HP SAS Expander Owner's Thread

Where are you guys getting your hp sas expanders from? Looking to buy one and was open to picking up a used one but nothing good on ebay now. Have you all found them there and about how much do they run? Look to be about $300+ on most sites new.
 
dirtrider said:
Where are you guys getting your hp sas expanders from? Looking to buy one and was open to picking up a used one but nothing good on ebay now. Have you all found them there and about how much do they run? Look to be about $300+ on most sites new.
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I've either got them in stock, or 2-3 days out. Our HP techs update the firmware prior to shipment.

PM with any questions.
 
Hi, it's been a while since this topic has been visited. Has anyone had any success using the HP SAS Expander with an Adaptec RAID card? I understand maybe firmware v1.0 works, but any luck with 2.02 or above and recent Adaptec firmware? Thanks, Hammer8
 
Hammer8 said:
Hi, it's been a while since this topic has been visited. Has anyone had any success using the HP SAS Expander with an Adaptec RAID card? I understand maybe firmware v1.0 works, but any luck with 2.02 or above and recent Adaptec firmware? Thanks, Hammer8
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The hp expander with v1 of the firmware works fine with the adapted 5xxx series for me,
 
Anyone know if the HP Expander is compatable with the Rocketraid 3560 or any of the 3500 series cards?

Thanks

Richard
 
Solarnet said:
Anyone know if the HP Expander is compatable with the Rocketraid 3560 or any of the 3500 series cards?

Thanks

Richard
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RocketRaid 35xx controllers are SATA controllers based in the IOP 341 controller (not SAS) and are not compatible with any SAS expanders, HP or otherwise.
 
PigLover said:
RocketRaid 35xx controllers are SATA controllers based in the IOP 341 controller (not SAS) and are not compatible with any SAS expanders, HP or otherwise.
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That's what I thought Just wanted to check to be sure.

Thanks

Richard
 
Guess I should report that it worked in my Asus P6T6 WS too. Forget which slots though.
 
Can anyone recommend a bare bone motherboard just to use to power up the hp sas expander? dont need a cpu / memory etc, just a bare motherboard to power up the hp sas expander card.

Thanx
 
Thanx blue fox, i was just hoping if there is a motherboard alterntive thats all? as the only drawback with using that setup is that you have to use the psu on/off switch.
 
I bought it from buy.com 3 month ago, it is green v1.52. I have simple flashed it from HP P411 to 2.06
 
LSI 9240-8i/ 9240-4i works fine with HP SAS Expander if you configure it from WEb BIOS inside console. Windows MSM and Mega Cli cannot see correct HDD numbers, so you cannot create RAID from all disk in windows. I also tested HP P411 from two servers because I creating windows cluster with HP SAS Expander. Such config works great, but if you start LSI and than HP P411 connecting to the same expander , LSI lost disk configuration. However HP doesn't lost disk config if you attach LSi without config, I am using HP for RAID 10 it works great for me.
 
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That is for the HP SAS controllers not the expander just to be clear
 
they don't update their big all-encompassing firmware disc every time there is a minor revision to one of the member items - just like microsoft doesn't release a new service pack every time there's a hotfix/patch. that's why HP instructs you to grab the most recent firmware file for a particular component and drag&drop it into the correct folder on the USB key you made of the big firmware update disc. its pretty easy.
 
I have an Raid-6 on Arc-1680ix-24 that has been running great. I also have a spare arc-1260-16 ports that I thinking swapping with the 1680 controller. I plan to use the 1680 in another box that can handle 24 drives. Is this 2 controller compatible? will 1260 recognize my raid 6 that was on 1680 without losing data?

thanks
 
You can move arrays between Areca cards quite easily. Just plug the drives in in the same order as before (otherwise you might have to rebuild the array) and you'll be set.
 
all this time I thought the drive order doesn't matter as long the controller is same brand. Does that means if one don't know the order of each drive will lose the data for good? the 1260 has sata connectors whereas 1680 is all SAS. how do you go about making sure that they are in order? sorry for so many questions as I've never done something like this before.
 
