• Some users have recently had their accounts hijacked. It seems that the now defunct EVGA forums might have compromised your password there and seems many are using the same PW here. We would suggest you UPDATE YOUR PASSWORD and TURN ON 2FA for your account here to further secure it. None of the compromised accounts had 2FA turned on.
    Once you have enabled 2FA, your account will be updated soon to show a badge, letting other members know that you use 2FA to protect your account. This should be beneficial for everyone that uses FSFT.

Sas Expander vs. another raid card

Z

Zuess

n00b
Joined
Mar 31, 2012
Messages
45
Hi, Long time lurker here but this is my first post.

Like the title says, I have an Adaptec 6805 that's been rock solid for 6 months now.
But, I would like to be able to use more than the 8 ports it has.

I want to have a raid 10 backup of my existing raid 6.

The way I see it is that since the card been solid why risk another card that may not be
trouble free.
I don't believe I would ever need more than 16 ports but, you never know.

The advantage with a second raid card would be that if one card goes down I wouldn't loose my array.

So, any advice or recommendation would be appreciated.
Thanks Zuess
 
You're using the term "backup" but the additional card or expander will be in the same system?

I don't think you should call that a backup. You'd be over looking something like a bad PSU taking out other system components rendering that system unusable.
 
Hi,
I guess backup is the wrong term.
This system has the zero maintenance module for the 6805 as well as an APC backup battery.
Do you think I should use another system for this?
Thanks
 
I think you should decide what kind of outage or loss you can tolerate and plan according to that.
 
vr. said:
I think you should decide what kind of outage or loss you can tolerate and plan according to that.
Click to expand...

Hi,
If I have two arrays I could obviously afford to loose one, but that's not really my question.
 
Zuess said:
Hi,
If I have two arrays I could obviously afford to loose one, but that's not really my question.
Click to expand...

Wasn't trying to derail your threads original question, just tried to point out you're assuming some other failure won't cripple that single system completely was all.
 
vr. said:
Wasn't trying to derail your threads original question, just tried to point out you're assuming some other failure won't cripple that single system completely was all.
Click to expand...

Hi,
I know what you mean, This system is brand new and kinks resolved, knock on wood.
But my understanding is that I would be able to move the raid card with all drives to a different
system if needed.

I'm presently backing up my raid 6 array to my old WHSv1 but I don't want to have two systems running all the time.
That's why I've been considering moving the disk drives to my new WHS 2011.
 
I use an Areca1880ix 12 port card with 2 intel SAS expanders. Inside the main case: Areca card/Intel SAS expander feeding 14 drives in a RAID 6 config. I use the 2nd expander in 2nd case to run my backups (~ 15 drives). A single 8088 cable connects the two boxes. I run backups as needed. Transfer speeds are a constant 300-350MB/s so transfers are fairly quick. The 2nd case is powered up only to run backups. It is more costly to run this setup, but I value my data and wouldnt want to have to recreate and some data/pics are irreplaceable.

Bottom line: intel SAS expander is a solid option as the cost is reasonable and seems to have an advantage over the HP expander in the area of compatibility.
 
Hi,
Thanks, that's what I'm looking at, I have a case that can hold 28 hard drives that's why I could
do it in one system.
So you're answer is the sas expander, LOL
 
Zuess said:
Hi,
Thanks, that's what I'm looking at, I have a case that can hold 28 hard drives that's why I could
do it in one system.
So you're answer is the sas expander, LOL
Click to expand...

He's actually doing it a little safer than what it sounds like you're proposing. Sounds like he only spins up his back up array when he's going to perform a backup. This would protect him at least a little more than having all spindles spinning all the time (which is what it sounds like you're going to do).

If you're wondering why I'm pointing this out, I recently had system problems that took out both arrays within the same system.
 
vr. said:
He's actually doing it a little safer than what it sounds like you're proposing. Sounds like he only spins up his back up array when he's going to perform a backup. This would protect him at least a little more than having all spindles spinning all the time (which is what it sounds like you're going to do).

If you're wondering why I'm pointing this out, I recently had system problems that took out both arrays within the same system.
Click to expand...

Exactly my thoughts. I have toyedwith idea of adding a 2nd 188x card in case one card goes bad, but still assessing cost/benefit.
 
