Check the Alert Log for an alert verifying that the system has
identified the new disk. You may receive alert "2052" or "2294."
Refresh the display by clicking Refresh or by changing screens.
NOTE: Clicking the Refresh button in the right pane refreshes only the right pane.
To view the new physical disk in the left pane tree view, click the system name
displayed at the top of the left pane, or select View --> Refresh from the browser's
menu bar.
The new physical disk should be displayed in the tree view after refreshing the display. If the new disk is not displayed, restart the computer.
You can avoid removing the wrong disk by blinking the LED display on the disk that you intend to remove. See the following sections for information on blinking the LED display:
SMART alerts are messages predicting that a disk may fail in the near future. If a physical disk is receiving SMART alerts, you should replace the disk. Use the following procedures to replace a disk receiving SMART alerts.
If the disk is part of a redundant virtual disk:
Select the redundant virtual disk that includes the physical disk that is
receiving SMART alerts and perform the Check Consistency task. See
"Check Consistency" for more information.
CAUTION: To avoid potential data loss, you should perform a check consistency before removing a physical disk that is receiving SMART alerts. The check consistency verifies that all data is accessible within the redundant virtual disk and uses the redundancy to repair any bad blocks that may be present. In some circumstances, failure to perform a check consistency can result in data loss. This may occur, for example, if the physical disk receiving SMART alerts has bad disk blocks and you do not perform a check consistency before removing the disk.
Select the disk that is receiving SMART alerts and execute the Offline
task.
Manually remove the disk.
Insert a new disk. Make sure that the new disk is the same size or larger as
the disk you are replacing. (On some controllers, you may not be able to
use the additional disk space if you insert a larger disk. See "Virtual Disk
Considerations for PERC 5/E, PERC 5/i, PERC 6/E, and PERC 6/I
Controllers" for more information.) After you complete this procedure, a
rebuild is automatically initiated because the virtual disk is redundant.
If the disk is not part of a redundant virtual disk:
Back up data from the virtual disk.
Delete the virtual disk.
Replace the disk that is receiving SMART alerts.
Create a new virtual disk. Make sure that the new virtual disk is the same
size or larger than the original virtual disk.
Restore the backed up data from the original virtual disk onto the newly
created virtual disk.
This property displays the name of the physical disk. The name is comprised of the connector number followed by the disk number.
State
This property displays the current state of the physical disk.
Ready — The physical disk is functioning normally. If the disk is attached to a RAID controller, Ready state indicates that the disk is available to be used by a virtual disk. When the physical disk is used in a virtual disk, the state changes to Online.
Online — The physical disk is part of a virtual disk and is functioning normally. See "Clear Physical Disk and Cancel Clear" for more information.
Degraded — The physical disk has encountered a failure and is operating in a degraded state.
Failed — The physical disk has encountered a failure and is no longer functioning. This state is also displayed when a physical disk that is part of a redundant virtual disk has been taken offline or deactivated. See "Clear Physical Disk and Cancel Clear" for more information.
Offline — The physical disk has failed or contains dead segments. Check to see whether the "Remove Dead Segments" task appears on the physical disk drop-down menu. If it does, perform a "Rescan Controller" and then do a "Remove Dead Segments" for the physical disk. If the "Remove Dead Segments" task is not displayed, then the physical disk cannot be recovered.
On the PERC 5/E controller, the Offline state indicates that the disk is included in a virtual disk, but it is not receiving I/O. This may occur when a user has set the disk to Offline. See "Clear Physical Disk and Cancel Clear" for more information.
Rebuilding — Data from a redundant virtual disk is currently being rebuilt onto the physical disk.
Incompatible — The physical disk is not suitable for a rebuild. The physical disk may be too small or it may be using an incompatible technology. For example, you cannot rebuild a SAS disk with a SATA disk or a SATA disk with a SAS disk.
Removed — The physical disk has been removed. This state only applies to physical disks that are part of a virtual disk.
SMART Alert Detected — A SMART alert (predictive failure) has been detected on the physical disk. The physical disk may fail and should be replaced. This state applies to physical disks attached to non-RAID controllers.
Unknown — The physical disk has failed or is in an unusable state. In some cases the physical disk can be returned to a usable state by performing an "Initialize" task. If the "Initialize" task does not appear on the physical disk drop-down menu, then this disk cannot be recovered.
Foreign — The physical disk has been moved from another controller and contains all or some portion of a virtual disk (foreign configuration). A physical disk that has lost communication with the controller due to a power loss, faulty cable or other failure event may also display the Foreign state. See "Foreign Configuration Operations" for more information.
Unsupported — The physical disk is using an unsupported technology. The physical disk cannot be managed by Storage Management.
You may also want to review the Alert Log to see whether the physical disk has generated alerts pertaining to a SMART predictive failure. These alerts can assist you in identifying the cause of the SMART alert. The following alerts may be generated in response to a SMART alert:
This property displays how close to completion an operation is that is being performed on the physical disk. For example, if the physical disk is being rebuilt, then a value of 52% indicates that the rebuild is 52% complete.
