Hi - once again guys, thanks for the prompt response. I'm new to a lot of this, so good advice is like gold dust!
I think I may have found my solution anyway to my personal circumstances. According to Gigabyte the specs for the 9128 chipset are as follows (taken from US site for GA-P55A-UD3 (rev 2.0)):
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Chipset:
1. 6 x SATA 3Gb/s connectors (SATA2_0, SATA2_1, SATA2_2, SATA2_3, SATA2_4, SATA2_5) supporting up to 6 SATA 3Gb/s devices
2. Support for SATA RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5, and RAID 10
Marvell 9128 chip:
1. 2 x SATA 6Gb/s connectors (GSATA3_6, GSATA3_7) supporting up to 2 SATA 6Gb/s devices
2. Support for SATA RAID 0 and RAID 1
* SATA3 RAID 0 4x and SATA3 2x performance are maximum theoretical values. Actual performance may vary by system configuration.
* SATA3 SSDs are not recommended for use in RAID 0 mode on Marvell SE9128 ports.
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So the key items from my point of view are that it (a) offers SATA 6Gb/s and (b) admits there are issues with a general kop out regarding system config
Now, when I check the specs for my SAMSUNG SPINPOINT F3
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Features
• MAX.500GB Formatted Capacity Per Disk
• Serial ATA 3.0Gbps Interface Support
• Improved recording stability over temperature with PMR
• Advanced dynamic FOD control for best data integrity
• Intelligent compensation of external disturbance
• SATA Native Command Queuing Feature
• Device Initiated SATA Power Management
• Rotational vibration sensor
• Environment friendly product with RoHS compliance
• Improved performance with dual-ARM based firmware
• ATA S.M.A.R.T. Compliant
• ATA Automatic Acoustic Management Feature
• ATA 48-bit Address Feature
• ATA Device Configuration Overlay Feature
• NoiseGuard™
• SilentSeek™
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From the above I can see that the SAMSUNG drive only support 3Gb/s - so for these hard drives, there would be no point using the Marvell chipset as the HDDs can't operate at 6 Gb/s. So I think I'll just revert to Intel ICH10R controlled ports. Do you agree with my logic?
Second question I have though is this:
SATA2 = 3 Gb/s
SATA3 = 6 Gb/s
Is the above assumption correct???
Thanks again for all the help. This is a brand new PC and I want to complete the build today if I can!
Thanks