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Forum Discussion
rn104
May 01, 2014Star
RN 102 eSata/USB & multidisk external drive enclosures
A local store currently has a very good discount on the RN102, valid until tomorrow, which I'm considering. I've read what I can find on these forums and talked to Netgear Presales support but I can't seem to find a definitive answer to the question of whether I can attach a multi-drive enclosure to the RN102 and have all 4 drives available as shareable data over the network. I'd be happy with either a RAIDed volume or just 4 JBOD disks dependent on the enclosure. Ideally I'd like to attach a multi-disk enclosure to the esata port but that would require that it supports FIS port multiplier functions, alternatively attachment to a USB3 port would be the second choice. The RN102 sounds like a good little machine but given that it's only a 2 bay device and RAID 1 would essentially make it a 1 bay device in terms of data storage I'm not sure if it would serve my purpose unless I could attach additional drives. However if I could attach a multi-disk drive enclosure to it then it would be a tremendous deal on a pretty good device solution to consolidate all the network data which is now scattered over a bunch of shares.
According to the SmallNetBuilder review the RN102 has a Marvell 88SE9170 chip in it, which apparently does support FIS based port multiplier (http://www.marvell.com.cn/guide/assets/data/marvell_psg.pdf), but I'm not sure if that's the chip for the internal sata connectors or the eSata. The Marvel Armada 370 SoC has integral sata support (same .pdf as above) so I'm thinking the 88SE9170 is likely for eSata. But, even if it is the eSata controller I don't know what functions Netgear has enabled or disabled, and apparently neither do Presales Support.
Can anyone provide definitive answers to the following?:
1. Can I attach network shareable individual drives to all of the eSata, USB3 and USB2 ports on the RN102. (I think I can but the Netgear presale support tech said I couldn't use the eSata port for anything, that it wasn't supported on the RN102!)
2.Can I attach multi-disk enclosures to the eSata or either type of USB port and have all the disks available as network shares, either RAIDed or JBOD?
If I can get a definitive positive answer before midday Thursday I think might luck into a very good value package. Here's hoping.
Thanks.
According to the SmallNetBuilder review the RN102 has a Marvell 88SE9170 chip in it, which apparently does support FIS based port multiplier (http://www.marvell.com.cn/guide/assets/data/marvell_psg.pdf), but I'm not sure if that's the chip for the internal sata connectors or the eSata. The Marvel Armada 370 SoC has integral sata support (same .pdf as above) so I'm thinking the 88SE9170 is likely for eSata. But, even if it is the eSata controller I don't know what functions Netgear has enabled or disabled, and apparently neither do Presales Support.
Can anyone provide definitive answers to the following?:
1. Can I attach network shareable individual drives to all of the eSata, USB3 and USB2 ports on the RN102. (I think I can but the Netgear presale support tech said I couldn't use the eSata port for anything, that it wasn't supported on the RN102!)
2.Can I attach multi-disk enclosures to the eSata or either type of USB port and have all the disks available as network shares, either RAIDed or JBOD?
If I can get a definitive positive answer before midday Thursday I think might luck into a very good value package. Here's hoping.
Thanks.
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