SGI® InfiniteStorage 350 Quick Start Guide
007-4932-001
CONTRIBUTORS
Written by Mark Schwenden
Illustrated by Chrystie Danzer
Production by Mark Schwenden
Additional contributions by Dick Brownell, Cheryl Herbison, Mark Miller and Sammy Wilborn
COPYRIGHT
© 2006, SGI. All rights reserved; provided portion s may be copyright in third parties, as indicated elsewhere herein. No permission is granted to copy , distribute,
or create derivative works from the contents of this electronic documentation in any manner, in whole or in part, without the prior written permission of SGI.
LIMITED RIGHTS LEGEND
The electronic (software) version of this document was developed at private expense; if acquired under an agreement with the USA government or any
contractor thereto, it is acquired as "commercial computer software" subject to the provisions of its applicable license agreement, as specified in (a) 48 CFR
12.212 of the FAR; or, if acquired for Department of Defense units, (b) 48 CFR 227-7202 of the DoD FAR Supplement; or sections succeeding thereto.
Contractor/manufacturer is Silicon Graphics, Inc., 1200 Crittenden Lane, Mountain View, CA 94043-1351.
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Linux is a registered trademark of Linus Torvalds.
All other trademarks mentioned herein are the property of their respective owners.
Record of Revision
Version Description
001 December 2006
First publication
007-4932-001 iii
Contents
Contents
1. SGI InfiniteStorage 350 Quick Start Instructions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
RAID Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Performance Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
RAID Controller Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Availability Features . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
General Technical Features and Specifications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Supported Platforms. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Contacting the SGI Customer Service Center . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
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Chapter 1
1. SGI InfiniteStorage 350 Quick Start Instructions
This document guides a knowledgeable user through the unpacking, installation and basic setup
of an SGI InfiniteStorage 350 SATA RAID system. If your system is being unpacked and set up
by SGI professional services personnel, set these instructions aside as a reference.
Figure 1-1 SGI InfiniteStorage 350 Front Panel
For information on SGI Altix servers used with your InfiniteStorage system, see:
• SGI Altix XE210 System User’s Guide (P/N 007-4870-00x)
• SGI Altix XE240 System User’s Guide (P/N 007-4873-00x)
• SGI Altix 450 System User’s Guide (P/N 007-4857-00x)
The InfiniteStorage 350 system shares many of the functions and components used by the
InfiniteStorage 4000 RAID sub-system. Shared information on storage operation, rack features,
system indicator lights, troubleshooting, and replacing components, is found in:
• SGI InfiniteStorage 4000 RAID System User’s Guide (P/N 007-4834-00x)
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1: SGI InfiniteStorage 350 Quick Start Instructions
These and other SGI documents are available in PDF or other formats, and can be searched,
accessed and downloaded via internet from the SGI publications library at:
http://docs.sgi.com
Various formats are available. This library contains the most recent and most comprehensive set
of online books, release notes, man pages, and other information.
RAID Features
The InfiniteStorage 350 RAID system is a mass storage system using serial ATA (SATA) disks
exclusively . All drive arrays in the RAID must be SAT A attached. No intermixing of fibre channel
expansion units is supported. Also, no intermixing of fibre channel disks within the controller unit
or SATA expansion units is supported. The InfiniteStorage 350 RAID does support the following:
• 1-GByte cache per RAID controller canister for a maximum of 2-GBytes per RAID
controller enclosure.
• 16 SATA disk drives are pre-installed at the factory in both the RAID controller enclosure
and the optional disk expansion enclosures.
• Each dual-controller RAID enclosure uses two 4-Gbit per second front-end host ports per
controller module, for a total of four host ports.
• One or two optional SATA disk expansion enclosures can be attached to the “back-end” disk
channels.
Important: The RAID controller canisters used with the SGI InfiniteStorage 4000 products
cannot be interchanged with the controllers used in the InfiniteStorage 350 products.
While the form and function of the InfiniteStorage 350 is similar to other SGI SA TA-based RAID
products such as the TP9300S, it is important you note the following:
• Older serial ATA drives (such as those used in TP9300S or TP9500S) are not generally size
(data capacity) compatible with the InfiniteStorage 350 disks and should never be used as
spares in InfiniteStorage 350 drive arrays.
• Fibre Channel (SCSI-protocol) drives cannot be used as spares in SATA enclosures.
• The 3992 RAID controller interface used in an InfiniteStorage 350 has a different form
factor than RAID controllers used in the interface on older SGI RAID products. The
difference can also be confirmed by special marking or part numbers on the 3992 RAID
controller canister.
