Archived from groups: comp.sys.ibm.pc.hardware.storage (
More info?)
Tod wrote:
> It's not the motherboard or operating system, it's the controllers.
> They are called SCSI, one main stream SCSI controller can easily control
> 15 SCSI hard drives.
>
> If you only want ATA/IDE stuff, I believe Abit made a mother board that
> had 6
> built in ATA/IDE controllers, so 12 IDE devices could be hooked up.
>
> Plus adding extra PCI ATA controllers, each controller controlling 4 hard
> drives.
> So how many PCI slot does the motherboard have ?
>
> You can also hook up external hard drives in USB or Firewire cases
> Maybe a dozen or more externals hooked up ?
You're thinking small. Google "SATA RAID" and "ATA RAID external" and
you'll find a ton of hits on interesting stuff.
It's conceptually possible to put together a solution using a high-end SCSI
RAID controllers and external SCSI-to-SATA enclosures that has more than
three thousand SATA devices in it. That, using the largest available SATA
devices, would be over 1.5 petabytes in capacity. I don't want to maintain
the thing. At least not unless you pay me a _hell_ of a lot.
Take a look at <http://www.raidking.com/rk827.htm> and
<http://www.lsilogic.com/products/megaraid/scsi_320_4x.html> for the pieces
for that configuration.
A smaller alternative would use four 3Ware
<http://www.3ware.com/products/serial_ata9000.asp> RAID controllers with
12 devices each for a total of 48 and only 19 terabytes capacity. In either
case a motherboard with four PCI-X slots available, preferably on separate
buses, would be needed to get maximum performance. A Supermicro X5DL8-GG
would be one option--it has 6 slots on 3 buses--not optimal but pretty
good.
>
> "mikea" <mikea@localhost.com> wrote in message
> news:cot5u9$6a5$1@newsg4.svr.pol.co.uk...
>> What is the max number of hard drives that can be installed (via SATA, or
>> IDE) on a single CPU windows xp based machine? and can anyone recommend a
>> motherboard that is suitable for a large number of drives?
>>
>>
>>
--
--John
Reply to jclarke at ae tee tee global dot net
(was jclarke at eye bee em dot net)
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