Spec me a cheap SCSI setup

[Messiah Khan]

2 18gb 15k cheetahs and adaptec 39320-R and a u320 cable £130 if you know where to look

blisteringly fast in RAID 0 too

Any hint as to where to look, or are we talking a competitor?

 

[Fred_Or_Dead]

Messiah Kahn - As a SCSI-noob - don't forget to add an "Active Terminator" to Fred or Dead's shopping list. And check with the seller of the cable that it really is a U320 cable. There are some cheap and nasty cables around that were designed for older, slower speeds. I have had problems with these in the past. Which is why it was nice to grab a TekRAM with all the cables in the box. (Most cables are labled)

And talking of bargins.... OCUK's own Member's Market is well worth a trawl. I picked up a spare TekRAM DC-390U2B as a backup to my main U320 rig. And that was a meaty cost of £20 - including the cables, terminators, etc.

My understanding of it is that you only need a terminator on the SCSI cable if you use 80-pin hd's as 68-pin 15k scsi hd's can be terminated with jumpers on the actual hd!? (could be wrong but this is the information a SCSI seller on ebay told me)

P.S) My £15 cable did come with a terminator as at the time I was unsure if i needed it or not so thought its better to have what you don't need then too not have what you do need

 

[MAllen]

That one is new to me. I don't have any 15k drives, so I can't look at them. My 68pin 10k LVD drives do need the cable terminated.

In the old days of 50pin SCSI there used to be non-active terminators that worked like you describe. Just a jumper on the last drive (normally my CD Player).

With 68pin SCSI I have always used active terminators. Though I guess there is no real reason they couldn't include this within the hard drives again. It would be a cost thing.

messiah kahn - if you do get these drives with built in terminators, then only set the terminator for the last drive in the SCSI chain. Personally I would try and stick with the traditional separate terminator on the end of the cable.

The important thing is to check what you have before you fire it up.

 

[Messiah Khan]

So would I simply requre 1 terminator at the end of the chain, not 1 terminator for every unused connection? Also, if say the SCSI card had 2 channels, would I need a terminator for both channels?

 

[dual2max]

My board has two SCSI channels, with a Maxtor Atlas 15K2 36Gb on each channel. Therefore 1 cable has 5 connectors and 1 terminator. So do this for each channel. Each channel can handle 15 drives. This I have found can cost 2 bombs.