[kwlug-disc] Linux-compatible eSATA expansion cards

[William Park]

On Mon, Jun 30, 2014 at 08:09:26PM -0400, Paul Nijjar wrote:
> Honestly the differences between eSATA and SATA still confuse me, even
> after reading the Wikipedia article. Is it true that not all SATA
> ports on a motherboard can be converted to eSATA with these
> connectors?

That conversion depends on BIOS.  eSATA and SATA are the same in
pinouts.  The difference are (from memory) 
    - greater voltage range for noise tolerance in longer eSATA cable
      outside computer case.
    - better hardware support for multiple devices.  I say "better"
      because they both use same driver.
    - better support for hotplug (again "better").

My Asus motherboard has BIOS option to convert internal SATA to eSATA,
and I'm using one port as eSATA which is connected to eSATA bracket.
The other side of eSATA is Mediasonic 4-bay USB3/eSATA enclosure.

Why use eSATA when you have USB3?  USB3 things are just scam.  
    - On this Mediasonic enclosure, USB3 5Gbps perform the same as eSATA
      3Gbps connection.  At eSATA 6Gbps, I get only 20% improvement.
    - On Windows tablet, USB3 speed is 3MB/s.
    - USB3 drops connection and reconnect in the middle of transfer.
      Very helpful when doing cron backups.