StoreEver Tape Storage
1748282 Members
3978 Online
108761 Solutions
New Discussion юеВ

DL380G4 and Ultrium960

 
SOLVED
Go to solution
stefano colombo_1
Super Advisor

DL380G4 and Ultrium960

I've a question regarding connecting a Ultrium960 to the external scsi port1 of the DL380.

I've connected it and booted the server . While booting the tape is recognized as attached to port1 by the embedded SA6i controller.
However when windows 2003 loads the device is seen with a different SCSI ID and after a while it disappear from the devices list.

The 6i documentation refers specifically to the 380G4 saying that its embedded 6i can manage on one channel the internal drives and the other channel ( the duplex channel ) to be used for external tape drives.

However I'va found no docs on how to cable them .

Can anyone help me with it ?

Thanks
7 REPLIES 7
Mahesh Kumar Malik
Honored Contributor

Re: DL380G4 and Ultrium960

Hi

It is not recommended to put Disks and Tape drives on same SCSI channel. You should have additional SCSI Card to connect external Tape Drive

Regards
Mahesh
Steven Clementi
Honored Contributor

Re: DL380G4 and Ultrium960

Stefano:

Internally, there are no cables to change from simplex to duplex, there is just 1 terminator which sits on the back HDD backplane approximately behind the middle of there the 2 rightmost and 2 middle HDD's sit. It is in a clear plastic housing.

By default, the Dl380G4 ships in simplex mode unless you buy and request duplex mode from your VAR.

When the terminator is NOT connected, the second channel is automatically routed to the back of the server and out through the external connector. When the terminator is applied, the back port does not work at all.

Now, your original issue was that is seems that both the hdd's and the tape appear on the same channel somehow. Have you checked the actual bus:target location before the device disappears in Windows? Can you provide screen shots of the device properties window for yout logical Disk unit and your tape device? Your should see some similar info as in the attached image.

From the sounds of it, during boot up, the drive is detected on port 1, which is the second channel. Port 0 being the first channel. This should be correct.


Have you tried a different SCSI cable? maybe a shorter one if it is long?

Mahesh is correct in saying that it is not recommended, but in this case, you already know that and just want to be able to use it since HP says it can be done. I too recommend a seperate SCSI adaptor as you will realize MUCH FASTER speeds vs. being attached to the SA6i. Even a slower/cheaper SCSI adaptor would be better than the 6i like an 80 or 160 card.



Steven
Steven Clementi
HP Master ASE, Storage, Servers, and Clustering
MCSE (NT 4.0, W2K, W2K3)
VCP (ESX2, Vi3, vSphere4, vSphere5, vSphere 6.x)
RHCE
NPP3 (Nutanix Platform Professional)
stefano colombo_1
Super Advisor
Solution

Re: DL380G4 and Ultrium960

Manesh, I'm aware that it's not wise to connect tape drives and disk drives on the same bus , but in this case we are talking of 2 separated scsi buses. And I'm wondering on how I can have disk drives on the first bus and tape on the second .

Steven,
You're right that channel 1 should be the second channel , I wasn't looking at it right enough , but I don't understand your final point.
Sa6i claimed to be a 2 channel U320 scsi controller , then I cannot see why using the second channel I would have poor performance . You said that I'll have better performance with an old 80 or 160 scsi controller . This sounds very strange to me.

I have always thought that the "duplex" configuration was studied to achieve better perfomance over the simplex one by writing on disk 0 and 2 at the same time ...

regarding the screenshot I can try getting some but next week when I'll be back at the customer site

regards
Stefano
Steven Clementi
Honored Contributor

Re: DL380G4 and Ultrium960

"Sa6i claimed to be a 2 channel U320 scsi controller , then I cannot see why using the second channel I would have poor performance."

I can not see why it would have poor performance either, but that has been the general consensus of those whom have tried what your doing, include yours truely. The fact that it is an U320 Controller AND a Smart Array Controller is likely the cause. Even though it will allow U320 devices, the Array Controller is still active on that channel is is trying to control communications.


"You said that I'll have better performance with an old 80 or 160 scsi controller . This sounds very strange to me."

It does sound very strange, even to me. You seen Peter's direct results... "A colleague installed a Ultra 160 SCSI card in the server (should really be a Ultra 320 but that was the only card that was lying around at the time) and it cut the backups from 10 hours 50 minutes to 1 hour 30 minutes. "

"I have always thought that the "duplex" configuration was studied to achieve better perfomance over the simplex one by writing on disk 0 and 2 at the same time ..."

It should since it is utilizing both channels to communicate. It also makes the configuation slightly more redundant (but not by much). Your not using Duplex though.



Steven
Steven Clementi
HP Master ASE, Storage, Servers, and Clustering
MCSE (NT 4.0, W2K, W2K3)
VCP (ESX2, Vi3, vSphere4, vSphere5, vSphere 6.x)
RHCE
NPP3 (Nutanix Platform Professional)

Re: DL380G4 and Ultrium960

Hi,

I have a similar problem, but I think I am not understanding the explanation.

I have a DL380G4 and a HP StorageWorks SDLT 320, so when I connected the SDLT on the external SCSI Port, The OS (W2K) gave me an error "Unknown Hard Error", then Reboot and on the booting a Received a message " SCSI Bus Termination Error, " Internal and External Drives CANNOT be both attached to the same SCSI port (Controller is Disabled this problem is solved". After this it keeps rebooting until I disconnect the external unit from the External Port. If I cannot use the external port, what it is intended for? Do I neeed to buy an SCSI CARD? Is there any kind of HW modification I can do to make ir work? If so, what about the performance?.
Thanks in advance for your help
Steven Clementi
Honored Contributor

Re: DL380G4 and Ultrium960

Daniel:

It would be best if you could start a new thread with your issue since you would be able to close out the post when you have found an answer, assign some points to people that have helped, make somments and whatnot as the "author", etc.


To give you something to think about... Is your DL380G4 configured for Duplex cage operation? If so, you can not use the external port for anything else.

What is it good for? Ever needed to attach a Disk Shelf to a server? You can on a dl380 without buying an extra Smart Array or SCSI controller.


Steven
Steven Clementi
HP Master ASE, Storage, Servers, and Clustering
MCSE (NT 4.0, W2K, W2K3)
VCP (ESX2, Vi3, vSphere4, vSphere5, vSphere 6.x)
RHCE
NPP3 (Nutanix Platform Professional)
Steven Clementi
Honored Contributor

Re: DL380G4 and Ultrium960

I retract my first statement to you Daniel. I did not look at the forums first since I received an e-mail that took me directly to this thread. I will post there as well.


Steven
Steven Clementi
HP Master ASE, Storage, Servers, and Clustering
MCSE (NT 4.0, W2K, W2K3)
VCP (ESX2, Vi3, vSphere4, vSphere5, vSphere 6.x)
RHCE
NPP3 (Nutanix Platform Professional)