FASTTRAK SX4100 USER MANUAL Version 2.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Copyright © 2005 Promise Technology, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Copyright by Promise Technology, Inc. (Promise Technology). No part of this manual may be reproduced or transmitted in any form without the expressed, written permission of Promise Technology. Trademarks Promise, and the Promise logo are registered in U.S. Patent and Trademark Office. All other product names mentioned herein may be trademarks or registered trademarks of their respective companies.
Notices Radio Frequency Interference Statement This equipment has been tested and found to comply with the limits for a Class B digital device, pursuant to Part 15 of the FCC Rules. These limits are designed to provide reasonable protection against harmful interference in a residential installation. This equipment generates, uses and can radiate radio frequency energy, and, if not installed and used in accordance with the instruction may cause harmful interference to radio communications.
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Contents Chapter 1: Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 About This Manual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .1 Product Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 XOR Acceleration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 Hot-Swapping . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .2 WebPAM Management Software .
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Windows 2000 Install Driver During New OS Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29 Install Driver in an Existing System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .29 Confirm Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30 Red Hat Linux 8.0, 9.0, EL 3.0, EL 4.0 Install Driver During New OS Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .30 Install Driver in an Existing System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .31 SuSE Linux 9.1, 9.
Contents Chapter 6: Troubleshooting & Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47 Motherboard Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .47 System CMOS Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48 Drive-Related Errors . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .48 Operating System-Related Issues . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .49 Performance Tips . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
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Chapter 1: Introduction • About This Manual, below • Product Overview (page 2) • WebPAM Management Software (page 2) Thank you for purchasing one of Promise Technology’s FastTrak SX4100 Serial ATA RAID controllers. About This Manual This User Manual describes how to setup, use and maintain the FastTrak RAID controller. It also describes how to use the WebPAM RAID management software.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Product Overview FastTrak SX4100 is a Serial ATA RAID controller. When used with WebPAM software, the FastTrak RAID Controller offers a feature-rich, secure and versatile enterprise-wide ATA RAID solution. In addition, the FastTrak SX Series supports RAID expansion. The resulting RAID environment allows users and administrators to configure, manage, and monitor everything from single logical drives on local systems to logical drive networks residing in offsite locations.
Chapter 2: Installation • Package list, below • Installing the FastTrak Card (page 4) • Installing the Disk Drives (page 5) • Create a Logical Drive (page 7) Package List When you receive the FastTrak SX4100 card, the package should contain the items listed below: • FastTrak SX4100 RAID Controller Card • Quick Start Guide • Four 1.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Installing the FastTrak Card The FastTrak RAID Controller card fits into any available PCI slot. 1. Remove the cover of your system. 2. Remove the inside slot cover of an available PCI slot on the motherboard. 3. Install the FastTrak card into the open slot (above). 4. Fasten the FastTrak card bracket to the system case (above). 5. Attach your system case’s 2- or 4-pin LED cable to the LED connector on the FastTrak card (see page 6).
Chapter 2: Installation Installing the Disk Drives Important If you wish to include your current bootable Serial ATA drive using the Windows operating system as part of a bootable Mirrored (RAID 1) logical drive on your FastTrak card, do NOT connect the disk drive to the FastTrak yet. You MUST install the Windows driver software first onto this drive while it is still attached to your existing disk drive controller. The FastTrak SX-Series RAID Controller card supports only 1.5 Gb/s Serial ATA disk drives.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual LED Pins SMBus Connector Ch4 Ch3 Buzzer Ch2 Ch1 2. Attach one Serial ATA data cable to each disk drive. Then attach the other ends of the cables to the connectors on the FastTrak card (above). 3. Attach the Y-cable power splitters to each of the disk drives.
Chapter 2: Installation Create a Logical Drive You will now use the onboard FastBuild BIOS utility to create a logical drive with the attached drives. Even if you plan to use the WebPAM software to manage your logical drive, you can still create your first logical drive using the FastBuild Utility, as described here. For an explanation of the logical drive concepts, see Chapter 5 of this manual. 1. Boot your system.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual 3. Press 2 on the Main Menu screen to display the Define LD Menu (below). 4. Press the arrow keys to highlight an logical drive number you want to define and press Enter to select it. The Define LD Menu for the logical drive number you selected will next appear (below). 5. 6. Choose the RAID Level you want.
Chapter 2: Installation • 7. Initialize logical drive, zero the disk drives. RAID 1, 5 or 10 only. • Stripe Block Size, the default 64KB is best for most applications. • Gigabyte Boundary, allows use of slightly smaller replacement drives. • Cache Mode, WriteThru or WriteBack. Press the arrow keys to move to Disk Assignments. Press the spacebar to toggle between N and Y for each available drive. Y means this disk drive will be assigned to the logical drive.
