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  1. #1

    Replace SAS with SATA on HP DL360

    I have HP DL360 running few tube sites with 6 HD's 2.5" on raid5 array:
    2X 72GB SAS
    4X 300GB SAS

    I'm running out of space, and I need to replace my HD's to something bigger, My budget is around 1.5K$.

    I thought to replace to WD scorpio 500GB 2.5" SATA, but i don't know if it's a smart to put 2.5" sata hd on production server.

  2. #2
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kernelosh View Post
    I have HP DL360 running few tube sites with 6 HD's 2.5" on raid5 array:
    2X 72GB SAS
    4X 300GB SAS

    I'm running out of space, and I need to replace my HD's to something bigger, My budget is around 1.5K$.

    I thought to replace to WD scorpio 500GB 2.5" SATA, but i don't know if it's a smart to put 2.5" sata hd on production server.
    These drives are horrible for reliability. We brought a batch in for some systems and most died before we even got the server racked.
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  3. #3
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    HP sell 500GB 2.5" 7.2k SATA disks for some servers - we are using 8 of them in a DL360 G6 and haven't had any isssues, although we do run RAID 6 which is recommended for large SATA arrays. They are re-badged WD.

    HP 500GB 3G SATA 7.2K rpm SFF (2.5-inch) Midline 1yr Warranty Hard Drive 507750-B21

    I would have thought you could get the HP ones in your budget easily?

    Gavin
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  4. #4
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    I also recommend going with the HP brand drives for production use. I actually use a WD Black 320GB 2.5" SATA drive just fine in one of my DL380's, but it's there as a backup drive (storage) with no RAID at all. I have configured RAIDs with generic drives before for low-use development and staging servers. For example, I have two older 750GB WD Caviar Black drives which I enabled TLER on (these were acquired before WD killed that option in the firmware) and use them in RAID 1 on a DL185.

    Again, if my business is on the line to keep the applications going though -- the drive responsible in my HP server is an HP though.

    Another thing to consider is, those 300GB SAS drives are probably 10k if I understand correctly. Going to the WD SATAs would drive your performance down pretty significantly for certain workloads. For video streaming, you probably wouldn't notice a lot of difference though since most operations are sequential - just make sure the server has enough memory to cache the filesystem.

    The real question mark that I have here is, would you be able to substitute drives one at a time from a SAS array and replace with SATA resulting in a mixed SATA/SAS configuration, at least temporarily? I'm unsure - never tried that before. Sounds like something that would be unsupported because if I open ACU (Array Config Utility) to create an array, it asks me SAS or SATA and then I can only pick SAS or SATA drives to create an array within.

    --Chris
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  5. #5
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    I agree Chris, I don't think the ACU will let you make a mixed SAS/SATA array - we moved a server from 8 x 146GB SAS to 8 x 500GB SATA but this was done by moving all the data off onto an external drive and moving it back on.

    If the OP does need the speed of SAS disks, HP offer the 450GB, 600GB and 900GB 10k 2.5" SAS disks as well, although these will probably start to push the budget depending on how many you want, but you could (for example) swap out two 300GB drives whilst the server was on for 600GB drives (one at a time allowing the RAID to rebuild), then use the extra space on these two drives to make a RAID 1 mirror of an extra 300GB, even though you are sharing the physical drives with RAID 5 logical volume.

    I don't know what the current config is as your drive sizes are mismatched, I assumed RAID 1 on the 72GB drives and RAID 5 on the 300GB drives?

    Gavin
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    UK VPS
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  6. #6
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    We do mostly use Seagate 1Tb drives (Servergrade 2,5" 7,2k) and these work fine in our G7 machines.

    Clear recommendation.

    William

  7. #7
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    Quote Originally Posted by gavint View Post
    If the OP does need the speed of SAS disks, HP offer the 450GB, 600GB and 900GB 10k 2.5" SAS disks as well, although these will probably start to push the budget depending on how many you want, but you could (for example) swap out two 300GB drives whilst the server was on for 600GB drives (one at a time allowing the RAID to rebuild), then use the extra space on these two drives to make a RAID 1 mirror of an extra 300GB, even though you are sharing the physical drives with RAID 5 logical volume.
    I think this is the best approach. You can replace drives a few at a time and create a small volume to get extra space in a pinch. As space needs continue to grow you can replace more drives and migrate the second volume to a RAID 5 and keep growing the space. There are minor performance implications this way versus going with the SATA.

    --Chris
    The Object Zone - Your Windows Server Specialists for more than twenty years - http://www.object-zone.net/
    Services: Contract Server Management, Desktop Support Services, IT/VoIP Consulting, Cloud Migration, and Custom ASP.net and Mobile Application Development

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