2PORT Tempo Sata EXPRESS34 Controller Esata Port Mac Win
Sonnet's Tempo SATA Express 34 ushers in a new level of higher disk performance capability for the mobile professional. Whether you capture and edit video content in the field, the studio, or home, Tempo SATA Express 34 sets the bar high for mobile storage products.The Tempo SATA Express 34 controller has two external, 3Gb/s, SATA II ports, and plugs directly into a MacBook Pro (15" or 17") or Windows notebooks with an ExpressCard/54 or ExpressCard/34 slot.Imagine connecting up to 10 drives for high-performance applications, such as Apple's Final Cut Pro. With two external SATA drives attached in a RAID 0 array, the Tempo SATA Express 34 can typically achieve sustained disk write and read speeds of 100 and 110 MB/sec, respectively, which is about three times as fast as USB 2.0 or FireWire connections to the same drive setup.Offering native SATA speed in a compact mobile package, Sonnet's Tempo SATA Express 34 redefines the definition of disk speed for the creative person on-the-go.
2PORT Tempo Sata EXPRESS34 Controller Esata Port Mac Win Accessories
 6FT Shielded External Esata Cable M/m
3FT Shielded External Esata Cable M/m
LaCie 301825U d2 Quadra 500 GB eSATA/FireWire800/FireWire400/USB 2.0 External Hard Disk
Western Digital My Book Studio Edition 1 TB USB 2.0/FireWire 400/FireWire 800/eSATA External Hard Drive WDH1Q10000N
Western Digital WDH2Q20000N 2TB My Book Studio Edition II Hard Drive with Quad Interface (FW400/FW800, USB 2.0 & eSATA)
SIIG CB-SA0111-S1 3.3-Feet Serial ATA External Cable
Mac OS X Version 10.5.4 Leopard
Case Logic Compact Portable Hard Drive Case (Black)
Microsoft Office 2008 for Mac Home & Student Edition
VMware Fusion [OLD VERSION]
2PORT Tempo Sata EXPRESS34 Controller Esata Port Mac Win Reviews
I am not saying it's Sonnet's fault, but you will be SOL if you're using those FreeAgent Pro or MyBook drives. A couple months later, the site was updated to state that there is a known incompatibility with a certain Oxford Semiconductor chipset used by Seagate and Western Digital. I purchased this to use the eSata interface on my external drives from Seagate. When I started to notice some issues with my MacBook Pro with respect to accessing the drive and file permissions, there was a small note at the bottom of the Sonnet web site stating that there were driver issues with OS X and that the next release should remedy them. It is odd that this card has issues with the #1 and #2 makers of drives.
This device supports my mac as well (double bonus). Con - expensive. Highly recommended. It leaves usb 2.0/firewire in the dust.
highly recommend for copying large files. I (without checking) thought I needed an express34 card but in reality this laptop supports an express34 and express54. I was shocked out fast files/folders were copied from external HD to laptop via expresscard. The sata card is fast. I have a Asus F3Sv-x1 laptop which I used this card for.
Pro - supports high transfer speeds; supports both mac/pc.
The driver is the "latest" one from the Sonnet website (dated 3/6/2007, v1.1.9). I originally bought this with the Sonnet Fusion 500P 5BAY Sata Enclosure back in July 2007. Doing a disk copy between any drive and the new Samsung would result in the usual finder hang, requiring a hard reboot. I also managed to hang finder copies using transfers between two disks. This seemed to be ok unless I was doing parallel finder copies, in which case it would hang again. So, I decided to upgrade to Leopard 10.5.2; same problem, hang, when copying between drives on the five bay enclosure. Again, this was with the Macbook Pro running Tiger.
Then I obtained a new Samsung 1T drive (the disk enclosure contains WD 1T drives, Samsung 500/250 drives and Seagate 750G drives). The last few months I have been using the card with the Firmtek SeriTek/5PM. I returned the Fusion 500P and used the espress34 card with my dual bay enclosures. This was with a 2007 Macbook Pro 2.4GHz running Tiger.
Hence, this card is not reliable when using port multiplier enclosures. I would not recommended this card for use in port multipler enclosures. The espress34 card seemed to work ok with a two disk enclosure (Firmtek SeriTek/1EN2 and SeriTek/2EN2). Doing copies between data on the five bay enclosure and a two bay enclosure containing the Samsung disk worked perfectly.
Doing file copies between a single drive and a two-disk raid 0 in the Fusion 500P bay would result in consistent finder hangs, requiring hard reboot.
Haven't had much time to check speed, but seems to be one of the only cards out right now that will support a Lacie drive on Leopard 10.5.1 Good luck
Also, the card doesn't come with a carry case, making storage when not in use difficult - I ended up hacking the original packaging and using that. For the price, I honestly expected more. Performance was slightly improved in sequential performance, but close to nothing in random reads and/or writes, which is more typical of average usage. Drivers work fine in both Leopard and Tiger, but the continuously running background monitoring program is a little klunky in terms of design; why run if the card isn't present. In summary, the card delivers what it says - eSATA connectivity via ExpressCard34.
Not on a 7200RPM 2.5" drive, or a 10000RPM 3.5" drive, no, it isn't. Bought this card to use with my Macbook Pro to see if I could wring any more performance out of my drives using eSATA rather than Firewire800. Buy this card if you don't have Firewire800 and/or you want to ensure that you can always connect to storage. Is it significantly faster than Firewire 800. Target device was a Lacie Quadra d500.
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