# Cables for LSI 8i card **URL:** \ **Category:** General\ **Tags:** chassis, help-and-suggestions\ **Created:** [June 15, 2025, 1:17pm UTC](https://forum.45homelab.com/t/cables-for-lsi-8i-card/3369 "2025-06-15T13:17:45Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Daniel\_V](https://forum.45homelab.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/f19dbf/32.png) [@Daniel\_V](https://forum.45homelab.com/u/Daniel_V)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2025, 1:17pm UTC](https://forum.45homelab.com/t/cables-for-lsi-8i-card/3369/1 "2025-06-15T13:17:45Z")
I have a HL15 that I recently got. My motherboard sadly only has 4 sata slots so my current cable set will not work. I am going to get a raid card and flash it in HBA it mode if not done already. I am looking at a used LSI 8i card. I am wondering if it is possible to get a cable that will work with this, The only problem I have is that I will need to keep one bank of drives on sata on the direct wire backplane because the card only has 2 ports. I am wondering if the backplane will still work if I mix and match the types of cables at the end? All the drives are identical so not too worried about mixing drives, Thank you in advanced! I guess I could get one of those PCIE cards with sata ports that plop into the NVME drive slot but those seem kind of jank 😛 Daniel V ---
**Author:** ![DigitalGarden](https://forum.45homelab.com/user_avatar/forum.45homelab.com/digitalgarden/32/1785_2.png) [@DigitalGarden](https://forum.45homelab.com/u/DigitalGarden)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2025, 1:48pm UTC](https://forum.45homelab.com/t/cables-for-lsi-8i-card/3369/2 "2025-06-15T13:48:00Z")
You can mix different connector types on the motherboard/HBA side no issues. The backplane has four SFF-8643 (“Mini SAS HD”) ports. Any cables you use have to have that connector on one end for the backplane, but what is on the other end of each of those four cables doesn’t matter. It can be another SFF-8643, an SFF-8087, four 7-pin SATA, etc. For the four SATA ports on the motherboard you want to be sure you get a _ **reverse** _ breakout cable, not a forward breakout cable. You can get 930x-_16i_ or 940x-_16i_ HBAs if you want to use all 15 drive bays, and not just 12 of them. ---
**Author:** ![Daniel\_V](https://forum.45homelab.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/f19dbf/32.png) [@Daniel\_V](https://forum.45homelab.com/u/Daniel_V)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2025, 2:02pm UTC](https://forum.45homelab.com/t/cables-for-lsi-8i-card/3369/3 "2025-06-15T14:02:35Z")
Sounds good, I just ordered the HBA used off of ebay! What length of cable do I need? Daniel V ---
**Author:** ![DigitalGarden](https://forum.45homelab.com/user_avatar/forum.45homelab.com/digitalgarden/32/1785_2.png) [@DigitalGarden](https://forum.45homelab.com/u/DigitalGarden)\ **Post date:** [June 15, 2025, 2:21pm UTC](https://forum.45homelab.com/t/cables-for-lsi-8i-card/3369/4 "2025-06-15T14:21:33Z")
0.5 meter (1.5 feet) should be sufficient