one cable per drive method.
PCI-11 requires installing additional drivers for Mac OS X.
Expensive.
SilverSATA V gets 4 AMUGs out of 5!
The WiebeTech SilverSATA V is a very nice SATA port multiplier capable enclosure. It provides lots of LED activity and power lights and a professional design. The SilverSATA V two tone color scheme looks good with a PowerMac G5, while providing a heavy duty storage enclosure for mounting SATA hard drives. The PCI-11 port multiplier host adapter works well with PCs and
Macintosh SATA PM enclosures. If the PCI-11 host adapter could be improved to support SMART drive data and direct cable SATA connections it would be a nice upgrade. There are other port multiplier SATA host adapters available on the market that will work with the SilverSATA V on a Macintosh. Sonnet has released the Tempo SATA E4P ($299) port multiplier aware host adapter for PCI Express PowerMac G5 models. The also have a Tempo SATA X4P for PCI-X models. Both models have four external ports which can support up to five SATA PM hard drives each. While the E4P and X4P do not have boot capability, they do pass SMART drive data and work properly in sleep mode. We will probably have to wait for a FirmTek port multiplier host adapter to enjoy port multiplier enclosure boot capability. No matter what port multiplier capable host adapter you end up using with the SilverSATA V enclosure, you will find the enclosure itself is a solid capable device.WiebeTech Special Offer - (Requires AMUG Membership)
For a limited time AMUG members can save 10% on the entire WiebeTech line including the SilverSATA series by using the discount code found in the AMUG members only section.
Contact Information:
WiebeTech LLC
8200 E. 34th St. North #1404
Wichita, KS 67226 USA
866.744.8722 Toll Free
http://www.wiebetech.com
Copyright 2006
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