Intel RS25NB008 User Guide - Page 35

SAS Expander Support The Intel® RAID Controller RS25NB008 supports LSI* expanders, Vitesse SAS expanders, and PMC expanders that are used as a component in Intel and 3rd party enclosures. Other expanders may be supported post launch, based on market conditions and customer requirements. Support for Non-Hard Disk Drive Devices Selected non-hard drive devices are supported for use with this controller. For information on support for non-hard drive devices, see this RAID controller's Tested Hardware and Operating System List. Enclosure Management Support The Intel® RAID Controller RS25NB008 supports SES2 enclosure management in-band to expander-based backplanes. RAID Functionality and Features Hierarchy The fundamental purpose of a RAID system is to present a usable data storage medium (virtual drive) with some level of redundancy to a host operating system. The Intel® RAID firmware is based on the concept of associating physical drives in arrays and then creating a virtual drive from that array that includes a functional RAID level. To create a virtual drive and present it to the host operating system, the RAID firmware typically follows these steps: 1. One or more physical drives are selected and associated as an array. 2. One or more arrays are associated and given a RAID level. This process creates a virtual drive and provides an option to initialize the virtual drive. 3. The RAID firmware presents the virtual drive to the operating system. RAID Physical Drive Status Table 11. RAID Physical Drive Status Drive State Code Description Unconfigured Good Unconfigured Good The drive is functioning normally, but is not part of a configured virtual drive and is not a hot spare. Online ONLN The drive is online, is part of a configured virtual drive, and is functioning normally. Intel® RAID Controller RS25NB008 Hardware User's Guide 25