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Is it possible to add a second raid card (there is a second pci-x slot) that uses SATA and transfer the current contents of the SCSI card's HDDs to the new larger SATA HDDs

Background: I bought 2 new 1 TB SATA drives and IDE <-> SATA converters because my boss informed me that the server was IDE rather than SCSI (and I didn't check twice) but of course the cables don't fit. server is a Gateway 920 http://support.gateway.com/s/Servers/COMPO/Cases/3501437/3501437tc.shtml

so my questions are can we simply add the second raid card and new drives and boot from something (Windows rescue cd? Ubuntu Live cd?) and clone the old SCSI disks to the new larger SATA disks and set the server to boot from there? if so can someone point me in the right direction?

mcgyvrfan121
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    You poor bugger. Are you allowed to buy a real server? [Seriously, you can buy a much, much, MUCH better server on eBay for under $250.](http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p5197.m570.l1311&_nkw=dell+poweredge+2950&_sacat=0&_from=R40) – HopelessN00b Jan 03 '13 at 15:40
  • Yes and that was a possible option if this cant be fixed – mcgyvrfan121 Jan 03 '13 at 15:47
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    Well, honestly, rather than screwing around on a "server" that has lower specs than my smartphone, I'd take the plunge and buy a nice, inexpensive Dell or HP server from a couple generations back and move the data from the old server to the new one. It'll be faster, work better, and probably end up being cheaper than trying to cram more hardware into your current "server." – HopelessN00b Jan 03 '13 at 16:00

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There comes a point where it doesn't make financial sense to invest in old hardware. Parallel-ATA, parallel-SCSI and PCI-X started to disappear from the server landscape in 2004.

When the street value of late-model production-quality servers is < $500, and new servers of that class are under < $1000, those may be better options than surgery on an older system...

Yes, the disk swap you speak of is technically possible, but it carries much higher risk of problems than simply moving to a new system. You also lose your fallback.

  • What if during power-down to install the PCI card, one of the old drives fails to spin up?
  • What if there's a system board battery issue and you lose BIOS settings?
  • What if the cloned OS refuses to boot because of a driver issue on the new SATA card?

You risk more downtime and complexity than just moving to a new server.

ewwhite
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