[mythtv-users] Another take on large-capacity disk enclosures

[Jeff Wormsley]

Jarod Wilson wrote:
> The 3Ware 9500S I have is 64-bit PCI, which is slightly different than 
> PCI-X (its an older and slower predecessor to PCI-X), and it *can* 
> theoretically be plugged into an old-fashioned 32-bit PCI slot (as 
> long as its PCI 2.2-compliant) and function, albeit less optimally.
>
Not only can be, but is.  I run one in a PCI 32bit slot on a dual Xeon 
server, with 8 250G Sata I drives for 1.5TB storage.  Aside from some 
initial problems with drive heat, this raid5 system has run flawlessly 
for about 4 years now, and is recording from my A-180 and streaming to 
my frontend without any problems.  It is slow, compared to what it could 
be, but faster than I need for Myth (which is all this server really 
does, other that acting as a storage dump for things like family photos 
that take 0.00% of any resource anyone would care to name).

Had I to do it over again (and I probably will, as I can get single 
drives as big as my whole $3000 array), I would probably not use the 
3-ware card, because software raid is now plenty fast enough, and much 
more flexible about resizing the array as disks get bigger and replaced, 
something I can't do with my 3-ware card (using its native raid 
implementation).

Jeff.
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