[geeks] New 2.5" SCSI HDs???

[Patrick Giagnocavo]

On Jan 18, 2007, at 3:54 PM, Charles Shannon Hendrix wrote:
>
>
> True, SATA is an upgrade from IDE, but now that we have made the move,
> it really makes no sense to keep it around in the future.
>

Today I set up a new Linux install for a customer.  A 1U Athlon 1.2 Ghz 
CPU, with 4x500 SATA drives and a $58 Promise TX4 300 (4-port, 3Gb/s 
PCI card).

As part of the install, we mirrored two drives, which Linux will 
re-sync by copying all the data from one drive to the other drive.

Using iostat -xk 5 or whatever, I observed 30MB/second reads from drive 
A to 30MB/second writes to drive B.  CPU usage was under 1% (on a 
1.2GHz chip, mind you).

The fact that you can get that kind of performance, cheaply, is what 
will keep SATA around.

If you have ever dealt with OEMs you know that all they care about is 
price.  SATA was only "allowed" to become a standard, by virtue of the 
manufacturers of the drive, keeping the price the same as ATA/IDE.

If SAS adds even 10 cents per system in additional costs, it will not 
be widespread the way SATA is.

--Patrick