Server Hard Drive Validation Test Report

Overview Intel® Server Boards/Systems 3000 and 5000 Series Chipsets

1. Overview

This document covers the Intel

5000 Series Chipsets–based server boards and systems, as

well as the Intel

3000 Series Chipsets–based server boards and systems. It is intended to

provide users with a list of hard drives tested by Intel validation labs and/or by individual drive

vendors.

This document will continue to be updated as new hard drives are tested. Each new release of

the document will present updated information as well as continue to provide the information

from previous releases.

Hard drive manufacturers develop drives to meet specific customer requirements for reliability,

capacity, performance and power consumption. Using drives in the application for which they

were designed ensures your data is available when and how you need it. Using drives outside

of their intended application can negatively affect the productivity and profitability of your

business.

A hard drive is a non-volatile storage device which typically stores data on rapidly rotating

magnetic platters. Data is usually read/written by a device which is nanometers away from the

surface of the platters. Accordingly, vibration can significantly affect hard drive reliability and

performance.

There are a number of factors that can cause drives to vibrate, including: vibrations from other

drives or the drive itself, spindle imbalance/torque, tolerance for rotational input, server

capability, population density, and properties of the systems chassis. These vibrations can

cause the read/write heads to be knocked off the data track. When this happens, a retry is

required to ensure integrity of the read/write data. A retry requires milliseconds of time,

however, because drive and storage subsystem electronics are operating in micro or

nanoseconds, a wait of milliseconds significantly reduces the overall performance of the storage

solution.

Two general categories of drives have evolved to meet customers’ needs:

• Desktop drives perform at an acceptable level when rotational vibration does not

exceed 10 radians per second. Desktop drives are typically used in single or dual –

drive environments where rotational vibration is limited. A desktop drive is built to

have typical reads or writes 50 to 80 times a day over an 8-hour period, 5 days a

week. Desktop drives are designed to work in environments that do not exceed 25

degrees Celsius. As heat increase, the MTBF decreases and the drives are more

likely to fail.

• Enterprise drives perform at an acceptable level when rotational vibration does not

exceed 21 radians per second. Enterprise drives are typically used in multi-drive

environments where rotational vibration is normally above 10 radians per

second. Enterprise drives are built using more advanced technology and

components to meet the performance, workload, and reliability needs to perform

hundreds of thousands of read/writes per second, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week.

Enterprise drives are also designed for higher temperatures. The low end of their

temperature specification is at the high end of the desktop specification, making

enterprise drives highly reliable in applications where desktop drives fail. Enterprise

drives usually have a longer warranty period than desktop drives. Enterprise drives