Dell PERC S100 User Manual

Dell PowerEdge

RAID Controller (PERC) S100,

PERC S300

User’s Guide

Notes, Cautions, and Warnings

NOTE:

your computer.

A NOTE indicates important information that helps you make better use of

CAUTION:

A CAUTION indicates potential damage to hardware or loss of data if

instructions are not followed.

WARNING:

A WARNING indicates a potential for property damage, personal

injury, or death.

____________________

Reproduction of these materials in any manner whatsoever without the written permission of Dell Inc. is strictly forbidden.

Trademarks used in this text: Dell™, the DELL logo, PowerEdge™, and OpenManage™ are trademarks of Dell Inc. Intel™ is a registered trademark of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries. AMD Sempron™ are trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices, Inc. Microsoft

Server and/or other countries.

Other trademarks and trade names may be used in this publication to refer to either the entities claiming the marks and names or their products. Dell Inc. disclaims any proprietary interest in trademarks and trade names other than its own.

Models: UCS61, UCS60

February 2011 Rev. A01

are either trademarks or registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States

is a registered trademark and AMD Opteron™, AMD Phenom™, and AMD

, Windows®, and Windows

Contents

1 WARNING: Safety Instructions

SAFETY: General

SAFETY: When Working Inside Your System

Protecting Against Electrostatic Discharge

2Overview

Introduction

General Information, Intended Audience, and Prerequisites for Use

Related Documentation

PERC S100 Adapter or PERC S300 Adapter Descriptions

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About RAID

RAID Terminology

3 Features

General Features

Specifications

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4 Hardware Installation

Before You Begin

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Contents

General Considerations

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Installing the PERC S300 Adapter

Connect Physical Disks to the PERC S300 Adapter

Complete the Hardware Installation

5 Installing the Drivers

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Installing the Microsoft Windows Drivers

6 RAID Configuration and

Management

Configuring the Controller: Using the PERC Virtual Disk Management Utility

7 Troubleshooting

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System Startup Problems

Warning Messages: Dell Inc. PERC S100 Adapter or Dell Inc. PERC S300 Adapter BIOS Screen

Virtual Disk-Related Errors

Physical Disk-Related Errors

8 Appendix A

Controller Specifications

Controller Tasks

Physical Disk Tasks

Virtual Disk Tasks

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Contents

Supported RAID Levels

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Virtual Disk Specifications

9 Appendix B

RAID Technology - Understanding Disk Arrays and Virtual Disks

10 Appendix C

Regulatory Notices

FCC Notice (U.S. Only)

Industry Canada Notice (Canada Only)

CE Notice (European Union)

CE Mark Notice

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11 Appendix D

Contacting Dell

Index

Glossary

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103

Contents

WARNING: Safety Instructions

Use the following safety guidelines to help ensure your own personal safety and to help protect your system and working environment from potential damage.

WARNING:

(PERC) S300 adapter to liquids. To reduce risk of fire hazard, do not cover or obstruct the ventilation openings of the system in which it is installed. Do not install the controller in a zero-clearance compartment. This could result in overheating.

Do not expose the Dell PowerEdge Expandable RAID Controller

WARNING:

any way.

WARNING:

damaged by static electricity. Be sure that you are properly grounded. It is recommended that you wear a grounded antistatic strap and that the system is unplugged before you install the controller.

CAUTION:

PERC S300 adapter. The connectors are keyed to prevent them from being inserted incorrectly.

CAUTION:

on any pending tasks (such as a rebuild) before it is turned off to conduct a system upgrade.

CAUTION:

PERC S300 adaper. An update might take up to five minutes per controller.

Do not operate the controller if it has been dropped or damaged in

The controller, like every other electronic part of a system, can be

Cable connectors must be mated carefully with the connectors on the

Ensure that the current RAID controller (if any) is not currently working

During a firmware update, do not reboot the system that contains the

WARNING: Safety Instructions

SAFETY: General

Observe and follow service markings:

• Do not service any product except as explained in the user documentation. Opening or removing covers that are marked with a triangular symbol with a lightning bolt might expose you to electrical shock. Components inside these compartments must be serviced only by a trained service technician.

• Use the product only with Dell-approved equipment.

• Operate the product only from the type of external power source indicated on the electrical ratings label. If you are not sure of the type of power source required, consult your service provider or local power company.

