LSI 2108 2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility
LSI 2108 2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility
LSI 2108 2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility
SAS MegaRAID
Configuration Utility
USER’S MANUAL
Revision 1.0
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Preface
Manual Organization
Chapter 1 Provides an overview on the LSI™ 2108/2208 MegaRAID® Software
Utility.
Chapter 2 Provides instructions on how to run the LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID
Utility to configure RAID settings.
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
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iv
Preface
Notes
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
Table of Contents
Preface
Chapter 1 Introduction
1-1 Overview of the LSI 2108/2208 SAS Controller.............................................. 1-1
Features of the LSI 2108/2208 Controller....................................................... 1-1
Functions of the LSI MegaRAID Utility............................................................ 1-3
Drive Features Supported by the LSI MegaRAID Utility................................. 1-3
1-2 RAID Levels Supported by the 2108/2208 Controller..................................... 1-4
RAID 0.............................................................................................................. 1-4
RAID 1.............................................................................................................. 1-4
RAID 10............................................................................................................ 1-5
RAID 5.............................................................................................................. 1-5
RAID 50............................................................................................................ 1-6
RAID 6.............................................................................................................. 1-6
RAID 60............................................................................................................ 1-7
Chapter 2 Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
2-1 Using the LSI MegaRAID Configuration Utility................................................ 2-1
2-2 The LSI MegaRAID Main Screen.................................................................... 2-2
2-3 Advanced Software Options............................................................................ 2-3
2-4 Controller Selection.......................................................................................... 2-3
2-5 Controller Properties........................................................................................ 2-3
2-6 Scan Devices................................................................................................... 2-6
2-7 Virtual Drives.................................................................................................... 2-6
2-8 Drives............................................................................................................... 2-8
2-9 Configuration Wizard........................................................................................ 2-9
Adding a Configuration.................................................................................. 2-10
Configuring Drives Manually...........................................................................2-11
2-10 Logical View................................................................................................... 2-14
Physical View................................................................................................. 2-14
2-11 Events............................................................................................................ 2-15
2-12 Exit................................................................................................................. 2-16
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Chapter 1: Introduction to the LSI MegaRAID Software Utility
Chapter 1
Introduction
After you have installed hardware components, you must first configure LSI
2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID settings before you install an operating system and
other software drivers.
Note: If you do not wish to configure LSI Software RAID settings, proceed
with the OS installation. For OS installation instructions, refer to related
documents posted on our website at www.supermicro.com.
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
High Performance
• Single PowerPC core at 800 MHz (LSI2108 only), 512MB Write Cache
• Dual PowerPC cores at 800 MHz (LSI2208 only), 1GB Write Cache
6Gb/s SAS Interface
• 8-port SAS/SATA controller
• 1.5 Gb/s, 3 Gb/s, and 6 Gb/s SAS/SATA data transfer rates supported
• Spread Spectrum Clocking supported
• SSP, SMP (Symmetric Multiple Processing), STP (Spanning Tree Protocol),
and SATA (Serial-ATA) protocols supported
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Chapter 1: Introduction to the LSI MegaRAID Software Utility
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
RAID 0
RAID 0 (Integrated Striping) can greatly enhance hard disk I/O performance by strip-
ing data across all disk drives in an array or drive group. This RAID configuration
does not provide data redundancy, but it offers the best RAID performance and a
high bandwidth. The following illustration provides a visual example of a RAID 0
drive group.
Drive A Drive B
Segment 1 Segment 2
Segment 3 Segment 4
Segment 5 Segment 6
Segment 7 Segment 8
RAID 0 Example
RAID 1
RAID 1 (Integrated Mirroring) allows data to be simultaneously written to multiple
drives. This RAID configuration increases data integrity by providing redundancy,
but requires twice the amount of data storage capacity. RAID 1 requires 2 drives.
The following illustration provides a visual example of a RAID 1 drive group.
RAID 1 RAID 1
RAID 1 Example
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Chapter 1: Introduction to the LSI MegaRAID Software Utility
RAID 10
RAID 10, a combination of RAID 1 and RAID 0, provides superb system performance
and system security. RAID 10 mirrors small blocks of data to a series of RAID 1
drive groups. Then the first RAID 1 drive in a drive group duplicates its data to the
second drive. RAID 10 requires a minimum of 4 drives. Any additional drives must
be be added in pairs (6 drives, 8 drives, etc). The following illustration provides a
visual example of a RAID 10 virtual drive group.
RAID 0
RAID 1 RAID 1
RAID 10
Segment 1 Segment 1 Segment 2 Segment 2
Duplicate Duplicate
Segment 3 Segment 3 Segment 4 Segment 4
Duplicate Duplicate
RAID 10 Example
RAID 5
RAID 5 provides high data throughput by implementing block-level striping with par-
ity data distributed across all drives. A RAID 5 configuration can survive the loss of
a single drive failure because the parity drive can be used to re-create the missing
data. RAID 5 requires at least 3 drives. The following illustration provides a visual
example of a RAID 5 virtual drive group with three drives.
