Sans Digital TowerRAID TR8M 8 Bay SATA to eSATA Port Multiplier JBOD/RAID 0, 1, 1+0, 5 Enclosure (Silver)

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Product Feature

• Eight 3.5-inch SATA hard disk drives to two eSATA Port Multiplier interfaces. Accesses eight hard drives using only two cables.
• Supports JBOD, Spanning, RAID 0, 1, 1+0, 5 with spare in two volume sets via software utilities.
• Cable-less backplane design support hot-swappable SATA I and SATA II. Bundled with 2-port eSATA PCIe 1x Host Bus Adapter. Supports Plug & Play for easy installation.
• Supports Plug & Play for easy installation. Compact enclosure with dust-free cover.
• Support PC, Mac, and Linux. (Please note that the host adapter card is based on Silicon Image chipset, which currently only support up to MAC OS 10.5.1 by Silicon Image.)

Product Description

The TowerRAID TR8M is an 8-bay storage enclosures for high capacity storage needs. With built-in ventilating protective screen front panel, both units utilize cable-less backplane-design to support up to eight hard drives. Hard drives are installed on easy access hard drive trays for simple insertion and removal. Hard drive cooling is provided by a large 4.7-Inch cooling fan located on the back of the units. The TR8M is a compact RAID tower uses only two cables to connected eight SATA drives utilizing the latest SATA II port multiplier technology. Using the bundled two ports eSATA PCIe adapter, the user could easily access eight hard drives via JBOD mode, or two different sets of RAID 0, 1, 1+0 and 5 with spare. Units are available in black (TR8M-B) and silver (TR8M) finish.

Sans Digital TowerRAID TR8M 8 Bay SATA to eSATA Port Multiplier JBOD/RAID 0, 1, 1+0, 5 Enclosure (Silver) Review

In my opinion, the Sans Digital TowerRAID TR8M is a cost-effective way to extend your computer's storage capacity. In my configuration, I've installed the included two-port SATA host card in a PCI slot of my HP Z400, and run the two included eSATA cables to the TowerRAID, which sits next to the HP. BTW, as required by eSATA electrical protocol, these cables are short - about a meter or so.
Next, I populated bay 0&1, and bay 4&5 with Western Digital 1Tb Caviar Green drives. It's easy - just install 4 included screws to install the drives into the drive trays. In my configuration, each pair of drives is set up as a redundant mirrored array, so I now have 2Tb of mirrored storage. I use these two mirrors as archival storage, as the Z400 is fully populated internally with a root drive, a data drive, and a two-drive striped array for video editing work.
I would have given this product five stars for overall quality and performance, however - the included RAID 5 software did not function correctly on Win 7 Enterprise x64. You won't need the software for RAID 0 or 1 operation; Windows handles that just fine from the Disk Management console / snap-in... regardless, the included host card is from Silicon Image, so there are plenty of drivers on-line at the Silicon Image website for the adventurous.
All-in-all, I was looking at the Drobo, but the TowerRAID came in at 1/3 the price... not as functional, but definitely a price-performance leader. Recommended!

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