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horvath1
Contributor
Contributor

SATA Raid Card recommendations

Hey All,

I'm looking for SATA raid card recommendations. I require raid 1 with two drives (SATA 150 is ok with me). I'm hoping to find something in the sub $300 range as I have not been able to yet. Can be officially supported or 'community' supported ie minor tweaks to get it working is ok. Any ebay specials you know of would be great.

Please respond with cards you are using with ESXi not things that 'should' work.

Thanks

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horvath1
Contributor
Contributor

Forgot to add you MUST be able to monitor the health status of the raid/drives.

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Spike999
Contributor
Contributor

I have heard a lot of people go on about the Adaptec AAR 2610SA 6 port SATA Raid 2610 card, there is also a 4 port version, 2410SA, I believe there both supported as well. You can pick one up on eBay between $60 - $100. Not to sure about the monitoring though, it does support SMART but that only monitors the health of the disks and not the RAID, I think.

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Dave_Mishchenko
Immortal
Immortal

The 2x10 are good options, but unfortunately don't provide health status.

Are you looking for an add-on card on would a MB with a built-in controller be OK?

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microkid
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Take a look at the Dell Perc 5/i SAS/SATA Raid adapters. You can pick them up from ebay at arround 160 euro's. I have my server running on one, got it for 160 euro's including Battery and cables. Runs very nice and fast, health can be monitored, supports up to 8 drives. I think the Perc 5/i is one of the most used raid cards for homebrew ESXi installations.

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