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  Hydra eSATA                                                                                                            Introduction 

1  Introduction 

1.1  System Requirements 

1.1.1  PC Requirements 

  Minimum Intel Pentium III CPU 500MHz, 128MB RAM 

  eSATA equipped PC; Windows XP/Vista 

  Your hardware device must have the correct corresponding port (e.g. eSATA host controller or 

PCI card) 

  eSATA Plug & Play support and Port Multiplier for host controller 

 

1.1.2  Mac Requirements 

  Minimum Apple G4 processor, 128MB RAM 

  eSATA equipped Mac; Mac OS 10.4 or above 

  Your hardware device must have the correct corresponding port (e.g. eSATA host controller or 

PCI card) 

  eSATA Plug & Play support and Port Multiplier for host controller 

 

1.1.3  Supported Hard Drives 

  Up to four 3.5" SATA-I or SATA-II hard drives (1.5Gb/s or 3.0Gb/s)  

  20GB - 1.5TB per HDD 

  Hard drives of identical capacities are recommended 

  Supports large volumes in excess of 2TB 

 

Note  

In order for the computer to access volumes larger than 2TB, both the hardware and Operating 
System need to have the capacity to support large volumes (e.g.: WinVista 32bit/64bit or Mac OS 
10.4 and above) 
 
 

1.2  Package Contents 

Package content may vary depending on vendor & version. 

  Hydra eSATA (no hard drives included) 

 Power 

cord 

 eSATA 

cable 

 Manual 

 
 

1.3  About this Manual 

Firmware, images and descriptions can slightly vary between this manual and the actual product 
you have. Functions and features may change depending on the firmware version. Please read 
your warranty carefully, as this may vary between different vendors! 
 
 

1.4  Trademarks 

  MS-DOS, Microsoft, Windows XP/Vista are trademarks of Microsoft Corporation. 

  Apple Macintosh and Mac are trademarks of Apple Computer. 

  All other third party brands and names are the property of their respective owners. 

Page 1 

Summary of Contents for Hydra eSATA

Page 1: ...EN 4 Bay RAID Storage Enclosure Hydra eSATA User Manual January 16 2009 v1 0 ...

Page 2: ... 6 1 Non RAID PM 3 1 6 2 JBOD Disk Spanning BIG 3 1 6 3 RAID 0 Disk Striping FAST 4 1 6 4 RAID 1 Disk Mirroring SAFE 4 1 6 5 RAID 10 Disk Mirroring with Striping SAFE 4 1 6 6 RAID 5 Disk Striping with parity BIG SAFE 4 1 7 About Data Backup 4 2 System Setup 5 2 1 Hard Drive Assembly 5 2 2 Replacing Hard Drives 6 2 3 Connection to Computer 6 3 Appendix 7 3 1 Precautions 7 3 1 1 Power on off precaut...

Page 3: ...ntical capacities are recommended Supports large volumes in excess of 2TB Note In order for the computer to access volumes larger than 2TB both the hardware and Operating System need to have the capacity to support large volumes e g WinVista 32bit 64bit or Mac OS 10 4 and above 1 2 Package Contents Package content may vary depending on vendor version Hydra eSATA no hard drives included Power cord ...

Page 4: ...mode settings MODE RAID mode selector button RAID 0 RAID 1 10 RAID 5 Non RAID JBOD HDD A B C D Green HDD status OK Blinking green Accessing data read write OFF Error HDD not installed or power off 1 5 1 Alarm The alarm will sound when a the fan speed is too low or has failed b the temperature goes above 65 C c the power supply located above HDD C D fails or d one of the drives in the RAID array fa...

Page 5: ...ID Modes For RAID 0 1 10 5 hard drives of identical capacities are recommended If the capacities are different the total amount of the space that can be used will depend on the drive with the smallest capacity Note It is not possible to add more drives to an existing RAID array without re formatting it When adding additional drives at a later point they will be mounted as independent volumes until...

Page 6: ...riping SAFE The drives are shown as one volume but only 50 of the total capacity depending on the drive with the smallest capacity can be used RAID 1 creates an exact copy or mirror of a set of data This is useful when reliability and backup take precedence over storage capacity When one hard drive fails it can be replaced and the data rebuilt automatically Æ 4 drives 1 6 6 RAID 5 Disk Striping wi...

Page 7: ... the HDD cassette back into the case push it lightly into place and fasten the screw 4 Repeat the previous steps for each hard drive cassette you are planning to install 5 Turn on the power set the RAID mode and then replace the front panel 6 Connect the drive to your computer create a new partition and format the drives Note Be careful not to damage any components and do not force the drives into...

Page 8: ... RAID 10 the RAID array will be rebuilt automatically During this process the Rebuild LED will light up green Rebuilding the RAID array will take several hours depending on the drive capacity 60MB s 4 For RAID 0 and JBOD enter the setup menu go through the RAID mode sequence to select the correct mode confirm it and then format the drives again 5 For Non RAID simply format the new drive Note We re...

Page 9: ...e one volume in Non RAID mode even though 4 drives are installed A To mount and access more than one volume the eSATA host controller needs to support the Port Multiplier function Without it only one volume will be visible Q What file system should I choose to format my drive A This will depend on how you want to use the drive but in general we recommend Windows XP Vista Æ NTFS Mac OS X Æ HFS Mac ...

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