| What's New |
| Q1. |
What is Serial Attached SCSI? |
| A1. |
Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) is the logical evolution that satisfies the enterprise data center requirement of scalability, performance, reliability and manageability, while leveraging a common electrical and physical connection interface with Serial ATA (SATA). This compatibility provides users with unprecedented choices for server and storage subsystem deployment. |
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| Q2. |
Why was SAS developed? |
| A2. |
SAS was developed to address anticipated I/O and direct attach storage requirements in the future. It provides universal interconnect with SATA, while offering logical SCSI compatibility along with SCSI reliability, performance and manageability.
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| Q3. |
What are the end user benefits of Serial Attached SCSI? |
| A3. |
Key end user benefits include enterprise class robustness, investment protection in compatible SCSI software and middleware and the choice of direct-attach storage devices (SAS or SATA). In addition, greater performance, longer cabling distances, smaller form factors and greater addressability will all lead to a new level of flexibility when deploying mainstream data center servers and subsystems. Since SAS is based on the foundation of the industry-leading SCSI specification, reliability and peace of mind will satisfy user's needs for continuity in the data center. |
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| Q4. |
How does Serial Attached SCSI benefit the storage industry? |
| A4. |
SAS leverages the proven SCSI technologies that customers expect in data center environments, providing robust solutions and generational consistency. It is based on a serial interface, allowing for increased device support and bandwidth scalability, and reducing the overhead impact that challenges today's SCSI environments. It utilizes SATA development work on smaller cable connectors, providing customers a downstream compatibility with desktop class ATA technologies.
Simplified routing will enable a new generation of dense devices, such as small form factor hard drives, enabling storage solutions to scale externally.
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Common Questions
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| Q1. |
Is the Smart Array P600 controller backwards compatible to Ultra2, Ultra3, and Ultra320 SCSI? |
| A1. |
No, serial attached SCSI controllers are not compatible with parallel SCSI devices. |
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| Q2. |
Will the Smart Array P600 support both internal and external drives at the same time? |
| A2. |
Yes. The Smart Array P600 has 8, 3Gb SAS ports supporting two simultaneous connections using the controllers x4 Wide SAS Ports (1 int. and 1 int./ext. shared x4 port). |
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| Q3. |
What RAID levels are supported by the Smart Array P600? |
| A3. |
The SA-P600 supports RAID 0, 1, 1+0, 5 and 6 (Advanced Data Guarding). |
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| Q4. |
What is Online Drive Flashing? |
| A4. |
Online Drive Flashing is a new feature available on the SA-P600. Previously, when hard disk drive (HDD) firmware required upgrading the storage had to be taken offline before a new firmware image could be loaded. With Online Drive Flashing, you can now download an updated HDD firmware image to the SA-P600 and update all of your SAS HDDs the next time you reboot the server. This greatly reduces the time involved in updating disk drive firmware. |
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| Q5. |
What is Recovery ROM? |
| A5. |
Recovery ROM provides a unique redundancy feature that helps ensure against controller availability. During the flash process, a new version of the firmware can be flashed to both a primary and secondary location in the controller ROM. If either ROM image is ever corrupted, the controller will continue to boot from the redundant image location. This reduces the risk of flashing new firmware to the controller. |
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| Technical questions - cache/memory |
| Q1. |
Does the Smart Array P600 have battery-backed cache? |
| A1. |
Yes. The Smart Array P600 has an innovative implementation of battery-backed cache. 1) In the event of a controller failure or server failure, the Smart Array cache can be removed from the SA-P600 controller and placed on another SA-P600 controller board; the cached data will be flushed to the disk drives. 2) The cache batteries provide up to 3 days of battery life for the standard 256MB BBWC module (up to 1 day for 512MB DDR BBWC Upgrade Module). 3) In addition, this unique design offers redundant and replaceable battery packs for increased data protection and better serviceability. |
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| Q2. |
Will the SA-P600 support standard server DIMM memory? |
| A2. |
No. The controller DIMM socket is not designed to accommodate standard DIMM memory because standard server memory DIMM does not support battery backed up and does not meet fault tolerant standards for a RAID controller. |
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| Q3. |
What kind of performance difference will I see from different cache sizes? |
| A3. |
Many industry standard benchmark tests do not show appreciable differences between 128 and 256 MB of controller cache because they place a maximum workload on the controller and quickly saturate the cache, not allowing it an opportunity to flush. Because the benchmarks do not vary their workloads, allowing the cache to flush during low load periods, it is difficult to measure the performance impact of various cache sizes. |
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| Q4. |
Is Drive Write Cache available on HP SATA drives? |
| A4. |
Yes, however HP ships SATA drives with Drive Write Cache (DWC) disabled. The preset configuration was selected to provide greater safety for our customer's drive data in case of sudden power loss, when there is no battery on the controller to protect the cache.
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| Q5. |
Can Drive Write Cache be enabled on the controller and SATA drives? |
| A5. |
Yes, please see the attached presentation for the latest servers and controllers that allow for Drive Write Cache to be enabled.
WARNING: Enabling DWC may result in loss of data if power is lost to the server and there is no power protection configured for the server. When Drive Write Cache is configured, the following best practices should be used to protect the data in case of power loss: Install a redundant power supply in the server (if available for that server). If redundant power supplies are used and one power supply fails, temporarily disable Drive Write Cache until a replacement power supply has been installed. If redundant power supplies are used, add an additional layer of power protection by connecting each power supply in the server to a separate Uninterruptible Power Supply (UPS). If multiple UPSs are used, add an additional layer of power protection by connecting each UPS to a different AC circuit.
How to Enable Write Cache on SATA HDDs for HP ProLiant ML100 series and ML310DL320 Servers DWC
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| Service and Support |
| Q1. |
Does the Smart Array P600 controller use the same configuration utilities and management software as the other Smart Array controllers? |
| A1. |
Yes, this is the Smart Array Advantage. All Smart Array controllers use the same configuration utility (ACU) diagnostic (ADU) and management software (HP Insight Manager) as the entire Smart Array family of products. In addition, the SA-P600 also provides Options ROM Configuration for Arrays (ORCA) that allows a simplified configuration tool at the time of controller boot. |
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| Q2. |
Which ProLiant servers are supported by the Smart Array P600? |
| A2. |
The Smart Array P600 is supported on most current generation ProLiant 300 and 500 series servers. View a complete, up-to-date list of supported servers. |
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| Q3. |
Which operating systems will be supported by the Smart Array P600? |
| A3. |
SA-P600 will support several operating systems including: Windows 2003 and Linux. Please refer to OS support for a complete list. |
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