Raid Acceleration

[Ayman Altounji]

Installing NT4 and various software to my new ML570 gave me numerous errors when using the 5304 controller (128MB), until I disabled acceleration. Does the acceleration feature disable the 128MB cache? Does the 5304 have to be in a particular PCI slot (mine is in slot 4-64-66mhz tertiary slot)? The card seems to be working now (with acceleration off) but I'm hesitant to use this server in production now. Possibly a bad controller?

[Ayman Altounji]

Possibly bad memory on the controller... Are you trying to boot from this card or just use it for storage. According to one reference, the first Smart Array card should be in slot 5 (preferably).

[Ayman Altounji]

try this the nic into slot one and leave 5300 in slot 4, also what errors are you recieving? Based on what they are you maybe okay some are false and may require a rome upgrade which is forth coming from Compaq

[Ayman Altounji]

I'm using this as the boot controller. I'll try moving to slot 5, then turning accell back on, and see what happens. Get back to you in a bit. Thx. Other config details: disabled onboard SCSI controller, set 5304 to boot controller.

[Ayman Altounji]

Hmmmm, accel seems to work now. I've tested by copying hundreds of MB from one partition to another, then back, then back, then back again. Unfortunately I made 2 changes prior to testing so I don't know which change may have made the difference. I moved 5304 to slot 5, and also moved drives to port 1 on 5304 rather than port 2 (I had used port 2 as the SCSI cable is just barely long enough to reach the controller connector at port 1). I'm gonna scrub the server and re-install everything again...hopefully with no errors this time. I'll report back what happens.

[Ayman Altounji]

What did the trick was to complete my OS install with accelleration turned off. This prevented any errors during the initial file copy steps of NT4 install. Once I loaded the NT4 SSD and other related Compaq drivers/agents I turned accell back on. All looks fine now ! I wonder if I do have a memory issue on the 5304 however. This still worries me somewhat. I have not seen any notes requesting accelleration be turned off during OS install. Time will tell, I suppose. Thanks for your suggestions...

Are there any tests I can run to put the controller through it's paces? Heavy stress simulation?

[Ayman Altounji]

After reading your last message on the resolution, I'm curious to know if you have any further information. Sounds like a problem we're encountering with our server. Any additional info (hardware swaps, OS loads, etc.) would be most appreciated.

Thanks!

[Ayman Altounji]

Well, we've now been running this server for 2 weeks in production with absolutely no problems. As mentioned earlier, during OS install acelleration had to be turned off, but once that was done everything has worked exactly as it is supposed to.

[Ayman Altounji]

What is your server's function? File and print? SQL? Exchange?

Thanks!

[Ayman Altounji]

Good info - but if you use a current smartstart and do an assisted installaton you can get around problems like this - the Compaq specific drivers/utilites (Support Paq) are loaded during the install.

[Ayman Altounji]

This server is strictly running SQL 7 services...to this date has been running perfectly with no array controller related issues. Since my initial problems I can only conclude that if doing a manual install, then accell must be turned off. I assume Phil Y's reply is accurate regarding the assisted install.

[Ayman Altounji]

Yes - it's accurate. One of the major selling points of smartstart is the little things, like this, that make setting up servers a little easier. thanks for the reply