Monday, August 31st 2009
ASUS Plans Optional SATA 6 Gbps Addon Cards
ASUS implemented an interesting design with its high-end P7P55D Premium motherboard, that makes use of a PLX PEX8613 3-port/12-lane PCI-E 2.0 bridge chip across its PCI-E 1.1 x4 from the PCH to drive the Marvell 88SE9123 2-port SATA 6 Gbps controller to its full-potential. Apparently the company plans to provide SATA 6 Gbps support using essentially the same design, for all its Intel P55 series motherboards by means of an optional addon card. Much larger than the SATA 6 Gbps card from ASRock, the card from ASUS uses the same basic design that involves PLX PEX8613 as a PCI-E x4 device. The card uses the same SATA 6 Gbps controller to provide 2 internal SATA ports. From the looks of it, the card has placeholders for two controllers, with the second (absent) NEC µPD720200 controller providing USB 3.0 ports. Perhaps a future revision makes use of it. Planned to be offered as an optional accessory, this card could make for a premium over the base models.
Source:
Hexus.net
16 Comments on ASUS Plans Optional SATA 6 Gbps Addon Cards
sad that sata III = will never be on HDD but only SSD : i think HDD can still get a few improvement but HRD will defeat HDD but HRD aren't know at all when they release but they said it would be cheaper cost then SSD By Twice and have from 80GB-2TB
www.tomshardware.com/news/Seagate-AMD-SATA3-Standard,7223.html
As long as they produce mechanical drives, they'll make them for the current interface of the time.
Even still, they are going to released mechanical drives using SATA III, we'll probably even see Optical drives using it...:shadedshu
Sure SATA III doesn't bring anything new, SATA II at least brought us NCQ that actually speeds things up with ACHI, even if we aren't maxing out any bandwiths.
Anyways this is kinda meh news, as when there is actually a need for SATA III, most will have a motherboard with it already in (and rest will have SATA II and the have plenty speed too). I don't know if I disagreed or agreed with newtekie1 smilie in the end :D
I'd argue that SATA II wasn't even enough of a real upgrade to warranty transitioning HDD/ODD to.
My ODD is SATA I, are there already SATA II DVD burners out there? Blu-ray burners might have more point in SATA II, or not, don't know how much more data they are pushing through.
SATA III brings...
- NCQ improvements.
- More bandwidth for single-cable multi-drive enclosures.
- Perf improvement where bursts aren't useless.
I know - not very useful to the lot of you, but there are markets and situations where SATA III is desired. If you're not one of "them" then you will benefit later from a standard that will be:
- Throughly tested by "them".
- Implemented in next gen south bridges.
- Devices priced in-line with current prices.
I've been around for older transfer modes -> ATA33 -> ATA66 -> ATA100 -> ATA133, SATA 1.5 -> SATA 3.0 and now SATA 6.0. So far this is how it's always gone. Obviously not everyone needed to upgrade at the time those standards were introduced -- if so we'd probably be a couple standards back and everyone here at TPU would be complaining. The techo plebes at lesser forums would be wondering what all the fuss is about, 100MB/s is enough for them (and they didn't need the features that SATA has brought).
Unlike SCSI or IDE/ATA where keeping opticals (and tape, portable disc, etc) up to date with the interface that the hard drive uses is a plus, there isn't a downside (that I'm aware of) when you use a slower device on a faster SATA controller.
Really works for me - Id like to see MOBO MNFR's going back to plenty of sockets and get all the crap OFF the motherboard back onto cards with their own independent controllers.
Much better performance, and easy to replace if a single part fails.
Thx...
My rig:
E8400 cpu @ 3.6ghz
nVidia GTX-280
4 gig G Skill PC2-8800
Current HD- WD Raptor 80 gig
PC Power & Cooling 610W PS