How to select SAS cables 

All articles on SAS are really confusing. This video is great

even though i've been in IT for years i haven't messed with a lot of hardware, except for consumer HW of course. Now i started designing a home server and quickly ran on various limitations and looking for solutions. i've got to say... holy shit dude, you do know your cables! this was enlightening, thank you for the info!

Thank you so much. I’m in the process of building my unraid server and all of your videos have helped me tremendously.

This is ASMR server talk. I have a HP Z840 being shipped to me. Figuring out the right parts to use for an upgrade is an education.

WOW! This just answered SOOOOO many questions I had about these cables and cards. Now I know what I need to get! BRAVO Sir! Thank you for doing this video. One of the BEST I've seen yet!!!

I wish I discovered this channel earlier. Your videos answer all the questions (and beyond) I have/had, and had to spend sometimes days to figure out. And the bonus is that you're very well spoken person.Thank you.

this video is incredible. Thank you so much for taking the time to create this. It's been very helpful.

This video popped up randomly in my suggestions and it's very informative. I could have used that back when I was building my first unRAID server and couldn't figure out the SAS connections. I actually ended up buying multiple PCIe SATA controller cards and laying a whole bunch of SATA cables to all the 13 drives in my first server. I replaced that mess with a proper SAS controller with cleaner cabling by now but boy was that SATA cable mess a pain to plug in and also to get back out!

I'm so glad I watched this before I put in a big order for cables.

I recently bought a Dell H200 controller and didn't realise it didn't come with cables. I didn't even know what a SAS was until a few weeks ago when I bought a used 6TB SAS drive that needs a controller. Thanks to this video I know exactly what to get (SFF-8087 to SFF-8482). I'm sticking to Dell at the time being but will refer to this video if or when I do get other brands because the Home Lab bug got me.

This was a very good watch. You probably couldn’t have done this any better. You followed a clear and well thought out concept with plenty of examples.

i just finished looking at your other videos on sas controllers. 20 seconds after that, i remembered i needed cables and i started searching ebay for them when this started auto playing lol

A very well and detailed presentation, Thank you very much.

This was really informative. Thank you for making this video!

Brot his video is amazing. You literally confirmed what I was primarily researching between Amazon, AliExpress and Ebay. Thank you!

Excellent information, I was just looking all over the internet and finally found this great and impressive video, thank you very much Art of Server, greetings from monterrey mexico.

i wish you'd have also explained sideband, because you even had a good example cable and backplane laying on the desk to explain this, because this is the next best thing to haunt you after you understood the common sas-connector-types :)

Thanks, looking to get into my first SAS experience and wasn't really sure how the drives actually connected. Usually SAS drives connect to backplanes and so I wasn't sure if there was something like a 4x breakout cable like they do for SATA. Mostly the power part I was questioning. But sure enough you showed exactly the kind of cable I should be looking for (with molex connectors).

SAS card to SAS drive cable at 11:55 exactly what I need. Thanks!

I wish I could "like" this video 1000x. Best sas cable on RU-vid!!!! Thanks so much!

The information cleared up a lot for me although we almost went into the airline flight safety instructions at the beginning 😊. Thanks for your knowledge and experience!

Thanks for the tip on that great staggered 8087 to staggered right angled sata!

Video is the 4th result on RU-vid when searching for SGPIO (which comes out of my SAS cable) ...interesting video, i did not know half of that... but no SGPIO mentioned. good job youtube!

I've learned the hard way that 8087 connectors will sometimes click twice. I'm not sure the cause, but I've found that if I visually inspect the latching holes, it becomes obvious whether or not the connector is fully seated.

ALOT of Information that i needed thank you.

Great video, I love the channel. Have you thought about doing a video on wide porting? The ability to connect two SAS cables from one HBA / controller to an expansion shelve to increase your potential throughput? I have heard mixed messages one saying it spilts the DATA and SAS commands per cable and another saying it doubles potential throughput and load-balances across all eight lanes. Would love to hear your thoughts.

SFF-8654 says hello! I come in both 4i and 8i versions! Good luck buyers!