RAID 5
RAID 5 Example
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
RAID 50
RAID 50 is a combination of RAID 5 and RAID 0. This type of drive group is called
a spanned drive group because data is striped across multiple RAID 5 drive groups.
RAID 50 requires at least 6 drives. The following illustration provides a visual ex-
ample of a RAID 50 virtual drive group.
RAID 0
RAID 5 RAID 5
RAID 50
Segment 1 Segment 2 Parity (1,2) Segment 3 Segment 4 Parity (3,4)
Segment 6 Parity (5,6) Segment 5 Segment 8 Parity (7,8) Segment 7
Parity (9, 10) Segment 9 Segment 10 Parity (11, 12) Segment 11 Segment 12
RAID 50 Example
RAID 6
Similar to RAID 5, RAID 6 also provides block-level striping with parity data distrib-
uted across all drives, except that there are two parity blocks per stripe instead of
just one. A RAID 6 configuration can survive the loss of any two drives in a virtual
drive without losing data and requires a minimm of 3 drives. The following illustra-
tion provides a visual example of a RAID 6 virtual drive group.
Note: In the following RAID 6 illustration, the P drives represent the RAID
5 parity scheme. The Q drives represent the second set of parity drives.
RAID 6
RAID 6 Example
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Chapter 1: Introduction to the LSI MegaRAID Software Utility
RAID 60
RAID 60 combines the features of RAID 6 and RAID 0. RAID 60 implements
distributed parity (two independent parity bloks per stripe in a RAID set) and disk
striping.The dual parity allows RAID 6 to survive two drive failures in each RAID 6
set without losing data. RAID 60 requires at least 8 drives. The following illustration
provides a visual example of a RAID 60 virtual drive group.
Note: In the following RAID 6 illustration, the P drives represent the RAID
5 parity scheme. The Q drives represent the second set of parity drives.
RAID 0
RAID 6 RAID 6
RAID 60 Segment 1 Segment 2 Parity (P1-P2) Segment 3 Segment 4 Parity (Q3-Q4) Parity (P3-P4)
Parity (Q1-Q2)
Segment 8 Parity (Q3-Q4) Segment 7 Segment 6 Parity (Q5-Q6) Parity (P5-P6) Segment 5
Parity (P3-P4)
Parity (Q11-Q12) Parity (P11-P12) Segment 12 Parity (Q9-Q10) Parity (P9-P10) Segment 9 Segment 10
Segment 11
Parity (P15-P16) Segment 15 Parity (Q15-Q16) Parity (P13-P14) Segment 13 Segment 14 Parity (Q13-Q14)
Segment 16
RAID 60 Example
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
Notes
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Chapter 2: Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
Chapter 2
This chapter provides instructions on how to configure MegaRAID settings for the
LSI 2108/2208 SAS controller. If you do not wish to configure LSI Software RAID
settings, skip this section and go directly to OS Installation. For OS installation
instructions, please refer to our web site at www.supermicro.com.
Note: To use the drives connected to the 2108/2208 controller, a RAID
must be created. If using drives like in JBOD, each single drive must be
created as a RAID 0 individually.
Note: For system stability, do not use both SAS and SATA drives in the
same array.
2. Press <CTRL> and <H> to enter the LSI MegaRAID Configuration Utility after
the controller is initialized. The Adapter Selection screen displays, as shown
below.
Adapter Selection
3. In the Adapter Selection screen, choose LSI SAS 2108/2208 then select Start
to display the MegaRAID main screen.
Note: To make a selection, use the mouse or use the <Tab> key to navi-
gate between the selectable items on the screen and press <Enter> to
confirm. If your USB Keyboard/Mouse is not supported by the MegaRAID
BIOS Config Utility, enter the BIOS Setup Utility and enable Port 64/60
Emulation support (Advanced > Chipset Config > South Bridge Config >
Port 64/60 Emulation).
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
On the left side of the LSI MegaRAID main screen is a list of configurable items.
To configure the settings for an item, use the mouse or press the <Tab> key to
select the item and press <Enter>. The main screen includes the following items:
• Advanced Software Options
• Controller Selection
• Controller Properties
• Scan Devices
• Virtual Drives
• Drives
• Configuration Wizard
• Logical View/Physical View
• Events
• Exit
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Chapter 2: Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
1. From the MegaRAID configuration utility main page, use the mouse or the
<Tab> key to select Controller Properties to display the Controller Information
screen (shown below). This screen displays information about the selected
controller such as Serial Number, WebBIOS Version, Firmware Version, Drive
Count, and Memory Size.
Controller Information
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
3. Select Next again to display the Controller Properties screen (shown below).
Controller Properties
4. The Controller Properties screen allows you to view and configure the follow-
ing items:
Item Description
Battery Backup This item indicates if a backup battery is installed in the
system. If installed, select Present to view the battery
details.
Coercion Mode Select a desired setting for the coercion mode. The op-
tions are None, 128MB-way, and 1GB-way.
Set Factory Select Yes to load factory default settings. Select No if
Default you do not want to use the factory default settings.
S.M.A.R.T Enter a number (in seconds) for the interval between the
Polling first and the next S.M.A.R.T (Self-Monitoring, Analysis,
and Reporting Technology) Polling.
