Plugging in a P4 breakout cable?

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F1ydave

Member
Mar 9, 2014
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Assembling my new octocore dual cpu home lab...

I have this breakout cable (Supermicro CBL 0097L-03). Where do I plug in the P4 and what is its purpose? It looks like it could plug into the pins next to the white SAS/SATA on the motherboard (pic attached/linked), but its wired next to the Female ends of the SATA cable.

I am not sure if it's meant to plug into some sort of internal drive cage controller or the motherboard. Maybe it's not needed?

Any help would be appreciated.

Thank you,
Dave

(https://store.supermicro.com/media/...f139433887a97daa66f/c/b/cbl-0097l-03_head.jpg)

 

EffrafaxOfWug

Radioactive Member
Feb 12, 2015
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The P4 is, IIRC, the SGPIO signal for the SATA ports; the idea being that you plug the 8087 connector to the motherboard and the P4 plug to the backplane; not all backplanes will support this, and if you're using a backplane with an 8087 or 8643 connector itself, the SGPIO should already be in-band.

I've got a couple of these cables myself but I've not got any backplanes I've used them with.
 
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F1ydave

Member
Mar 9, 2014
137
21
18
The P4 is, IIRC, the SGPIO signal for the SATA ports; the idea being that you plug the 8087 connector to the motherboard and the P4 plug to the backplane; not all backplanes will support this, and if you're using a backplane with an 8087 or 8643 connector itself, the SGPIO should already be in-band.

I've got a couple of these cables myself but I've not got any backplanes I've used them with.
Ok, so it is for a backplane.

Do you know if I can still run the SATA cables without the use of the P4 cable plugged in? I would like to use the onboard SAS to 4 - 4tb drives.

If I can't it's not the end of the world as I was already running a SAS 9211-8i PCI from my last home lab. I was just hoping to have the option to add 4 more drives.
 
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