Configuring A Raid Array - IBM Flex System p260 Installation And Service Manual

Configuring a RAID array

Use this information to configure a RAID array.
About this task
Configuring a RAID array applies to a compute node in which disk drives or solid-state drives are
installed.
Note: When configuring a RAID array, the hard disk drives must use the same type of interface and
must have identical capacity and speed.
Disk drives and solid-state drives in the IBM Flex System p260 Compute Node or IBM Flex System p460
Compute Node can be used to implement and manage various types of RAID arrays in operating
systems that are on the ServerProven list. For the compute node, you must configure the RAID array
through the smit sasdam utility, which is the SAS RAID Disk Array Manager for the AIX operating
system. The AIX Disk Array Manager is packaged with the Diagnostics utilities on the diagnostics CD.
Use the smit sasdam utility to configure the disk drives for use with the SAS controller. For more
information, see http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/systems/scope/hw/index.jsp?topic=/p7ebj/
sasusingthesasdiskarraymanager.htm.
Important: Depending on your RAID configuration, you might have to create the array before you install
the operating system in the compute node.
Before you can create a RAID array, you must reformat the drives so that the sector size of the drives
changes from 512 bytes to 528 bytes. If you later decide to remove the drives, delete the RAID array
before you remove the drives. If you decide to delete the RAID array and reuse the drives, you must
reformat the drives so that the sector size of the drives changes from 528 bytes to 512 bytes.
Related information:
http://www.ibm.com/systems/info/x86servers/serverproven/compat/us/
http://publib.boulder.ibm.com/infocenter/systems/scope/hw/index.jsp?topic=/p7ebj/
sasusingthesasdiskarraymanager.htm
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Power Systems: IBM Flex System p260 and p460 Compute Nodes Installation and Service Guide