Cooling Off Large Raid's (pic)

[twistacatz]

For all those people who are starting to invest in large arrays make sure you have a great cooling. With so many hard drives working next to each other the heat build up can cause a failure quick. This is what I did with my array:

 

[valve1138]

I bought some of the Coolermaster 4 in 3 drive cages. They do the same thing, but much more elegantly. And their only $26 at zipzoomgooglegear


edit: I used to have 2 of those case, check your exhaust, it's not very good. and if ther eis more air in than out, the increased pressure will cause heat buildup.

 

[twistacatz]

I looked at those coolmaster drives cages and they are over priced BS. When I built this box I wanted it do it for the low. Buying those stupid cages would not have helped me in any way. I can't tell beucase I can only look at pictures of the cage but it seems like the fan pulls air from the inside of the case which is great but I wanted cool air from outside of the case. I also think that this solution gets more air over the drives and inside the case then drive cage would have provided.

As far as being elegant the inside of the front bezel looks very rough but when attached to the case IMO it looks awesome. And IMO it looks far better then a drive cage and nothing in the front.I looked at those coolmaster drives cages and they are over priced BS. When I built this box I wanted it do it while spending the least amount of money as possible. Buying those stupid cages would not have helped me in any way. I can't tell because I can only look at the pictures of the cage but it seems like the fan pulls air from the inside of the case which is great but I wanted cool air from outside of the case. I also think that my solution gets more air over the drives and inside the case then drive cage would have provided.

As far as being elegant the inside of the front bezel looks very rough but when attached to the case IMO it looks awesome. And IMO it looks far better then a drive cage and nothing in the front.

I pull air out with two fans one on the bottom and one in the back, and it works fine. I'm sure with another case I could move a lot more air but this is what I had to work with.

 

[pwnx]

I got the coolermaster drive cages too with the stacker case. They don't pull air from inside the case. It is actually similar to yours. With the stacker, the front has perforated panels which allow air through so the 120mm is pulling air from outside over the drives.

 

[valve1138]

I got the coolermaster drive cages too with the stacker case. They don't pull air from inside the case. It is actually similar to yours. With the stacker, the front has perforated panels which allow air through so the 120mm is pulling air from outside over the drives.

even without those grills onthe Stacker, the fan on the cage doesn't look too bad, I've got one in an Antec case atm.

 

[mikeblas]

I looked at those coolmaster drives cages and they are over priced BS. When I built this box I wanted it do it while spending the least amount of money as possible. Buying those stupid cages would not have helped me in any way. I can't tell because I can only look at the pictures of the cage

I'm confused: are those cages complete BS, or is it that you can't tell?

NetApp, EMC, Compaq/HP, Dell ... every major enterprise storage vendor uses technology similar to what you've called "over priced BS". With their levers and backplane, those cages enable hot-swapping.

How are you gonig to swap a failed drive with your hot-glue window screen?

.B ekiM

 

[twistacatz]

Backplanes are nice but really not necessary unless you plan to swap drives often, or if your environment is mission critical. Hopefully I don't ever have to swap out an HD out but if I do I have to open up the case and do it, while someone with backplanes can just slide out a tray and pop the HD in. Of course opening up the case sux but if you don't do it very often is it worth $$$ for backplanes? I say NO! Anyone with money would buy backplanes and drive cages they make things easier and look nice, but if you don't are they really that important, and worth the money?

 

[mikeblas]

I say NO! Anyone with money would buy backplanes and drive cages they make things easier and look nice, but if you don't are they really that important, and worth the money?

Maybe not. But if they're not worth the money for some people, are they "total over priced BS"?

.B ekiM

 

[twistacatz]

Maybe not. But if they're not worth the money for some people, are they "total over priced BS"?

.B ekiM

Maybe the coolermaster drive cages are, who knows? I think I was just pissed at the fact that he said they were more elegant.

 

[Ice Czar]

those cages enable hot-swapping.

maybe with SCSI or SATA but not IDE without a sideband
a large number of drive carriers are absolute dog shit and foul up the signal quality considerably
one of the reasons external RAID array are often a better choice
at least that way an EE has gone through and tested the backplane(s)


ATA Not So Frequently Asked Questions

The following article was written by snn47 to address some of the issues associated with standard ribbon cables and the use of e.g. removable drive racks as an attempt to share some insight into factors that can adversely affect the life or reliability of of desktop Hard Disk Drives. Specifically, issues like why some drives are working in some systems and not in others, the impact of cable routing and why is it that the drive manufacturers always recommend using their own cables (if supplied with the drive).