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Chapter 3: FastBuild™ Utility • FastTrak BIOS (below) • Delete Logical Drive (page 19) • Main Menu (page 12) • Controller Configuration (page 20) • View Drive Assignments (page 13) • Logical Drive Problems (page 21) • Create a Logical Drive (page 14) FastTrak BIOS This section explains the information that you can obtain from the FastTrak BIOS. When the FastTrak BIOS loads during bootup, it displays pertinent information about the RAID logical drives that it finds.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Offline – The logical drive is no longer operational and the FastBuild utility cannot rebuild it. You must identify and replace the failed drive(s). Then you can create a new logical drive and copy your data to it from the last tape backup or other device. For RAID levels 1, 5 and 10, at least two or more disk drives in the logical drive have failed. For a RAID 0 or JBOD logical drive, at least one disk drive has failed.
Chapter 3: FastBuild™ Utility View Drive Assignments From the Main Menu screen, press 1 to see the View Drive Assignments screen (below). This screen reports disk drive assigments and provides the following information: Channel: ID – Shows the FastTrak Controller channel ID (1 through 4) to which a particular disk drive is attached. Drive Model – Identifies the manufacturer, model, and model number (if applicable) of each disk drive.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Create a Logical Drive 1. From the Main Menu screen, press 2 to display the Define LD Menu (below). 2. Press the arrow keys to highlight an logical drive number you want to define and press Enter to select it. The Define LD Menu for the logical drive number you selected will next appear (below). 3. Choose the RAID Level you want.
Chapter 3: FastBuild™ Utility 4. Press the arrow keys to move to the next option. Option choices depend on the RAID Level you selected. • Initialize logical drive, zero the disk drives. RAID 1, 5 or 10 only. • Stripe Block Size, the default 64KB is best for most applications. • Gigabyte Boundary, allows use of slightly smaller replacement drives. • Cache Mode, WriteThru or WriteBack. See “Other Logical Drive Features” on page 41 for more information. 5.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Two Logical Drives Continued from Create Logical Drive step 7, above. 1. Press Ctrl-Y to allocate a portion of the disk drives to the first logical drive. 2. Enter the desired capacity in MB for the first logical drive and press Enter. The Define LD Menu displays again.
Chapter 3: FastBuild™ Utility 3. Press the up and down arrow keys to select an available logical drive number and press Enter. 4. Choose the RAID level and options for the second logical drive. Note that the disk drives in Channels 1, 2 and 3 reflect smaller capacities because a portion of their original capacity belongs to a different logical drive. In this example the disk drive in Channel 4 is not assigned to a logical drive in order to use it as a hot spare drive. 5.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual View Drive Assignments, Split Disk Drives After you create two logical drives from the same set of disk drives, press 1 on the Main Menu screen to see the View Drive Assignments screen (below). In this example, observe how each of the disk drives in Channels 1, 2 and 3 are split between two logical drives. Extent 1 belongs to logical drive 1 (LD 1). Extent 2 belongs to logical drive 2 (LD 2). Under Assignment, the disk drive is divided into LD 1 and LD 2.
Chapter 3: FastBuild™ Utility Delete Logical Drive Caution Deletion of an existing logical drive will result in the loss of all data saved on the logical drive. Record all logical drive information, including RAID level, disk members, stripe block size and gigabyte boundary, in case you wish to undo a deletion. Logical drives may possibly be recovered after deletion by immediately re-defining the logical drive with information identical to the original configuration. To delete a logical drive: 1.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual 3. Press Ctrl-Y to confirm and complete logical drive deletion. The screen returns to the Delete LD Menu. Press Esc to return to the Main Menu. Controller Configuration From the Main Menu screen, press 4 to display the Controller Configuration Options screen (below). the Controller Configuration Options screen has one setting and provides diagnostic information.
Chapter 3: FastBuild™ Utility Halt On Error The Halt On Error function causes the FastTrak controller to stop the boot process at the FastTrak BIOS screen when there is a problem with your logical drive. For example, a disk drive failure causes your logical drive to go critical. Depending on the Halt On Error setting, one of the following events will happen: • Enabled – Your system will stop booting at this point to alert you to the condition.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual When you boot your system, the FastTrak BIOS screen informs you if there is a critical or offline logical drive. If you enabled the Halt On Error option, your system will stop booting at this point. 1. Press Ctrl-F to access the FastBuild utility. 2. From the Main Menu screen, press 3 to see the Define LD Menu. 3. Press the up and down arrow keys to select the logical drive with Critical status and press Enter.
