The PERC 2 RAID controller contains four channels. PERC 2/Si and PERC 3/Si are single integrated channel controllers. The PERC 3/Di is a dual integrated channel controller.
Working with these controllers requires an understanding of the Array Manager storage model, which represents the Array Manager storage objects in an object hierarchy. Each object has a set of attributes and operations associated with it. Attributes describe the properties of the object, and operations allow you to create new objects and modify existing object attributes. See The Array Manager Storage Model section in the Storage Management Concepts chapter for more information about the Array Manager storage model.
Unless otherwise stated, each operation described in this chapter is available on each controller type listed above. Operations that are grayed out in the console are not supported or not available at that time. To view attributes or to perform operations, right-click on a given storage object. A context menu will appear with a list of commands available, including a Properties command.
Array Manager allows you to create virtual disks, which are logical disks that can be created from one or more physical disks (known as array disks). The logical disks can have RAID layouts, which let you to manage your storage more efficiently. Once a virtual disk is created and a rescan is done, the Windows® operating system sees the virtual disk as if it were a physical disk. The topics in this section include:
Creating virtual disks is the first step in configuring your RAID storage subsystem. For more information about creating RAID solutions, see Choosing RAID Levels in the Storage Management Concepts chapter.
Right-click on an array group and click Create Virtual Disk.
Read the welcome screen shown and click Next to continue. (You can cancel the operation at any time by clicking the Cancel button.)
The Select Creation Mode dialog box appears. Select Express or CustomMode and click Next to continue or Backto return to the previous screen.
ExpressMode examines your current physical disk layout and available space, and then calculates an appropriate virtual disk layout for you. You select the RAID type and size.
CustomMode allows for a more detailed configuration of your choice. You select the array disks to use.
Click Finish to create a virtual disk or Back to return to the previous screen.
Rescan Disk Layout is checked by default because it is the recommended setting. Rescan Disk Layout allows the host operating system to recognize the new virtual disk and prepares the disk for use. If the Rescan Disk Layout box is not checked when you create the virtual disk, you can complete the same operation later by selecting the Rescan command.
If necessary, add a disk signature to the virtual disk.
If the new virtual disk has an error icon and the General tab view shows that the disk has no disk signature, you will need to add a signature to the disk. For instructions on writing a disk signature, see the section Write a Disk Signature in the Disk Management chapter. For Windows 2000, a disk signature must be added manually. For Windows NT, the signature is added automatically.
Use the Virtual Disk Reconfiguration wizard to change attributes of a virtual disk on a PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, or PERC 3/Di controller. You can:
Migrate from one RAID type to another without adding space.
Use this operation to assign and configure a hot spare. This hot spare will be used to rebuild a degraded array disk, if possible.
If an array disk belonging to a virtual disk fails or is removed, the virtual disk will become degraded. A degraded virtual disk that has a properly configured hot spare will automatically rebuild onto that hot spare.
Right-click on a redundant virtual disk and click Configure Hotspare.
Assign the disks you want to configure as hot spares by dragging them from the left panel to the right panel and click OK.
Note: Hot spares for PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, and PERC
3/Di controllers are always associated with a specific virtual disk.
These controllers do not have a global hot spare option.
Note: If you are formatting a virtual disk on a NetWare® system, you
must first go to the NetWare console and remove the corresponding
volume and partition. For information on how to perform these
operations, see the appropriate NetWare documentation.
This command recovers the disk space occupied by an orphan or dead disk segment. An orphan disk segment is part of a multipartition virtual disk that cannot access another disk segment within the same virtual disk. A dead disk segment is either no longer needed by the virtual disk or is physically damaged. This operation can be performed only on failed virtual disks of redundant RAID types.
Use the SplitMirror command to permanently convert a mirror set or a multilevel virtual disk of mirror sets into two concatenated sets or two multilevel virtual disks of concatenated sets and preserve the data in each resulting virtual disk.
Use the Unmirror command to convert the mirror set to a concatenated set or convert a multi-level virtual disk of mirror sets to a multilevel virtual disk of concatenated sets. Unmirroring preserves the data in the mirror set or multilevel virtual disk of mirror sets, but erases any data maintained by the redundant segment and returns the redundant virtual disk's segments to free space.
Note: A right-click on any one of the array disks displays a menu of
supported operations. These menus are dynamic. Not all menu options
are available at all times.
This command removes the disk space occupied by an orphan or dead disk segment.
A segment may be designated as dead if it is logically bad, is physically damaged, or resides on a disk that has been disconnected from and then reconnected to the controller.
The Blink command allows you to find an array disk within an enclosure by blinking one of the light-emitting diodes (LEDs) on the disk. This command will automatically cancel in 60 seconds.
Use this command to display the array disk properties.