SAFETY: When Working Inside Your System

Before you remove the system covers, perform the following steps in the sequence indicated.

WARNING:

covers from the system, and access any of the internal components, unless the Dell documentation expressly states otherwise.

Only trained service technicians are authorized by Dell to remove

CAUTION:

after turning off the system before disconnecting the controller.

Turn off the system and any devices.

Wear grounding straps that are properly grounded before touching anything inside the system.

While you work, periodically touch an unpainted metal surface on the chassis to dissipate any static electricity that might harm internal components.

Disconnect your system and devices from their power sources. To reduce the potential of personal injury or shock, disconnect any telecommunication lines from the system.

To help avoid possible damage to the system board, wait five seconds

WARNING: Safety Instructions

In addition, take note of these safety guidelines when appropriate:

• When you disconnect any cable, pull on its connector or on its strain-relief loop, not on the cable itself. Some cables have a connector with locking tabs. If you are disconnecting this type of cable, press in on the locking tabs before disconnecting the cable. As you pull connectors apart, keep them evenly aligned to avoid bending any connector pins. Also, before you connect a cable, make sure that both connectors are correctly oriented and aligned.

• Handle the controller with care. Do not touch the components or contacts on the controller.

Protecting Against Electrostatic Discharge

Electrostatic discharge (ESD) events can harm electronic components inside your system. ESD, or electrostatic discharge, is the process by which static electricity can build up within a person or an object, and then discharge into another object. ESD events can harm your PERC S300 adaper, your system, and other electrical components. To prevent ESD damage, you must discharge static electricity from your body before you interact with any of the system’s internal electronic components. You can protect against ESD by touching a metal grounded object (such as an unpainted metal surface on your system’s I/O panel) before you interact with anything electronic. In addition, as you work inside the system, periodically touch an I/O connector to remove any static charge your body might have accumulated.

You can also take the following steps to prevent damage from electrostatic discharge:

• When unpacking the controller from its shipping carton, do not remove the controller from the antistatic packing material until you are ready to install it. Just before unwrapping the antistatic package, be sure to discharge static electricity from your body.

• Handle all electrostatic sensitive components in a static-safe area. If possible, use anti-static floor pads and work bench pads.

WARNING: Safety Instructions

Overview

Introduction

The Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC) S300 provides an integrated software RAID solution for Dell PowerEdge Value Servers. The PERC S300 controllers support SAS and SATA interfaces. Containing two internal connectors with four ports each, the PERC S300 adapter features eight ports for connecting drives with a maximum burst speed of up to 3 Gbps per port.

The PERC S100 adaper is targeted as a low-cost RAID solution for Dell PowerEdge Value Servers. The PERC S100 adapter solution supports SATA Hard Disk Drives (HDD) and Solid State Disk (SSD) drives. The PERC S100 adapter requires no additional hardware; it runs from the I/O Controller HUB (ICH) or Platform Controller Hub (PCH) chipset on the platform motherboard.

The PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter offer the same RAID level support and functionality, including the support of up to eight physical drives.

General Information, Intended Audience, and Prerequisites for Use

This document provides information about:

•The

• Controller configuration and startup procedures

• Controller operating modes

PERC S100 adapter

operating system, and software support

and PERC S300 adapter, including server,

Overview

This document is intended for use by system administrators and technicians who are familiar with the storage system installation and configuration.

Prerequisites for configuring and using the controller include familiarity with:

• Servers and computer networks

• RAID technology

• Storage-interface technology, such as SAS and SATA

Related Documentation

For more information about the PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter and its relationship to the Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Storage Management documentation, see the Storage Management documentation available on the Dell Support website at support.dell.com/manuals.

PERC S100 Adapter or PERC S300 Adapter Descriptions

The following list describes each type of controller:

• The PERC S300 Adapter has two internal connectors with x4 SAS ports.

• The PERC S300 Modular has two internal connectors with x4 SAS ports.

• The PERC S100 adapter runs on the ICH or PCH chipset on the platform motherboard.

