PCIe SATA card shows up as parallel SCSI ?

[therishi]

Hi

I've installed a (cheap) DELOCK PCIe SATA controller (product#70157) and connected a Sandberg SATA docking station (very low cost too,) to be able to store early raw resource files from photo and video jobs on WD internal SATA harddrives (All in all a good Tb/$ rate for storing big sets of resc files). I've installed the latest Silicon non-raid driver.
HD mounts and works, but I'm wondering why this setup is defined as a SCSI connection in the "About this Mac" overview:

Readout from "PCI cards":

pci1095,3132:

Type: Other Mass Storage Controller
Driver Installed: Yes
Bus: PCI
Slot: Slot-3
Vendor ID: 0x1095
Device ID: 0x3132
Subsystem Vendor ID: 0x1095
Subsystem ID: 0x3132
Revision ID: 0x0001
Link Width: x1
Link Speed: 2.5 GT/s

In "Parallel SCSI":

SCSI Parallel Domain 0:

Initiator Identifier: 255

SCSI Target Device @ 15:

Manufacturer: WDC WD15
Model: EADS-00P8B0
Revision: 01.0
SCSI Target Identifier: 15
SCSI Device Features:
SCSI Initiator/Target Features:
Peripheral Device Type: 0

- - -

Everything works - I'm just wondering why it doesn't show up as SATA or serial ATA - and works a bit faster.
Around 40 to 80 Mb/s

If anyone has experience and can clarify I'll be grateful.
Thanx

Rishi

[PaulD-UK]

Hi
Its a legacy strategy for adding hard drive controller channels - to avoid conflicts with existing channels/controllers. If the PCI card emulates a SCSI controller it doesn't conflict with existing IDE/SATA controllers.

So to this day very cheap cards still do this. I saves the manufacturer actually writing a proper SATA driver - which of course 'name' manufacturers like Sonnet/LaCie/Areca etc do. My older Highpoint PCI-X SATA HBAs in my G5s report themselves as SCSI, but they work fine.

[therishi]

Thanx Paul - Learning something everyday :)


Hi
Its a legacy strategy for adding hard drive controller channels - to avoid conflicts with existing channels/controllers. If the PCI card emulates a SCSI controller it doesn't conflict with existing IDE/SATA controllers.

So to this day very cheap cards still do this. I saves the manufacturer actually writing a proper SATA driver - which of course 'name' manufacturers like Sonnet/LaCie/Areca etc do. My older Highpoint PCI-X SATA HBAs in my G5s report themselves as SCSI, but they work fine.