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Booting to the MAXPower RAID eSATA 6G-4e Card
While most users do not need to boot from drives connected to the MAXPower RAID eSATA card, it is
possible to do so using the steps provided in this section. You do not need to do these steps if you are not
booting to drives connected to the MAXPower RAID eSATA card.
Proceed with care as the process can be involved depending on your computer type.
PC BIOS Booting
The NewerTech MAXPower RAID eSATA 6G-4e Card by default has boot support for PC BIOS. During startup, press
"Ctrl + M" when the prompt appears on screen to access the card's BIOS setup. From within the BIOS Setup, you
can create a drive set/array. After creating the drive set/array, you can install to it using your Windows installer or
you can use third party cloning software to clone an existing installation to the connected drive set.
Mac OS X Booting
The NewerTech MAXPower RAID eSATA 6G-4e Card by default has boot support for PC BIOS, but not Mac EFI. The
latest Mac EFI support file can be downloaded from www.newertech.com/support/ .
READ BEFORE PROCEEDING!
Any Mac OS X installation on the MAXPower RAID card will not have the Mac OS X recovery partition
!
under Lion (Mac OS X 10.7) and Mountain Lion (Mac OS X 10.8).
Before proceeding, it is strongly recommended to have a drive permanently on hand that contains
Mac OS X Recovery in case reinstallation of Mac OS X becomes necessary. You can use Apple's
Recovery Disk Assistant (http://support.apple.com/kb/DL1433) to install OS X Recovery to an empty
drive. In order to use this tool, you must have an existing Mac OS X Recovery partition.
IMPORTANT NOTES:
- It is strongly recommended to check the website for the most recent EFI support file.
- In order for a Mac OS X installation to be bootable from the MAXPower RAID card, it must have the drivers installed
as well as the EFI support file uploaded to the card.
- The clone/restore process is different for the various Mac OS X versions using Disk Utility. Third party cloning
software can be used to greatly simplify the process on Mac OS X 10.7 and 10.8.
- Mac OS X 10.6.8 has the ability to do a file-level clone/restore using Disk Utility while you are booted to the
source.
- Mac OS X 10.7 & 10.8 requires Disk Utility to do a block-level clone/restore, which means that the source must
be unmounted for the clone/restore to occur. In this process, you must boot from another Mac OS X installation
that has the MAXPower card drivers installed in order to use Disk Utility to clone/restore. Using third party
cloning software that can do file-level clones can simplify the process, as you can be booted to the source
volume as the clone/restore is being conducted.
SUPPORTED MACS:
- Mac Pro Models
- MacPro3,1 (Early 2008)
- MacPro4,1 (Early 2009)
- MacPro5,1 (Mid 2010 & Mid 2012)
- Any Mac via Thunderbolt PCIe expansion unit
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NewerTech MAXPower RAID eSATA 6G-4e
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