HighPoint RocketRAID 2300 PCI Express SATA II (3.0Gb/s) Controller Card

Pros: On Win XP pro x64, very easy setup, and both BIOS interface and win GUI are very easy to use. This setup is way more stable than the NVRAID on my Asus M2NPV-VM, and the card works great on this board even though it isn't on the compatibility list

Cons: Slow initialization in RAID 5.

Overall Review: I do sysadmin work at my job, and I have built servers with LSI logic $500 SCSI full hardware PCIE RAID cards. The administration tools on this card are far simpler and more intuitive. But of course, this isn't a full hardware card and the admin apps are programs rather than bios-only.

Pros: Great Price, and very good speeds for what you pay for.

Cons: A little difficult to program, if you don't know what you are doing. More tips on this in other thoughts

Overall Review: Okay so I had one of these controllers for about a year, and decided I wanted to add 4 more drives, and thought I would buy another and be all set, well when I put the second one in my computer it would freeze at the HighPoint Raid bios with an error "OUT OF MEMORY" I figured out that you can press "END" to skip it loading BIOS and then it would boot perfectly into windows. I also found out you need to lower the number of supported Raid Volumes from 512 to more like 2 or 4 (kinda like the old DOS config.sys Lastdrive=z setting) lowering it to 2 for me allowed it to load the bios into memory and then it would not freeze at POST. so when you hook two of these together make sure you adjust this setting when you flash the controller for the first time. Another cool feature is when you press CTRL+H to get into bios you configure both cards at the same time (so you could have 8 drive and put them in a RAID50 or RAID0 .. you get the picture... Regards, Eric

Pros: Works great (once working) under FreeBSD 6.1. Very affordable SATA II 3gbt solution, and well performing.

Cons: The included kernel modules for FreeBSD are mis-named on the CD when you write to floppy. Additionally, the device is listed as scsi direct access da(x). Unfortunately these number assignments float at boot, so you cannot leave a USB device plugged in while booting (such as CF card) or it won't find RAID device.

Overall Review: Download the latest from Highpoint www, and use: load disk0:rr2310.00-6.0-amd64.ko to load before install, and make sure to copy that file into /boot/kernel after install before rebooting. Installed on Asus AM2 socket mobo, using mitsumi usb floppy for kernel module loading. Kudos to Highpoint for supporting FreeBSD, I'm sure future revisions will make install easier. Kudos to NewEgg for great price, fast shipping!

Pros: Price - It's tough to find an add-in card that offers RAID 5 this inexpensively. PCI-X x1 interface - What else are you going to use that plug for? Size - The card is physically very small and a low-profile bracket is included. Everything you need is included in the box - This includes 4 good quality SATA cables.

Cons: Installation can be tricky - The card's BIOS often conflicts with the motherboard's onboard BIOS. Upgrading the firmware appears to fix this in most cases. No locking SATA connectors - The connectors seem to fit in the plugs snugly, but I do wish they had used the locking style plugs.

Overall Review: The BIOS conflict can be frustrating, but I figured out why. The included manual says to install the card, plug in the drives, start the system, and then upgrade the firmware with the latest version. This is incorrect. If the card has the default firmware, it will always steal the primary boot function and disable other SATA controllers *only if it has drives attached to it*. To remedy the issue, disconnect all of the hard drives from the RocketRAID and then boot the system to upgrade the BIOS. The ultimate solution, of course, is for Highpoint to ship the cards with the latest firmware to begin with.

Pros: Boot screen in 10 seconds fully populated Hot swappable Installs on x64 bit systems Mounting bracket fits tightly Good customer support Small & functions in any PCIe slot Easy firmware flashing Runs cool Just won't die!

Cons: None

Overall Review: Writing this in response to those that stated this card could not do any of the things I've listed in Pros. Bit of a RR2300 fan boy here as I've had the RR2300 for approximately 5 years on multiple systems. It's the oldest piece of hardware I own by far. I was pleased to see it's still on the market and recently purchased another for a second machine. The only change I can see is they moved two SATA ports to the side of the Card whereas originally it had all 4 on the end. I currently have the RR2300 populated by WD 2TB Blacks. The drives have sustained read/write speeds identical to those on the mother board's controller. The card also works with 3TB drives as I found recently. For some of you struggling, one of the most important steps in the installation of any controller card is to load drivers during a fresh Windows install. This process allows for maximum stability and fewer headaches down the road. I contacted Highpoint support about the original RR2300 card 3 years or so out of warranty and they answered my questions quickly. In summary I would argue that when installed properly this card is durable and gives good value for the price.

Pros: This is the second PC I've built using the card. I'm pleased with the performance. I did not use this RAID to boot from. I use it as a large data disk. I struggled a bit to get it configured in Windows 7 and wanted to share how I did it in case others are in the same boat. I did the typical configuration hitting ctrl-h during boot up and setup a RAID5. But after loading the OS, couldn't see it anywhere. The Add Device option never discovered it. I eventually noticed under the device management a SCSI device that needed drivers. This is the RocketRAID. Download the drivers from HighPoint onto you computer somewhere. Control Panel->Hardware and Sound->Devices and Printers brings up icons of your hardware. Double click on your computer name, and go to the Hardware tab. You should see the SCSI device with a yellow warning next to it. Click on it, select properties, and update the driver. I hope that helps

Cons: Took 13 hours to configure 4x500GB disks into a 1.5TB RAID 5.

Pros: Performs well when you finally get it set up (Raid 5 configuration)

Cons: A few pointers I learned the hard way. 1. You will need to have an operating system before you install the rocket raid. It will not boot or work until you access the web. 2. Make sure you have all windows updates on the hard drive before you install the Rocket raid card. My Operating system continues to lock up on the windows update scans. Only after I removed the card, and uninstalled the software would it update. 3. Plan on hours on the web initializing the drives I started at about 6 pm and it did not complete until about 11 am the next day. 4. Check their hardware compatability specs for hard drives and motherboards before purchasing the card. My motherboard is not listed, so it may be part of the compatability problem. 5 Manual is not clear on the setup procedures from a first reading it would sound like all you need to do is set up the drives and load the driver during the setup process - in no way would it work for me!

Overall Review: Previously I set up an Adaptec & DPT raids, all set up could be done from the driver disks. Only a limited amount of setup can be done from their driver CD, rest is WEB based, which I do not like.

Pros: The difference in speed is noticeable. I have used many different RAID cards in my day. The installation on this card is straight forward and had no pittfalls. Great for most modern motherboards that only have a PCI Ex 1x rather than a 4x or add, 16x.

Cons: If you want to setup a bootable RAID array... expect to have to use drivers on a floppy. I would also recommend using the XP floppy boot disks to avoid any bus conflicts.

Overall Review: *Make sure to update your driver disk and cards BIOS prior to installation in order to avoid any issues*