Cliff's Notes: The Syba SD-PEX40068 uses the Marvell 88SE9230 chip (Superior to the RocketRAID 640L, 642L, 644L's 9235 chip), runs at PCIe 2.0 x4 speeds, doesn't slow down boot time, and requires no driver. Sleep works with it!
First off, my system specs:
2009 Mac Pro -> Mid 2010 FW
Xeon W3690 @ 3.46GHz - Hex Core
24GB Corsair 1333MHz ECC Registered
GeForce 680 GTX with EFI FW - 2GB
Sandisk Extreme SSD 240GB and Intel 80GB 3G SSD on Syba SD-PEX40068
2 Western Digital Red 2.0TB 3.5" drives in internal slots
IOGear Bluetooth 4.0 USB dongle
Orico PFU3-2P Dual Port USB 3.0 adapter (working with Generic UHCI kext)
OSes:
Mountain Lion 10.8.4 (Sandisk)
Windows 7 x64 Ultimate (Intel)
I've tried an Apricorn X1, which worked, but was crashy with my system setup - Read speeds were limited right at 300MB/second, and it only supported one drive. And froze my system. A lot.
I tried a RocketRAID 642L - This required me to reflash the firmware to an EFI 64 one in Windows, meaning I had to boot Boot Camp/Win7 first. Also, OS X needed a driver installed prior to being able to boot to it, meaning you could not install the OS to it - It just doesn't see the controller prior to the driver being installed. With my Sandisk in the internal bay, I had roughly 2.5 load icon spins while booting. After the RocketRAID, I had over 12 spins before it loaded. Once it did load, speeds were good, but it wasn't a very good solution.
Enter the Syba SD-PEX40068 - A no-name brand that's sold on Amazon but produces some good cards. This card uses a Marvel 88SE9230 HARDWARE RAID chip, unlike the 9235 in the RocketRAID. Here are the benefits:
1) Mount 2 2.5" SSDs on-board - with 2 internal SATA 6G ports that you can run elsewhere or convert to eSATA - Your call.
2) Does not delay OS X boot - Only get 1/2 of a load icon spin now vs 2.5 internally, and system doesn't sit at a black screen forever. Maybe about 8 seconds.
3) If Boot Camp volume is connected to the controller, changing your boot volume in either OS works. Have not tried mixing it up.
4) No driver needed in OS X. OS X sees the drives immediately, even when booting from the OS USB Key/Disc
5) No driver needed for Windows, but one comes with it, with a RAID utility.
6) Oh yes. Sleep WORKS. Have tried it multiple times without any failures.
7)$43.60 at Amazon! -
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00BG0NMNA/ref=oh_details_o02_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
Bad:
1) Takes 2 PCIe slots. I put an eSATA 2-port connector beside it, so I'm making use of my "useless" slot.
2) Needs a floppy power connector. So I used the Monoprice cable here, and plugged it into a free internal drive bay's power -
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B005E2XQQY/ref=oh_details_o09_s00_i00?ie=UTF8&psc=1
3) It's not free?
Unknowns:
I have yet to try it in SW or HW RAID-0 configurations. Evidently, you need Windows installed to set up a HW RAID, and I may end up doing that later. If I do, expect benchmarks here.
Ordered a Samsung 840 Pro 256GB drive that I'm going to run on it when it arrives, and will update with benchmarks. Then may pick up another and run HW RAID-0 on it and see how it runs. My old Sandisk isn't the fastest drive in the world, but I was getting ~278MB reads internally, ~300MB reads with the Crapricorn X1, and ~440 with the RocketRAID 642L (At $100 without any provisions for mounting SSDs)
I've also only had it in my system for a few hours. We'll see how it works over the upcoming weeks/months.
Hope this helps some of you guys out there who want to spruce up your Mac Pro on the cheap.
Cheers,
Geoff
P.S. - Below is a bench with my Sandisk Extreme 240. Will update with the Samsung when it arrives.
