Which port multipliers for a Perc6 ?

RimBlock · 23 Dec 2010 at 08:51

Hi,

I have a Dell Perc 6/i being used for my home NAS.

Im my impulse buying wisdom I now also have a Norco rack mount server case with 20 SATA hot swap bays.

I plan to have the majority of drives as the WD Caviar Green 1.5TB (have 5 already so would rather not change now).

The Perc 6/1 can take 8 drives. The drive sustained data transfer is listed as 110MB/s. Sata II is 3Gbps (375MB/s) so in theory I could put three drives on each Perc 6/i sata cable. To do this I imagine I would need port multipliers.

Any obvious flaws with the idea (except on it being stunning overkill for a home environment).

Any recommendations on compatible port multipliers (like this from addonics, remove the case mount bracket and attach to custom stand-offs on the chassis I would have to make) ?

I am thinking of a way to get to use the 20 bays if I want to sometime in the future and getting 2 Perc /i cards and finding a motherboard to support them with on-board video, I think, is unlikely to be cheaper than the port multipliers.

Thanks
RB

bremen1874 · 23 Dec 2010 at 20:15

I don't think you can use a SATA port multiplier with a SAS connection. I think you'd need SAS Expanders instead.

RimBlock · 24 Dec 2010 at 03:06

Hi,

Card is a SAS/SATA controller.

RB

bremen1874 · 24 Dec 2010 at 17:23

Card is a SAS/SATA controller.

No, it's a SAS controller that also supports SATA drives. This is not the same as having a native SATA controller.

nightmare99 · 24 Dec 2010 at 18:44

I'm prety sure those port multipliers linked only work with certain sillicon image based sata controllers making them pretty useless in this instance.

RimBlock · 25 Dec 2010 at 04:29

bremen1874 said:
No, it's a SAS controller that also supports SATA drives. This is not the same as having a native SATA controller.

Thanks for clarity on that.

So the question. Which sas extenders for a Perc 6/i which will support sata drives ?

Thnks
RB

nightmare99 · 27 Dec 2010 at 09:45

Google for SAS expander, I think Chenbro do one for around £200.

Yamahahahahaha · 27 Dec 2010 at 11:52

Edit: Sorry re-read the OP.

I believe Supermicro do a good SAS expander.
http://www.supermicro.com/products/accessories/addon/AOC-SASLP-MV8.cfm

They also do a PCI-X version which apparently has more mature drivers on linux.

RimBlock · 27 Dec 2010 at 15:39

Thanks all,

Turns out the Perc 6/i is really a Perc 6/ir, refuses to see any on my 5 hard drives and refuses to be flashed with the LSI 1068e firmware.

I have now bought a couple of LSI 1068e 8 port cards (US$95 each) and will use software raid.

Cheers
RB

Yamahahahahaha · 27 Dec 2010 at 17:02

The newer Dell drivers should lift any drive firmware restrictions.

ftp://ftp.dell.com/sas-raid/

Tried any of those?

nightmare99 · 27 Dec 2010 at 17:09

They also do a PCI-X version which apparently has more mature drivers on linux.

Does a SAS expander need drivers? I would not have thought that.

RimBlock · 28 Dec 2010 at 01:50

Yamahahahahaha said:
The newer Dell drivers should lift any drive firmware restrictions.

ftp://ftp.dell.com/sas-raid/

Tried any of those?

Will take a look, thanks. Have tried the firmware from the support site 00.25.47.00 (29/09/2008). This is the firmware already on the card. I have read that the latest LSI 1068e firmware will not load on the card but the previous LSI firmware will. I cannot find the previous firmware anywhere. The current 1068e firmware I can only find on softopia but not on the LSI support site at all.

nightmare99 said:
Does a SAS expander need drivers? I would not have thought that.

The expanders should not but the SAS HBA/Raid card will (although to my knowledge, not specifically special ones to enable expander use. That is an ability of the chipset the HBA/Raid card is based around).

I took a look at the HP SAS expander as there are a lot going on ebay but they are quite expensive (300+), there are two versions (yellow and green PCB) with one being unflashable. Needs bios 1.53 (IIRC) or higher to use Sata2/3 speeds. Can only flash when connected to a HP HBA/Raid card (ebay around 300+). Considering my luck so far with Raid cards and HBA's, I really would rather not chance it

.

RB