HP ProLiant G7 c-Class server blades with Intel® Xeon® processors
issue with certain PCI-e Generation 2.0 cards which get configured for PCI-e Gen 1 instead of PCI-e
Gen 2 because the card does not report its capabilities properly when the system is configured for
Auto mode. However, this mode does not work around the issue which exists with certain PCI-e
Generation 1.0 cards that did not work properly in PCI-e Gen 2 slots.
Force PCI-E Generation 1 – Configures all PCI-e devices in the system to operate at PCI-E
Generation 1.0 speeds. This mode may be useful in allowing cards to function properly which have
an issue operating in PCI-e Generation 2.0 slots and which did not operate properly when the
system is configured for the other modes. In addition, this mode can be used to save power if
maximum PCI-e bandwidth is not required.
HP Smart Array controllers
ProLiant c-Class server blades with Xeon 5600 Series processors support internal hard drives through
integrated or optional HP Smart Array controllers. For example, the ProLiant BL460c G7 server blade
uses the Smart Array P410i controller and supports SAS and SATA SFF drives.
Smart Array controllers can use an optional battery-backed write cache (BBWC) or flash-backed write
cache (FBWC). The battery or flash device prevents information in the buffer from being lost in case of
an unexpected system shutdown. In the case of a complete system failure, you can move the controller
and disks to a different server, where the controller will flush out the cache to the disks after power is
restored. In the case of a controller failure, you can move the cache module and disks to a working
controller, where the cache will be flushed out to the disks. For BBWC, the battery will last up to 48
hours without receiving any power from the computer. FBWC eliminates this 48-hour battery life
limitation because the data is written to flash media and will be posted to the disk drive on the next
power up.
SAS and SATA small form factor hard drives
SAS
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is a serial communication protocol for direct-attached storage devices such as high-performance
SAS and high-capacity SATA
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small form factor (SFF) disk drives. SAS is a point-to-point architecture
in which each device connects directly to a SAS port rather than sharing a common bus, as parallel
SCSI devices do. Point-to-point links increase data throughput and improve the ability to locate and fix
disk failures.
SFF drives provide higher performance than large form factor drives. The smaller SFF platters reduce
seek times because the heads have a shorter distance to travel. At this writing, the peak data transfer
rate for SAS drives supported with the Smart Array P410i firmware is 6Gb/s in full duplex mode.
RAID performance improves by increasing the numbers of spindles.
The SAS architecture increases storage options for BladeSystem servers, providing simple in-rack
shared or zoned direct attach SAS storage. The architecture combines the simplicity and cost
efficiency of direct-attached storage with the flexibility and resource utilization of a SAN, delivering a
simple storage solution that’s ideal for growing capacity requirements.
Solid state drives
In late 2008, HP introduced solid state drives (SSDs) for use in specific BladeSystem environments.
SSDs connect to the host system using the same protocols as disk drives, but they store and retrieve
file data in flash memory arrays rather than on spinning media. SSDs eliminate the latency of
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For more information about SAS technology, refer to the HP technology brief titled “Serial Attached SCSI
storage technology”:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs
/support/SupportManual/c01613420/c01613420.pdf.
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For more information about these features, refer to the technology brief “Serial ATA technology”:
http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bc/docs/support/SupportManual/c00301688/c00301688.pdf.
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