Welcome to our community

Be a part of something great, join today!

Log in
  • Hey all, just changed over the backend after 15 years I figured time to give it a bit of an update, its probably gonna be a bit weird for most of you and i am sure there is a few bugs to work out but it should kinda work the same as before... hopefully :)

Orders for M-Logic RED Rocket enclosure are LIVE

Justin O'Neill

Justin O'Neill

Well-known member
Joined
Jan 12, 2007
Messages
1,673
Reaction score
0
Points
0
Age
47
Location
San Diego/LA/Seattle
Website
www.hdcinemagroup.com
Orders for the M-Logic RED Rocket Thunderbolt enclosure just went live on their site. You can purchase now for $699 and it will ship Tues/Wed next week: http://www.mlogic.com/products/mlink-r

EDIT: International users can select the PayPal link to order.
 
Lemme see what I can do for you Mark. The M-Link is x4. We need to do a definitive test but it looks like there is no speed increase if you go up to x8 or x16 due to Thunderbolt's current limitations. Jeff Kilgroe says in about a year we could see a much faster version of Thunderbolt.
 
Justin O'Neill said:
Lemme see what I can do for you Mark. The M-Link is x4. We need to do a definitive test but it looks like there is no speed increase if you go up to x8 or x16 due to Thunderbolt's current limitations. Jeff Kilgroe says in about a year we could see a much faster version of Thunderbolt.
Click to expand...

Only 4x speed... thats sad. :(

O well. Still better than processing from a tower computer all the time, Still a good portable solution.

Yes, see what you can do with getting your mates to sell internationally online.

Cheers man.
 
Looks like Roger's got you taken care of.

The Magma 3t has one slot that is supposedly x8 but people who have tested it say it wasn't any faster than the x4 in the Sonnet. REDuser needs to do proper test but it sounds like x4 maxes out Thunderbolt.
 
Bob Gundu said:
I thought RR needs a full length slot???
Click to expand...

Nope, it's like 1/2" or 1.5cm longer than a "textbook" half-length slot.

The Magma one looks nice, but it's not as friendly as the M-Link seems to be. Will have to drill a hole or two in it for getting the SDI connectors out and accessible. And I'm not so sure the Rocket will fit length-wise. I have not seen confirmation of that, nor have I seen internal dimensions. The M-Link is more expensive, but is specifically made to house the Rocket. The Sonnet Echo enclosure (half length version) would be 100X better if they made it about 3/4" longer. OTOH, not too many cards are longer than "half length" these days. The few that are fall into the realm of GPUs and specialized storage for the most part. So we have to buy the Sonnet Echo Pro for the Rocket and I feel like there's a boatload of extra space in there for the Rocket to swim around in.

Justin O'Neill said:
Looks like Roger's got you taken care of.

The Magma 3t has one slot that is supposedly x8 but people who have tested it say it wasn't any faster than the x4 in the Sonnet. REDuser needs to do proper test but it sounds like x4 maxes out Thunderbolt.
Click to expand...

It's an X8 slot in the magma, but the Thunderbolt interface peaks at 10Gbps per channel. 2 channels per port, only one accessible per device at a time. So, in a nutshell, the Rocket isn't going to get any more than a theoretical 10Gbps maximum throughput -- that's a bit faster than PCIe v1 X4 or a bit faster than half the bandwidth of a PCIe v2 X4 slot. By providing more lanes within the Thunderbolt expander, you don't gain more bandwidth, but you potentially gain better distribution of bandwidth onto the bus. Once again, to talk theoretically, the X8 slot in the Magma should allow the Rocket to run a wee bit faster... But not enough faster to make a real difference. I have not had the opportunity to test the Magma 3T alongside a Sonnet Echo expander. I own the Sonnet, works just fine really. Actually it works great, but I will probably pick up the M-Link since the Sonnet is a beast!

IMO, the most unfortunate design characteristic of the Rocket is that it's a PCIe v1.1 X8 card and not a PCIe v2.0 X4 card as it probably should have been, given its time of release. I know that RED worked with DVS and the Rocket is pretty much a tweaked version of an existing design... And this probably had a lot to do with what could be done for what price and by what date.