Chapter 3: FastBuild™ Utility 4. In the Define LD Menu screen, compare the number of drives assigned to the logical drive (Total Drv) with the disk drives listed under Drive Assignments. In the above example, three drives are assigned but only two appear. The missing disk drive is the failed drive. The disk drive on Channel 2 has failed. In an actual situation, you would replace this disk drive. See “Installing the Disk Drives” on page 5 for help identifying Channels on the FastTrak Controller card.
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Chapter 4: Installing Software Drivers Following are driver installation procedures for the FastTrak SX4100 RAID Controller card. Download the latest drivers from the Promise Technology website at www.promise.com. Procedure Page Number Windows Server 2003 Install Driver During New OS Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Install Driver in an Existing System . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 26 Confirm Installation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Windows Server 2003 Install Driver During New OS Installation 1. Start the installation: Boot from the CD-ROM. Press F6 after the message “Press F6 if you need to install third party SCSI or RAID driver” appears. 2. When the Windows Setup window is generated, press S to specify an Additional Device(s) 3. Insert the Promise Technology driver diskette into drive A: and press Enter. 4.
Chapter 4: Installing Software Drivers 5. Under Install from Disk, type A:\wnet wnet and click OK. 6. Under Select the device driver you want to install, click Next. 7. If a warning about Windows Logo testing appears, click Continue Anyway. 8. Under Completing the Found New Hardware Wizard, click Finish. 9. If the New Hardware Wizard appears again, close it. 10. Click Yes to restart your PC. 11. Remove the Promise FastTrak Driver diskette. 12.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Note: If you need to specify any additional devices to be installed, do so at this time. Once all devices are specified, continue to the next step. 6. From the Windows Setup screen, press the Enter. Setup will now load all device files and then continue the Windows XP installation. Note: Check the readme file, included with the downloaded driver files, for instructions on installing the RAID Console.
Chapter 4: Installing Software Drivers 3. Click on the System icon. 4. Choose the Hardware tab, and then click the Device Manager button. 5. Click the + in front of SCSI controllers. WinXP Promise FastTrak SX4100 (tm) Controller should appear. Windows 2000 Install Driver During New OS Installation 1. Start the installation: Boot from the CD-ROM. Press F6 after the message “Press F6 if you need to install third party SCSI or RAID driver” appears. 2.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual 2. Insert the Promise FastTrak Driver diskette in the A: drive. 3. Under Install Hardware Device Drivers, select Search for a suitable driver... and click Next. 4. Under Locate Driver Files, uncheck Floppy disk drives and CD-ROM drives. Check Specify a Location and click Next. 5. Under Insert the manufacturer’s installation disk, type A:\win2000 and click OK. 6. Under Driver Files search Results, when a:\Win2000 \ft4100.inf should appears, click Next. 7.
Chapter 4: Installing Software Drivers 7. Scroll down to the Promise FastTrak SX4100 (tm) Controller and click OK. 8. When the Installer displays Promise FastTrak SX4100 (tm) Controller has been found, click Done. 9. Continue with the installation normally. Note: Check the readme file, included with the downloaded driver files, for instructions on installing the RAID Console. Install Driver in an Existing System 1. Insert FastTrak Driver Diskette into the floppy drive. 2. Log in as root. 3.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual 3. When the boot: prompt appears on the bottom of the screen, type acpi=oldboot into the lower input box. 4. Press the left Alt key and insert the FastTrak driver diskette into the floppy drive. 5. Finish the installation normally. Install Driver in an Existing System 1. Insert the FastTrak driver diskette into the floppy drive. 2. Type the following commands: # mount /dev/fd0 /media /floppy # cd /media /floppy # ./install # insmod FastTrak # umount /media /floppy 3.
Chapter 5: Concepts • About FastTrak, below • Introduction to RAID, below • Choosing a RAID Level (page 39) • Other Logical Drive Features (page 41) About FastTrak FastTrak SX4100 is a high performance RAID Controller card that features concurrent data channel operation and onboard BIOS. The channels on the FastTrak card support concurrent operation that allows for overlapped I/O under multi-tasking operating systems and sharing the workload between multiple drives.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual RAID 0 – Stripe When a logical drive is striped, the read and write blocks of data are interleaved between the sectors of multiple disk drives. Performance is increased, since the workload is balanced between drives or “members” that form the logical drive. Identical drives are recommended for performance as well as data storage efficiency. The logical drive's data capacity is equal to the number of drive members multiplied by the smallest logical drive member's capacity.