Looks like ipcdirect (the Norco webstore) is stocking the HP SAS Expander now, $323. Price is a little higher than what the refurb/grey market ones are going for, but that's not necessarily a bad thing since its factory new. I'm going to ask about the shipping firmware rev and whether it includes miniSAS cables like the retail SKU or not.

http://www.ipcdirect.net/servlet/Detail?no=274
 
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odditory said:
they don't update their big all-encompassing firmware disc every time there is a minor revision to one of the member items - just like microsoft doesn't release a new service pack every time there's a hotfix/patch. that's why HP instructs you to grab the most recent firmware file for a particular component and drag&drop it into the correct folder on the USB key you made of the big firmware update disc. its pretty easy.
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Thanks Odditory, but i do not think they have ever included it on the update disc. i have been editing the update iso for the paste 4 versions of update disc.

I also run 8 DL370's all equipped with the SAS Expander and the update is not mentioned on the DL370 server drivers page.

A big thumbs up for all the time you have put into SAS Expander research. I wonder if all the parts are available in the UK
 
Bookmage said:
For that board, cant u install a regular atx power switch instead of jumpering the ATXCTL1? That way you can use the switch in the front of the case to power it on/off?
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Unfortunately no. Only way that would work is if you had a momentary switch that was normally closed. Alternatively a toggle switch would work too, but the usual power button on a case like the Norco ones won't work.
 
kpuzakov said:
LSI 9240-8i/ 9240-4i works fine with HP SAS Expander if you configure it from WEb BIOS inside console. Windows MSM and Mega Cli cannot see correct HDD numbers, so you cannot create RAID from all disk in windows. I also tested HP P411 from two servers because I creating windows cluster with HP SAS Expander. Such config works great, but if you start LSI and than HP P411 connecting to the same expander , LSI lost disk configuration. However HP doesn't lost disk config if you attach LSi without config, I am using HP for RAID 10 it works great for me.
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Sorry to go a bit off topic, but is such a config really possible? Since the requirement for SAS was introduced for Windows failover clustering, the only configs I have seen have been for simple SAS HBAs in the servers with the actual RAID controllers as part of the array. You are saying it is possible to use RAID controllers in two servers, connect them to one SAS expander, connect your drives to that expander, and have a cluster that works and passes the cluster validation test? Are you limited to two nodes, or can you go higher? Do you have to use dual ported SAS drives? This would be REALLY interesting to me, as I'm hitting bandwidth limits of 10GbE iSCSI and would like to look at potential for SAS for 2 to 4 node clusters, but the prices of arrays like the Dell MD3220 are too high...
 
I had to read that a few times to understand the point @kpuzakov was trying to make, but it sounds like he's talking about multipath, and you'd definitely need dual port drives for that. That and he's finding an inability to mix an LSI and HP (PMC) raid card into the same MPIO topology, which isn't surprising, and I imagine he'd find the same problem regardless of brand of expander used, given its just a link switch.

He doesn't mention whether he used SAS-1 or SAS-2 drives, but I'm guessing SAS-1. SAS-2 in general seems to do better in these kinds of interoperability scenarios.
 
well, it's the "windows cluster" which tripped my alarm bell... Multipath I/O needs providers for MS MPIO (whether iSCSI, FC or SAS) so I wouldn't expect to be able to mix different manufacturer's RAID cards and have it work. But proper failover clustering, two servers connected to the same storage - it would be great if you could do that with RAID cards instead of HBAs and a very expensive chassis, typically with support only for the same vendor's server, HBA and drives.
 
What you would have to do is use HBA's in the your Compute Cluster Nodes.

Then have the "Head Storage Node" setup with the Raid Controller(s) connecting to Expander Chassis. The Head Storage Node would also need some sort of Adaptor (iSCSI, Fiber, Infiniband) to connect back to your Compute Nodes, and possibly a fiber switch depending on how many nodes we are talking about.