There is a ton of data in this article, some of which are of interest only for the EE-crowd or else some nerds but there is also some stuff of why sometimes simply rerouting the cable can solve the problems at hand.

to wit, my SX6000 RAID 5 error log when it was running the drives via IDE hotswap bays (now they are directly connected)

11/29/03 08:06:57 Warning Read/Write Error Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3) of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=1305d9b cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.
11/27/03 08:35:49 Warning Read/Write Error Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3) of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=4537600 cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.
11/26/03 09:11:21 Warning Read/Write Error Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3) of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=4536773 cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.
11/18/03 17:17:28 Warning Read/Write Error Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3) of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=4537e00 cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.
11/06/03 19:29:49 Warning Read/Write Error Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3) of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=4537180 cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.
11/06/03 17:13:35 Warning Read/Write Error Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3) of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=4537c80 cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.
11/05/03 20:16:51 Warning Read/Write Error Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3) of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=45378c0 cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.
11/05/03 06:18:52 Warning Retry Drive Retry drive access in Array Array1 (0x00000018) Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3)
11/05/03 06:18:51 Warning Read/Write Error Drive WDC WD400BB-00CFC0 (0x00000002 ch 3) of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=4536653 cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.
09/03/03 21:56:30 Error Drive Fail Drive 0x00000002 ch 1 failed
09/03/03 21:56:29 Warning Reserve Sector Error occurred in the reserved sector of the drive 0x00000010 ch -1.
09/03/03 21:56:29 Warning Read/Write Error Drive 0x00000010 ch -1 of Array Array1 (0x00000018) has Read Write Error ch3 LBA=4a8b141 cmd=20 Disk Status= 51.

no drive actually failed, and all of them are now fine, sychronizing the array fixed all read \ write errors, that and getting rid of the hotswap bays

pony up the $$$ for good ones
Personally Im now only using SCSI hotswap carriers

 

[mikeblas]

maybe with SCSI or SATA but not IDE without a sideband

What's a "sideband", in this context?

.B ekiM

 

[Ice Czar]

Winows doesnt support IDE hotswap
(well Win98 sort of did, kind of like USB now)

thus sideband technology is a strategy Promise came up with to hotswap IDE RAID
you need their carriers and cards


http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;192604
http://www.t10.org/ftp/t10/document.94/94-230r1.pdf
http://www.promise.com/company/press/press_news_detail_eng.asp?press_id=9

its both a hardware and a driver issue
the SCSI protocol and SATA do supprt hotswap but again its a driver and hardware issue

 

[mikeblas]

Promise came up with to hotswap IDE RAID
you need their carriers and cards

Yep, those are some of the ones I've used. We've got a lot of TX1000 boxes for externa RAID at work. They were really cool ... four years ago.

Our labs have hot swappable trays from almost every vendor I can think of, and I'd hardly describe them as "BS".

.B ekiM

 

[Ice Czar]

well you got lucky
Promise Carriers are good
but a great majority of "enthusist" drive cages are problematic (and none are "hotswap" )
LSI or 3com had a list of acceptable vendors that was pretty good
the word hotswap came very quickly to be adopted as marketing hype, when in fact only a handful of IDE RAID cards supported it and fewer cages

review the pdf for hotswap issues as they are addressed in SCSI

 

[mikeblas]

but a great majority of "enthusist" drive cages are problematic (and none are "hotswap" )

Not even the SCSI trays built-into Supermicro cases? Not even the 3Ware SATA cages? I've used piles of those, too, and they seemd to work fine.

.B ekiM

 

[Ice Czar]

SCSI and high quality SATA drive cages dont qualify
those arent "enthusiast" cages, Im talking about IDE
PCToys, Kingwin, Bytecc, Sanmax, , ect et al

some are better than other Cermax was on the 3ware list I think, Vantec seems to be rebranding something that seems to work
however I wouldnt adopt anything without extensive testing with ATACT
and reserve the ability to return the cages if they didnt workout
often the nastiest ones come bundled with rackmount cases
adding a few interfaces to ATA and then bumping a standard that was designed for 66MHz up to 133 MHz and expecting it to work with probelmatic cabling and routing is asking for trouble if entered into blindly

 

[twistacatz]

Our labs have hot swappable trays from almost every vendor I can think of, and I'd hardly describe them as "BS".

.B ekiM

Mike I'm getting tired of you taking my words out of context. I told you already I was referring to the coolermaster cages. Not all cages are worthless and over priced. But now that Ice Czar is dropping knowledge it seems like my point makes even more since.

If your using your raid sever as a place to store mp3's or something like that, then you don't need it. If lets say your running a heavy traffic website that has to be up 24/7 then backplanes are necessary. Most people are not doing the later of the two.