What Mobo For a SCSI HD?

[stevem326]

I'm thinking about buying a system with a 15K SCSI hard drive. Can someone recommend some motherboards that support SCSI technology? Don't I need a special mobo for that?

Thanks!

 

[ToeJam13]

Finding boards with intergrated SCSI is going to be a challenge. Now that SATA has become mainstream, SCSI has been pushed even further into the high-end niche market.

Tyan makes a dual S940 board based on the nVidia 2200 and 2050 chipsets with optional U320 support. link
Supermicro makes a S775 board based on the Intel E7221 chipset with dual U320 support. link

Most likely, you will need to purchase an expansion card for your system. SCSI U320 boards usually come in one of three flavors: PCI (64-bit), PCI-X and PCI-Express.

Most of the boards by Adaptec are still only PCI-X. LSI makes a PCI-Express board, but its in excess of $600.

 

[mechBgon]

A 15k SCSI drive will work fine with an inexpensive LSI Logic U160 card in a standard PCI slot, too. Pick whatever mobo suits your needs and budget.

 

[stevem326]

Thanks a lot for the feedback. I think I might have confused you though. I'm not trying to find a SCSI mobo...I'm just trying to find a mobo that I could use with a SCSI HD and controller. Wouldn't a regular mobo work as long as I have the controller as well?

I'm trying to build an ultra-fast workstation. Just something that boots up really fast, shuts down really fast, moves/deletes/renames/finds files really fast. I'll mainly just be using MS Office software. No gaming or video editing. No music stuff. Just a super fast workstation.

Thanks again for the advice!

 

[mechBgon]

Fast bootup is not SCSI's forte, since the controller takes a while to initialize. But then again, who cares how long it takes to boot when the drive is built to run 24/7/365 for 5 years at a time?

 

[Peter]

Initializing a SCSI channel and one HDD isn't taking any longer than IDE. Most people make the mistake of letting the SCSI card scan all 15 possible drive positions - and that'll delay things. Just like with IDE, use the SCSI card's BIOS and disable drive detection for those IDs where you don't have anything connected.

Any mainboard, plus an LSI U160, that'll do the job nicely.

 

[ToeJam13]

Yeah, Peter is correct. Both my old Adaptec 2940UW, Diamond Fireport40 and AMI MegaRAID-UW allowed me to set specific SCSI IDs to scan during bootup so the amount of time looking for devices was cut down.

That said, having an SCSI card with its BIOS enabled at boot added at least 10 seconds of time to my bootup before Windows started loading. Once I got past that, the system would scream. In the end, it all evened out.

 

[Peter]

I'm doing BIOS engineering for a living, so I know the stats SCSI channel init adds a second to the boot time, no more. Depending on their settings, some SCSI BIOSes add delays to give users more time to press the hotkey to enter the SCSI BIOS, or just read the output.
About the same time is regained by disabling an IDE channel, so actually, little is lost as soon as you make the SCSI BIOS be as terse as it can. LSI's have the delays and terse/verbose output modes configurable, and can be just as quick as an IDE init if you let them. On default settings, with verbose output, large timeouts and all ID positions scanned, you'll get it up to 20 seconds.

As long as the SCSI drivers loaded by the OS honor the scanning rules set in the SCSI BIOS, you won't get any extra delays during OS boot either. LSI's do, btw.

 

[stevem326]

Thanks a lot for the info guys. I think I might just go with a Raptor 10K instead of the 15K SCSI. To be honest, I?d probably be more than happy even with a 7,200 SATA drive and I could just use the savings to buy a better CPU/RAM/MoBo, etc. Or maybe turn this rig into a mid-level gaming system instead and get a decent gaming card.

SCSI just seems a little too complicated and maybe a bit of an overkill for my needs right now!

 

[mechBgon]

SCSI isn't that complicated SATA can be much worse if you pick the wrong motherboard, or don't know what you're doing with the right motherboard.

 

[t3h l337 n3wb]

Wait a sec. First, you're trying to build a workstation, and now a mid-level gaming system? That's kind of a huge leap...

 

[stevem326]

Originally posted by: t3h l337 n3wb
Wait a sec. First, you're trying to build a workstation, and now a mid-level gaming system? That's kind of a huge leap...

Well, to be honest, I'm starting to think I'm not sure what I really want to buy. I don't do any gaming right now, but it might be a good idea to get a halfway decent video card just in case I change my mind down the road.

Basically, I just want something that is really fast so that's why I was thinking of going with SCSI.