You would also need software to take your RAID array and serve it up through the Fiber or iSCSI.
SANMelody and Openfiler come to mind, but im sure there are others as well.
 
ah, nitrobass24, that be HPC clustering, I be thinking about failover clustering. Specifically, hyper-v with live migration & CSV.

What I do now: Supermicro twins, hyper-v cluster, storage on VHDs in CSVs on iSCSI targets, accessed via 10GbE. My iSCSI target is Starwind - two boxes, with their own raid and disks, and synchronous replication between the boxes (at least, I will do that when they rease 5.5). Still, Starwind can use system ram as WB cache, so you can have seriously large WB cache. From cache or RAM disk it can easily saturate 10Gbe and I have freedom of choice about my NICs, RAID and disks.

10GbE is fast, but it's not as fast as SAS. Still, 40GbE products are starting to appear...
 
aitoribarra said:
ah, nitrobass24, that be HPC clustering, I be thinking about failover clustering. Specifically, hyper-v with live migration & CSV.

What I do now: Supermicro twins, hyper-v cluster, storage on VHDs in CSVs on iSCSI targets, accessed via 10GbE. My iSCSI target is Starwind - two boxes, with their own raid and disks, and synchronous replication between the boxes (at least, I will do that when they rease 5.5). Still, Starwind can use system ram as WB cache, so you can have seriously large WB cache. From cache or RAM disk it can easily saturate 10Gbe and I have freedom of choice about my NICs, RAID and disks.

10GbE is fast, but it's not as fast as SAS. Still, 40GbE products are starting to appear...
Click to expand...

The concept is exactly the same. Replace Compute nodes with Virtual Host Nodes and fiber with Ethernet (iSCSI) and its the same setup.

My point was that you cannot connect two RAID controllers to the same "RAID Set" for failover.
 
Ah, but in the old days of SCSI clustering, you could - for two node clustering. It was a bit messy, but it worked. IIRC you were limited to 13 or 14 drives on one SCSI bus. If you could do the same trick with SAS RAID controllers and a SAS expander, with cascading you might be able to get to 200+ drives.
 
I am pretty new to all this so sorry for any rookie mistakes I might do.

I am planning on buying a Norco 4220 chassis (20 bay) and a HP SAS expander.
I am planning on using raid 50 with 2 or 4 sets of raid 5. I am not completely sure though because I want maximum throughput but with some redundancy for when a disc fails. Suggestions are welcome on which raid config to use.
Now, I want to connect this SAS expander via a sff-8088 cable to my workstation, what is a cheap yet reliable raid card that has 1 or 2 sff-8088 connectors that will also work with the HP SAS expander?

Now, what kind of throughput can I expect using 20 identical WD Black 1TB (or 2TB haven't decided)? Am I right in thinking that one sff-8088 (4x 300MB/s) can in theory have a throughput of 1200MB/s? If so I would only need a 4 channel raid card in the workstation.

I want maximum throughput with minimal bottlenecks. In the workstation I am running a 4x60GB SSD raid 0 with over 900MB/s read/write and I want something very close to this speed when transferring large files to and from the file server.

Thanks for any and all help.

/Dan
 
Figured out what RAID card you're going to use yet? If not, Areca is recommended as always. 1880i works nicely with the HP SAS expander. Will also recommend Hitachi drives with the setup as well then over the WD ones. RAID 50 should work nicely for you, but I guess RAID 60 will work too. You are correct about the 1200mb/s part though. With a 6gbit SAS card however, that's doubled. You shouldn't have any troubles reaching ~1gb/s with 20 drives on an Areca 1880i either. You mentioned moving stuff to and from your server. Do you have a network connection that can handle this? If not, you might want to get yourself a couple 10gbit ethernet cards (relatively cheap these days actually) as you'll otherwise be fairly limited speed wise.
 
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