# Do my motherboard/chipset have Port Multiplier Support?



## Sweetchuck (Sep 10, 2008)

I have got a number of external 3.5 HDDs which I want to put into a multi-bay enclosure, running them JBOD-style with an eSATA connection to a USB/eSATA port on my laptop. However, the external enclosure I have my eye on says that if I want to connect it by eSATA, I need to make sure that my mobo/chipset has port multiplier support: if this is not the case, only the first drive in the external enclosure will show up.

However, I don't know how to find out if my mobo/chipset support this. My laptop is a *Dell Studio 1555*, running on a dual Core *Intel T5750* processor, which I believe is on an *Intel PM45 (ICH9-M) Express chipset*.

Does anyone know if this setup will support eSATA port multiplication? If nobody knows for sure, does anyone know how I would find out?

I have tried looking around and finding out for myself, but I'm not hugely IT-literate and have just been bamboozled by the Google results.

Thanks in advance!


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## ickymay (Jan 6, 2010)

Sweetchuck said:


> I have got a number of external 3.5 HDDs which I want to put into a multi-bay enclosure, running them JBOD-style with an eSATA connection to a USB/eSATA port on my laptop. However, the external enclosure I have my eye on says that if I want to connect it by eSATA, I need to make sure that my mobo/chipset has port multiplier support: if this is not the case, only the first drive in the external enclosure will show up.
> 
> However, I don't know how to find out if my mobo/chipset support this. My laptop is a *Dell Studio 1555*, running on a dual Core *Intel T5750* processor, which I believe is on an *Intel PM45 (ICH9-M) Express chipset*.
> 
> ...


here's your PM45 chipset spec and it does support eSATA :tongue:

the only problems I have seen is speed control recognition on boot but that was three or four years ago :4-dontkno

If your still unsure I would give dell a quick call but make sure your speaking to someone who knows, so ask your 1st line support tech to ask his 3rd line supervisor for confirmation :wink:


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## Sweetchuck (Sep 10, 2008)

ickymay said:


> here's your PM45 chipset spec and it does support eSATA :tongue:
> 
> the only problems I have seen is speed control recognition on boot but that was three or four years ago :4-dontkno
> 
> If your still unsure I would give dell a quick call but make sure your speaking to someone who knows, so ask your 1st line support tech to ask his 3rd line supervisor for confirmation :wink:


Hi there,

Thanks for the answer. I already knew that it supported eSATA, but I didn't know if it supported eSATA port multipliers specifically (some chipsets support only one eSATA input). Dell have been absolutely useless: take a look at someone else's experiences of trying to find out about port multiplier support from Dell here.

However, the spec sheet you posted to suggests that the PM45 chipset's controller supports "Storage E-SATA Port Multiplier" so I can only assume that the enclosure will work.

Many thanks again for the help. Of course, if anyone else has anything to add (especially anoyone who already uses this chipset with a RAID or JBOD array), I'd be keen to hear.


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