Technology considerations in selecting a direct attached storage solution for HP ProLiant Gen8 servers

BladeSystem direct attached storage

HP BladeSystem servers can support two types of direct attached storage: drives on the blade servers

and drives in external storage enclosures. HP SAS storage for BladeSystem servers support zoned

direct attached storage as well as shared SAS storage to blade servers. This SAS architecture consists

of an HP Smart Array Controller and a SAS switch connected to an HP Modular Disk System (MDS) or

Modular Smart Array (MSA) storage enclosure. The Virtual SAS Manager interface, accessed from the

SAS switch, allows users to dynamically zone drive bays to specific blade servers. HP Smart Array

Controllers can access SAS or SATA drives installed in the zoned drive bays as local and dedicated

storage.

HP hard disk drive categories

At HP, we have refined and expanded our HDD family into three distinct categories: Entry, Midline,

and Enterprise (Table 2). These categories meet the needs of different environments for performance,

reliability, and cost-capacity.

HP Enterprise drives give you maximum reliability, highest performance, scalability, and error

management under the most demanding conditions. They are the only HP drives designed for

unconstrained I/O workloads and for mission-critical environments such as large databases, email

servers, back-office applications and virtualization.

HP Midline drives are for high-capacity applications that require increased performance and

reliability. Midline drives are more resistant to rotational and operational vibration than HP Entry

drives and so are better suited for multi-drive configurations. Midline drives are available with either

SATA or SAS interfaces and are for use in moderate workload environments. We do not recommend

Midline or Entry drives for mission-critical applications.

HP Entry drives have the lowest unit cost and give you a basic level of reliability and performance.

They are best suited for non-mission-critical environments where I/O workloads are 40% or less. They

are typically best suited for internal or archival storage, or as boot drives for entry-level servers. Entry

drives are only available with a SATA interface.