HP ML150 HP ProLiant Intel-based 100-series G6 server technology - Page 12
SAS-2 standard, New generation HP Smart Array controllers - proliant g6 firmware
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The latest Smart Array controllers are compatible with SATA technology and include the following features to enhance performance and maintain data availability and reliability: • SAS and SATA compatibility - The ability to use either SAS or SATA hard drives lets administrators deploy drive technology that fits each computing environment. HP Smart Array controllers can manage both SAS arrays and SATA arrays. Smart Array configuration utilities help administrators configure arrays correctly so that data remains available and reliable. • SAS wide port operations - Wide ports contain four single lane (1x) SAS connectors and the cabling has all four lanes bundled together. SAS wide ports allow balanced SAS traffic distribution across the links for enhanced performance. In addition, wide ports provide redundancy by tolerating up to three physical link failures while maintaining the ability to communicate with the disk drives. The most common use of these wide links is to a JBOD or to an internal server expander connecting to large numbers of drives. No special configuration is required for this functionality. • SAS expanders - Low-cost, high-speed switches called expanders can combine multiple single links to create wide ports and increase available bandwidth. SAS expander devices also offer higher system performance by expanding the number of hard drives that can be attached to an HP Smart Array controller. SAS expanders are an aggregation point for large numbers of drives or servers providing a common connection. By cascading expanders, administrators can chain multiple storage boxes together. For more information on the HP SAS Expander Card, go to http://h18004.www1.hp.com/products/servers/proliantstorage/arraycontrollers/sasexpander/index.html. SAS-2 standard The second-generation SAS (SAS-2) link speed 4 of 6 Gb/s is double the SAS-1 transfer rate. SAS-2 link speeds require SAS-2 compliant hard drives. SAS-2 eliminates the distinction between fanout and edge expanders by replacing them with self-configuring expanders. SAS-2 enables zoning for enhanced resource deployment, flexibility, security, and data traffic management. SAS-2 connections have the potential to deliver peak raw data bandwidth of up to 600 megabytes per second (MB/s) per physical link in each direction. SAS-2 devices are capable of sending and receiving data simultaneously across each physical link, which is known as full duplex. When effectively implemented, full duplex, 6 Gb/s SAS connections can deliver peak raw data bandwidth of up to 1200 MB/s between the controller and storage device. It is important to note that the SAS-2 data bandwidths described here are theoretical speeds identified by the SAS-2 standard. Real-world performance will be affected by the storage devices attached to the SAS-2 connection. Smart Array controllers, with releases beginning in the first quarter of 2009, incorporate SAS-2 connections. The SAS-2 standard is compatible with both Serial SCSI and Serial ATA protocols for communicating commands to SAS and SATA devices. SAS-2 compliant controllers are fully compatible with 1.5 Gb/s and 3 Gb/s SATA technology. For an up-to-date listing of HP Smart Array controllers that support the SAS-2 specification, see the Smart Array controller matrix: www.hp.com/products/smartarray New generation HP Smart Array controllers The new Smart Array controllers are modular solutions with a common form factor, hardware, and firmware. The controllers are compatible with all ProLiant G6 servers. All ProLiant 100-series G6 servers incorporate embedded SATA storage controllers, and the Smart Array B110i software RAID is available. The Smart Array 410 incorporates Zero Memory RAID (ZMR) and is available as an entry level hardware-based RAID, but users have the option to choose the cache size and to include the battery backed write cache (BBWC). With these options, ZMR can be upgraded to 512 BBWC. 4 Serial Attached SCSI-2 (SAS-2) is an American National Standards Institute (ANSI) standard from the INCITS T10 Technical Committee on SCSI Storage Interfaces. SAS-2 is the successor to SAS-1.1 and SAS-1. 12