SCSI??? A little advice?

i no the real LSI version's can take upto 256mb of ram, i've also seen the intel versions with 512mb.

dell on the other hand problay will release new bios for upto that,
when its required. as the jump from 128mb to 512mb is on 1% in speed
diffrence.
 
cavemanoc said:
Since it's easier to find 256Mb modules, begs the question - is it worth flashing the cards back to LSI bios's's and going from there?


dont think you can flash a dell back to LSI
dell made it like that
 
Ah Dell - Love to feel that they are proprietary (sp?) providers don't they - lock 'em in and never let them go! Brings back memories of their 'own brand' motherboards!

On a slightly lighter note - I have managed to find a possible solution to our problem - I'm bidding on a scsi bundle that includes 2 Ram modules - so if the unthinkable happens and I actually win we can do a little split :D
 
Further to my last - I fired off an email to LSI with a couple of questions about the RAM and the iTBBU battery module and, impressively, they got back to me with this:

Hi Shane

LSI does not support any other memory modules other than supplied with the controller.

The various memory modules with different clocks may improve a bit performance but overall performance does not improve. Memory is only one component in the big picture and they are other factors.

Having RAID 0
- It has no fault tolerant attributes.

iTBBU
- it has two main function:
1. Manage the Battery and report its status to the FW

2. Maintain the DATA in the cache if there is power failure.

On power failure, the data in the cache will be maintained at least 72 hours (Friday to Monday). When it becomes online, the data in the cache will be flushed to the disks.

Regards
Saba Nesar
UK

Unfortunately I don't quite get what he's trying to say - I asked whether it has to be ECC and pc2700 - so I guess we can use pc3200 (as expected) but it may still have to be ECC

I have no idea what the relevance of the 'Data in the Cache' - perhaps someone who actually understands Scsi architecture could help out on this one - does that mean that in the event of a catastrophic power failure, the data being 'processed' would be lost without a Battery Backup? But the Array itself would still be intact - that's my reading of it - would be silly to lose the whole array?
 
cavemanoc said:
Further to my last - I fired off an email to LSI with a couple of questions about the RAM and the iTBBU battery module and, impressively, they got back to me with this:



Unfortunately I don't quite get what he's trying to say - I asked whether it has to be ECC and pc2700 - so I guess we can use pc3200 (as expected) but it may still have to be ECC

I have no idea what the relevance of the 'Data in the Cache' - perhaps someone who actually understands Scsi architecture could help out on this one - does that mean that in the event of a catastrophic power failure, the data being 'processed' would be lost without a Battery Backup? But the Array itself would still be intact - that's my reading of it - would be silly to lose the whole array?

excellent digging sir!! I knew I'd be able to rely on you!!!! From what lsi have said to you, the battery simply saves what is in the cache.. so say you were transferring some files when the power cuts out, the battery will hold that info for up to 72 hrs, when power is restored, the files being kept in the cache are written to a disk. It looks like if that all the battery is used for, we're laughing. Coming to think about it, raid controllers have their own bios, if that's like mboard bios, it'll need a battery to maintain the settings :( Damn, this maybe a little more complicated than i thought!!!

On the subject of memory, if my controller doesn't come with the ram, then I'd be interested in going halves :D
 
Having had a liitle look at the board I think the bios has it's own little battery anyway so the iTBBU is only for the Cache, NOT for the Bios - the Battery really is just a nicity from mission critical server ops that can't afford to lose data <- Not me then :D The memory on it's own will be more than sufficient - unfortunately it will not function without the memory - so pray yours has it - should be in the description on fleabay - it's a standard part so if it's removed it should say so! (Only the Battery is optional!)
 
cavemanoc said:
Having had a liitle look at the board I think the bios has it's own little battery anyway so the iTBBU is only for the Cache, NOT for the Bios - the Battery really is just a nicity from mission critical server ops that can't afford to lose data <- Not me then :D The memory on it's own will be more than sufficient - unfortunately it will not function without the memory - so pray yours has it - should be in the description on fleabay - it's a standard part so if it's removed it should say so! (Only the Battery is optional!)

on the bay currently is some ibm branded ecc 2x256meg ram modules.. are you garyb**** ? if so I don't want to outbid you lol..

Cheers
 
It was:

Kingston ValueRam ( :eek: ) 256Mb pc2700 333 ECC 184pin CL2.5 unbuffered RAM
p/n: KVR333X72C25/256

And it works beautifully - I've posted the results over on my benchmark Thread

About £22 but the delivery was crippling unless you can wait 6-10 days :p
 
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