IBM EXP300 disk Array Configuration tutorial

Server: IBM eserver x Series 235 Server

Array: IBM EXP300 array Enclosure, IBM Serverraid 4Mx Control card

1, Hardware connection

Close the server, install the Serverraid card and connect the Serverraid card with the array cabinet with a dedicated line cable.

Boot sequence: First open the array cabinet power, wait for the array cabinet to start, then start the server.

IBM Serverraid offers several levels: RAID 0,raid 1,raid 1E, raid5,raid5e. Where raid 1E and RAID 5E are proprietary RAID levels defined by IBM.

RAID 0: Striped disk array with no fault tolerance, but all hard drive space is available.

RAID 1: Disk mirroring of two hard disks, allowing a bad piece of space with only half the utilization.

RAID 1E: Striped disk mirroring, supports more than two hard drives, allows any bad piece of hard drive, space utilization only half.

RAID 5: Stripe with parity, support for more than three hard drives, allow any bad hard disk (2 pieces will lose data), Space utilization (N-1)/n.

RAID 5E: Equivalent to RAID 5 plus built-in hot backup disk, support four or more hard drives, allow any bad two (not simultaneous) hard drive, space utilization (N-2)/n.

2, Software Environment

(1) During the server boot self-test, press ctrl+i into the MINI serverraid configuration interface to observe the operation of the array, including the current status of each physical disk (online-onl, offline-ddd, rebuild-RBL, ready (not in any array)-rdy, hot spare-HSP), And the current state of the logical disk (good-okay or crisis-critical), you can also force the array to be restored to the factory state or save the configuration to the Server RAID card.

(2) The configuration of the array can be configured using the configuration program in the IBM-supplied CD-ROM (setup and installation), or after the operating system has been installed, Serverraid Manager management program.

With the setup and installation disc configuration, you need to start the machine with the CD, go to the Configuration Wizard (written in Java), and follow the wizard's prompts to complete the configuration step down.

The configuration process is exactly the same regardless of the circumstances in which it is configured. This article takes the Serverraid Manager management software installed under Windows2000 as an example.

3, the creation of RAID

After the hardware connection is complete, the array and the server host are started and can be created and managed by the management software. After running the Serverraid manager program, the initial interface is as follows:

As you can see, the Channel 1 of the array contains 7 hard drives with 70007MB capacity (because of the non-IBM brand, so the front is yellow exclamation mark, does not affect the use), because it was not added to any array, so the current state of the 7 physical disk is ready.

We plan to create the most common RAID5 array. Right-click Arrays and click on the "Configure RAID" menu command to enter the Configuration wizard window. We have "quick configuration" and "Custom Configuration" 2 choices. If you select Quick Configuration and then click the "Next" button, the wizard uses all the hard drives to create a RAID5 group array-a with one hot spare (HSP) and a logical drive Driver1.

Because a disk is hot standby, there is a disk capacity for data verification, so the actual capacity of the logical drive Driver1 is 5 hard drive capacity of 350035MB. At this point, in addition to the hot spare, the other 6 physical hard drive state all become online.

If you select Custom Configuration, and then click on the "Next" button, the wizard will guide us to establish the array-a first, we can select the left side of the ready state of the physical hard drive to join our group. Here we can create several array (A, B, C ...), or several hot spares. Of course, only 3 or more hard drives are allowed to establish RAID5-level drives. Of course, not all physical hard drives must be added to the panel, you can decide according to the situation. Here I choose to use one of the 4 hard drives to establish the RAID5 level drive, and do not establish a hot spare hard drive.

By clicking on the Next button, you can see that there are several RAID levels to choose from, and we choose RAID Level 5.

Then click the Next button and we see that the array drive has been built. Finally, click the Apply button to formally generate the configuration.

One array disk group corresponds to a logical drive, and we can create multiple drives with different RAID levels.

Because the hot spare