Dl380 gen7 server and 1TB SAS drive issue

[MJasner]

I recently got my hands on an HP proliant dl380 Generation 7 server. I'm using it for self-education and experimentation. The first thing I did was look for good SAS drives for it.


I was able to find some used but certified good HP 1tb SAS drives, part number 72511 8 - 0 0 1. However, when the drives are plugged in and the system Powers up the drive lights up Amber and the system sees the drive as failed. I don't believe the drives are actually failed, and I'm wondering if perhaps this model is not compatible with the gen7 server? Is that a possibility? Does anyone know if these drives will work in the gen7 server?

They came pre-installed in trays from a different server with yellow tabs handles and the number 72739 7 on the front. The drive also has a label on it with the following part number : 72857 5 - 0 0 1.

Any help or advice is appreciated. Thanks in advance!

[Amd550]

can  you take a screen shot of the error message 

[MJasner]

There is no error message, the drive light on the front panel  for that drive is simply amber and if I go into the raid setup utility on boot up (with f8) it says that drive is not present.

[Amd550]

ok check the leads on the front sas array are fully home and the same on the motherboard. mine had a loose one and it was doing the same thing

[MJasner]

Thanks for the suggestion. I'm sure the cables are all seated properly because SATA drives work fine in the same slots. I'm thinking the drives might be SAS3 and I'm guessing they're not backward compatible with an SAS2 controller (Which I believe the P410i is).

[Jimmy Vance]

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@MJasner wrote:

Thanks for the suggestion. I'm sure the cables are all seated properly because SATA drives work fine in the same slots. I'm thinking the drives might be SAS3 and I'm guessing they're not backward compatible with an SAS2 controller (Which I believe the P410i is).

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I haven't found any good screen shots of the connector on this drive model, but from what I've seen it appears these were originally in 3PAR drive trays, and the connector interface (what I can see in images anyway) appears to be a bit different than the standard SATA/SATA  interface on most drives.

[MJasner]

The physical connectors look identical.
I'll try and post a picture in a bit, but the connector on the 1tb sas drive looks the same as the 72g sas drive that came in the machine. It also looks the same (minus the center divet) as a sata disk

[Jimmy Vance]

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@MJasner wrote:
The physical connectors look identical.
I'll try and post a picture in a bit, but the connector on the 1tb sas drive looks the same as the 72g sas drive that came in the machine. It also looks the same (minus the center divet) as a sata disk

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Thanks, as I said, the pictured I could find online the space between data and power connectors look like it was a bit different, but if it looks the same as your other drives then I wouln't have any suggestions

[MJasner]

Sorry for the delay in getting this. Anyway, I sat one of the 1tb SAS drives in question on top of a 72gb SAS drive that came out of the server, and sat those on top of a standard SATA drive that works in the server as well for comparison. The picture can be found here:

https://jasnermeadow.dyndns.org:44443/~marc/4hp/1223191523.jpg

As you can see, they all appear the same. At this point I'm thinking either the 1tb drives are SAS3 and not compatible with the P410i controller, or that they're from a 3Par storage system and those are, for some reason, not standard SAS compatible. I guess if I can't get it working in the next few days I'll take advantage of the return policy on these drives and just stick with standard SATA drives that I have on hand for now.