I am glad I watched this video to the end, lots of great information. I picked up a HBA 310 from your ebay store and I have breakout cable sff 8987 to sff 8482 and connected 3 sata 6gb transfer speed 6tb drives and it works great. I was able to pick up a SAS hard drive and it is a 12gb and not 6gb, so I checked a few forums and was told it will work but will only work at the 6gb speed and that is fine with me but after I got the Seagate ST6000NM0034 6TB 7.2K 3.5" SAS 12Gbs Server and plugged it the drive did not spin up and it looks like the connector is wider on the Seagate drive and there are 4 pins next to the data cable and I don't have that plugged into anything. The breakout cable supports 4 drives and I have 3 sata and 1 SAS 6Gbs 2TB drive and it worked fine and so I tried to swap out the SAS 6Gbs drive with the Seagate SAS 12Gbs SAS drive and it would not power up, so I am thinking the drive is bad?? Or is it just the HBA 310 card, it won't work (at 6gb speed) for a SAS 12Gbs drive)? Any ideas? (no I did not buy the Seagate drive from your Art of Server ebay store, not sure if you have HDs for sale). I am getting ready to return the Seagate drive I purchased it from but if it is my mistake I really should not send it back to the ebay seller because his drive might work and the problem could be on my side with the HBA 310 that does not support 12Gbs drives(and I did not take this in account when I purchased the HBA 310 card, I thought it would support both 6 or 12 Gbs drives but I did not research it ahead of time). SORRY for the long comment/question.

I am facing a scenario where I will be taking the four cables from my Z820 backplane, removing them from the MOBO, and plugging them into a "FORWARD" type mini sas to sata/sas cable of my controller. In this case I believe that I will require 4x 7pin SATA 3.0 male to male adapter 6Gbps convertor. BTW, thanks for another very insighful YT presentation.

very informative. thank you and hail from iran

Only wish I'd found this video before I laid money out for cables! I bought a Dell H200 & assumed the SAS connectors were like SATA, being one fits all generations. Well I bought SFF-8643 to 4 SFF-8482, these have yet to arrive along with the card, just doing research after the fact. Sure do hope there is an adapter available & cheap!

This man rocks..lots of love and appreciation ❤

It was really helpful. Having a good time watching all your videos. Thanks again!

This video taught me a lot, mainly about connector type and direction. I knew what you meant about assumptions. My HP P440ar controller is a SAS 3 card that uses two 8087 connectors cabled to my backplane. You didn't mention about 8639 connectors? How do 8639 connects differ from the 8087/8088, 8643/8644 or 8484?

Thx for info, I learned lots :)

Hi, You didnt mention the external cables SFF 8088 and 8644 with the connectors with 2 or 3 grooves. In the same topic also diamond and circle keys to connect correctly. Also active and passive cables are one additional group.

Hey man thanks heaps for your guide this is really helpful! I was going through all video to hit the unique case where I believe I am the use case for the reverse break out cable but can't seem to find one or not confident I am getting the right thing. I am building a server and its now all but perfect Super Micro H110 Epyc Board with 2x SFF-8643 to Mini sas connectors show 8 of my 12 drives after playing with several HBA's to no avail it appears that the easiest thing to do would be to connect the remaining Mini SAS to 4x SATA controllers on the board and this would free up a PCIE slot also which would be good. I went on your store but can't seem to find this not here or on Amazon sadly (Well I find them but I believe they are Forward only)

very useful and instructive.. thanks!!!

kinda wish I watched this earlier although I lucked out in buying all my cables although I could of gotten fancy with right/left angle cables:P... I have a half dozen reverse break out cables but they came with these 4 bay removable enclosures that I got from computers that got thrown out

THX, outstanding guide.

Thank you for this. I accidentally bought a pair of sas drives, and wanted to figure out if it was possible to put them in my desktop…

Hey! Thanks a lot for making this video, the whole Internet is confusing when explaining SAS cable...

Great video, really helping me with my unraid home server.

Very good video.... information I couldn't find elsewhere. Awesome. Thx

Thank you for your time and knowledge! I will support your store before of this video! Regards Shane from Trinidad.