This property is only displayed when an operation is being performed on the physical disk.
Bus Protocol
This property displays the technology that the physical disk is using. Possible values are:
SAS — Serial Attached SCSI
SATA — Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA)
Media
This property displays the media type of the physical disk. The possible values are:
HDD—Hard Disk Drive. A HDD is a non-volatile storage device which stores digitally-encoded data on rapidly rotating platters with magnetic surfaces.
SSD—Solid State Drive. An SSD is a data storage device that uses solid-state memory to store persistent data.
Unknown—Storage Management is unable to determine the media type of the physical disk.
Used RAID Disk Space
This property displays how much of the physical disk space is being used by the virtual disks on the controller. This property is Not Applicable for physical disks attached to non-RAID controllers.
In certain circumstances, the Used RAID Disk Space displays a value of zero (0) even though a portion of the physical disk is being used. This occurs when the used space is 0.005 GB or less. The algorithm for calculating the used disk space rounds a figure of 0.005 GB or less to 0. Used disk space that is between 0.006 GB and 0.009 GB is rounded up to 0.01 GB.
Available RAID Disk Space
This property displays the amount of available space on the disk. This property is Not Applicable for physical disks attached to non-RAID controllers.
Hot Spare
This property indicates whether the disk has been assigned as a hot spare. This property is Not Applicable for physical disks attached to non-RAID controllers.
Vendor ID
This property displays the disk's hardware vendor.
Product ID
This property displays the disk's product ID.
Revision
This property displays the disk's revision number.
Serial No.
This property displays the disk's serial number.
Negotiated Speed
This property displays the speed of data transfer that the disk negotiated while spinning up and upon initial communication with the controller. This speed is dependent on the speed of the disk, the capable speed of the controller, the current speed of the controller on that connector, and the speed of the EMM (Enclosure Management Module) on the enclosure.
Capable Speed
This property displays the highest possible speed that the device can transfer data.
Manufacture Day
This property displays the day of the month during which the physical disk was manufactured.
Manufacture Week
This property displays the week of the year during which the physical disk was manufactured.
Manufacture Year
This property displays the year that the physical disk was manufactured.
SAS Address
This property displays the SAS address of the physical disk. The SAS address is unique to each SAS disk.
Physical Disk Tasks
Do the following to execute a physical disk task:
Expand the Storage tree object to display the controller objects.
Expand a controller object.
Expand a Connector object.
Expand the enclosure or Backplane object.
Select the Physical Disks object.
Select the Information/Configuration subtab.
Select a task from the Available Tasks drop-down menu.
Click Execute.
NOTE: Different controllers support different features. For this reason, the tasks
displayed on the Tasks drop-down menu can vary depending on which controller is
selected in the tree view. If no tasks can be performed because of controller or
system configuration limitations, then the Tasks drop-down menu displays No Task
Available.
The Blink task allows you to find a disk within an enclosure by blinking one of the light-emitting diodes (LEDs) on the disk. You may want to use this task to locate a failed disk.
On most controllers, the Blink task automatically cancels after a short duration such as 30 or 60 seconds. If you need to cancel the Blink task or if the physical disk continues to blink indefinitely, use the Unblink task.
NOTE: The Blink and Unblink tasks are only supported for hotswap physical disks
(disks that reside in a carrier). On some controllers, the Blink and Unblink tasks
apply to physical disks contained in carriers that can be inserted into a server or an
enclosure.
The Remove Dead Segments task recovers disk space that is currently unusable. A dead or orphaned disk segment refers to an area of a physical disk that is unusable for any of the following reasons:
The dead segment is an area of the physical disk that is damaged.
The dead segment is included in a virtual disk, but the virtual disk is no longer using this area of the physical disk.
The physical disk contains more than one virtual disk. In this case, disk space that is not included in one of the virtual disks may be unusable.
The dead segment resides on a physical disk that has been disconnected from and then reconnected to the controller.
Use the Prepare to Remove task to spin down a physical disk so that it can safely be removed from an enclosure or backplane. It is recommended that you perform this task before removing a disk to prevent data loss.
This task causes the lights on the disk to blink. You can safely remove the disk under the following conditions:
Wait for about 30 seconds to allow the disk to spin down.
Wait until you notice the initial blink pattern has changed into a different pattern or the lights have stopped blinking.
A physical disk is no longer in Ready state after doing a Prepare to Remove. Removing the physical disk from the enclosure or backplane and replacing it causes the physical disk to spin up and return to Ready state.
In some cases, a rescan is required for the controller to recognize configuration changes such as the removal of a disk. See "Rescan to Update Storage Configuration Changes" for more information.
NOTE: This procedure is not available for physical disks that have been assigned
as a hot spare or physical disks that are part of a virtual disk. In addition, this
procedure is only supported for hotswap physical disks (disks that reside in a
carrier).
