Thunderbolt –> eSata adapter ??

[Evan Crush]

@Ron: I don’t have this type of enclosure and I don’t think it would work as per the port multiplier “thing”. But i’ll try to be creative (sounds like a moto deosn’t it?) to get back to you with something.

I have an eSATA drive (with a single drive inside) also so i’ll put in a 7200rpm drive and come up with a bench with the 4big and the eSATa drive connected to see how it behaves with 2 drives connected… wait and see

[Thomas Morter-laing]

Ron- your read speeds should be twice that, mine are over double FW800, it’s just the write which has issues for me- but something I expect Sonnet to sort or I too will be complaining- I’m going to email them tomorrow about it.

Tom Morter-Laing
Twitter- @TomTheEditor
_________________________________________________
Editor, Certified Apple Product Proffessional, 2010
——————————————-

Equipment (not for ‘bragging’, but in case it’s relevant to future posts :D): Canon 7D, with Rode NTG2.
iMac 27″ intel i7 3.4GHz, 12GB RAM, ATI HD 6970M [2GB GDDR5], 2x G-Tech G-RAID (0) 2TB over Thunderbolt via Sonnet Echo ExpressCard/34 Thunderbolt adapter and Tempo™ SATA ExpressCard/34. Elgato Turbo H264HD.

[Ron Priest]

[Thomas Morter-Laing] “Ron- your read speeds should be twice that, mine are over double FW800, it’s just the write which has issues for me- but something I expect Sonnet to sort or I too will be complaining- I’m going to email them tomorrow about it.”

Really? I just checked again and I’m only getting 64.9 write and 104.2 read. Once again, this is just using a single 7200 RPM SATA drive connected as JBOD.

Checking with the internal drive I’m getting 121.2 write and 121.4 read. This is a brand new i7 iMac with 16GB RAM.

Ron Priest
Videographer
Louisville, KY

[Thomas Morter-laing]

Ron- I checked yesterday and my internal drives are about 10 short of that :S – although Im hopeing thats because mine are 3/4’s full (if anyone cares to elaborate on that, would be great :D)

But yes, I’m getting about 180MBs read speed (my write speed’s about the same though – not much more than 70 ever).

If anyone gets hold of the Lacie version, PLEASE post your speeds here so we can make informed decisions on buying them (and rebelling against sonnet :D)

Tom Morter-Laing
Twitter- @TomTheEditor
_________________________________________________
Editor, Certified Apple Product Proffessional, 2010
——————————————-

Equipment (not for ‘bragging’, but in case it’s relevant to future posts :D): Canon 7D, with Rode NTG2.
iMac 27″ intel i7 3.4GHz, 12GB RAM, ATI HD 6970M [2GB GDDR5], 2x G-Tech G-RAID (0) 2TB over Thunderbolt via Sonnet Echo ExpressCard/34 Thunderbolt adapter and Tempo™ SATA ExpressCard/34. Elgato Turbo H264HD.

[Thomas Morter-laing]

Has anyone got one of the Lacie esata hubs yet?

[Evan Crush]

Ah sorry I promised some number and got dragged into lotta work…

anyway here they are: with 2 4bigs in RAID 5 altogether stripped in RAID 0 it gives this:

kinda cool no?…

[Thomas Morter-laing]

Ive been in contact with Sonnet. They are releasing a 6Gb/s card which is fully compatible. Rather than going through the hassle of getting a brand new device and having to try and return/ sell on ebay my sonnet setup, Im going to get one of those cards. I will reports back here on my speed findings.

Of course, the Sonnet adapter also has the advantage of being an expresscard /34 slot, so for things like SxS cards and a few other peripherals, it has the edge. Juts not the speed at the moment!

Tom Morter-Laing
Twitter- @TomTheEditor
_________________________________________________
Editor, Certified Apple Product Proffessional, 2010
——————————————-
Equipment (not for ‘bragging’, but in case it’s relevant to future posts :D): Canon 7D, with Rode NTG2.
iMac 27″ intel i7 3.4GHz, 12GB RAM, ATI HD 6970M [2GB GDDR5], 2x G-Tech G-RAID (0) 2TB over Thunderbolt via Sonnet Echo ExpressCard/34 Thunderbolt adapter and Tempo™ SATA ExpressCard/34. Elgato Turbo H264HD.