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• The InfiniteStorage 350’s 3992 RAID controllers cannot be used as spares or replacements
for other SGI RAID controllers.
• The expansion enclosures contain environmental status modules (ESMs) instead of RAID
controllers. Each environmental status module contains an environmental services monitor
board (ESM) and two slots for SFPs (small form-factor pluggables).
• The ESM board is the interface between the controller enclosure and the expansion
enclosure. The ESMs used in the 16-slot disk expansion units are not interchangeable with
those used in the SGI 14-slot disk expansion enclosures.
• The ESMs in the enclosures can be swapped with those used in the InfiniteStorage 4000
units as they also support Fibre Channel (SCSI-protocol) drives.
Performance Features
The SGI InfiniteStorage 350 RAID storage system has the following basic features:
• Support for cost effective (SATA) drive array technology.
• Continuous availability, with constant monitoring and optional redundancy of all active
components.
Performance Features
• Dynamic scalability, making it easy to grow RAID disk resources without disruption.
• Superior connectivity, allowing simultaneous connections to multiple servers directly or by
way of storage area networks (SANs). Support for optical host connections.
• Large storage capacity with support for up to 48 drives.
• Storage management facilities for installation, configuration, expansion, and monitoring.
• Redundant power supplies and hot-swappable components.
• Upgradeable to meet a variety of RAID requirements.
• Integrated RAID controllers.
• Battery backup for cache data.
Note: The InfiniteStorage 350 controller enclosure and it’s 16-slot disk expansion units use a
switched bunch of disks (SBOD) technology. This functions in a manner similar to an FC-AL
switch, allowing the controller to establish point-to-point connections between a disk and the
controller.
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1: SGI InfiniteStorage 350 Quick Start Instructions
RAID Controller Features
The RAID controllers in the InfiniteStorage 350 have the following features:
• 48-drive maximum configuration
• Five RAID levels (0, 0+1, 1, 3, and 5)
• 4 Gbit/s front end (FE) and 4 Gbit/s back end (BE)
Note: The back end can also support 2 Gbit/s, the setting of whether to use 2 or 4 is based on
the selector switch located on the front of the controller and expansion enclosures.
• Switched connection to disk (SBOD)
• Immediate LUN availability (ILA)
• Transparent disk drive rebuilds
• Variable stripe size per controller (16K, 32K, 64K, 128K, 256K and 512K)
• Mirrored cache
• Drive roaming during power off
• Cache coherency
• Transparent failover and failback
• Automatic error recovery
• Write through, write back, or read ahead support
• Automatic detection of failed drives
• Automatic drive rebuilds, using a “hot spare” drive
• Hot-swappable drives
• SAN mapping server to LUN mapping
• Automatic firmware flashing: In a dual controller configuration, the firmware of the
replacement controller is automatically flashed to match the firmware of the surviving
controller.
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Availability Features
The InfiniteStorage 350 has the following availability features:
• Dual power feeds with dual power supplies
• Redundant cooling
• Battery back-up (BBU) maintains cache in case of power failure
• Dynamic hot-sparing
• Non-disruptive component replacement
General Technical Features and Specifications
The InfiniteStorage 350 has the following technical features and specifications listed in T able 1-1.
For additional technical information and specifications, see Appendix A in the SGI InfiniteStorage
4000 RAID System User’s Guide (P/N 007-4834-00x).
Availability Features
Table 1-1 InfiniteStorage 350 Technical Features and Specifications
Technical Feature Specification Overview
Enclosure airflow Front to back airflow
Host interface compatibility Backward compatible with 1Gbit and 2 Gbit HBAs
Enclosure max shipping weight 115 lbs. (52.2 kg) use at least two people to lift enclosure
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1: SGI InfiniteStorage 350 Quick Start Instructions
Supported Platforms
The InfiniteStorage 350 supports the following hardware and software platforms:
• Hardware: SGI Altix series, Silicon Graphics Prism visualization systems.
Note: Contact your SGI sales or service representative for more specific information on
supported hardware systems.
• Software: SGI Linux Environment of SLES 10 with SGI ProPack 5 or later and CXFS.
Support for SLES 9.
• Specific IRIX platforms are supported with IRIX release 6.5.27 or higher.
Note: For further updates or information, refer to the product release notes located on the CD
shipped with your InfiniteStorage 350 RAID system.
Contacting the SGI Customer Service Center
To contact the SGI Customer Service Center, call 1-800-800-4SGI, or visit
http://www.sgi.com/support/customerservice.html.
From outside the United States contact your local SGI sales office.
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