Awesome video. Very well explained

This is good information. Thank you!

Thank you for this video. This is very helpful

Haha I asked before buying but still.... very informative. Looks like there is a fair bit of wiggle room in the decision process, where Option A vs Option B is really not related to performance but to what you bought going in or the set up structure you want to achieve.

Very helpful !!

Thank you!

thank you it was very informative

Totally off topic, but I remember hearing a while ago that anti static bags being good for motherboard testing is a bit of an urban myth. The logic was that because the outside is actually somewhat metallic/conductive, it could very well cause shorts when power is applied.

Great video

awesome video! thank you so much!

I hate those PCB-mounted 8087 connectors, at least as Dell use them. The metal shield is quite flimsy, and I've had a couple of servers where the cable has pulled the shield out of the PCB, because the little "fingers" weren't soldered.

Thank you very much for this 👍

I have been reluctant to start another sas sata or sata ara. If I do this, I will need a controler with 512mb cache onboard and a battery backup to start. Since I use a variety of Sata 2 and 3 hard drives mechanical and ssd. I'm using a 2010 ASUS P7P55D-e with 8 sata ports set to JOBD on Windows 10 pro, it's reliable but aging. The other a 2018 ASRock Fatality gaming Pro K6 with 5 4TB Seagate Baracuta's 5900rpm drives and tgey are at least 3 years old. A seperate SAS SATA card would do the trick and I could squeeze 12, 3 1/2" hard drives into 1 case. Since I never used SAS but realize keeping the drives matched (same brand same size) for the SAS and keeping JOBD seperate might work. I "Subscribed", "Clicked the Bell" and chose "All", hoping to get all the help I can before taking this on. Thank You for making this video, I hope ther are many more to coming.

Came across your ebay listings doing some research as I am in the process of building a home lab to start trying to learn more enterprise level systems. I got a P420 to put into a xeon based proliant ml310e gen8 v2 I picked up fairly cheaply. Found your channel reading through the part listing for a H220 you had listed as I was considering setting up proxmox to play with vs ESXi or Hyper-V, but of course I probably bought the wrong card. Oh well, I may have to just go the Microsoft / HP route, it's a good place to start at least. Anyways, great video, very informative! Nice lego collection in the background there :)

excellent content! Answered all my questions :)

I recently acquired 2 on site professional editing stations that were used in major motion pictures.. last one was Life of Pie. My set up is all CODEX DIGITAL and eachstation has 2 large bay dock stations CDB1 with 2 bays each for 4 large drive bays that take the CDP1 shoebox size drives that have 10 Seagate Savvio 10k rpm, 146gig 16mb cache SAS drives in each.. had i known that i would have done my project differently .. the edit stations also have 2 more docking and transfer stations each and they have 2 LTO 5 tape drives and 2 smaller drive bays .. about a brick size called T-800 that has 4 Western Digital Scorpio Black 320 gig SATA drives in those..and if it wasnt copied onto the tape drive it could of been copied to 1 of the 6 Western Digital Caviar Black 2 T.B Sata 64mb cache drives housed inside each transfer dock..everything went to a main editing station CDR1 and both of the CDR1 had the same motherboard and set up as what i believe was the server... and I thought it would be a great idea to take 2 transfer stations and the server and make a home server, storage, gaming, streaming, computer coffee table....and I Would Like To Give You A Giant Thank You.. because I have 90% of what you were just showing and only 10% knowledge of how to use it..... i even joined 2 clubs and got 0 infornation on my sas boards and portable bay boards.. the 2 CDR1 and the server have SuperMicro X7DBE-ATX motherboards, Dual Xeon 771 quad core intel E-5450 cpu's, A 5000P Blackford chipset, ATI ES1000 Graphics Onboard along with Centarous 2 Lucy 4 capture card and Myricon 10g-PCIE-8B 2S PCI-E cards..so I couldnt see the actual use in the server..so i emptied all 3 ( 2 transfer stations and the server )sanded buffed and polished to look like chrome, turned the transfer ones on end and used the tops as swing open doors, mounted to plywood for base with rubber pads for floor, used the top of server for shelfs inside the legs and a shelf between the legs for support, built custom drive holders and made 3 stacks of 4 drives with fans on each side.. either through luck or ego i tried to keep as many of the sas cards and bay boards as possible so my creation would maintain as many functions as it originly had..the motherboard says it has INTEL ESB2 DUAL-PORT GIGABIT ETHERNET CONTROLLER, SATA 3.0GBPS CONTROLLER RAID 0,1,10 LINUX, OR RAID 0,1, 5,10 WINOWS, Of course after getting everything together and getting it to post it did not notice the 12 drives mostly because i wasnt sure how to get from the SAS portable bay board to the motherboard..or expansion card... i went from sata drives to sas Chasis boards just like the transfer station but without the lto drives or t800 so i have some unused sata ports for now. in the ts it was 4 sas boards to 2 bay boards the sas boards have ribbon to bay boards the 2 bay boards have ribbon with a parrelel port off it...each sas has 2 8644 port...so i have 16 drives going to 8 sas boards going to 4 bay boards and i didnt have a way to get to the motherboard or expansion card.. i tried 8044 to 8088 that acknowledged the drives existencs.. so i tried the parrellel port and it said it only acknowleges sata drives or sas drives i'll recheck and after looking that up i found myself here.. here is a link to a short video of what it was and what i am trying to get it to become. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-7vDn8slg-58.html so thats where i am right now... thank you for what you all ready done .. if see my video i would love your opinion on what i could sell the 2 editing stations with all 16 drives

