Sas And Ssd Controllers - IBM System x3850 X5 Implementation Manual

The failure rate of SSDs is low because, in part, the drives have no moving parts. The 50 GB
High IOPS SSD is a Single Level Cell (SLC) device with Enterprise Wear Leveling. As a
consequence of both of these technologies, the additional layer of protection that is provided
by a RAID controller might not always be necessary in every client environment and, in
certain cases, RAID-0 might even be an acceptable option.

3.9.4 SAS and SSD controllers

Table 3-27 lists the disk controllers that are supported in the x3850 X5.
Table 3-27 Disk controllers that are compatible with the x3850 X5
Part Feature
number code Name
44E8689 3577 ServeRAID BR10i
46M0831 0095 ServeRAID M1015
46M0916 3877 ServeRAID M5014
46M0829 0093 ServeRAID M5015
46M0830 0094 ServeRAID M5025
f
None 3876 IBM 6Gb SSD HBA
46M0969 3889 ServeRAID B5015 SSD
a. See 3.9.5, "Dedicated controller slot" on page 100.
b. The BR10i is standard on most models. See 3.3, "Models" on page 64.
c. M1015 support for RAID-5 and RAID-50 requires the M1000 Advanced Feature Key (46M0832, 9749).
d. M5014, M5015, and M5025 support for RAID-6 and RAID-60 requires the M5000 Advanced Feature Key
(46M0930, fc 5106).
e. ServeRAID M5015 option part number 46M0829 includes the M5000 battery; however, the feature code 0093 does
not contain the battery. Order feature code 5744 if you want to include the battery in the server configuration.
f. The IBM 6Gb SSD Host Bus Adapter is currently not available as a separately orderable option. Use the feature
code to add the adapter to a customized order, using the configure-to-order (CTO) process. Part number 46M0914
is the L1 manufacturing part number. Part number 46M0983 is the pseudo option number, which is also used in
manufacturing.
RAID levels 0 and 1 are standard on all models (except 7145-ARx) with the integrated BR10i
ServeRAID controller. Model 7145-ARx has no RAID capability standard.
All servers, even those servers that are not standard with the BR10i (model 7145-ARx),
include the blue mounting bracket (see Figure 3-25 on page 101), which allows for the easy
installation of a supported RAID controller in the dedicated x8 PCIe slot behind the disk cage.
Only RAID controllers that are supported with the 2.5-inch SAS backplane can be used in this
slot. See Table 3-27 for a summary of these supported options.
ServeRAID BR10i Controller
The ServeRAID-BR10i has the following specifications:
LSI 1068e-based adapter
Two internal mini-SAS SFF-8087 connectors
SAS 3 Gbps PCIe x8 host bus interface
Fixed 64 KB stripe size
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IBM eX5 Implementation Guide
b
Yes No
Yes Yes
Yes Yes
Yes Yes
No No
No Yes
No Yes
Battery Cache
Yes No None
Yes No None
Yes Optional 256MB
e
Yes Yes 512MB
No Yes 512MB
No No None
No No None
RAID support
0,1,1E
c
0,1,10,5,50
d
0,1,10,5,50,6,60
d
0,1,10,5,50,6,60
d
0,1,10,5,50,6,60
No
1,5