Intel RS3UC080 User Guide - Page 12

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Intel®

Integrated RAID Solution User Guide

Benefits and Features

The Intel

®

Integrated RAID Solution has the following benefits and features:

•

Support for up to 10 disks per Integrated RAID volume, with one or two volumes on

each SAS-3 controller. Each controller can support 14 volume drives, including one

or two hot spare disks.

•

Support for two-disk Integrated Mirroring volumes (RAID 1).

•

Support for disk drives with 512-byte sectors and disk drives with 4-KB sectors.

Note:

An Integrated RAID volume must use all 512-byte-sector drives or all 4-KB-

sector drives. You cannot combine the two types of drives in a single volume.

Also, some operating systems do not fully support 4-KB-sector drives. Refer to

the documentation for the operating system you are using.

•

Support for online capacity expansion (OCE) for RAID 1 volumes. OCE permits

you to increase the size of a RAID 1 volume by replacing the disk drives with

higher-capacity drives.

•

Support for RAID volumes, and physical disks within a RAID volume, where the

volume or disk exceeds 241 bytes (2.199 TB or 2 TiB).

•

Low-cost RAID volume creation, which meets the needs of most internal RAID

installations.

•

Easy installation and configuration.

•

Support for booting from any kind of Integrated RAID volume.

•

Ability to operate without special operating system-specific software.

•

High reliability and data integrity.

—

Nonvolatile write journaling.

—

Physical disks in a volume are not visible to the operating system (OS) or to

application software.

•

Low host CPU utilization and PCI* bus utilization.

•

Processing power provided by Fusion-MPT architecture. Shared-memory

architecture minimizes external memory requests.

Host Interface

The Integrated RAID host interface uses the message-passing interface, as described in

the

Fusion-MPT 2.5 MPI Specification

. The Fusion-MPT interface gives the host OS

access to the RAID volumes as well as to additional non-RAID physical disks.

Section	Page
Preface	3
Audience	3
Organization	3
Related Publication	3
Table of Contents	5
List of Figures	7
List of Tables	9
1 Introduction to the Integrated RAID Solution	11
Overview	11
Benefits and Features	12
Host Interface	12
Metadata Support	13
SMART Support	13
Fusion-MPT Support	13
CacheCade on Host	13
2 Overview of Integrated RAID Mirrored Volumes	15
Overview	15
Integrated Mirroring and Integrated Mirroring Enhanced Features	16
Operation of Mirrored Volumes	17
Mirrored Volume Features	19
Resynchronization with Concurrent Host I/O Operation	19
Hot Swapping	19
Hot Spare Disk	19
Online Capacity Expansion	19
Media Verification	20
Disk Write Caching	20
NVSRAM Usage	20
Background Initialization	20
Consistency Check	20
Make Data Consistent	21
3 Creating Mirrored Volumes	23
Mirrored Volume Configuration Overview	23
Creating Mirrored Volumes	23
Creating an Integrated Mirroring Volume	24
Creating an Integrated Mirroring Enhanced or Integrated Mirroring + Striping Volume	26
Expanding an Integrated Mirroring Volume with OCE	27
Managing Hot Spare Disks	28
Creating Hot Spare Disks	28
Deleting a Hot Spare Disk	30
Other Configuration Tasks	30
Viewing Array Properties	30
Running a Consistency Check	30
Activating an Array	31
Deleting an Array	31
Locating Disk Drives in a Volume	32
Selecting a Boot Disk	33
4 Overview of Integrated Striping	35
Overview	35
Integrated Striping Features	35
Integrated Striping Description	36
5 Creating Integrated Striping Volumes	39
Integrated Striping Configuration Overview	39
Creating Integrated Striping Volumes	39
Other Configuration Tasks	41
Viewing Array Properties	41
Activating an Array	41
Deleting an Array	42
Locating Disk Drives in a Volume	43
Selecting a Boot Disk	43
Appendix A: Using the SAS-3 Integrated RAID Configuration Utility	45
Hardware and Software Requirements	45
Controller Support	45
Operating System and Software Support	46
Interface Description	46
Commands	46
Common Command-Line Parameters	47
CREATE	48
Command Line	49
Parameters	49
Program Return Value	49
DELETE	49
Command Line	49
Parameters	49
Program Return Value	50
DELETEVOLUME	50
Command Line	50
Parameters	50
Program Return Value	50
DISPLAY	50
Command Line	51
Parameters	51
Program Return Value	51
Sample Output	51
HOTSPARE	54
Command Line	54
Parameters	54
Program Return Value	54
STATUS	55
Command Line	55
Parameters	55
Program Return Value	55
Sample Output	55
LIST	56
Command Line	56
Parameters	56
Program Return Value	56
Sample Output	56
CONSTCHK	57
Command Line	57
Parameters	57
Program Return Value	57
ACTIVATE	57
Command Line	57
Parameters	57
Program Return Value	57
LOCATE	58
Command Line	58
Parameters	58
Program Return Value	58
LOGIR	58
Command Line	58
Parameters	58
Program Return Value	59
BOOTIR	59
Command Line	59
Parameters	59
Program Return Value	59
Sample Output	60
BOOTENCL	60
Command Line	60
Parameters	60
Program Return Value	60
Sample Output	61
HELP	61
Command Line	61
Parameters	61

Intel RS3UC080 User Guide - Page 12

Benefits and Features, Host Interface

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