Author Topic: S. Image 3124 / 3132: SImagixII 9.0.0b9 benchmarks (10.2.8, 10.6.8, 10.13.6)  (Read 1986 times)

Offline (S)ATAman

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Focused on PowerPC and x64 builds (Jaguar, Leopard, Snow Leopard, High Sierra).
The driver is signed and notarized, so it should run on Mojave and Catalina.

Affected hardware: Silicon Image 3124 (PCI-X) and Silicon Image 3132 (PCI-e machines).

This is OS-X driver only, not locked in any form.

It's still in "beta" because i386 wasn't tested, neither port multiplier extensively.

I think the performance beats everything made for that card.

It was important to see, what is the gain if the "X" code is ported to "9".

The answer is: quite a lot. I think, this would be one of the fastest controllers for "9" (and so far the only SATA-II).

The drive icon is from long-obsolete "FWB RAID Toolkit" abandonware. Hope they are OK with that.

Originally, 3132 is one of the slowest PCIe controllers and it has two extra problems:
- neither MSI, nor MSI-X is supported
- it does not show up in any Thunderbolt box I am aware of.

The later is moot because of the first: MSI or MSI-X non-support + Thunderbolt = Apple + Intel is very angry at you.

But at least who have the 3132 or consider to buy it for $5 - $10 on eBay can use it in their $100 Dell Hackintosh without much restriction. An other good use is the G5 with PCIe slots. 3132 is even bootable in G5 (well, OK, updating the FCode won't hurt either).

Since:

- there is no new FCode update (yet), just the old one which is here and there in your ROM-s
- the installation is convenient for 10.4.0 and above (up until 10.15.2), not for 10.2 - 10.3
- there is no "9" yet
- more testing is needed

We are still in "beta". The version was "bumped" to "9", reflecting the 10+ years of new life.
« Last Edit: January 21, 2020, 02:46:39 PM by (S)ATAman »