Raid For Your Server - Lenovo THINKSERVER 387 Hardware Maintenance Manual

• RAID 50: a combination of RAID 0 and RAID 5
RAID 50 uses distributed parity and disk striping. A RAID 50 drive group is a spanned drive group in
which data is striped across multiple RAID 5 drive groups. RAID 50 works best with data that requires
high reliability, high request rates, high data transfers, and medium-to-large capacity.
Note: Having virtual drives of different RAID levels, such as RAID 0 and RAID 5, in the same drive group is
not allowed. For example, if an existing RAID 5 virtual drive is created out of partial space in an array, the
next virtual drive in the array has to be RAID 5 only.
RAID 50 requires a minimum number of six hard disk drives.
For detailed information about RAID, refer to "Introduction to RAID" in the MegaRAID SAS Software User
Guide on the documentation DVD that comes with your server.

RAID for your server

This topic provides information about the RAID supported by your server.
Your server supports the following two types of RAID configurations:
• Onboard SATA software RAID configuration using the LSI Software RAID Configuration Utility
program; and RAID management using the MegaRAID Storage Manager program
The onboard SATA software RAID controller is integrated in the Intel C202 chip on the system board. If your
server has SATA hard disk drives that are connected to the system board, you can use the LSI Software
RAID Configuration Utility program to configure RAID. Your server supports onboard SATA software RAID
levels 0, 1, and 10. You can also activate RAID level 5 by installing a ThinkServer SATA Software RAID 5
activation key. See "Installing or removing the ThinkServer SATA Software RAID 5 Key" on page 102.
You can install and use the MegaRAID Storage Manager program to manage the RAID array and RAID
controller in an operating system environment.
For detailed information, see "Configuring the onboard SATA software RAID" on page 74.
• Advanced SATA/SAS hardware RAID configuration using the WebBIOS Configuration Utility
program; and RAID management using the MegaRAID Storage Manager program and the MegaCLI
Configuration Utility program (requires a RAID card)
Some server models come with a required RAID card to provide advanced SATA/SAS hardware RAID
functions to the server. You can also purchase the RAID card from Lenovo and install it into server models
that support the RAID card to get advanced SATA/SAS hardware RAID functions. See "RAID card" on
page 33 and "Installing or removing the RAID card" on page 98 for more information.
Note: For server models with more than four hard disk drives or models that use SAS hard disk drives,
there must be a RAID card installed.
The RAID card provides the WebBIOS Configuration Utility program to help you configure RAID
independently of the operating system. You can also install the MegaRAID Storage Manager program and
the MegaCLI Configuration Utility program to help you manage the RAID array and RAID controller in
an operating system environment. The supported RAID levels are RAID 0, 1, and 10. To activate RAID
5 and 50 levels, you need to install a RAID 5 key on the RAID card. See "Installing or removing the
ThinkServer 9240-8i RAID 5 Upgrade Key" on page 100.
For detailed information, see "Configuring the advanced SATA or SAS hardware RAID" on page 79.
Note: The ThinkServer EasyStartup program simplifies the process of configuring supported RAID and
installing supported operating systems and device drivers.
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Chapter 5 Configuring the server
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