The Initialize task prepares a physical disk for use as a member of a virtual disk.
On some controllers, the Initialize task can only be performed once on a physical disk. In some cases a physical disk that is in an Unknown state can be returned to a usable state by performing the Initialize task. The Initialize task is not displayed for physical disks that have already been initialized using Storage Management or the BIOS.
CAUTION: This is a data-destructive task. Any virtual disks residing on this physical disk will be removed.
Use the Cancel Rebuild task to cancel a rebuild that is in progress. If you cancel a rebuild, the virtual disk remains in a degraded state. The failure of an additional physical disk can cause the virtual disk to fail and may result in data loss. It is highly recommended that you rebuild the failed physical disk as soon as possible.
NOTE: If you cancel the rebuild of a physical disk that is assigned as a hot spare,
you will need to reinitiate the rebuild on the same physical disk in order to restore
the data. Canceling the rebuild of a physical disk and then assigning another
physical disk as a hot spare will not cause the newly assigned hot spare to rebuild
the data. You will need to reinitiate the rebuild on the physical disk that was the
original hot spare.
A global hot spare is an unused backup disk that is part of the disk group. Hot spares remain in standby mode. When a physical disk that is used in a virtual disk fails, the assigned hot spare is activated to replace the failed physical disk without interrupting the system or requiring your intervention. When a hot spare is activated, it rebuilds the data for all redundant virtual disks that were using the failed physical disk.
You can change the hot spare assignment by unassigning a disk and choosing another disk as needed. You can also assign more than one physical disk as a global hot spare.
NOTE: On SAS 6/iR controllers, you cannot assign physical disks that have boot
partitions, as hotspares.
Global hot spares must be assigned and unassigned manually. They are not assigned to specific virtual disks. If you want to assign a hot spare to a virtual disk (it will replace any physical disk that fails in the virtual disk) then use the "Assign and Unassign Dedicated Hot Spare."
NOTE: When deleting virtual disks, all assigned global hot spares may be
automatically unassigned when the last virtual disk associated with the controller is
deleted.
CAUTION: The SAS 6/iR controller enables you to assign two physical disks as global hot spare. Assigning a physical disk as a global hot spare on a SAS 6/iR controller is likely to cause data loss from the physical disk. If the system or boot partition resides on the physical disks, it may be destroyed. You should only assign physical disks that do not contain critical data. For more information about global hot spares and the SAS 6/iR, see "Global Hot Spare Considerations on a SAS 6/iR."
You should be familiar with the size requirements and other considerations associated with hot spares. See the following sections for more information:
Use the clear physical disk task to erase data residing on a physical disk. The Clear task applies to physical disks that are in Ready state and that contain data or that are in Clear state.
NOTE: A physical disk may display the Clear state if it is a member of a virtual disk
that is being slow initialized. Performing a Cancel Clear task on the physical disk
causes the Slow Initialize task to be cancelled for the entire virtual disk. See
"Format and Initialize; Slow and Fast Initialize" and "Considerations for Slow
Initialize" for more information.
To clear the physical disk:
Review the physical disk that will be erased by the clear task. Be sure that it
does not contain necessary data and make a backup if necessary. If you
want to blink the physical disk, click the Blink button.
Click Clear when you are ready to erase all information on the physical
disk. To exit without clearing the physical disk, click Go Back to Previous
Page.
To locate this task in Storage Management:
Expand the Storage tree object to display the controller objects.
Expand a controller object.
Expand a Connector object.
Expand the enclosure or Backplane object.
Select the Physical Disks object.
Select Clear from the Available Tasks drop-down menu of the physical
disk you want to clear.
Use the Revertible Hot Spare task to copy data back from a hot spare to a physical disk.
If the physical disk in a virtual disk fails, the data on the failed disk is copied to the assigned hot spare. If you replace the failed disk with a new physical disk and if you have enabled the revertible hot spare task, the data is copied from the erstwhile hot spare to the new disk.
You can also use the Revertible Hot Spare task to copy data from a physical disk to the hot spare on a predictive failure event.
If Revertible Hot Spare is enabled and the physical disk is SMART-enabled, the controller firmware automatically starts copying data from the SMART-enabled disk in the virtual disk to the hot spare.
NOTE: To use the Revertible Hot Spare task, you should have assigned a hot spare
to the virtual disk.
NOTE: If the disk is not SMART-enabled or if the Auto Replace on Predictive Failure
option is disabled, the failed disk will not be replaced automatically.
To enable Revertible Hot Spare:
On the Change Controller Properties page, enable Revertible Hot Spare
and Auto replace on predictive failure.
Click Apply Changes.
To locate this task in Storage Management:
Expand the Storage tree object to display the controller objects.
Select a controller object on which you want to enable the revertible hot
spare task and select the Information/Configuration tab.
From the Controller Task drop down menu, select Change Controller
Properties and click Execute.
NOTE: The Rebuild rate for Revertible Hot Spare will be the same as defined for the
controller.
