Product manual

Table Of Contents

Barracuda 18FC Product Manual, Rev. B 5

3.0 General description

Barracuda 18FC drives are random access storage devices designed to support the Fibre Channel Arbitrated

Loop (FC-AL) and SCSI Fibre Channel Protocol as described in the ANSI specifications, this document, and

the

Fibre Channel Interface Manual

(part number 77767496) which describes the general interface character-

istics of this drive. ST118273FC drives are classified as intelligent peripherals and provide level 2 conformance

(highest level) with the ANSI SCSI-1 standard.

You can view the Fibre Channel interface simply as a transport vehicle for the supported command set

(ST118273FC drives use the SCSI command set). In fact, the Fibre Channel interface is unaware of the con-

tent or meaning of the information being transported. It simply packs the SCSI commands in frames, transports

them to the appropriate devices, and provides error checking to ensure that the information reaches its destina-

tion accurately. Refer to the documents referenced in Section 2.3 if you require additional information about the

Fibre Channel interface, FC-AL topology, or the SCSI fibre channel protocol.

The head and disc assembly (HDA) is environmentally sealed at the factory. Air recirculates within the HDA

through a non-replaceable filter to maintain a contamination-free HDA environment.

See Figure 2 for an exploded view of the drive. Never disassemble the HDA. This exploded view is for informa-

tion only. Do not attempt to service items in the sealed enclosure (heads, media, actuator, etc.) as this requires

special facilities. The drive contains no parts replaceable by the user and opening the HDA for any reason

voids your warranty.

Figure 2. Barracuda 18FC disc drive

Barracuda 18FC

drives use a dedicated landing zone at the innermost radius of the media to eliminate the pos-

sibility of destroying or degrading data by landing in the data zone. The heads automatically go to the landing

zone when power is removed from the drive.

An automatic shipping lock prevents potential damage to the heads and discs that results from movement dur-

ing shipping and handling. The shipping lock disengages and the head load process begins when power is

applied to the drive.

The drives also use a high-performance actuator assembly design that provides excellent performance with

minimum power dissipation.