Chapter 5: Concepts RAID 1 – Mirror When a logical drive is mirrored, identical data is written to a pair of disk drives, while reads are performed in parallel. The reads are performed using elevator seek and load balancing techniques where the workload is distributed in the most efficient manner. Whichever drive is not busy and is positioned closer to the data will be accessed first. With RAID 1, if one disk drive fails or has errors, the other mirrored disk drive continues to function.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual RAID 5 – Block Striping with Distributed Parity RAID level 5 organizes data across the disk drives of the logical drive, and distributes parity information across the disk drives along with the data blocks. This organization allows increased performance by accessing multiple disk drives simultaneously for each operation, as well as fault tolerance by providing parity data.
Chapter 5: Concepts RAID 10 – Mirror / Stripe Mirror/Stripe combines both of the RAID 0 and RAID 1 logical drive types. It can increase performance by reading and writing data in parallel while protecting data with duplication. At least four disk drives are needed for RAID 10 to be installed. With a four-disk-drive logical drive, one drive pair is mirrored together then striped over a second drive pair. Data Stripe Data Mirror Disk Drives Figure 4.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual About Dual Data Redundancy One unique (though rarely occurring) feature of RAID 10 is dual fault tolerance. In some cases, two disk drives can fail simultaneously and still maintain the integrity of data. There are six combinations in which two drives can fail. The FastTrak SX4100 card protects your data in four of those cases. Assume the drives are configured as follows: • CH indicates channels on the FastTrak Controller card.
Chapter 5: Concepts JBOD – Single Drive An alternative to RAID, JBOD capacity is equal to the size of the disk drive itself. JBOD appears in the User Interface as one individual drive. There are no performance or fault-tolerance features. When one disk fails, all data on that disk is lost. The other disks are unaffected. Disk Drive Choosing a RAID Level There are several issues to consider when choosing the RAID Level for your FastTrak logical drive.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual RAID 1 Advantages Disadvantages Simplest RAID storage subsystem design Very high disk overhead - uses only 50% of total capacity Can increase read performance by processing data requests in parallel since the same data resides on two different drives Recommended Applications for RAID 1 • Accounting • Payroll • Financial • Any application requiring very high availability RAID 5 Advantages Disadvantages High Read data transaction rate Disk failure has a medium impac
Chapter 5: Concepts RAID 10 Advantages Disadvantages Implemented as a mirrored logical drive Very high disk overhead - uses only whose segments are RAID 0 logical 50% of total capacity drives High I/O rates are achieved thanks to multiple stripe segments Recommended Applications for RAID 10 • Imaging applications • Database servers • General fileserver JBOD Advantages Disadvantages Enables you to manage a large number An alternative to RAID without any of disk drives from a single controller RAID
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual • If your data retrieval consists of fixed-size data blocks, such as some database and video applications, choose that data block size as your stripe block size. Generally speaking, email, POS and webservers prefer smaller stripe block sizes. Video and database applications prefer larger stripe block sizes. Gigabyte Boundary This feature is for fault tolerant logical drives (RAID 1, 5 and 10).
Chapter 5: Concepts Spare Drives are automatically added to an logical drive once a disk member of the logical drive has been detected as failed. To restore fault tolerance as quickly as possible, the FastTrak Controller performs an automatic data rebuild on the spare drive in the background without the need to restart the system. At a later time, the failed drive can be physically removed and a new drive added in its place to function as the spare drive.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Expansion takes place on an existing Functional logical drive without disturbing the existing data. While the logical drive is expanding, you can access the data as before. When expasion is complete, your logical drive will have a larger capacity.
Chapter 5: Concepts Increase From Redundancy To Capacity Performance RAID 5 • • RAID 1 Add Lose • • * Increases the existing redundancy Important • The Target logical drive may require more disk drives than the Source logical drive • If the Target logical drive requires an EVEN number of disk drives but the Source logical drive has an ODD number, ADD a disk drive as part of the migration process • You cannot reduce the number of disk drives in your logical drive, even if the Target logical d
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual As a result, there are range limits imposed upon logical drive expansion as shown in the table above. For example: • You can expand a 2.5 TB logical drive up to 4 TB • You can only expand a 1.9 TB logical drive up to 2 TB See the table below.
