P5Q Pro - Safe to connect SATA (1-6) to eSATA connector on case?

Hello.

Looking to install Ubuntu 8.10 onto an external drive using eSATA
offered by the Silicon Image ports set to normal mode. However, all
attempts and most Google searches [suggest] that the Sil controller
might not be the best choice. That is, although I can "see" the drive
within the Ubuntu installer, when changes made to partition of the
attached eSATA drive (Seagate 320GB) are attempted, error occurs in
actually performing the commit to the drive and install fails. I have
tried the other options such as pollirq and such to no success.

So, is it safe/OK/acceptable to use one of the six ICH10R ports and
connect it to my external SATA PC case cable, full-well knowing
hot-plugging is no longer an option?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Mike

mike wrote:
Hello.

Looking to install Ubuntu 8.10 onto an external drive using eSATA
offered by the Silicon Image ports set to normal mode. However, all
attempts and most Google searches [suggest] that the Sil controller
might not be the best choice. That is, although I can "see" the drive
within the Ubuntu installer, when changes made to partition of the
attached eSATA drive (Seagate 320GB) are attempted, error occurs in
actually performing the commit to the drive and install fails. I have
tried the other options such as pollirq and such to no success.

So, is it safe/OK/acceptable to use one of the six ICH10R ports and
connect it to my external SATA PC case cable, full-well knowing
hot-plugging is no longer an option?

Thanks in advance for any help.

Mike

Do you have an adapter cable, to go from ESATA (on the drive enclosure)
to a SATA connector on the motherboard ?

The difference between ESATA and SATA electrically, is the TX/RX
signal amplitude. ESATA has more signal budget, so that a longer
cable can be used. If the cable is shorter, it is possible an
ESATA device can be used with a SATA connector. ESATA cables
can be 2 meters, while the motherboard ones are the shorter ones.

If you pull the drive out of its enclosure, you could just
slide it into a drive bay in the computer.

As for the "Silicon Image" aspect of your posting, I think we
should be fair to the folks at Silicon Image. The circuit
solution consists of two chips. The SIL5723 is the final
output on the motherboard.

http://www.siliconimage.com/products...t.aspx?pid=103

As far as I know, it is being driven by the Marvell 88SE6111.

http://www.laptop.org/teamwiki/image...s_88SE6111.pdf

PCI_Express --- 88SE6111 --- SIL5723 ----
----

I think that means you'd at least need a driver that
understands the Marvell 88SE6111, before this would
work. I don't know if the SIL5723 needs anything or
not - I think it may fabricate a "drive name", so
you might not see "Seagate" as the drive brand name.
I think the concept, is the SIL5723 looks like
a drive, and fakes the appearance of a drive.
Whether doing RAID0, RAID1, or whatever on the
peripheral side of the chip.

Paul