[Fredy Schwerdtner]

Hi Thomas and you all.
I was traveling doing a job out of the country (Brazil).
Now I’m back.
I’ve been using the card a lot. It stills getting hot when it is in use and kind of warm when it is only connected.
The bottleneck still the speed of the esata regardless the thunderbolt connection on the iMac.

All the best for you all …

iMac 2.7 GHz Intel 4 Core i5
16 GB memory

MacBook Pro 17″
2.5 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo
6GB 667 MHz DDR2 SDRAM

OWC RAID 5 with 4TB

OS X 10.7.3
FCPX
Final Cut Studio “3”

[Ron Priest]

Hey Thomas

You said: “Ive been in contact with Sonnet. They are releasing a 6Gb/s card which is fully compatible. Im going to get one of those cards. I will report back here on my speed findings… Of course, the Sonnet adapter also has the advantage of being an expresscard /34 slot, so for things like SxS cards and a few other peripherals, it has the edge. Juts not the speed at the moment!” I was wondering what speeds you’re now getting and what type of RAID you’re using?

My Sonnet E4P card in my MacPro went dead on me 4 months short of the 3 year warrantee. After contacting Sonnet, they informed me It only came with a 2 year warrantee even though my OWC receipt indicated that it was a 3 year warrantee. Well, I was quite pissed to say the least, but in the end, Sonnet came through an honored my 3 year warrantee. I have a better opinion of Sonnet these days considering how they have bent over backwards to please me.

While communicating with them about the e4P card replacement, I mentioned that I wasn’t very happy with the speeds I was getting with the Echo Thunderbolt Adapter, which I was using on my iMac with the Tempo SATA Pro ExpressCard/34. I was getting about the same write and read speeds as with my Firewire connections. Mind you, I was using single JOB eSATA drives, not a RAID of any kind. They told me that my problem was the ExpressCard.

This is when they informed me that they had a new card out (it’s so new, it’s not even on their website yet). This is the new card you were talking about Thomas for the benefit of others reading this post. Well, to make a long story short, I received the card yesterday and it almost doubles my write and read speeds with the stand-alone JOB eSATA drives. I ended up doing a software RAID 0 on two each 1 TB external SATA II drives (3Gb/s not 6) and I’m getting write and read speeds around 180 – 190 MB/s with 1.5 GB free on the RAID. So, needless to say, I’m a pretty happy camper. This will do me until I can get a Thunderbolt RAID.

For anyone else wanting to get this new card, it’s not listed on their site as of this posting. But the official name of this card is: Tempo SATA Pro 6Gb ExpressCard/34 not to be confused with their older 6GB card. This new card doesn’t use any additional Sonnet drivers for the MAC, the drives included in the MAC OS is all you need. This is great as now I don’t have to worry about constantly checking for new drivers from Sonnet.

One caution though, this new card does not support port multipliers on the Mac, however, it does under windows 7 and Vista. Another plus with this card is that it seems to run a lot cooler in the Echo Thunderbolt Adapter then my previous card.

On another note, Sonnet has a new Thunderbolt Adapter , with the word “Pro” in front of it. If anyone can explain to me what the difference between the two adapters, it would be much appreciated.

https://www.sonnettech.com/product/echoexpresscard34thunderbolt.html

Ron Priest
Videographer
Louisville, KY

[Thomas Morter-laing]

Can’t reply fully right now, but good to hear! I still havent got the new card. The difference bwteen pro and not I gather is:

Data Transfer Speeds
Up to 5.0 Gb/s (Echo Pro ExpressCard/34)
Up to 2.5 Gb/s (Echo ExpressCard/34)

Tom Morter-Laing
Twitter- @TomTheEditor
_________________________________________________
Editor, Certified Apple Product Proffessional, 2010
——————————————-
Equipment (not for ‘bragging’, but in case it’s relevant to future posts :D): Canon 7D, with Rode NTG2.
iMac 27″ intel i7 3.4GHz, 12GB RAM, ATI HD 6970M [2GB GDDR5], 2x G-Tech G-RAID (0) 2TB over Thunderbolt via Sonnet Echo ExpressCard/34 Thunderbolt adapter and Tempo™ SATA ExpressCard/34. Elgato Turbo H264HD.