sorry for the newb question, but how do you connect this to the computer? do I need anything else to connect it? Thanks!

No worries just ensure that you motherboard has the correct port PCI-e x1 (desktops only, diagram here: http://imgsrv.worldstart.com/images/ct-images/2013/04/mb.jpg), then you simply slot the card into the port, it comes with a couple of SATA data connection cables so you only need to make sure your PSU has sata power connectors available depending on the number of drives you wish to connect (they look like this: http://sharpsblogorama.files.wordpress.com/2010/11/sata-hard-drive-power-cable-connector.jpg) .Hope this answers your question, let me know if you have any further queries or are stuck.

Is there a HD size limit with this?

I don't believe there's any limit. I have drives 2-14 TB connected to these cards across multiple PCs and they all worked flawlessly.

so if I put this into a x16 PCIE 1.0 port and hooked an SSD to it, what would be my max bandwidth to the SSD?

Hello,well, the maximum bandwith provided by the PCI-E x16 gen 1.0 standard port; it is greater than the PCI-E x1 gen 1.0, and not having now many specifications on these standards on Wikipedia.org I have found about that for x1 slot the bandwith is 2.5 GB/s (250 MB/s) and for x16 slot it is 8 GB/s (? MB/s). I hope this is enough. Greetings,Massimo.

Hi, Does this card support Raid and strip volume?

Seems like a simple question, with a bunch of conflicting answers. The problem is Amazon groups several IO Crest SATA controller cards into one listing and the questions and answers are common across several models. First, it should be clarified that there is hardware RAID and there is software RAID, and if software RAID is what you are after your OS will provide that regardless of your disk controller -- but software RAID doesn't match the performance of hardware RAID. None of the IO Crest cards that are based on the ASMedia chipsets support hardware RAID. The Marvell 88SE9215 does not support hardware RAID. Marvell 88SE9230 support hardware RAID 0 and 1. Marvell 88SE9705 supports hardware RAID 0 and 1 and also HyperDuo. What is HyperDuo? It is like RAID 0 but you mix (hybrid) SATA HDDs and SSDs in the array, and the controller card manages the array to swap the most recently used items onto the SSD storage. This allows you to get the best of both worlds -- the read speed of SSD but the mega storage you get with regular hard drives. Since very little of what is on your array is used on a frequent basis, it can really result in performance gains. But please don't spend $100 on a card that can do HyperDuo without researching it further because there are some potential downsides. For the majority of home users , you want a card that can do RAID 0 and 1.

Brand	IO Crest
Product Dimensions	14.22 x 12.19 x 4.06 cm; 68.04 g
Item model number	SI-PEX40057
Manufacturer	Syba
Series	SI-PEX40057
Colour	Green
Graphics Card Interface	PCI Express
Number of Serial Ports	4
Are Batteries Included	No
Item Weight	67.9 g
Guaranteed software updates until	unknown

I/O Crest 4 Port SATA III PCI-e 2.0 x2 HyperDuo RAID Hard Drive Controller Card Marvell 9230 Chipset

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