good job!!!

thanks

Thanks for the great video. But I am still confused on a point that experts will likely roll their eyes at. I want to support 8 internal 2.5" SAS drives at 12 G/s. I'd like to use an HBA such as SAS9302-8i. So on the controller I am going to plug in a SFF-8643 cable end, and on the other end... what end for the drive-side cable? What's confusing me is how the drives get their power. I was thinking that they get powered through this cable without the need for separate power supply because I have seen cables with wide ends on the drive side that extend over both the data and power pins. Perhaps that is crazy talk and I need to power the drives via a separate cables. Help!!!!! :)

Tack!

This is so difficult for me to understand topics like SAS / SATA / IDE / SCSI / PCIE / NVME Are they interfaces? Then interfaces for what? What is interface? (really don't understand) Are they cables or ports? Are they parts of SSD or parts of HDD? Are they parts of motherboard or parts of something else? These terms are so stressful really :D I don't understand completely nothing about it)) My dream is to become a system administrator or networking engineer but I really struggle understanding hardware (especially topics like interfaces, ports, cables, types of hard drives and how it all works) Maybe any of you seeing this comment have some suggestions how I should learn?)) Thank you))

Need a workaround for attaching a much longer external tape drive (lto5) SAS cable. The one I have is about two metres and works perfectly. However, those that are much longer have a metal notch, preventing them from being plugged in. Wondering if there's anything like the active extension cable you find with USB.

Well done. Thanx!

really nice and informative video. still im confused. can u help me which cables to choose? id straight up buy them from your shop. i want to connect 16SAS drives to my LSI 9211-8l. What cables would u reccomend? thanks!

hank you again

So on a cable with 8087 on both ends is there a directionality aspect, or will that one work either direction? I didn't hear mention of it so I assume it's either way but hey.... you know what they say when you assume.... hopefully... lol

I have 6 12TB SAS hard drives, and I like to install them in my case. my question is what would I need to make this project work. I see the controller what about power to the drives?

I am new to all of this. I am wondering if we have long distance fiber optic 8088 cable. I want to to connect SATA hard drives to my PC across the room. I don't want to accidentally hit my PC case with hard drive in them so I want to setup the hard drives into a secure place at the corner of my room and put my PC on my desk.

Tried to figure out why my raid controller cannot detect the SATA Drives , because they were connected via a reverse breakout cable, jeez that cable comes with the raid controller card. Took me 8hours to figure it out.