Overview

Supported Platforms

Table 2-1. Dell Systems and Support Matrix for the PERC S100 Adapter and PERC S300 Adapter

PowerEdge Server PERC Controller, with Chipset and Adapter Support per Platform

PowerEdge R210 PERC S100 adapter – Intel Ibex Peak chipsets

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter

PowerEdge R210 II PERC S100 adapter – Intel Cougar Point chipsets

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter

PowerEdge R310 PERC S100 adapter – Intel Ibex Peak chipsets

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Modular

PowerEdge R410 PERC S100 adapter – Intel ICH10R chipsets

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Modular

PowerEdge R415 PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Modular,

AMD SP5100 South Bridge chipsets

PowerEdge R510 PERC S100 adapter – Intel ICH10R chipsets,

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter

PowerEdge R515 PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter,

AMD SP5100 South Bridge chipsets

PowerEdge T110 PERC S100 adapter – Intel Ibex Peak chipsets

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter

PowerEdge T110 II PERC S100 adapter – Intel Cougar Point chipsets

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter

PowerEdge T310 PERC S100 adapter – Intel Ibex Peak chipsets

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter

PowerEdge T410 PERC S100 adapter – Intel ICH10R chipsets

PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter

Overview

Platform Requirements for the PERC S100 Controller and PERC S300 Controller

Table 2-2. Platform Requirements — PERC S100 Controller or PERC S300 Controller

Component Requirements

Processor x86, 32-bit compatible processor greater than 500 MHz. Memory 512 MB or greater. Physical

disk

Ports

Available slots

At least one Hard Disk Drives (HDD) or Solid State Disk (SSD) Drives.

NOTE:

4 SATA HDD or 4 SATA SSD physical disks. The PERC S300 controller supports cabled or hot-swap configurations of up to 8 SATA or SAS HDD physical disks.

• SATA-II HDD physical disks can be used with a PERC S100 adapter or

• SATA-II SSD physical disks can be used only with a PERC S100

• SAS HDD physical disks can be used only with a PERC S300 adapter.

• The S300 Adapter has two 8470-type internal SAS connectors on the

• The S300 Modular typically plugs into a backplane that has a single

The PERC S300 Adapter and PERC S300 Modular cards plug into 8-lane Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCI-E) slots.

The PERC S100 controller supports cabled configurations of up to

a PERC S300 adapter.

adapter.

adapter card. Each mini-SAS connector supports 4 SAS/SATA ports.

8470-type SAS connector (except for PERC S300 adapters on an R210 or T110, whose cables plug directly into the physical disks).

Overview

Table 2-2. Platform Requirements — PERC S100 Controller or PERC S300 Controller

Component Requirements

Operating systems

• Microsoft Windows Essential Business Server (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Datacenter Edition (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Edition (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Edition (x86)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Foundation

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 HPC Edition

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter SP1

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise SP1

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation SP1

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 HPC Edition

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard SP1

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Datacenter Edition (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Enterprise Edition (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Enterprise Edition (x86)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Standard Edition (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Standard Edition (x86)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Web Edition (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Web Edition (x86)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Standard Edition (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Standard Edition (x86)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2, 64-bit, Standard and Enterprise Edition

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 64-bit Web Edition

Overview

Table 2-2. Platform Requirements — PERC S100 Controller or PERC S300 Controller

Component Requirements

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Web Edition (x64)

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Web Edition (x86)

• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2008

• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2008 SP2

• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003 R2 SP2 (x86 or x64)

• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2011

• Microsoft Windows Web Server 2008 R2

• Microsoft Windows Web Server 2008 R2 SP1

• Microsoft Windows Server 2003 SP2 (x86 or x64)

•Microsoft Windows Enterprise Edition

• Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2 32-bit Web Edition

• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2, 32-bit or 64-bit, Standard and Enterprise Edition

Server 2003 R2 SP2, 32-bit or 64-bit, Standard and

Supported devices

NOTE: NOTE:

NOTE:

with Windows Hyper-V.

• PERC S100 adapter: supports Dell-supported SATA-based tape devices

NOTE:

Dell RD1000 tape device. Select Continue while in CTRL-R for RD1000 to remain first in the boot order. The RD1000 option goes to end of the boot order listing if <Ctrl><Alt><Del> is selected and you would not be able to boot to it.

• PERC S300 adapter: does not support tape devices or SATA optical disk

Microsoft Windows Server 2003 SP1 is not supported.

Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 is not supported.

PERC S100 controllers and PERC S300 controller are not supported

and SATA optical disk devices.

The PERC S100 controller supports system boot to a tape using a

devices.

