Modular Smart Array 30 - need to start using those disks / need RAID5

[cokehpux]

connected a disk array to my hpux server

how do I configure those disks and start using the disks insde that array for VG creation, data copy etc

I will also need some basic learning as inhow to work on these disks in disk array 

Many thanks

# model
9000/800/rp3440
# uname -a
HP-UX xxxxxxxxxx B.11.23 U 9000/800 2785651817 unlimited-user license
#

used HP 12 VHDCI To VHDCI SCSI Cable

one end of the cable is in a card installed in  pci 3 slot in my hpux server

the other end of the cable is  in MSA30's  U320 slot A

ioscan shows just two local OS disks

did ioscan -fn to see 

Class I H/W Path Driver S/W State H/W Type Description
===================================================================

ba    3     0/2/1/0 PCItoPCI CLAIMED BUS_NEXUS PCItoPCI Bridge
ext_bus 19 0/2/1/0/4/0 ciss CLAIMED INTERFACE PCI-X SmartArray 6402 RAID Controller
/dev/ciss19
target 3 0/2/1/0/4/0.7 tgt CLAIMED DEVICE
ctl 10 0/2/1/0/4/0.7.0 sctl CLAIMED DEVICE Initiator
/dev/rscsi/c19t7d0

(I know there are 14 x 300GB disks in the disk array)

I see ths\is:

# saconfig /dev/ciss19

******************** SmartArray RAID Controller /dev/ciss19 ********************

Auto-Fail Missing Disks at Boot = disabled
Cache Configuration Status = cache NOT configured
Cache Ratio = N/A

---------- PHYSICAL DRIVES ----------

Location Ch ID Size Status

External 1 0 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 1 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 2 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 3 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 4 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 5 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 8 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED

#

then I see this

# sautil /dev/ciss19

******************************************************************************
**** ****
**** S A U T I L S u p p o r t U t i l i t y ****
**** ****
**** for the HP SmartArray RAID Controller Family ****
**** ****
**** version A.02.12 ****
**** ****
**** (C) Copyright 2003-2007 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. ****
******************************************************************************

---- DRIVER INFORMATION ------------------------------------------------------

Driver State........................ READY

---- CONTROLLER INFORMATION --------------------------------------------------

Controller Product Number........... A9890A
Controller Product Name............. HP PCI-X SmartArray 6402
Hardware Path....................... 0/2/1/0/4/0
Serial Number....................... Confidential info erased
Device File......................... /dev/ciss19
Hardware Revision................... 'B'
Boot Block Revision................. 3.86
Firmware Revision (running)......... 2.48
Firmware Revision (in ROM).......... 2.48
Firmware Revision (inactive)........ 2.48
# of Logical Drives................. 0
# of Physical Disks Configured...... 0
# of Physical Disks Detected........ 7
Logical Drive Rebuild Priority...... 0 (low)
Array Capacity Expansion Priority... 0 (low)
Auto-Fail Missing Disks at Boot..... disabled
SCSI Transfer Detection Mode........ Auto Detect

---- ARRAY ACCELERATOR (CACHE) INFORMATION -----------------------------------

Array Accelerator Board Present?.... yes
Cache Configuration Status.......... cache NOT configured
Cache Ratio......................... N/A
Total Cache Size (MB)............... 128
Read Cache........................ N/A
Write Cache....................... N/A
Transfer Buffer................... N/A
Battery Pack Count.................. 2
Battery Status (pack #1)............ BELOW REFERENCE VOLTAGE
Battery Status (pack #2)............ ok

---- LOGICAL DRIVE SUMMARY ---------------------------------------------------

# RAID Size Status

[ No logical drive(s) detected ]

---- SCSI DEVICE SUMMARY -----------------------------------------------------

Location Ch ID Type Capacity Status

external 1 0 DISK 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
external 1 1 DISK 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
external 1 2 DISK 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
external 1 3 DISK 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
external 1 4 DISK 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
external 1 5 DISK 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
external 1 8 DISK 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
external 1 15 PROCESSOR
internal 2 0 N/A 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
internal 2 1 N/A 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
internal 2 2 N/A 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
internal 2 3 N/A 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
internal 2 4 N/A 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
internal 2 5 N/A 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
N/A 2 7 N/A N/A N/A
internal 2 8 N/A 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED

---- SCSI BUS SUMMARY --------------------------------------------------------

External Internal
Ch LVD_Mode Connector Connector

1 YES YES -
2 YES - -

---- SCSI DEVICE 1:0 [DISK] --------------------------------------------------

Connector Location............................... external
Channel Number................................... 1
SCSI ID.......................................... 0
Device Type...................................... DISK
Disk Capacity.................................... 300.0 GB
Device Status.................................... UNASSIGNED
Device Vendor ID................................. COMPAQ
Device Product ID................................ BF3008B26C
Device Serial Number............................. Confidential info erased
Device Firmware Version.......................... HPB9
SCSI Transfer Rate (actual)...................... Ultra-320
Reserved Area (cfg/status info).................. 557.1 KB (0.6 MB)
Block Size (bytes/sector)........................ 512 bytes
M&P Data Stamped?................................ yes
Last Failure Reason.............................. none

(a very long output - I am wondering how do I attach a text file here)

[feigenL]

Hello there, you need to configure the disks with the saconfig command, for example:

https://www.dectrader.com/docs/set01/44192/J6369-90075.html

[cokehpux]

the MSA has dual port IO moules

so we connected two VHDCI SCSI cables from MSA to our PA RISC hpux 11.23 server

MSA has 14 x 300GB disks.