Why does no-one make any cables with female SAS connectors? I have a server with a proprietary SAS-SATA breakout cable built into the cage, I'd just like to extend from the SAS 8087 connecter and maybe have the terminal connector as an 8088 but no one seems to make any cables with a female SAS-8087 end to allow me to extend the proprietary cable!

I have a HP Microserver gen 7 that I plan to repurpose, not with a new mobo but instead use it as a SAS disk shelve. On ebay there are tons of these dual port pci brackets, bridging 8087 with 8088. Anything to consider buying those?

Can I use a SFF-8643 TO SFF-8087 cable to a Raid Card that is 8087 ports to a backplane with 8643? it seems to suggest on the cable that I can use a MINI SAS HD to MINI SAS Backplane but wondering if I can use a 6g card (8087) to 12 backplane (8643)

I'm considering getting an HP z840 for a homelab server. I intend to get some Seagate Constellation SAS drives for it. As far as I can determine the SAS/SATA ports on the motherboard look like any old SATA port. Do I just use SATA cables or do I need to hunt down SATA style SAS cables (7-pin?)? Or does the z840 use a backplane (in which case I'll need a reverse breakout cable)?

Thank you so much for this informative video I’m just learning... my question is MiniSAS TO 4 SATA... is it MiniSAS to both SATA AND SAS ALTHOUGH IT IS CALLED MINISAS TO 4 SATA I HAVE 4 SAS DRIVES AND A LSI 9272-8i can I use the MiniSAS to 4 SATA WILL IT WORK WITH SAS DRIVES?

Can I use sff 8087 to 4 sata cables connected on my motherboard(sata ports) and attach it to a break out and have external 8808 to 4 external sata drives ? Thank you

love to get high and watch shit like this

What's the SAS sideband cable for?

hi, thank you for this video! can i connect my sas HDD (WD) to sata motherboard with the HBA card? will power work with sff8482 to sff-8087 cable?

Great video, thank you! One question though, Do SFF 8644 slots take SFF 8643 male adapters?

Hello how are you? I have two SAS (I think is 8482) seagate ST12000NM002G and I want to conect them to a traditional desktop motherboard. What do you recomend me to do that? thank you in advance

Is there a certain brand 8087 to 4xSATA breakout cable brand you recommend?

hey, i have 8 disk toshiba mg04sca60ea. which adapter do i need? motherboard x99 huananzhi truenas scale as os

so on my supermicro x10drw-i only 2 sata cable is plug to motherboard its white color it mean i can using only 2 disk ? if i want to using around 10 disk as i said my server is 10 bay so i will need around 8 cable ?

I learned so much! Thank you! My computer has an external 8088 port, but I can’t for the life of me figure out what I need to connect my SAS drives (externally, of course). I have four of them. Do you have any suggestions?

what type of connector i need for smarthba2100 24i , plz adivse

Hi, I have two servers, each server has an HBA card, can I connect two servers with fiber optic cables? (without switch)

Is there a way to adapt oculink to sff8087? I’m thinking of buying a new epyc board which has tons of oculink ports.

11:15. What purpose has the 8-pin supplemental cable, called 'P4' ?

headache, why the hell i buy 2 SAS HDD, need to buy an HBA and cable now

Thanks for the video, explaining a lot of thing. How is the speed distributed for SAS cable?

Is your store still active, looking for a pre-flashed IT mode HBA SAS controller

11:06 What is the 5th cable for?

thanks a lot for the video! My question is: it is possible to connect a 4 sata connectors to one SFF-8087 directly in motherboard, so that we not use a Sas controller? Briefly we connect the 4 sata connectors in mobo and not in the HDs, and the one SFF connect in backplane. I tried it without success....

Question... the 8643 connector(on a cable) would that work with a U.2 connection on a consumer level motherboard? They look identical at first glance with the motherboard port accepting 2 pcb’s as well(U.2). Something tells me “No” but idk for sure. Hope you can shed some light on this matter. Aside from that this video helped me with the rest of my cable questions. Thanks!

What if my motherboard has SAS controller onboard and it got SATA connectors for that controller (X10SL7-F). Can I use usual SATA cables to connect it to backplane wth sata ports?