Overview

About RAID

A RAID disk array is a group of independent physical disks that provides high performance by increasing the number of drives used for saving and accessing data. A RAID disk subsystem improves I/O performance and data availability. The physical disks appear to the host system either as a single storage unit or multiple logical units. Data throughput improves because several disks are accessed simultaneously. RAID systems also improve data storage availability and fault tolerance. Data loss caused by a physical disk failure can be recovered by rebuilding missing data from the remaining physical disks containing data or parity.

NOTE:

is no redundancy for this RAID level. However, when a physical disk in a RAID 1, RAID 5, or RAID 10 fails, data is preserved because there is redundancy with these RAID levels.

Summary of RAID Levels

When a physical disk in a RAID 0 virtual disk fails, data is lost because there

•Volume logical volume on which data is stored.

• RAID 0 uses disk striping to provide high data throughput, especially for large files in an environment that requires no data redundancy.

• RAID 1 uses disk mirroring so that data written to one physical disk is simultaneously written to another physical disk. RAID 1 is good for small databases or other applications that require small capacity but also complete data redundancy.

• RAID 5 uses disk striping and parity data across all physical disks (distributed parity) to provide high data throughput and data redundancy.

• RAID 10 uses disk striping across two mirrored sets. It provides high data throughput and complete data redundancy.

uses available space on a single physical disk and forms a single

Overview

RAID Terminology

Stripe element 1 Stripe element 5 Stripe element 9

Stripe element 2 Stripe element 6

Stripe element 10

Stripe element 3 Stripe element 7

Stripe element 11

Stripe element 4 Stripe element 8

Stripe element 12

Disk Striping

Disk striping allows you to write data across multiple physical disks instead of just one physical disk. Disk striping involves partitioning each physical disk storage space into stripes of the various sizes. These stripes are interleaved in a repeated sequential manner. The part of the stripe on a single physical disk is called a stripe element.

For example, in a four-disk system using only disk striping (used in RAID level 0), segment 1 is written to disk 1, segment 2 is written to disk 2, and so on. Disk striping enhances performance because multiple physical disks are accessed simultaneously, but disk striping does not provide data redundancy.

Figure 2-1 shows an example of disk striping.

Figure 2-1. Example of Disk Striping (RAID 0)

Disk Mirroring

With mirroring (used in RAID 1), data written to one disk is simultaneously written to another disk. If one disk fails, the contents of the other disk can be used to run the system and rebuild the failed physical disk. The primary advantage of disk mirroring is that it provides 100 percent data redundancy. Because the contents of the disk are completely written to a second disk, it does not matter if one of the disks fails. Both disks contain a copy of the same data at all times. Either of the physical disks can act as the operational physical disk. Disk mirroring provides 100 percent redundancy, but is expensive because each physical disk in the system must be duplicated.

Figure 2-2 shows an example of disk mirroring.

Overview

Stripe element 1 Stripe element 2 Stripe element 3

Stripe element 1 Duplicated Stripe element 2 Duplicated Stripe element 3 Duplicated

Stripe element 4 Stripe element 4 Duplicated

NOTE:

devices cannot be migrated to a PERC S300 controller.

Figure 2-2. Example of Disk Mirroring (RAID 1)

Mirrored physical disks improve read performance by read load balancing.

The PERC S300 controller only supports physical disks (SAS and SATA). SSD

Spanned RAID Levels

Spanning is a term used to describe the way in which RAID level 10 is constructed from multiple sets of simpler RAID levels. For example, a RAID 10 has multiple sets of RAID 1 disk arrays in which each RAID 1 set is considered a span. Data is then striped (as it is in RAID 0) across the RAID 1 spans to create a RAID 10 virtual disk.

Parity Data

Parity data is redundant data that has been generated to provide fault tolerance within certain RAID levels. In the event of a drive failure, the parity data can be used by the controller to regenerate user data. Parity data is present only for RAID 5 disk arrays.

The parity data is distributed across all the physical disks in the system. If a single physical disk fails, it can be rebuilt from the parity and the data on the remaining physical disks. RAID 5 combines distributed parity with disk striping, as shown in Figure 2-3. Parity provides redundancy for one physical disk failure without duplicating the contents of entire physical disks.

