HighPoint RocketRAID 2310 PCI Express x4 (x8 and x16 slot compatible) SATA II (3.0Gb/s) Controller Card

Pros: Cheap SATA RAID. Supports SATA/3Gbps drives. Pre-built Linux drivers available from vendor and source code too allowing custom builds for other kernels. The management software is outstanding--you can view all of the drives, arrays, and controllers, send email alerts, etc. Overall far superior to built-in RAID solutions that rely on dmraid or other fake RAID driver sets.

Cons: Drivers are not bundled into many Linux distros since they are propreitary. The card is not yet supported by open-source dmraid drivers either. This means you will pretty much have to install/build the drivers separately, which can be difficult--not for newbies. The only other problem is that the management software comes in two packages that are incompatible with each other--you can either install the web-based tools or the command-line tools, but not both simultaneously.

Overall Review: I bought this card as a stop-gap, since the ICH7-R SATA RAID bundled with my mobo is not yet fully supported under Linux (this will change soon), and my budget for this build precluded a high-end card. Getting the drivers to work under opensuse 10.1 with kernel patches was pretty difficult (you should boot from another drive if possible), but once I got it working I have found the management software to be extremely impressive. Overall an excellent solution for low-cost SATA RAID under Linux.

Pros: Inexpensive

Cons: Absolutely does not work under Ubuntu Linux Server 10.10

Overall Review: Should have done more research before I purchased this. Highpoint has not addressed their Linux drivers since 2009. Vendor offers no support.