Chapter 6: Troubleshooting & Tips • Motherboard Issues, below • System CMOS Issues, page 48 • Drive-Related Errors, page 48 • Operating System-Related Issues, page 49 • Performance Tips, page 50 This section is used to assist with troubleshooting conflicts and FastTrak SX4100 installation problems. Also refer to the README.TXT file on the FastTrak driver and utility diskette for more recent information as well as the PromiseOnline services listed in Chapter 7.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual System locks up during boot up or when Windows starts There may be a possible IRQ conflict with an ISA card. Identify what IRQs are used by ISA cards, enter the Motherboard PCI Setup, and reserve the IRQ for use with ISA. PCI slots cannot share IRQs with ISA cards. Miscellaneous problems such as: • FastTrak BIOS does not appear during boot • FastTrak driver does not load • Slow data transfer rates Move the FastTrak card to a different PCI slot.
Chapter 6: Troubleshooting & Tips Powering the system off and on once to reset the drive. Also confirm that cables are properly attached and the drive is receiving power. If the drive still appears to have failed, refer to the Rebuilding a logical drive option in the WebPAM software as detailed in the WebPAM User Manual. Drive cannot be formed into an logical drive Disk drives must be free of media defects to be added into a logical drive.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual For Windows 2000, XP and 2003 Server, Promise recommends a clean install of the Operating System. This action restores the MBR and OS boot record. This requires repartitioning and formatting the drive. Promise Windows driver does not appear in Device Manager Windows may already be listing the controller under Other Devices instead of the Hard disk controllers section. In Device Manager under Other Devices to see if it lists a PCI Card or RAID Controller.
Chapter 7: Support • Frequently Asked Questions, below • Contact Technical Support, page 55 • Limited Warranty, page 57 • Return Product for Repair, page 59 Frequently Asked Questions This section lists frequently asked questions involving pre-installation, drive issues, installation, and post-installation.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual How can I change the resources that the FastTrak uses? The FastTrak SX4100 is fully PnP. This means all the resources that it uses are given to it by the PnP BIOS on the motherboard. The FastTrak Controller supports IRQ sharing, but this feature only works when ALL the concerned devices support it.
Chapter 7: Support I already have an array on an older FastTrak controller. Can I move that array to my new FastTrak SX4100 controller? Yes. All FastTrak controllers read the arrays the same way and can be moved from one controller to another. Can I take a drive used in a FastTrak SX4100 logical drive and access it directly with a different controller, such as the one integrated on the motherboard? Yes, but only under certain configurations.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual How do I partition/format my FastTrak SX4100 RAID logical drive? The FastTrak Controller represents the logical drive as a single disk drive to your system. Therefore, anything that you can do to a single disk drive you can do to a FastTrak logical drive. For example, you should use the FDISK and FORMAT utilities to partition and format the logical drive. You can format the logical drive with any file system you wish.
Chapter 7: Support Contact Technical Support Promise Technical Support provides several support options for Promise users to access information and updates. We encourage you to use one of our electronic services, which provide product information updates for the most efficient service and support.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Europe, Africa, Middle East E-mail Support support@promise-emea.com Fax Technical Support +31 (0) 40 256 9463 Attention: Technical Support Phone Technical Support +31 (0) 40 235 2600 8:30am-5:00pm M-F The Netherlands Time If you wish to write us for support: Promise Technology Europe B.V. Attn: Technical Support Luchthavenweg 81-125 5657 EA Eindhoven, The Netherlands Germany E-mail Support support-de@promise-emea.
Chapter 7: Support China E-mail Support support-china@promise.com Fax Technical Support +86-10-8857-8015 Attention: Technical Support Phone Technical Support +86-10-8857-8085/8095 9:00am-6:00pm M-F China Time If you wish to write us for support: Promise Technology China Attn: Technical Support Room 1205, Tower 3 Webok Time Center, No.17 South Zhong Guan Cun Street Hai Dian District, Beijing 100081, China Limited Warranty Promise Technology, Inc.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual Disclaimer of other warranties This warranty covers only parts and labor, and excludes coverage on software items as expressly set above. Except as expressly set forth above, Promise DISCLAIMS any warranties, expressed or implied, by statute or otherwise, regarding the product, including, without limitation, any warranties for fitness for any purpose, quality, merchantability, non-infringement, or otherwise.
Chapter 7: Support Your Responsibilities You are responsible for determining whether the product is appropriate for your use and will interface with your equipment without malfunction or damage. You are also responsible for backing up your data before installing any product and for regularly backing up your data after installing the product. Promise is not liable for any damage to equipment or data loss resulting from the use of any product.
FastTrak SX4100 User Manual You must follow the packaging guidelines for returning products: • Use the original shipping carton and packaging • Include a summary of the product’s problem(s) • Write an attention line on the box with the RMA number • Include a copy of proof of purchase You are responsible for the cost of insurance and shipment of the product to Promise. Note that damage incurred due to improper transport or packaging is not covered under the Limited Warranty.
