VOGONS


First post, by TimWolf

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Building a PC around the Asus P2B-S and want to see what the best (price) options are out there for using a solid state solution. So far I've seen several iterations of scsi to SD ranging from $60 - $125. Other than that, are the really stinking expensive devices are CF and SATA to scsi the only other choices being super costly at $200 - $2000? Am I forgetting any other possibilities?

Thanks in advance!

Reply 1 of 5, by wiretap

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This: http://www.peripheral-vision.com/products/sol … csi-disk-drives
or this: https://www.cf2scsi.com/index.php/products/scsi-drives-fixed

Those are the two best options I have found -- I'm using several of the CF2SCSI options at work to replace DEC/Compaq Alpha tape decks and hard disks.

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Reply 2 of 5, by BushLin

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Lots of info here: SCSI2SD - Comparison of SCSI SD, CF, and HDD performance
There is some potential in the Acard\Addonics SATA to SCSI adapters and a unicorn native SCSI Sandisk drive mentioned in this thread SCSI SSD's?

TimWolf wrote:

Am I forgetting any other possibilities?

Yeah, don't use SCSI!
After all the expense, your board's Ultra 2 theoretical bandwidth is 80MB/s so after taking reality and the conversion into account maybe you get 70MB/s.
If you use a SATA SSD over IDE or a SATA PCI card you'll end up with better performance and a healthier wallet. Disabling the SCSI controller will shave the initialisation time off your boot too.
Whatever your priorities are, I'd always go for a SATA SSD rather than SD or CF for much better performance in all departments, also not having very limited write cycles before they're junk.

Screw period correct; I wanted a faster system back then. I choose no dropped frames, super fast loading, fully compatible and quiet operation.

Reply 3 of 5, by chinny22

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As a proud owner of the P2B-DS I get wanting to use the onboard SCSI, but its not practical in any way, shape or form.
Mines got 4 noisy ex server hard drives, becase I had them and because I can, not due to performance or anything like that

I'd say even $60 is to expensive compared to the cost of Sata to IDE adapter.
I would say get a SCSI device just for the sake of having one, be it a CD, Tape, HDD or whatever but if you really want Solid State go with one of Bushlin's options.

Reply 4 of 5, by TimWolf

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Thanks guys, it does seem that SATA seems the best option for me right now.

Reply 5 of 5, by ruthan

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I now that is necro, but not much is happened on the market, Zulu SCSI is 20 MB/s, but found some server grade 1.6 Ultra SCSI from HP, but its very rare and expensive:
https://www.serverblink.com/160097-001-hp-1-6 … 6d48747c6d56d2c

There is ACARD ARS-2160H (also 160MB/s) / 2000SU (320 MB/) Sata to SCSI bridges which seems to be even more expensive.
Acard ARS-2320S - is only 20 MB/s

Yeah there are Sata and Pata controllers..
PATA - sucks it has to parallel ques and its require lots of cpu power.
Sata -still needs more CPU power, than SCSI for basic controller, yeah there are high end Sata controllers with own CPU and RAM, but they often has not drivers for MS-DOS or Win9x and because its newer technology even NT4 is problematic.

SCSI is more retro freindly drivers for very OLD retro Gaming consumer OS exists, because it scaled well, it was for normal users which wanted more performance up to fastest servers.

Im old goal oriented goatman, i care about facts and freedom, not about egos+prejudices. Hoarding=sickness. If you want respect, gain it by your behavior. I hate stupid SW limits, SW=virtual world, everything should be possible if you have enough raw HW.