Hot Swap Capability PCIE

A

Alai

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Jul 19, 2008
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Everyone hates on RocketRaid cards from Highpoint, but I just want the cheapest option for being able to hot swap hard drives between my data storage machine and my HTPC. Will the RocketRaid cards do?

EDIT:

Oh I think I see where people are getting confused. I do not yet have a server machine and it will NOT have any server hardware on it. I am planning my server machine out and this is part of that planning. I want to use basic i3 1155 budget components and slap a RAID/SATA card on it.

Therefore, I don't have a RAID/SATA card yet. I just want to be able to hot swap drives from the hot swap bays I plan on having. I need one for my future data storage machine and I want one for my HTPC. My HTPC already has hot swap bays built into the case, but I need a RAID/SATA card for the HTPC to have the hot swap capability.

As for the size of array, for my HTPC, I plan on just having 2 hard drives hot swappable. For my data storage, I plan on having up to 6 hard drives hot swappable and up to 4 hard drive without hot swap.
 
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From your post title, you want to swap out not just the drives, but the card they are connected to as well, correct? How large an array?
 
Oh I think I see where people are getting confused. I do not yet have a server machine and it will NOT have any server hardware on it. I am planning my server machine out and this is part of that planning. I want to use basic i3 1155 budget components and slap a RAID/SATA card on it.

Therefore, I don't have a RAID/SATA card yet. I just want to be able to hot swap drives from the hot swap bays I plan on having. I need one for my future data storage machine and I want one for my HTPC. My HTPC already has hot swap bays built into the case, but I need a RAID/SATA card for the HTPC to have the hot swap capability.

As for the size of array, for my HTPC, I plan on just having 2 hard drives hot swappable. For my data storage, I plan on having up to 6 hard drives hot swappable and up to 4 hard drive without hot swap.
 
I don't get it. How do I turn on this function then? I don't see the option to "Safely Remove Hardware".
 
you just do it. I don't know how you disable a drive in windows, but on linux you'd just umount it and do whatever you want to it.
 
Alai said:
I don't get it. How do I turn on this function then? I don't see the option to "Safely Remove Hardware".
Click to expand...

If you use "removable disks" like USB disks or floppies, you have this option.
Hotswap on "fixed disks" means mainly that your OS gets informed about the change and updates its disk table
(you can use the new disk without a reboot)

This is true with most newer SATA controllers in AHCI or Raid mode but not in IDE mode
 
_Gea said:
If you use "removable disks" like USB disks or floppies, you have this option.
Hotswap on "fixed disks" means mainly that your OS gets informed about the change and updates its disk table
(you can use the new disk without a reboot)

This is true with most newer SATA controllers in AHCI or Raid mode but not in IDE mode
Click to expand...
There ya have it.

Sometimes it takes a little while and the computer may "freeze" depending upon what's in the drive but I've never had a problem with data loss.
 
Turn on AHCI if you haven't already. Don't want to be using IDE mode on the SATA controller.
 
Yeah, all of my SATA controllers are on AHCI except my opticals.

Wait, so let me get this straight.

1) When I pop OUT a hard drive from a hot swap bay that is connected to a SATA controller set to AHCI, there should be no issues with the computer as long as the data from the hard drive isn't being used?

2) On top of that, when I pop IN a hard drive into a hot swap bay that is connected to a SATA controller set to AHCI, the computer SHOULD recognize the hard drive and show it when I open "My Computer"?

3) I do not need to do anything beyond physically (dis)connecting the hard drives? There's no required procedure, button, or protocol to beware of?
 
in windows, you can setup whether the disk cache shall be used for that disk.
it's pretty simple: everything removable/hot swapable like usb-sticks must not use the disk cache as it cannot guarantee that its contents are persisted on disk.

therefore, just disable the disk cache for those disks and you can pull them out.
if you dont disable the disk cache you may get filesystem-problems that are to be corrected with chkdsk and of course lost data that hasn't been written from cache to disk yet.

and ofc what the others told you: hotswap is not a special HBA-feature, it's part of the sata-spec.
however, some bios allow to explictly set sata-ports to hot-swap mode, so that e.g. windows recognizes the port as a detachable medium and displays the safely remove button.
 
hotzen said:
in windows, you can setup whether the disk cache shall be used for that disk.
it's pretty simple: everything removable/hot swapable like usb-sticks must not use the disk cache as it cannot guarantee that its contents are persisted on disk.

therefore, just disable the disk cache for those disks and you can pull them out.
if you dont disable the disk cache you may get filesystem-problems that are to be corrected with chkdsk and of course lost data that hasn't been written from cache to disk yet.

and ofc what the others told you: hotswap is not a special HBA-feature, it's part of the sata-spec.
however, some bios allow to explictly set sata-ports to hot-swap mode, so that e.g. windows recognizes the port as a detachable medium and displays the safely remove button.
Click to expand...

That explains the specifics on what I was confused about. Special thanks to you and general gratitude to all who contributed!
 
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