NT Server on PL3000 to ML530 by moving RAID

[Ayman Altounji]

We plan to move an NT Server 4 from a ProLiant 3000 with Smart 3200 card to a ML530 with a Smart 3200 card also. We did a review of both machine (the ML530 is a new box).

Both machine are configured with dual processor (PL 3000 with PIII 800, ML530 with PIII Xeon 866), Nic card a little bit different and in different slot, same video chips. Same amount of memory. The Smart 3200 bios are at the same version.

The PL3000 use duplex option and has 2 drive cages. 3 HD Ultra2 are installed in each drive cage. The Smart 3200 card is configured as 2 logical volumes: 1 mirror and 1 RAID 5. The mirror volume is using 2 HD (1 in each drive cage). The RAID-5 volume is using 4 HD (2 from each drive cage).

The ML530 is configured also with 2 drive cages (not duplexed but each drive cage on their own raid channel).

We plan to move the HD from the PL3000 to the ML530 (for each HD, the drive cage, position inside drive cage will be the same).

On each server, the drive cage are using the same Channel on the 3200 card (PL3000 - Smart 3200 channel 1 for Cage A, ML530 - Smart 3200 channel 1 for Cage A, and so on).

Before move drives, we plan to shutdown as many NT services as we can. Take a full backup. Then shutdown, move the drives, power on the ML530. Make sure each logical drives are recognized (boot with SmartStart depending on Smart message during bootup) then boot NT.

Do you think this scenario should work ? How do you think NT will react when booting in a different hardware environment (not so different after all....) ? Do you expect a blue screen ? Need to re-detect NIC card ?

Thanks for all people who will respond with their input.

[Ayman Altounji]

It should work ok, but: move the RAID controller (and cache unit) with the drives, why? The RAID controller , Systemboard and drives all contain information about the array configuration, if one component is changed, arbitration occurs and the component with invalid or nonexisting data is updated. In your case the systemboard on the ML530 will be updated with the RAID configuration. Be sure to run the SSD for the ML530 to update drives for the HW subsystem support (3 may 2001).

[Ayman Altounji]

I am pretty sure that NT will freak out whe it sees the different Microcode of the nth Generation Xeon with 256k cache.. (Corrupt Kernel )I would load the OS from scratch.