PCI and SCSI controllers

[andreadebiase]

hello,
I am trying to know more about SCSI drives and learned that I would need a SCSI controller to put in my PCI slot (my mobo has no SCSI interfaces)in order to install a SCSI hard drive (the item i am interested in!).
Now the question is:

how fast is the PCI bus and is it going to be a bottleneck for a hard drive that has , for esample, a SCSI-320 (320Mb/sec transfer) interface?

if SCSI-320 is too fast for a PCI bus which SCSI interface do you recommend? (SCSI-1, 2, 3 or else)

is it worth in general for a home user (no networking) with Win98SE to have a SCSI hard drive assuming money is not an issue?

thanks

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#!@$*%.....just format the damn C:

[Bailey]

This scsi is probably not what you want for home use. These drives are really for serious access speed for running databases and servers. The increase in access speed on a home pc will be negligible compared to the price of the scsi 320. You would probably see little difference in speed compared to the Ultra DMA, which is by far more affordable.

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"Ooooh, They have the
internet on computers now!" - Homer Simpson (http://asf.allwavs.com/wav4/Simpsons/inetcptr.wav)

[Rick]

Here is a Link that shows the difference between the scsi interfaces. http://www.adaptec.com/worldwide/product/markeditorial.html?cat=%2fTechnology%2fSCSI&prodkey=ultra320_whitepaper&type=Technology

You may want to check out all the info on SCSI and the PCI interface from this page. http://www.adaptec.com/worldwide/product/prodtechindex.html?cat=%2fTechnology%2fSCSI

The SCSI white papers for the scsi360 will show that you Need a 64 bit PCI slot to use the 360 cards. These are only on server mother boards.

As shown on this link below. http://www.motherboardx.com/specs/index.cfm?ProductID=9036

Note the slots. 5x 64/32 bit pci..

Compare that photo to this one. http://www.motherboardx.com/specs/index.cfm?ProductID=5906

Note the extra length of the PCI slots. 64 bit is longer.

For a Home system the scsi360 is of no use.

How ever if you want to exceed the IDE limits for number of drives.
Scsi is a very good option.( Scsi 160 or below)
7 drives per Chanel ( One card) as apposed to the 2 drive limit of IDE

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To ERR is HUMAN
To REALLY screw things UP, YOU NEED a COMPUTER !