Note: Array disks for the PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, and PERC
3/Di controllers display Ready status regardless of whether they are a
part of a virtual disk or not. Ready status means the disk is operational.
The Rescan operation scans the channels of the controller to verify the currently connected devices or to recognize new devices that have been added to the channels.
After the operation is finished, the console is refreshed and any configuration changes appear under the Array Group object and under the channel object.
The removal of an array disk within a virtual disk is reflected immediately in the console, whereas an addition is reflected only by performing the Rescan operation. Array disks that are not part of virtual disks will not be polled for status changes.
This command pauses I/O on all channels that are polled for status changes on the controller. Use the Pause I/O command when you need to hot-swap disk drives without having to reboot.
If the disks are contained in an enclosure that supports hot-swapping, Pause I/O is not required unless the disk is part of a virtual disk.
CAUTION! This can be a potentially dangerous command, and
sufficient steps should be taken to warn others who may be
using any virtual disks on the selected controller that I/O
will be paused.
This command extracts a log from the controller(s) and places it in the Array Manager installation directory. The log gives detailed information on the controller activities and can be useful for troubleshooting. The log's file name is the word "log" and the month and day, such as "log0921" for a log created on September 21.
Use this function to display controller attributes.
Right-click on a controller.
Click Properties.
Properties for each of PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, and PERC 3/Di controllers appear differently. When a controller is opened in read-only mode, the console displays Read only in the name that appears in the left pane. If the controller is already in use, it can be opened only in read-only mode.
Note: A controller will be opened in Read Only mode if it is already in
use.
Note: The PERC 2/Si and PERC 3/Si RAID controllers do not
contain a battery and therefore do not support battery management.
The battery of the PERC 2 controller preserves the contents of its nonvolatile cache memory in the event of power loss. The battery provides a minimum of 72 hours protection for DIMMs up to 64 MB and 48 hours protection for 128-MB DIMMs. However, the duration of protection, or holdover time, depends on the battery's charge level. This section has two topics:
The battery is fully discharged when you first install the controller. The controller detects this condition and automatically begins charging the battery. This charging process takes approximately three hours. The controller can be used during this time; however, the battery is unable to meet the specified holdover time until it is fully charged. The battery is still able to handle brief power losses during the initial charge cycle.
After you have installed the controller, it notifies you every six months that a battery reconditioning cycle is required. This reconditioning cycle requires a full discharge and recharge of the battery. It ensures that the battery's capacity is being measured correctly and that the battery's full holdover time is maintained.
The reconditioning cycle takes approximately 8 to 10 hours. During this time, the battery's holdover time is reduced to zero (during discharge) and then restored (during full charge). To ensure that no data is lost from nonvolatile cache memory, the controller automatically disables cache (both read and write) during a reconditioning cycle. When the cache is disabled, performance is degraded for the reconditioning period. Once the reconditioning cycle is complete, the cache is restored to its original settings.
It is highly recommended that battery reconditioning be done during off-peak times.
Both Array Manager and FAST can be installed on the same server. However, only one program can be used to configure PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, and PERC 3/Di controllers at any given time. These controller interfaces support two different access rights: read-only and read-write. To maintain the integrity of storage device configuration, these controllers grant only one application read-write access and all others read-only access.
When Array Manager is launched, it attempts to get read-write access. If read-write access is denied, then Array Manager gets read-only access. When Array Manager is launched in read-only mode, you can view storage devices and their properties but you cannot configure the PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, and PERC 3/Di controllers or devices on them. Make sure FAST is not running if you want to launch Array Manager in read-write access mode.
After some planning and preparation, it is possible to migrate array disks, virtual disks, and array volumes between one controller and another, between one enclosure and another, or between one server and another. You can perform array and volume migration on PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, and PERC 3/Di controllers as long as the following conditions are met:
A virtual disk cannot be migrated from any PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, or PERC 3/Di to any PERC 2/SC, PERC 2/DC or PERC 3/DCL controller.
A virtual disk cannot be migrated from any PERC 2/SC, PERC 2/DC, or PERC 3/DCL controller to any PERC 2, PERC 2/Si, PERC 3/Si, or PERC 3/Di controller.
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To migrate virtual disks and volumes from one system to another, do the following.
Right-click on the controller that contains the virtual disk(s) you are migrating and choose Pause I/O. You can also perform this operation with a shutdown of the server that contains the array disks and the virtual disk(s) that you wish to migrate.
Remove the array disks from the enclosure that belong to the virtual disk(s) you are migrating, making sure to remember their order.
Place the array disks into the new enclosure in the same order.
The terminology used in the Array Manager console differs from the terminology used in the PERC 2 BIOS Container Configuration Utility (CCU). The following table shows a summary of these differences.
Naming convention differences between Array Manager and PERC 2 BIOS Container Configuration Utility (CCU)
