ML 115 G5 with GB0250EAFJF HDs ; No SMART ability??

[BetaPsi_]

I have an ML 115 G5 with 4 GB0250EAFJF model hard drives. I was hoping to monitor the SMART thresholds of the drives, but it seems as if SMART is not supported. I checked the BIOS and I don't see any settings related to SMART. I searched the ML100 series server documentation and could not find mention of SMART. I searched for the individual HD model and couldn't find anything specific about SMART support on the GB0250EAFJF model.

Does anyone have any ideas about if SMART is supported on the ML115 servers?

[Manuel Boosch]

what controller are u using ? e200 ?

[BetaPsi_]

Sorry I left out that vital piece of information. I have the integrated RAID controller from nVidia running MediaShield ( http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c00908661/c00908661.pdf ).

[Manuel Boosch · Accepted solution]

as shown by the quick specs, all of the Serial-ATA (SATA) Midline (MDL) HDD's support smart.
("Before final certification, all HP SATA hard drives are optimized for compatibility and functionality, including support of SMART and HP Systems Insight Manager.")

i think it is supported, read this thread
http://forums11.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=1290554

regards

[BetaPsi_]

Thanks for the tips! For some reason I didn't think to search nVidia's site for RAID management software. That thread that you sent me to is basically my exact situation. I'll write out my experience with the software here for the edification of anyone reading this in the future.

I installed the nVidia management software, rebooted and was a little freaked out when the server didn't come back up. I ILO'd into it and saw nothing but a blinking underscore in the upper left corner. I power cycled it via the ILO and watched the BIOS boot up. I saw that two mirrors were blinking "degraded" in red. =( Fortunately this is a pre-production box so nothing is vital on it. Windows did boot up successfully.

I opened the nVidia RAID storage control panel and saw that one mirror was listed as healthy, but there was a second and third mirror showing as unhealthy. That wsa odd since I only had four drives and two mirrors originally. The first with two hard drives were shown as being in a healthy mirror. The next two mirrors had only one hard drive per "mirror" and both mirrors listed as degraded. I could still get to the partitions that were on those drives though.

I deleted those two straggler mirrors and then rebuilt them (all within the nVidia storage control panel) and it seemed to work just fine after that showing only two mirrors and both were healthy. So if anyone is considering installing the nVidia Storage control panel, make sure it's on a pre-production machine and/or you have very up-to-date backups.

I have to say I'm a little displeased with HP's support / treatment of their bottom end servers (ML 110/115). I know they're low-priced for a reason and are targeted at small businesses, but it seems like I've hit a few too many dead ends trying to get this thing set up and manageable (lack of a smart start CD, no ProLiant Support Pack support, can't update hard drive firmware and etc.). Too bad I didn't have the budget for a ML150 with a good RAID card. Ah well. end.rant() =)

Thanks again for the help!

[BetaPsi_]

FYI, I just had reason to install the nVidia storage management software on a new installation of SBS 2008. Same server hardware as above. This time I was patient and waited at the black screen for a little more than 10 minutes. Finally the server booted and got to the ProLiant BIOS splash screen. Apparently I was too impatient before and did not have to reset the server.

I booted into Windows and noticed that one of my mirrors was degraded just like in the other installation. I was hoping that it wouldn't do that since I didn't reset the server in pre-boot. It took my formerly mirrored E: drive and split it into an E: and an F: drive with the exact same volume label "Exchange". Fortunately I had moved the Exchange data to the C: drive temporarily just in case the mirror was broken.

It looks like this is a consistent issue with the nVidia software at least on this hardware.