Overview

Figure 2-3. Example of Distributed Parity (RAID 5)

stripe element1 stripe element2 stripe element3 stripe element4 stripe element5 parity (1-5)

stripe element7 stripe element8 stripe element9 stripe element10 parity (6-10) stripe element6

stripe element13 stripe element14 stripe element15 parity (11-15) stripe element11 stripe element12

stripe element19 stripe element20 parity (16-20) stripe element16 stripe element17 stripe element18

stripe element25 parity (21-25) stripe element21 stripe element22 stripe element23 stripe element24

parity (26-30) stripe element26 stripe element27 stripe element28 stripe element29 stripe element30

Overview

Features

General Features

The features of the Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC) S100 and PERC S300 adapter are described in Table 3-1.

NOTE:

Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller

RAID Controller Feature Description

BAS, BGI, CC and OCE run only on the operating system.

Automatic virtual disk rebuild

Background Array Scan (BAS)

Background virtual disk initialization (BGI)

Rebuilds a redundant virtual disk automatically when a failure is detected, if a hot spare is assigned for this capability.

Verifies and corrects correctable media errors on mirror, volume, or parity data for virtual disks. BAS starts automatically after a Virtual Disk is created while in the OS.

The background initialization of a redundant virtual disk creates the parity data that allows the virtual disk to maintain its redundant data and survive a physical disk failure.

Because background initialization helps the controller to identify and correct problems that might occur with the redundant data at a later time, background initialization is similar to a consistency check.

Background initialization allows a redundant virtual disk to be used immediately. Data is lost if a physical disk fails before the completion of a BGI.

NOTE:

Disk Management utility, the PERC S100 adapter/PERC S300 adapter drivers must be loaded before the BGI runs.

Although a BGI is software-initiated at the PERC Virtual

NOTE:

Management utility refers to both the PERC S100 Virtual Disk Management utility and the PERC S300 Virtual Disk Management utility.

Unless mentioned otherwise, the term PERC Virtual Disk

Features

Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller

RAID Controller Feature Description

(continued)

Boot support for RAID levels

Boot support for degraded virtual disks

Cache support for virtual disks

Checkpointing Allows different types of checkpointing (background

Command queuing Command queuing is a command protocol used by SATA

Allows boot support for Volume, RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5, and RAID 10.

Enables the system to boot from degraded redundant virtual disks (RAID 1, RAID 5, or RAID 10).

Supports these cache options: None, Read Only, Read/Write. The PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter uses part of system memory for cache.

initialization, consistency check, and rebuild) to resume at the last point following a restart.

After the system restarts, background checkpointing resumes at its most-recent checkpoint.

and SAS physical disks that is supported by the PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter.

Command queuing allows the host to issue multiple input/output requests to a disk simultaneously. The disk can then decide in which order to process the commands to achieve maximum performance.

The SATA and SAS versions of command queuing have slightly different protocols and means of handling multiple traffic requests at the same time, but the end-purposes are comparable.

Features

Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller

RAID Controller Feature Description

(continued)

Consistency check (CC)

Disk initialization For physical disks, initialization writes metadata to the

Fault tolerance The following fault tolerance features are available with the

A consistency check is a background operation that verifies and corrects the mirror or parity data for fault-tolerant physical disks. It is recommended that you periodically run a consistency check on the physical disks.

By default, a consistency check corrects mirror or parity inconsistencies. After the data is corrected, the data on the primary physical disk in a mirror set is assumed to be the correct data and is written to the secondary physical disk in the mirror set.

A consistency check cannot be user-initiated in the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility. However, a consistency check can user-initiated when using Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Storage Management.

physical disk, so that the controller can use the physical disk.

PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter, in order to prevent data loss in case of a failed physical disk:

• Physical disk failure detection (automatic).

• Virtual disk rebuild using hot spares (automatic, if the hot spare is configured for this functionality).

• Parity generation and checking (RAID 5 only).

• Hot-swap manual replacement of a physical disk without rebooting the system (only for systems with a backplane that allows hot-swapping).

If one side of a RAID 1 (mirror) fails, data can be rebuilt by using the physical disk on the other side of the mirror.

If a physical disk in RAID 5 fails, parity data exists on the remaining physical disks, which can be used to restore the data to a new, replacement physical disk configured as a hot spare.

If a physical disk fails in RAID 10, the virtual disk remains functional and data is read from the surviving mirrored physical disk(s). A single disk failure in each mirrored set can be sustained, depending on how the mirrored set fails.

