Compaq Proliant 3000

[Andy Robertson_1]

Hello,
I recently bought part of a Compaq Proliant 3000 at a computer garage sale. It is just the drive cage, with 8x9.1GB scsi drives and the board on the back of the cage that the drives plug into. I hooked power up to the power connector and 1 scsi cable (internally and externally on the card) and all that happens is the 3 lights on the trays all light up and then go off. The first drives(top,left) yellow light stays on. I am using an adaptec 2944UW/Dell. I don't really expect this to work, but I figured it would just be like a scsi chain. I realize there are a lot of variables and such and am not really looking for a direct answer to "why doesn't this work?", more of a "can this be done, or am I wasting my time?"
The drives did not spin up either. There is another plug (looks like a mini atx connector) that I figure powers the drives to spin up, but do not know the pin out. I have a plug from the original machine that I could probably modify but need the pin out to do so.
I probably need the rest of the machine as well for this to work but I figured it was worth a shot.
Thanks for any help you can give.
Andy

[JohnWRuffo]

Andy:

Wow... blazing a new trail! yes, the drives will need to receive a signal from the RAID/SCSI controller to initialize and spin up. The drives are hard jumpered to wait for an init sequince. So, saying that, you may be able to configure the Adaptec to send the init and spin commands to the drives and get them to go.

The other connector is for the IDE signal cable.

A major concern if you do get this I/O cage to work for you is going to be airflow. These drives need a lot of air moving over them to keep cool.

Yeah... the rest of the server would be a good thing.
Here is a PDF on the 3000 media cage:
http://h200005.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/UCR/SupportManual/TPM_179764-001_ch2/TPM_179764-001_ch2.pdf
Start on Page 20.

[Andy Robertson_1]

Thanks for the swift reply.
And the encouragement... I am going to give this a shot then.
Keep in mind, I am not a newbie, but then again, I am not an expert either.
I checked out the file you sent me and it raised some more questions.
Am I going to need the system and utilities software that originally came with the 3000 or will Win98 or XP do?
Do I need the Drive Array Software or is that only for the card that was with the original system?
Is it Raid only?
Will I need the IDE signal cable?
What does the IDE signal cable do?
The one power plug is enough to power 8 7200RPM drives?
I had it hooked up to a spare plug in the computer with the scsi connection, maybe a separate power supply will be needed? Would 300-350 watts be enough? I see the original power supply was 750 watts, but it had the rest of the computer to power as well.
Again, thanks for your help....
Andy

[JohnWRuffo]

This is such a cool effort, I wana see it work too!

The software you would normally need for a ProLiant 3000 would be the Array Configuration Utility and the System Configuration Utiltiy. Since you don't have the rest of the 3000 then the SCU is not needed. Since you are not using a Compaq/HP RAID controller, you will not use the ACU either.
Your 2940 will have "drivers" to be installed in the O/S of your choice. That is about it for software.

The IDE signal cable is for the CD-ROM.

The power needed for the server are mostly taken up by the processors and the drives. Yes, one connector with a BIG draw! 350 watts should be enough to spin the drives.

I am curious, how are you going to bind the units together and provide enough cooling? You will need to be carefull if you use two power supplies that they get sine wave cleaned power. The PC you connect this to as well as the power for the drive cage will need to come from the same UPS. Otherwise i am sure you are gona get feedback.

[Andy Robertson_1]

Well, I am glad you think it is "cool". I figured I was nuts or something!
This is good then that I won't have to worry about any of the original software.
I wonder if I am using a scsi CD Rom, will I need the IDE Signal cable?
What may I ask do you mean by *bind* the units together? They are in the cage that was in the original computer. I was thinking of seeing if I could get it to work first, and then maybe *try* to build a box of some sort to fit them into and have serious cooling built into the box. I am even less of a carpenter than I am a computer person so this one may prove more difficult than getting it to go.
I do have a UPS that I could connect both drives and computer to. I never even thought of that, I figured with 2 separate power supplies it would be ok as long as there was enough power to it.
Thanks for all your help John!
I will probably be back again in the future as I get this beast up and running.
Andy

[JohnWRuffo]

The IDE signal cable = Typical 40 pin IDE cable set to "cable select" on the CD-ROM.

Yeah... I was wondering what the final enclosure would be like... I forsee a bunch of fans in the back. LOL

[Andy Robertson_1]

I don't see a 40 pin connector on the board.
This is the board directly attached to the back of the drive cage.
It has 2 scsi input connectors (labeled 0 and 1)
Directly between and slightly lower these is a connector labeled power input. I thought this might be the IDE signal cable connector. I see now that it is a power connector. I am going to have to find the pin out for this as it is 8 pins smaller than a regular atx connector.
Below this plug is a 4 pin plug that I also see now is labeled "removable media power output" OOPS! I was so excited when I got this thing home, I figured this was the power plug and this is where I plugged the power into. DOH! This is probably why the drives didn't spin up. Hope I didn't fry anything. Didn't see or smell smoke.
Underneath this is the simplex passthru connector.
Certainly no 40 pin ide connector though.
There is a number on the board...
Board No 007462-001 rev c.
Well, I just got a new motherboard for my gaming system and I am itching to install it, so the earliest I will be back at this thing is Sunday.
Thanks again
Andy

PS- If you get a few 0's or blank points, It took me a couple of minutes to figure out how to do it and then today, I hit the wrong button. Sorry 'bout that!

[Andy Robertson_1]

Hello Again,
Well, I was able to get the drives going. I borrowed a 80 pin SCA to 68 pin SCSI adapter from a friend and was able to format and verify 7 of the 8 drives. 1 of them is dead. I now know the drives work and am looking into options with which to get the rest of it to work. I was talking with a couple of people who have access to some things I don't. One of them works in a call centre for HP and is going to see if he can find a pinout for the power supply on the backplane board. Failing that, he is willing to try to figure out which pins are ground and which ones provide power. The other guy services them and has put a poo-poo on the whole idea. He says that it will only work in the proper computer with the supplied adapter. I may have to look for another 3000 complete and go from there.
He said that there is bits of information on the drives, the backplane, motherboard and the scsi controller which enables it to work properly as a unit. I had pictured the backplane as being like a cable except in a more solid form. I don't really care to use the raid option, I was just looking for some cheap storage.
Thoughts.....?
Andy

[Devin Colbert]

While we are on the topic of Proliant 3000 I have a configuration question.

I recently picked up a Proliant 3000 and 5500. They are complete and run. The 3000 includes the Smart 2chd SCSI ARRAY as well as dual video card and redundant fan system.

Now I am trying to get the 3000 to boot into bios so I can make some changes to the boot sequence. I do not have an operating system installed yet. I would like to get the CD Rom to boot first so I can install Windows onto one of the SCSI drives. I plan to switch the OS to Linux once I am done playing around with the Windows OS.

The problem is:

I boot the system and it does give me the "Proliant" wash screen. It does test the memory and the Array but I get a 172-nonvolatile memory not valid error during the boot screen. It then asks to if I want to continue to the run configuration screen(F1), if I don't select annything the 3000 will jump to a blank screen with just a flashing cursor. If I do select something the 3000 will jump to a screen say diskette error, please install and press any key. I have not been able to get into the system BIOS so I can't make any changes to have it look at the SEAGATE HDD I installed for the OS. It just sits there with a blank look on it's face.

All I am trying to do at the moment is load the Windows OS so I can play around with it before I convert it to a Linux Mail, IRC Chat server.

So, how do I get into BIOS and what is the hang up here? Thanks!

[Devin Colbert]

Sorry that should be a 2DH Smart Array.