External SCSI

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I've just come into possesion of a PC which has an SCSI card in. I got excited till i opened it up and the D-sub connector on the back (for external devices) is the ONLY connector on it.
Can you still get external SCSI hard disks and if so are they more expensive than internals ones and are they still faster than SATA?
 
Yes, a decent card should have internal and external connectors, ie 50 pin Wide and 68 Ultra Wide, with 50 or 68 mini scsi external connector. You still can get SCSI hard drives and mount them in external SCSI boxes (I have a 5.25" x 2 Ultra SCSI box) With a Advansys 930 SCSI/Ultra SCSI for scanner and CD Re-Writer. What devices are you looking at getting?

I don't think SCSI is worth going down now though, IDE has caught up and unless you want extreme performance or for server use (and the cost involved) a good fast 7200rpm IDE is fast enough. SCSI devices in the past had wider more reliable support in software, better drivers (because going through the standardised controller) so worked better than IDE devices. No problems with master/slave slowdowns and limitations to 4 devices. ie compare a Parrarel port scanner to a SCSI scanner. :-D but since USB scanners really leapfrogged over parrarel in performance and for most users "do the job"
 
well what you say is true, but that's not really answering my questions. I know SCSI is faster and more expensive for internal stuff. This is why i was opting for 10k SATA RAID. BUT i just got given this PC for free, if i can put normal SCSI drives in an enclosure that isn't overly expensive (i.e more than a new controller) then i'll opt for the extra performance as i don't have to fork out £200 for a controller.
What i wanna know is, is external SCSI that connects using a D-sub connector faster than an internal SATA drive? And how much would i be looking at for External SCSI drives/ enclosure so i can decide if it's worth while.
 
SCSI external and internal connections are the same! (ie I use the same cable to connect my 2 15k SCSI's on both the internal 68pin connector and the external 68pin connector of my U320 SCSI card)
 
What type of D-sub connector do you have? If it's at least 68-pin, you're probably OK, but if not, you may have one of the cheap SCSI external-only cards that were designed for use with SCSI scanners, and their performance for disks would quite frankly suck.
 
SCSI external and internal connections are the same! (ie I use the same cable to connect my 2 15k SCSI's on both the internal 68pin connector and the external 68pin connector of my U320 SCSI card)
they're not. I've never seen an SCSI with a DB25 connector on it the cable is probably a DB25 to 48 pin o.oooo1Ultranarrow. As beserker pointed out certain types of SCSI are not suitable for HDDs, this is a 25pin i think, looks like a printer port, Certainly not 68pin or 50 pin. However i can probably muster from selling the components of the PC and the lexmark printer and 19" CRT it came with enough cash to put a dent in the price of a decent SCSI card. :)
Just gotta find a PCI-E one now, any suggestions?
 
You just confirmed my suspicion. Cards with DB25 connectors are designed for slow devices (usually scanners). You can of course connect other devices with the appropriate cables (25 to 50), but you'll be limited to an 8-bit data path and <10 MB/s. Might even be 10Mbit/s, can't remember offhand. Either way, it'll suck. Bigtime. Avoid.

As for cards, Adaptec always worked for me. :)
 
Well I use an internal U320 cable for connecting my Maxtor Atlas II 15k onto the second U320 channel of my Adaptec 39320-R which is external. (I just run the cable back into the PC via an empty PCI backplate slot.)
{See Pic below}

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Why??? Scuzzi can chain devices up to at least 13....Single channel should be enough unless you have upwards of 6 Disks, and from those Pics i can see you don't have an HP ML350 chasis.

Where the hell does you PC live? down a well??
 
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