Earl H said:
I use an Areca1880ix 12 port card with 2 intel SAS expanders. Inside the main case: Areca card/Intel SAS expander feeding 14 drives in a RAID 6 config. I use the 2nd expander in 2nd case to run my backups (~ 15 drives). A single 8088 cable connects the two boxes. I run backups as needed. Transfer speeds are a constant 300-350MB/s so transfers are fairly quick. The 2nd case is powered up only to run backups. It is more costly to run this setup, but I value my data and wouldnt want to have to recreate and some data/pics are irreplaceable.

Bottom line: intel SAS expander is a solid option as the cost is reasonable and seems to have an advantage over the HP expander in the area of compatibility.
Click to expand...

I'm curious how you do this, do you manually power up the 2nd case or do you some how
have it automated.
 
Is your 2nd Intel expander powered be a second PSU?
Well currently I've been using WHSv1 for backup of the raid 6 volume and maybe that's the way to go for the short term.

Thanks so much for your help.
 
Zuess said:
Is your 2nd Intel expander powered be a second PSU?
Well currently I've been using WHSv1 for backup of the raid 6 volume and maybe that's the way to go for the short term.

Thanks so much for your help.
Click to expand...

Earl H said:
I use an Areca1880ix 12 port card with 2 intel SAS expanders. Inside the main case: Areca card/Intel SAS expander feeding 14 drives in a RAID 6 config. I use the 2nd expander in 2nd case to run my backups (~ 15 drives). A single 8088 cable connects the two boxes. I run backups as needed. Transfer speeds are a constant 300-350MB/s so transfers are fairly quick. The 2nd case is powered up only to run backups. It is more costly to run this setup, but I value my data and wouldnt want to have to recreate and some data/pics are irreplaceable.

Bottom line: intel SAS expander is a solid option as the cost is reasonable and seems to have an advantage over the HP expander in the area of compatibility.
Click to expand...

Looks like yes to me.
 
Yes it would seem the best way to do it.

Thanks for your assistance.
Zuess
 
Earl H said:
Yes, I manually power up/down. Backups are manual as well.
Click to expand...

After your backups have run and you shut down the second case, how does the raid card react. Does this not set off the alarm.

This sounds like the best way to go but I'm not sure my raid card wouldn't drive me crazy.
 
Zuess said:
After your backups have run and you shut down the second case, how does the raid card react. Does this not set off the alarm.

This sounds like the best way to go but I'm not sure my raid card wouldn't drive me crazy.
Click to expand...

If the 2nd array isnt powered up, the card doesnt recognize it. When it is powered up, the card reads/initializes normally. My old setup(currently for sale) which used two Areca 1202 eSata cards combined with either a Rosewill or Sans Digital 8 bay enclosure(1 main, 1 backup) ran for more than a year without a hitch. When the array/enclosure is powered up, the card recognizes and initializes the entire array...so 2 similar setup, same functionality, no real issues.
 
Earl H said:
If the 2nd array isnt powered up, the card doesnt recognize it. When it is powered up, the card reads/initializes normally. My old setup(currently for sale) which used two Areca 1202 eSata cards combined with either a Rosewill or Sans Digital 8 bay enclosure(1 main, 1 backup) ran for more than a year without a hitch. When the array/enclosure is powered up, the card recognizes and initializes the entire array...so 2 similar setup, same functionality, no real issues.
Click to expand...

That's good to know, and thanks again for your help.

Zuess
 
I just purchased the intel expander so I could setup a backup system in another case as
(Earl H) described in post #8.
So far it doesn't work but it's probably the way I have everything connected.
In the second case I have the Intel expander which is powered by it's own psu using
the 4pin molex on top of the expander.
From the 6805 to the intel expander it's connected with one of the long miniSAS cables
that came with it.
I powered up the second case/backup raid array and created then formatted the array.
When I turned off the backup case the alarm went off and said the array failed.
When I turned the backup case on again I had to wait for a rebuild.
It's not very efficient working like it is now.
Hope someone can help with this setup.
 
Sorry to bump an older thread, but I was wondering if the intel SAS Expander, with it's two in, 4 out architecture supports a net throughput that is a single SFF 8087/8088 (or 4x 6Gbit) i.e. if I ran several SSDs in a JBOD connected to the intel SAS Expander, running to to an outboard server with 2 x SFF 8088 links via an LSI 9285 (or something comparable), would my net throughput = 8 x 6Gbit, or would it be 4 x 6Gbit with redundancy?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top