New Vantec Nexstar 3i

[Lennart Sorensen]

On Fri, Jan 30, 2009 at 09:02:25PM -0500, Madison Kelly wrote:
>   I've been eye'ing the new Vantec Nexstar 3i SATA HDD chassis for the 
> last little bit, and was debating picking it up. I'd not seen any 
> mention of it being supported by Linux, so was a little worried. I'm 
> happy to say thought that, on initial testing, it works great.
> 
>   It's a bit different in that it's got a built-in processor that spins 
> the drive down after a period of inactivity, from "Idle", to "Stand by" 
> and finally "Power Down". It claims that the three states reduce power 
> draw from 100% when in "Active" state to 80/20/7% power use, respectively.
> 
>   I've tried accessing the drive when in full idle and it only took 
> about 5 seconds or so to be fully available again. Not too bad, I think.
> 
>   I like it, and thought others might, for use with backups. I run a 
> nightly rsync of my local machines and remote servers and it bothered me 
> that the normal USB carriers kept the HDD spinning the whole time. It 
> was a waste of hydro and needless wear on the drive.

My experience is that drives last longer if you leave them spinning.
Can't help with the wasted electricity part though.

I have one 18GB quantum IDE drive that has about 80000 power on hours,
and about 100 power cycles.  The ball bearings are starting to sound a
bit worn by now, but it still works.

>   So anyway, now you know it works, should any of you be curious to 
> check it out. Cost me $45 at Canada Computers.
> 
> http://www.vantecusa.com/front/product/view_detail/292
> http://canadacomputers.com/index.php?do=ShowProduct&cmd=pd&pid=019533&cid=516.700

-- 
Len Sorensen
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