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This review was part of the OWC Tips & Deals Newsletter from 8/16/02. Click HERE if you would like to subscribe. This newsletter is e-mailed typically 2-3 times per month and contains recent news, hardware and software tips/reviews, and special deals and offers you may not find anywhere else.
*************************************************************************** Until the dawn of FireWire and USB; until the availability of large, cheap, and fast ATA drives; until the new super fast video cards; many of us had had our PowerMacs running quite happily without any of those PCI slots filled. But that was then, today you know it's a darn good thing those slots are there and even 3 slots can be rather limiting! If you have a 9500, 9600, or S900 model - well - your in the clear. For everyone else with PowerMac G3 Beige or 44/72/73/75/76/85/86/95/9600 or compatible server/clone model, well, Sonnet's new Trio card is the slot saver you may need! Sonnet's Trio, which just began shipping this week, is the first PCI card to combine an ATA/133 controller(supports up to 4 internal ATA hard drives), 2-Port FireWire interface, and 2 Port USB 2.0 + 1.1 interface all on one card. With a cost of $179.95, it's more than adding the features with separate cards: But even with that considered, you've only got 3 slots and no easy/inexpensive way to change that. Consider these scenarios for any PowerMac with 3 PCI slots: Scenario#1 Slot 1: MacAlly USB Card $24.95 Scenario#2 Slot 1: MacAlly 3 Port FireWire/2 Port USB 2.0+1.1 Combo $79.95 Scenario#3 Slot 1: Sonnet Trio ATA/FireWire 2 Port/USB 2 Port Combo $179.95 You've spent about $180 or about $50 more to have two extra slots open compared to scenario #1 or about $20 more compared to to scenario #2 to gain one more additional open slot. All things considered, the Trio is a excellent value for keeping those slots open. And lest not forget the 2 Slot PowerMac 6500 owner! The Trio is supported by Sonnet for the 6500 and while the 6500 already supports internal IDE, the ATA/133 Trio interface will offer a 2-3X gain over the stock IDE performance. Ah and performance.... Once concern we had was how the Trio would fare with data transfers between 'channels' of it's own card. For example, how does a data transfer (like a file copy) between an ATA drive and a FireWire drive that are both connected to the Trio compare to the same transfer between a drives connected to a separate ATA and FireWire card? The difference was NIL! From our tests of copying files in the all on Trio scenario compared to between separate FireWire and ATA cards we saw no real measurable difference. The slight difference there MIGHT have been was a fraction of a second (both copy tests took 1 minute, 13 seconds) which was more likely a difference with the human element of pressing the start and stop buttons on the stop watch. Our conclusion, the Sonnet Trio saves slots and you get the same performance even with it all on one card vs. having the same features on separate cards. The Trio is compatible with any Apple OS version 9.0 - 9.2.x, OS X 10.1.3 and higher. To use USB 2.0, you do need OS X although you can use the USB ports for USB 1.1 with either OS X or OS 9.x. Quite honestly, as long as you have FireWire there really is no present advantage to USB 2.0 since FireWire 1394a out performs it in real world tests. Also, regardless of what USB 2.0 card, it is a limitation of the OS - not the card as to why USB 2.0 support is ONLY available under OS X. |