Features

Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller

RAID Controller Feature Description

Mirror rebuilding A broken mirror can be rebuilt after a new physical disk is

inserted and the physical disk is designated as a hot spare. The system does not have to be rebooted.

(continued)

Online Capacity Expansion (OCE)

Physical disks (general)

OCE is a process that allows you to add storage capacity to an existing virtual disk. In most cases additional storage capacity can be added without taking the system offline. However, if an additional physical disk needs to be added and the system does not support hot-swapping, the system must be turned off.

OCE enables you to increase the total storage capacity of a virtual disk by integrating unused storage with the virtual disk.

Data can be accessed while the physical disks are added (if a system has hot-swap capability) and while data on the virtual disk is being redistributed.

For Volume and RAID 1, OCE expands the virtual disk by using the available space of the physical disks that are already members of the virtual disk. For RAID 0, RAID 5 and RAID 10, additional capacity can be attained by adding physical disks to the virtual disk.

The PERC S100 adapter supports up to four SATA HDD or SSD physical disks. The PERC S300 adapter supports up to eight SAS or SATA HDD physical disks.

Features

NOTE:

interface and drive type (HDD or SSD). For example, you cannot mix a SATA and SAS interface (HDD or SSD), or HDD and SSD physical disks, in the same virtual disk.

A maximum of eight physical disks can be used for RAID 0 and RAID 5. A maximum of two physical disks can be used for RAID 1. A maximum of four physical disks can be used for RAID 10.

If a physical disk fails during system startup, the controller identifies the failed physical disk as follows:

• At the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility by

The physical disks in a virtual disk must be the same

highlighting the failed physical disk in a virtual disk in red.

Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller

RAID Controller Feature Description

(continued)

Physical disk hot-swapping (hot-swap capability)

• In a brief warning at the

BIOS

that a virtual disk(s) were found that are

Failed

• At Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Storage Management.

• With a bi-color Status LED on each physical disk. The green element of the Status LED is off, while the amber element flashes on and off.

NOTE:

adapter and a backplane that has removable physical disks.

NOTE:

capacity 2 TB and greater. Current and upcoming releases of PERC S300 adapters will only support upto 2 TB HDD physical disks .

Hot-swap (hot-plug) capability is the manual substitution of a physical disk for another one while the host system is powered on.

If a system supports hot-swapping, physical disks can be plugged into a system’s backplane while the controller is operating, without causing the controller to reset.

Dell Inc. PERC S300 Controller BIOS

. This alerts the user to the failed physical disk(s).

The Status LED applies only to systems with a PERC S300

PERC S100 adapters support HDD physical disks of

Dell Inc. PERC S100 Controller

screen,

Degraded

and/or

CAUTION:

only if the system has a PERC S300 adapter and a backplane that supports hot-swapping.

NOTE:

system’s cover is removed, the physical disks cannot be hotswapped. The physical disks must be located on the backplane (behind the removable front panel) and accessible externally.

NOTE:

already been created, make sure that SAS HDD physical disks are replaced with SAS HDD physical disks, that SATA HDD physical disks are replaced with SATA HDD physical disks, and that SATA SSD physical disks are replaced with SATA SSD physical disks.

NOTE:

new disk is of equal or greater capacity to the physical disk that is being replaced.

A physical disk can be hot-swapped from a system

If a system’s physical disks are accessible only when the

When replacing physical disks in a virtual disk that has

When hot-swapping a physical disk, make sure that the

Features

Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller

RAID Controller Feature Description

Physical disk roaming The controller supports moving a physical disk from one

backplane slot or cable connection to another (on the same controller). The controller automatically recognizes the repositioned physical disk and logically places it in the proper order.

(continued)

WARNING:

roaming while an OCE is running at Storage Management.

NOTE:

add parts, see the Hardware Owner’s Manual, available on the Dell Support website at support.dell.com/manuals.

Perform the following steps for physical disk roaming:

NOTE:

backplane with hot-swap capability.

NOTE:

configuration data on the physical disks.

For more information on how to open the system and

These steps do not apply to systems that have a

Turn off the power to the system, physical disks, and system components.

Disconnect the power cables from the system.

Move the physical disks to different slots on the backplane or to different cable connections.

Perform a safety check. Make sure the physical disks are inserted properly.

Connect the power cables and power up the system.

