Sata Port Multiplier or PCI Sata Controller?

I am in the process of planning a fanless/silent media server, and I have found that none of the consumer oriented, embedded, mini-itx motherboards have more than 4 sata ports. To that end it looks like I will need a card to add enough Sata ports. Has anyone here experimented with a sata port multiplier, if so did it work well? My main concern in speed since I will be using software based redundancy (i.e. snapraid, aufs, greyhole, etc. idk which yet), and I will be using this as a Plex server with transcoding.

Also, I am running OMV inside of Windows Hyper-V Server core, and I'm not sure if that will help me or hurt me. Any input would be appreciated, or if you know of any non-server (i.e. cheap) mini-itx motherboards that would remove the need for a sata card card that would be great too. Cheers!

Zitat von "WastlJ"

I´d prefer a Sata Controller over a port multiplier if you have some free ports on your mobo.

Most mobos I've looked at have a pcir slot, but the case I'm designing is going to be very short vertically, so any pci card would require a riser card, and some sort on internal support structure. Is it just a speed difference where the controller has an advantage, or is reliability a concern with port multipliers?

mkgriesinger: I had considered going socketed, but moving from embedded to socketed adds a lot of cost, and uses more power. Also, I think even an i3 is overkill processing wise. My current setup has an AMD e-350, and is able to transcode 90-100% of my content depending on which TV I am using (strangely its my 720p setup that has issues, because Plex has to downconvert a lot of my shows). I will look into it further, but many of the current generation of socketed, mitx boards have moved from 6 to 4 sata ports.

Thanks for the info guys. I will keep looking, and update when I finally buy the hardware.