SSD 6G (sata) on BL460 G6, G7 and G8?

[drolfe]

Hi,

I'm looking high and low for a solution to provide 6G SSD (sata based) to our current blade servers. Mostly BL460c G6 and G7's but it seems even our BL465G8's are not 6G SATA capable.

We currently use p700M mezz cards to attach spining SAS drives to our blades and 3G SAS is fine for this.

We can boot from a drive connected to the p700M, say something in a D2600 or one of our MDS600's, this would give us the front drive bays free for ssd but almost all of the HP smart array cards I can see fall back to 3G when using sata (SSD included) drives.

I hope someone has a solution to this issue...

Thanking you in advance.

Regards, Daniel

[Nestorov]

Hi,

the p410i will fall back to 3gb trnasfer rate when using SATA disks, but the p420i or any other pX2X controller will not.

You can check the respective quickspecs of the controllers to find out which controller would best suit your needs, but the g6/g7 servers have no compatible Smart Array Controller that can use SATA disks with 6gb transferrate, as all pX1X Smart Array Controllers can achieve a maximum of 6gb SAS and 3gb SATA transfer rates. The gen8 blades on the other hand can use any pX2X or pX3X controller for 6gb SATA.

p700m can achieve 3gb SAS and 1,5GB SATA:

http://www8.hp.com/h20195/v2/GetDocument.aspx?docname=c04110946

(look under key features p3. for the transfer rate; usually the 3rd bullet point)

p410 quickspecs:

http://www8.hp.com/h20195/v2/GetDocument.aspx?docname=c04111713

p.3 key features, 3rd bullet point

p420 quickspecs:

http://www8.hp.com/h20195/v2/GetDocument.aspx?docname=c04111534 

p.2 key features, 3rd bullet point

an overview of the Smart Array Controllers compatible with gen8 Servers

http://www8.hp.com/h20195/V2/GetPDF.aspx/4AA2-4101ENW.pdf 

the p220i has no quickspecs of its own as it can be found under the quickspecs of the BL460c gen8, but basically all HP Smart Array Controllers pX2X support 6gb SATA transfer rates; the pX3X support a peak rate of 6gb SATA and 12gb SAS.

[Nestorov · Accepted solution]

Ok, my bad, the BL465c gen8 and the p220i doesn't support 6gb SATA:

http://www8.hp.com/h20195/v2/GetDocument.aspx?docname=c04128168 

p.4 Storage section:

Storage Controller

All Models

One (1) HP Smart Array P220i Controller with 512MB FBWC, (RAID 0 and 1)

NOTE: Upgradeable firmware with recovery ROM. NOTE: The HP Smart Array P220i supports two (2) small form factor (SFF) hot plug drive bays.

NOTE:

The HP Smart Array P220i supports 6G SAS and 3G SATA data transfer rates.

So you won't be able to get a 6gb SATA connection out of the BL465c gen8, as the optional p230i is listed only under the quickspecs and optional parts for the intel model, the bl460c gen8.

BL460c gen8 quickspecs:

http://www8.hp.com/h20195/v2/GetDocument.aspx?docname=c04128175 

p. 55 more detailed description of the p230i

So, unfortunately, with the gen8 server, you can only get the maximum out of a 6gb SAS disk through a 6gb SATA capable disk enclosure if you have a 6gb switch installed and a p721m/p731m mezannine card.

[drolfe]

Thank you so much for your very detailed repy

I"m sure this will help a few others also

Regards, Daniel

[drolfe]

Hmmm ok, I've got the drives in and they show up as 6G but I"m not sure if this means they are really running at 6G ?

see attached

Regards, Daniel

[Nestorov]

Hi, i was away for a while and couldn't monitor the thread.

The output from the console should the display the maximum possible speed of the disks and not the speed they actually work with currently, as the adu report and acucli are always only showing static information. Furthermore as the quickspecs showed the p220i although from the gen8 series controllers actually works with 3gbps only :/

the screenshot from the lab server also shows 6gbps for the disk, but as i said the controller only allows for 3gbps

[Nestorov]

of course the 3gps is for SATA disks, SAS SSD/HDD should be capable of speeds up to 6gbps according to quickspecs

[drolfe]

Hi,

I was looking at the P721m/2g cards to install into our BL465 gen 8's

With the blade enclosure 6g Sas switches connected to our D2700 storage array

My question now, Will the D2700 array connect SATA SSD drives to its backplane at 6G or 3G??

Regards Daniel