External Storage - Need for Speed - Best Data Transfer Option?

Mike_Driven_Imagery

I'm a photographer and I use external hard drives to store archived images. I'm looking for new drives and wanting drives with good speed and high data access and transfer speeds. I looking for drives in the 6TB-10TB range in size and don't have adequate budget to consider SSD for the external drives (all of my internal drives are SSD).

I'm considering some drives that have eSATA. How does eSATA transfer speed compare to USB 3.1?

Compatibility question:

Will this host card work with my system: Vantec 6-Port 6GB/s PCIe RAID Host Card (I don't need to use the RAID configuration)

https://www.microcenter.com/product/417099/vantec-6-port-6gb-s-pcie-raid-host-card-with-hyperduo-technology

My system:

AORUS X570 Master MB with (1) each open: PCIEX8, PCIEX1 & PCIEX4

AMD Ryzen 7 3700X

Windows 10 Pro

Concerns:

Card data does not state compatibility with Windows 10.

If this card is not compatible with Windows 10, does MicroCenter have another eSATA external port option?

TSKevinG

For the external drives, there will be a few models that should work for you. The faster usb drive you are going to find is going to use USB 3.1. With this drives the ones in the link below will all spin up to 7200 rpms which is going to work good. I also checked our external SSD's as these would be the fastest drive we would have but i do not have anything that goes up to 6 to 10 GB

https://www.microcenter.com/search/search_results.aspx?Ntk=all&sortby=match&N=4294945771+671+672+673+4294821127&myStore=true

Ian

Greetings. What was your budget for the hard drive? USB 3 would be a quicker transfer than eSATA.

Mike_Driven_Imagery

Ian - Thanks for the response. I learned that USB 3 would be quicker than eSATA after posting my question, so that is where I'll be looking. I'm hoping to spend around $200-$250 for the drive.

I'm certain my MB is capable of supporting USB 3.1, as I've got a two ports, one front type C and one back type A, in that configuration. I'm using my current USB 3.1 rear port for a WD - BLACK D10 8TB drive. I may need to add an expansion card to increase USB 3.1 ports for new drives. I have one each - PCIEX1, PCIEX4 and PCIEX8 available for expansion slots at the rear of my MB. Where the system bogs down is copying from internal SSD to USB remote drives.

I tend to shoot events, download RAW images to internal SSD for initial edits, and then transfer to remote USB drives when archiving, to free up limited room on the internal SSD drives. My intent is to buy the quickest drives available as new ones are needed.