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Any issues with multiple SCSI cards in one computer??

A

animeguru

Needs More Cowbell
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Nov 5, 2001
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I've got a couple of external arrays that I'm conencting to one server. I currently have a LSI MegaRAID 1600 controlling two internal arrays and one external array, both U160.

I also have a Sun A1000 and a Sun D1000 array that have come into my hands and I'd like to add them to my existing server. Unfortunately, they're HVD devices and they don't like to play with LVD devices. :(

Can anyone think of any reasons why adding an HVD controller wouldn't work?? The motherboard (Intel L440GX+) has SCSI on board, but not in use. Of course, I have available PCI slots, so that's not an issue either.

If I can add another controller, should I use another LSI card, or will an Adaptec or other brand be fine. I don't know if multiple controllers from different manufacturers will be an issue either... ie, conflicting IRQs, etc.

Will it be an issue that there will be HDDs that have the same SCSI ID?? They'd be on seperate controllers, but I don't know if that'd be a Windows issue as well.

Or will this just be an excuse to build another server. :p
 
Shouldn't be a prob ...

I had a KT266A fileserver filled with a Adaptek U2W RAID controller and Adaptec U160 Controller ... and a dual Port NIC ... tons o IRQ sharing but it ran for 38 days 24/7 :D
 
In most cases, you should not have an issue with multiple SCSI controllers in one system. In fact, I've set up systems before with 4 dual channel controllers and it worked fine.

One issue you may or may not run into is that the PCI expansion ROM space on systems is limited. For example, an LSI U320 SCSI host adapter will request 64kB of space at SCSI BIOS initialization. Once initialization is over, it will deallocate memory and use something like 20kB of that expansion ROM space.

The limit is system dependent, but is usually in the 128 to 196kB range. This most likely will not be a problem with only two different controllers, depending on what else is installed in your system that has a PCI expansion ROM.

In the cases where I have run into this limiation, it was with several different models of SCSI controllers from different manufacturers. Sometimes re-ordering the cards in the PCI slots will fix the problems as they all have different initialization and run-time requirements and memory may be available in certain orders.

Typically SCSI controllers of the same brand and model will share the PCI expansion ROM for all the installed controllers, so that is another way to mitigate this problem.

But, in your case, it seems unlikely that adding one more SCSI controller would cause you to run into this problem.
 
UICompE02 nice to see you around :D

same issue can occur with various IDE RAID cards
initialization and run time being different it can often be sorted out by changing the PCI slot the cards reside in (PIRQ routing order) so that a different card intializes first
 
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