eSATA rant

[HavocXphere]

Is it just me or is eSATA one huge step backwards.

I've got a friends external HDD here that has both usb and eSATA connections.

The issue I'm having is that the eSATA connection does not seem to be hot-pluggable. First time round it only recognized the drive after a restart. A few hours later I switch the PC+drive on again and this time it interfered with the boot process. No idea wtf windows was trying to read from the drive. After like 5 mins it was still not in windows. Switched everything off and back on again and it still doesn't boot properly.

Then I switched to usb and everything just works.

I know eSATA is faster, but geez this is sooo much more hassle.

(NexStar 3 btw)

 

[Thestealth]

Have you checked your bios settings for "additional bootable devices"? Might sound silly but if it's an option for your bios, she'll try and go for it!

 

[kevinswan007]

I have never got my ESATA to work. changed motherboards, changed external drives.

dont know wtf im doing wrong.

 

[HavocXphere]

Have you checked your bios settings for "additional bootable devices"? Might sound silly but if it's an option for your bios, she'll try and go for it!

The PC detected it fine the first time round (after a restart) so I think the BIOS settings are OK. I'll have a look around the BIOS for stray option nonetheless.

I just hope that it is just this particular drive that needs a restart before its detected.

USB does seem to be significantly slower though. 22mb/s atm. while I saw some 66mb/s on the esata connection.

 

[SYNERGY]

Works fine for me-DQ6 mobo.
The motherboard has to support it (hot swappable), not only sata

 

[HavocXphere]

Works fine for me-DQ6 mobo.
The motherboard has to support it (hot swappable), not only sata

My P5K mobo has eSATA ports at the back so I assume that its supported. But you just reminded me of something else: I'm using standard MS drivers for sata. The others gave me issues. Maybe thats why its not hotswappable.

 

[Wisemansa]

p5ne-sli, esata port on back, using MS drivers no problems here...CM enclosure

 

[Asha'man X]

I posted a thread about my misery with eSATA at the start of the month.

I found that the Vantec NexStar I'm using is great, but the Vantec controller card I bought for the server in our school came with junk drivers.
Basically, I don't get a Remove Hardware Safely icon in the system tray, due to the way the drivers are written.

So to remove the drive, I first go to Computer Management, right click the drive and select Disable. I can actually feel the drive spinning down in the enclosure. I then switch the enclosure off, and presto, drive safely removed.

Updating the driver theought Windows Update didn't make a big difference.

The flip side to all this is that eSATA flies. USB can't compare, especially for backing up 50 odd gigs.

Curse the manufacturers for messing up a standard and not implementing it properly.