HP ML110G6 Raid Options (2 x raid 1 arrays)

[n0fx]

I have a HP ML110G6 desktop server and I'm using the built-in HP Smart Array B110i raid controller (SATA). I already have a raid 1 setup on the server but I was wondering if this card was capable of creating another logical array for another 2 hard drives configured for raid 1?

Basically I have 2 x 1.5TB drives in there already created as a Raid 1 array but I wanted to add another 2 drives to the system with SSDs and make them a separate raid 1 array, so that I can use the SSDs as a boot drive and the 1.5TB drives as storage.

Currently the server is way too slow during bootup and loading programs up.

Is this type of configuration possible? From the manual it looks like it is but I wanted to make sure if it was.

[Michael A. McKenney]

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/Document.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&taskId=120&prodSeriesId=3956246&prodTypeId=15351&objectID=c02555555

[Ali]

Hi There,

ML110 G6 comes with First generation of B100i SATA Raid which does not support SSD drives.

check the storage section of ML110 G6 quickspecs for supported hard drives
http://h18000.www1.hp.com/products/quickspecs/13477_div/13477_div.HTML#Storage

Second generation of B100i SATA Raid controller does support SSD drive. however not available for this server.

hope this helps,
thanks,
Aftab

[n0fx]

Actually it comes with the B110i controller and according to that link, it doesn't state it doesn't support SSDs at all. I just wanted to know if I can do 2 logical array's (separate raid 1s) with the built-in controller.

From the first link I got a response for, it looks like it can. I'll just have to try and see.

[Michael A. McKenney]

As long as the BIOS can see the SSD drives, it should work. HP does not fully support SSD drives on many of their servers. I would look at switch to SAS RAID over using SSD drives in a server. Many consumer grade SSD drives don't last. Unless you get server grade SSD drives, I would consider SAS RAID. You can do much more with a SAS RAID controller. 15K SAS drives have the performance and reliability. SSD drives tend to lose performance over a few months time. Costwise, SAS is a better solution and is fully supported.

[n0fx]

I finally did the config and the raid controller is capable of doing 2 x Raid 1 configurations (not 0+1). I have 4 hard drives, 2 x 1.5TB SATA and 2 x 64GB SATA drives.

It was tricky as first when I added the SSD hard drives to the existing configuration. It would not boot up with the new OS I tried to install it. I had to remove the old Raid 1 configuration for the 2 x 1.5TB hard drives then, then recreate the raid 1 for the 2 SSD drives, install the OS, then add the other raid 1 logical drive to the raid card.

Everything works fine now. Thanks for the help guys!

[Michael A. McKenney]

Did you mix SSD and standard drives? I usually only use the same drives in each RAID array. I don't mix drives because of performance between different drives.