Simplex vs. Duplex

[Bryan Gill_1]

Hi all,

I have a ProLiant 6500 with a simplex/duplex drive cage. Currently the drive cage is set for duplex. I am wanting to set it to simplex so I can manage the drives the way I want. I want two 18.2Gb drives in a mirror and four 9.1Gb drives in a raid-5 and one 18.2Gb to serve as a hot-spare for both srive sets. is this possible? Looking for some help! Hello?

Bryan J, Gill, M.C.P.
Quartzon, LLC
Owner / Senior Hardware Engineer
http://www.quartzon.com
bgill@quartzon.com

[Wesley W.D. Summers]

The Simplex & Duplex options only affect which Controller PORT the physical drives are connected to.

None of what you have described above suggests that you NEED a Simplex configuration.

In fact, by describing your need for "two 18.2Gb drives in a mirror" suggests you would be better off with a DUPLEX configuration.

This would allow the mirrored (As well as the RAID-5) drives to have the I/O distributed accross 2 channels. The would provide faster throughput.

Do you have 2 Smart Array ports internally? Which Smart Array controller do you have?

Lastly, the Smart Array Configuration Utility (ACU) requires you to assign any Online Spare to an array. This precludes a single drive being the "hot-spare for both" Logical drives.


Regards, Wesley.

[Bryan Gill_1]

Thanks for the reply! About 30 minutes after I posted this I figured out my config and put it into place. 2003 server is now up and running just fine and in the config I wanted it in. You were correct, the duplex is the way I wanted to go, only I didn't know it. Now I'm off to buy another 18.2Gb for the hot-spare for the primary mirror.

Thanks again for the assistance!

Bryan J, Gill, M.C.P.
Quartzon, LLC
Owner / Senior Hardware Engineer
http://www.quartzon.com
bgill@quartzon.com