Will Intel chipsets ever have more than 6 native SATA ports?

[foscooter]

Will Intel chipsets ever have more than 6 native SATA ports, and/or more than 2 SATA III 6G ports?

The key being native SATA ports…that you can boot from, and RAID together.

Image 4 x SATA 3 SSDs in RAID 0…reads over 2GBps! (20Gbps or 2000MBps)

All that without an expensive PCI-e add-on card. Some, if not most, of those (quality) RAID cards are more than a motherboard!

 

[PreferLinux]

Only Intel can answer that question, but my guess is they will change to six native SATA3 ports rather than two SATA3 and four SATA2, but still only be six – for the mainstream chipsets. For the extreme chipsets, I'm guessing that most of them will be like X79 was rumoured to supposed to be – loads more, with SAS as well as SATA.

 

[nikorr]

Check this one @ http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131803

Storage Devices
SATA 3Gb/s - 4
SATA 6Gb/s - 4 x SATA 6Gb/s
SATA RAID - 2 x SATA 6Gb/s port(s), red and 4 x SATA 3Gb/s port(s), black support RAID 0, 1, 5, 10

 

[PreferLinux]

Still only 6 native ports, only two of which are SATA3.

 

[nikorr]

Ivy bridge have more....

 

[PreferLinux]

More native SATA ports, or more native SATA3 ports?

 

[nikorr]

More native SATA ports, or more native SATA3 ports?

I have to find where on Toms I read about that.... I better check that again : )

 

[foscooter]

Check this one @ http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131803

Storage Devices
SATA 3Gb/s - 4
SATA 6Gb/s - 4 x SATA 6Gb/s
SATA RAID - 2 x SATA 6Gb/s port(s), red and 4 x SATA 3Gb/s port(s), black support RAID 0, 1, 5, 10

Product still only has 6 native SATA ports, with 2 added SATA ports via another onboard controller (as do many other models using either Marvell, JMicron, or ASMedia for the extra ports).

Most of the time you can't boot to the "third-party" SATA controller, but sometimes you can.

But, you can't RAID them. And if you can RAID them, only within the added controller (i.e. 2 drives), not witht he native ports.

I've seen a mobo with 6 Intel SATA ports: 2x6G + 4x3G; with 2 added controllers, each with 2x6G ports that you could RAID only within each controller, not across all added ports.

So my question now is, more native SATA III 6G ports. Even if there are still only 6 (2x3G + 4x6G) native total.

Not that I'd ever need that many SATA ports (again, I once had 8 drives). I just wanted to know if we could (currently) RAID 0 4xSATA III 6G SSDs together on 4 SATA III 6G ports, on the native motherboard controller, without using an add-on card.

 

[foscooter]

Only Intel can answer that question, but my guess is they will change to six native SATA3 ports rather than two SATA3 and four SATA2, but still only be six – for the mainstream chipsets. For the extreme chipsets, I'm guessing that most of them will be like X79 was rumoured to supposed to be – loads more, with SAS as well as SATA.

Haven't seen any yet, with those "loads more" options.

Man those LGA2011 CPUs and motherboards are expensive! And Quad channel memory? So I need 4 x DDR3-1600?

Anyway, Intel still doesn't have USB 3.0, althought it has been in the works, waiting for something else to evolve.

Only time will tell. I'll have to wait to see Ivy Bridge (a different version of Sandy Bridge) and the new x77 chipsets (Z77, H77, etc.).

I just came across this artcle: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4318/intel-roadmap-ivy-bridge-panther-point-ssds/2. Dated, but a good read with Intels roadmap on Panther Point chipsets. Still, it looks like the X79 chipset was supposed to have lots more SATA ports. But even the new Panther Point Chipset won't have any more than 6 SATA ports, with only 2 SATA III 6G.

 

[PreferLinux]

Haven't seen any yet, with those "loads more" options.

Man those LGA2011 CPUs and motherboards are expensive! And Quad channel memory? So I need 4 x DDR3-1600?

Anyway, Intel still doesn't have USB 3.0, althought it has been in the works, waiting for something else to evolve.

Only time will tell. I'll have to wait to see Ivy Bridge (a different version of Sandy Bridge) and the new x77 chipsets (Z77, H77, etc.).

I just came across this artcle: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4318/intel-roadmap-ivy-bridge-panther-point-ssds/2. Dated, but a good read with Intels roadmap on Panther Point chipsets.

The current X79 boards don't haveit – they were taken out later on because of problems. That article you linked shows what it was supposed to have.

 

[foscooter]

Best answer selected by foscooter.

 

[nikorr]

This topic has been closed by Nikorr