If the card were a v2 X4 card, it wouldn't really affect how it interacts with these Thunderbolt expanders. It would however be more convenient for installation in a lot of workstations. Most sytems have a paltry few X16 slots and usually only one X8 slot with a scattering of X4 slots. Modern workstations from the time of the Rocket's launch and beyond are all PCIe v2 and better. To get full bandwidth out of the Rocket, we have to eat up our precious X8 or X16 slots, when the X4 slots provide all the bandwidth we need, just not in the right form.
 
Last edited:
Justin O'Neill said:
Looks like Roger's got you taken care of.

The Magma 3t has one slot that is supposedly x8 but people who have tested it say it wasn't any faster than the x4 in the Sonnet. REDuser needs to do proper test but it sounds like x4 maxes out Thunderbolt.
Click to expand...

Waiting for the email.. :)
 
Jeff Kilgroe said:
Nope, it's like 1/2" or 1.5cm longer than a "textbook" half-length slot.

The Magma one looks nice, but it's not as friendly as the M-Link seems to be. Will have to drill a hole or two in it for getting the SDI connectors out and accessible. And I'm not so sure the Rocket will fit length-wise. I have not seen confirmation of that, nor have I seen internal dimensions. The M-Link is more expensive, but is specifically made to house the Rocket. The Sonnet Echo enclosure (half length version) would be 100X better if they made it about 3/4" longer. OTOH, not too many cards are longer than "half length" these days. The few that are fall into the realm of GPUs and specialized storage for the most part. So we have to buy the Sonnet Echo Pro for the Rocket and I feel like there's a boatload of extra space in there for the Rocket to swim around in.



It's an X8 slot in the magma, but the Thunderbolt interface peaks at 10Gbps per channel. 2 channels per port, only one accessible per device at a time. So, in a nutshell, the Rocket isn't going to get any more than a theoretical 10Gbps maximum throughput -- that's a bit faster than PCIe v1 X4 or a bit faster than half the bandwidth of a PCIe v2 X4 slot. By providing more lanes within the Thunderbolt expander, you don't gain more bandwidth, but you potentially gain better distribution of bandwidth onto the bus. Once again, to talk theoretically, the X8 slot in the Magma should allow the Rocket to run a wee bit faster... But not enough faster to make a real difference. I have not had the opportunity to test the Magma 3T alongside a Sonnet Echo expander. I own the Sonnet, works just fine really. Actually it works great, but I will probably pick up the M-Link since the Sonnet is a beast!

IMO, the most unfortunate design characteristic of the Rocket is that it's a PCIe v1.1 X8 card and not a PCIe v2.0 X4 card as it probably should have been, given its time of release. I know that RED worked with DVS and the Rocket is pretty much a tweaked version of an existing design... And this probably had a lot to do with what could be done for what price and by what date.

If the card were a v2 X4 card, it wouldn't really affect how it interacts with these Thunderbolt expanders. It would however be more convenient for installation in a lot of workstations. Most sytems have a paltry few X16 slots and usually only one X8 slot with a scattering of X4 slots. Modern workstations from the time of the Rocket's launch and beyond are all PCIe v2 and better. To get full bandwidth out of the Rocket, we have to eat up our precious X8 or X16 slots, when the X4 slots provide all the bandwidth we need, just not in the right form.
Click to expand...

Joe...
Your a clever bugger... :)
 
NO International Love :(
 
Thanks Justin!!
 
Im about to order a Mlogic TB rocket encloser.. Any one here that can give any last words of recommendations. Basically is there any other option thats better, more bang for the buck etc.

I had a maxxdigital red rocket 4tb raid that apparently could not handle my ways of working, as it consistently broke down even though I tried to handle it with care, keeped it in a padded pellicase at all times etc. The whole thing fell a part in bits and pieces on several occasions on me, and I went trough a couple of power supplies, so now I decided to ditch it for a small TB solution that is rigid and built for traveling.

So speed is not first priority, or at least it's second to reliability and strong build. Also I would prefer it to run of the TB power only. As I will most likely sit out in the ocean in a small dive / rib boat with no real power source. So if it can run straight of my macbook air it would be perfect.

I need delivery before the 21st of august so I can not really wait, basically need to order something tomorrow. Would appreciate your comments.
 
I have had the M-Logic running for 3 weeks straight (literally not powered down) without a single issue. Super solidly built. It definitely won't run off the Thunderbolt power, though. I am not aware of a single PCI enclosure that does.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top