Re: Dell Hardware Recommendations

On Aug 10, 2007, at 4:36 PM, Merlin Moncure wrote:

> I'm not so sure I agree.  They are using LSI firmware now (and so is
> everyone else).  The servers are well built (highly subjective, I
> admit) and configurable.  I have had some bad experiences with IBM
> gear (adaptec controller though), and white box parts 3ware, etc.  I
> can tell you that dell got us the storage and the server in record
> time
>
> do agree on adaptec however

Ok, perhaps you got luckier... I have two PowerVault 220 rack mounts
with U320 SCSI drives in them. With an LSI 320-2X controller, it
*refuses* to recognize some of the drives (channel 1 on either
array).  Dell blames LSI, LSI blames dell's backplane.  This is
consistent across multiple controllers we tried, and two different
Dell disk arrays.  Dropping the SCSI speed to 160 is the only way to
make them work.  I tend to believe LSI here.

The Adaptec 2230SLP controller recognizes the arrays fine, but tends
to "drop" devices at inopportune moments.  Re-seating dropped devices
starts a rebuild, but the speed is recognized as "1" and the rebuild
takes two lifetimes to complete unless you insert a reboot of the
system in there.  Totally unacceptable.  Again, dropping the scsi
rate to 160 seems to make it more stable.