Help using a seperate raid controller with a proliant ML330

[Keith Dinser]

Greetings all, I'm pretty new to setting up servers and such, so please go easy on me if I ask stupid questions. I'm setting up a proliant ML330 server that we had in our warehouse for a customer who wants 2 18 gig HDD's set up in a mirrored pair. I get lots of errors if pull out the scsi card that came with the unit so I'm assuming that has to remain in place. The card has a jumper block on it, is it possible to disable the scsi controller on the card so I can use a seperate raid controller?

Card Part number is Spare#176608-001

[Sunil Jerath]

Hello Keith,
The P/N you have mentioned in your message is a Server feature board which cannot be taken out or the server wont boot. In any case you do not need to disable the SCSI Controller which is onboard this feature board. Just install the SCSI controller and go in the System partition and make sure it's recoganized by the system. Save and exit and then you should be all set to go.

Regards,

[Gert Luyten]

I'll add something to this: if you are new to Proliant servers, you must make sure you have the following tools/knowledge:
- generation of the ML330 you have (if it's opal color=Generation1, carbon color =Generation 2 or 3). This has it's affect on the BIOS configuration tool.
- the Smartstart CD's that come with the server (can be version 5.x or 6.x)
- if the server contains a RAID controller (usually a Smart Array or a lower-end LC2 or LC3). If it doesn't, you can use the built-in SCSI channel to configure software RAID1 but I recommend against it (and underline against)!!

With all this info and tools, you can begin installing the server with the Smartstart CD that accompanies the server. Simply boot from it and choose 'Assisted Installation'.
A child can do the rest :-))

Rgds, Gert.

[Lien Mock]

No need to disable with jumpers, Just install the smart array(sa) and connect the scsi drives to the sa ctlr. Make sure the id's are set. on boot up it shouold recognize the scsi ctlr and the sa ctlr. Just hit F9 when prompted and change the boot ctlr and then the boot order. put your smart staart cd in and if you have a 6.x version proceed to update the rompaqs before doing the os install.

[Keith Dinser]

Thanks for the replies, I'm past my original question/problem. Here's my current situation,

I installed an adaptec scsi raid 2100s after installing win2000 server on one of the scsi drives. After installing the card and letting the raid system rebuild the second drive, the server would hang when it tried to run windows. It would also blue screen and give an unexpected_kernel_mode_trap error
(0x0000007f), if I tried to rerun the 2000 install.

I pulled one of the mirrored drives from the server and put the cable back on the unit's original scsi card and was able to boot into windows just fine. That's when I found that the Raid driver had an error on it. I reinstalled the driver and let windows reboot and it went away, every thing seemed fine.

I hooked up the raid card again with both drives and tried to run windows again. Again it wouldn't load, but this time it told me that a file was corrupted.

At this point, I'm assuming, (I don't know that much about raid systems, so this could be totally wrong), that the corrupted file error is because the drives are out of sink just a bit due to the driver changes that I preformed on only one of the drives. How can I get them back in sink, short of formating the second drive and letting the first drive rebuild it again. Thanks again for any tips/help. Also, this is a used server, and I don't have the smartstart CD and I don't have time to order one.

[Martin Breidenbach]

I'd use a HP/Compaq RAID controller with a HP/Compaq server. Much less trouble.

I don't know that adaptec RAID controller so I don't know how it handles this but:

DON'T MOVE DRIVES BETWEEN RAID AND 'NORMAL' SCSI CONTROLLER (if you still need the data).

(This may not happen in your special case but I prefer to be careful)

Many RAID controlles use a different hard drive layout and reserve some space for themselves (for example to store the RAID configuration on the drives). In such a case connecting a drive containing data that was not formatted by the RAID controller to a RAID controller can destroy all data.

If you want to use a RAID controller:
1. connect drives to the RAID controller
2. configure RAID
3. format the drives from the RAID controller (if it offers this option; some controllers need this. HP/Compaq SMART don't, HP/AMI NetRAID and HP/Adaptec NetRAID do.)
4. install operating system
5. install RAID adapter tools (some RAID controllers require special management software to notice you when a drive fails.)

[Keith Dinser]

Thanks for the info guys, I've slowly but surely plowed my way through this mess. The drives are happy, windows 2000 is updating, I just have to install exchange server and it should be ready to go. Knowing I had this forum to turn to helped keep me calm during the more stressful moments, thanks.

Keith Dinser
(no longer a server virgin)