In hpux server in saconfig I see 7 disks from one channel and another 7 from another channe;

we intend to use RAID 5

(1) how do I use the disks while creating a logical drive? which disk to be used as spare dirive in the below command

saconfig /dev/ciss5 -R 5-S 16 -p 1:1 -p 2:1 -s 1:2

(2) after creating logical drive using saconfig - I will see that logical drive in ioscan -funC disk in HPUX OS - I beleive 

(Like I said I am looking for basics here.... any guidance will be highly appreciated - Many thanks)

# saconfig /dev/ciss19

******************** SmartArray RAID Controller /dev/ciss19 ********************

Auto-Fail Missing Disks at Boot = disabled
Cache Configuration Status = cache NOT configured
Cache Ratio = N/A

---------- PHYSICAL DRIVES ----------

Location Ch ID Size Status

External 1 0 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 1 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 2 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 3 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 4 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 5 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 8 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 0 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 1 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 2 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 3 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 4 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 5 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 8 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED

#

=========================================================================

p.s.

this from page 4 in https://www.dectrader.com/docs/set01/44192/J6369-90075.html - very helpful for me

4. Determinethelogicaldriveconfiguration.Considerthefollowing:

• OnlylogicaldrivescanbeaccessedbyHP-UX.Physicaldiskscannotbeaccessedby

HP-UX.EachlogicaldriveisrecognizedasaverylargeSCSIdisk.

• Donotincludephysicaldisksofdifferentcapacitiesinthesamelogicaldrive.

• HP-UXrecognizesSmartArraylogicaldrivesasdisks,soyoucanusetheLogical

VolumeManager(LVM)toconfigurethemasphysicalvolumes.Youcanthenpartition

thedriveintoseparatelogicalvolumes

[cokehpux]

@feigenL 

I think I understand it now

I will use six disks from channel 1 - will create RAID5 (7th disk will be a spare)

I will use six disks from channel 2 - will create another RAID5 (7th disk will be a spare)

I was confused with -c option in saconfig

as I do not  know what size would it come up with when I use certain number of disks

but that same option -c made me realise I can make multiple logical drives by mentioning

channel 1 - has 7 disks...each 300GB

channel 2 - has 7 disks..each 300GB

If I use the below command, use 6 disks in RAID5 plus one spare disk....

then one single  logical drive - logical drive#0 will be created  with  approx size 1.4TB

(only one large scsi disk in OS will be created because of this)

saconfig /dev/ciss19 -R 5 -S 16 -p 1:0 -p 1:1 -p 1:2 -p1:3 -p 1:4 -p 1:5 -s 1:6 

But then I may need more than one disks in OS to use... three different PVs in OS for three different VGs - for example

so I need to do this by using -c 

saconfig /dev/ciss19 -R 5 -S 16 -p 1:0 -p 1:1 -p 1:2 -p1:3 -p 1:4 -p 1:5 -s 1:6  -c 400GB 

(logial drive 0 with 400GB size gets created)

saconfig /dev/ciss19 -R 5 -S 16 -p 1:0 -p 1:1 -p 1:2 .......-p 1:5 -s 1:6 -c 300GB

(logical drive 1 with 300GB size gets created with the same set of PVs used in logicaldrive 0)

go to HPUX OS....ioscan, insf etc...

you will see two new disks (400GB and 300GB size)

use them to create VG, LV mount points etc

==

# saconfig /dev/ciss19

******************** SmartArray RAID Controller /dev/ciss19 ********************

Auto-Fail Missing Disks at Boot = disabled
Cache Configuration Status = cache NOT configured
Cache Ratio = N/A

---------- PHYSICAL DRIVES ----------

Location Ch ID Size Status

External 1 0 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 1 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 2 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 3 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 4 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 5 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 1 8 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 0 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 1 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 2 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 3 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 4 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 5 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED
External 2 8 300.0 GB UNASSIGNED

#

==

if you have dual port MSA30

channel 1 has 7 disks and

channel 2 has 7 disks

how do you recommend to use the disks frm

one RAID 5 from all disks in channel 1 or

one RAID 5 from a 3 disks on channel 1 and a 3 disks from channel 2 and may be a spare disk from any channel

is there some logic to thsi...to spread the DISKs across the channels - or it doesnt matter?