The controller detects the RAID configuration from the

A virtual disk is lost if you perform disk

Storage port (Storport) driver support

Stripe size Stripe size is determined by a PERC S100 adapter/PERC

Features

For use with Storport driver improves throughput and miniport driver interfaces.

S300 adapter algorithm. Stripe size cannot be configured by the user.

Microsoft Windows Server

2003 and later, the

Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller

RAID Controller Feature Description

Virtual disks (general) Up to eight virtual disks are supported.

The PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter allows:

• Creating virtual disks of different RAID levels on a single controller.

• Creating different RAID level virtual disks on the same physical disk, to adapt each virtual disk to the I/O that it processes.

• Building different virtual disks with different characteristics for different applications.

The PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter does not allow:

• Creating a virtual disk from a mix of different type physical disks. For example, a RAID 10 virtual disk cannot be created from two SATA-II HDD physical disks, a SAS HDD physical disk, and a SSD physical disk. All of the physical disks must be the same interface (SAS or SATA) and drive type (HDD or SSD).

(continued)

• Selecting a physical disk as a dedicated hot spare if the physical disk is a different type from the physical disk or disks.

A virtual disk refers to data storage created by the controller from one or more physical disks. Although a virtual disk can be created from several physical disks, it is seen by the operating system as a single disk.

The capacity of a virtual disk can be expanded online for any RAID level, without the operating system being rebooted.

Features

Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller

RAID Controller Feature Description

Virtual disk migration The controller supports automatic virtual disk migration

from a PERC S100 adapter to a PERC S300 adapter (or vice versa). Manual intervention for migration is not required or used by the PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter.

(continued)

Virtual disk RAID levels

Virtual disk transformation

CAUTION:

down both systems before removing or inserting the physical disks. After the migration occurs, make sure that all of the physical disks have been migrated and are present in the virtual disk.

CAUTION:

migration during an OCE.

NOTE:

SATA SSD disks. SAS disks cannot be migrated with a PERC S100 adapter.

NOTE:

dissimilar controllers or dissimilar system models when the system uses Microsoft Windows Server 2003 as its operating system.

Virtual disks at different RAID levels can be created.

Virtual disk transformation can consist of:

• Capacity expansion, using OCE (to allocate additional virtual disk space on the original physical disks or after additional physical disks are added).

Before starting a virtual disk migration, power-

The virtual disk is lost if you perform a virtual disk

The PERC S100 adapter only supports SATA HDD and

A bootable virtual disk cannot be migrated between

• Rebuilding (rebuilding data on a virtual disk consists of using an available hot spare or backup physical disk).

Features

Specifications

Table 3-2 compares the specifications of the PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter.

Table 3-2. Specifications for the PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter

Specification PERC S100 adapter PERC S300 adapter

SAS technology No Yes SATA technology Yes Yes eSATA technology Yes No SSD technology Yes No Support for x8 PCI-E Host Interface No Yes I/O Controller Intel ICH10R or

Intel Ibex Peak chipsets or Intel Cougar Point

chipsets Communication to the system Integrated PCI-E lanes Communication to end devices SATA links SAS/SATA links SAS connectors No Two 4-port connectors

SATA connectors Discrete on the

motherboard Lead-free Yes Yes Supported operating systems Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Family,

Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Family,

Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Dell-compliant SATA compatibility Yes Yes Dell-compliant SAS compatibility No Yes

Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter

on all systems Two 4 -po rt c onn ect ors

on all systems

Dell-supported direct-connected end devices

*SMART error support through management applications

Backplane supported systems No Yes

Dell-compliant

physical disks

Yes Ye s

Dell-compliant physical disks

Features

Table 3-2. Specifications for the PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter

Specification PERC S100 adapter PERC S300 adapter

Software-based RAID Volume, RAID 1,

RAID 0, RAID 5,

RAID 10 Maximum number of virtual disks 8 8 Support for internal tape drive Yes No Support for global hot spare Yes Yes Maximum number of hot spares Varies (by the number

of free disks in the

system)

Volume, RAID 1, RAID 0, RAID 5, RAID 10

Varies (by the number of free disks in the system)

*SMART is supported under the Windows Driver but is not supported with Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) and CTRL-R. The SWRAID SMART drive status shows as "Degraded" in OpenManage Storage Services (OMSS).

Features

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