6402 ultra320 controller upgrade

[Skaria Thomas]

After trying in vain to work with MS on our Exchange 2000 performance problems, we have finally decided to throw hardware at the problem.

We have a Proliant DL380 with the integrated 5i RAID controller (ultra2, ultra3 only) with the Storageworks 4354R enclosure. The RAID controller is setup in a RAID 0 + 1 configuration. However, the disks are ultra320 disks, so we decided to upgrade the controller to the 6402 (supports ultra320) and also upgrade the I/O module on the Storageworks to get it to ultra320 speeds.

The upgrade of the I/O module in the Storageworks 4354R is a piece of cake and so is adding the new SCSI card. However, I am a little worried that the new SCSI card will not recognize the RAID configuration. Has any of you done this? I am running Windows 2000 server. Also, do I just add the 6402 driver to Windows 2000 before I shutdown and add the new SCSI card? I know I need to change the boot order but since no drives will be attached to the 5i, that should not be a problem.

Thanks.

[Leon Rosier]

Hi,

The disks /raidsets will be recognized.
I would do the following:
- Insert the new controller, leave the disks connected to the 5i controller.
- check if 6402 controller has latest firmware
- check system firmware for latest version
- run HP supportpack for Windows, to install the driver
- shutdown the system and connect the drives to the 6402 controller
- during p.o.s.t go into setup (F9) and adjust the boot controller, this does not go automatically.
- you also should see a message during the p.o.s.t. of the 6402 controller that it found a raidset.

Good Luck,

Leon

[Skaria Thomas]

Thank you. That is very helpful. I will try this on my test machine and let the forum know my results.

[Skaria Thomas]

This was completed with only a slight unrelated glitch;

1. upgrade the Windows 2000 5i driver to the latest one which supports the 6402 card
2. plug in the 6402 card but leave the disks attached to the 5i
3. upgrade BIOS of Proliant DL380 (not required but I did it anyway)
4. upgrade the firmware of the 6402 to the lates version (this is required since v. 1.92 exhibits incorrect battery failure messages which also disables the cache) *
5. boot Windows and make sure the 6402 is recognized
6. shutdown server and attach the disks to the 6402
7. boot the server and go into the BIOS setup and change the boot controller order
8. the controller will recognize the RAID set which was previously attached to the 5i automatically
9. boot all the way into Windows

* It turns out that the 6402 firmware upgrade can only be done off-line (their online utility to do this was pulled off the HP website several times already). To upgrade the firmware on the 6402, you need the SmartStart CD ver 6.3 or 6.4. The latest SmartStart CD 7.0.0 does not include the ROM Update utility. HP separated that into a new Firmware Maintenance CD which you have to buy. Any earlier versions of the SmartStart CD (e.g. ver 6.2) is of no use because it does not contain the driver to recognize the 6402 and hence prevent you from upgrading the firmware.

-Skaria

[Skaria Thomas]

One other thing: make sure you insert the 6402 into PCI slot 1. PCI slot 1 is 133 MHz while the other two are 100 MHz.

-Skaria