Cluster Mode A cluster is a group of servers that connects to a common
set of clients and can access the same data storage.
Select Disabled to disable cluster support. Select Enabled
to enable cluster support.
Alarm Control Use this item to enable, disable, or silence the onboard
alarm.
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Chapter 2: Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
Item Description
Rebuild Rate The rebuild rate determines the percentage of system re-
sources that will be applied toward rebuilding a drive that
has failed. Enter a number between 1 and 100 to control
the rebuild rate.
Patrol Read A patrol read monitors physical disks to find and resolve
Rate any problems that may result in disk failure. Enter a num-
ber between 0 and 100 for the patrol read rate.
BGI Rate The BGI (Background Initialization) Rate determines the
rate at which virtual drives are initialized in the back-
ground. Enter a number between 0 and 100.
Cache Flush Enter a value in the field to specify (in seconds) how often
Interval the system will flush the cache memory.
CC Rate The CC (Check Consistency) Rate determines the rate at
which consistency check scans are performed on a disk to
determine if data is corrupted. Enter a number between 0
and 100.
Spinup Drive Enter a number to control the amount of drives that spin up
Count at one time.
Reconstruction The reconstruction rate determines the rate at which a
Rate virtual drive is reconstructed. Enter a number between 0
and 100.
Spinup Delay After the RAID controller completes initialization, the spinup
delay is the initial amount of seconds that pass before the
first disk interrogation request is sent to the array.
NCQ Enable NCQ (Native Command Queuing) to increase
the performance of an HDD by allowing it to optimize the
operation sequence in retrieving outstanding requests and
executing read/write commands.
Spin Down This item indicates how long a spin-down drive will wait
Delay Time before the next command is executed
Stop CC On Select Yes to stop a consistency check when an error is
Error encountered.
Schedule CC Use this item to schedule a consistency check.
Maintain PD Enable this feature to track bad PDs (Physical Disk) across
Fail History reboot.
Stop on Error Enable this feature to stop system POST if an error is
detected.
Controller This item enables the controller BIOS. The default is
BIOS Enabled.
Disk Activity Enable this option if you want disk activity indicated by a
green activity LED. The disks must be installed in an enclo-
sure for this option to work.
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
Item Description
Emergency Specify whether to use GHS (Global Hot Spares) or UG
Spare (Unconfigured Good) drives as emergency spares.
Emergency for Select to enable or disable this feature. The default is
SMARTer disabled.
Link Speed Use this item to manage the link speed between the con-
troller and a drive that is connected to the controller.
Data Protection Use this item to enable or disable data protection.
SSD Caching Use this item to manage SSD caching on virtual drives.
After all settings have been configured, select Submit to implement the changes
or select Reset to reset the settings.
1. From the configuration utility main screen, use the <Tab> key or the mouse to
select Virtual Drives and press <Enter>. The following screen displays.
Virtual Drives
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Chapter 2: Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
2. In the window on the right, select a virtual drive and perform one of the fol-
lowing actions:
• Fast Initialize: Initializes the selected drive by writing zeros to the first sector of
the drive, then continue the initialization in the background after system boot.
• Slow Initialize: Initializes the selected drive by writing zeros to the entire drive
volume. This process can take hours or days to complete, depending on the
drive size.
• Check Consistency: Verify that redundancy data is correct and available for
arrays or disk groups using RAID 1, 5, 6, 10, 50, or 60. If a difference in data
is found, MegaRAID WebBIOS assumes that the data is accurate and automati-
cally corrects the parity value.
• Properties: Check this item to view and change the properties of the selected
drive (see #3 below).
• Set Boot Drive: Check this item to make the selected drive a bootable drive.
After selecting an action to perform, click Go to perform the action or click Reset
to reset the setting.
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
Policies: This section allows you to view and change the read, write, disk cache,
BGI, access, and I/O policies on the drive. To change any settings, choose the de-
sired setting from the pull-down menu and select Change to confirm the change.
Operations: This section allows you to perform the following operations on the
virtual drive:
• Delete
• Locate/Stop Locate
• Adv Opers (Advanced Operations)
• Fast/Slow Init (fast/slow initialization)
• CC (Consistency Check)
• Expand
After selecting a desired operation, click Go to perform the operation.
2-8 Drives
This feature displays all physical drives detected on the controller and allows you
to rebuild or view the properties of the selected drive.
1. From the MegaRAID configuration utility main page, use the <Tab> key or the
mouse to select Drives. The following screen displays.
Drives
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Chapter 2: Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
2. Highlight a drive and select one of the following items to perform an action.
1. From the configuration utility main page, use the <Tab> key or the mouse to
select Configuration Wizard. The following screen displays.
Configuration Wizard
• Clear Configuration: Check this item to clear the existing RAID configuration
settings.
• New Configuration: Check this item to delete all RAID configuration settings and
create new a RAID Volume. Data previously stored in the drive will be erased.
Warning: When creating a new RAID volume, all existing RAID arrays will be erased.
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
• Add Configuration: Check this item to keep the existing configuration settings
and to add new settings to the drive. This is a safe operation because there is
no risk of losing data.
After you have checked an item, select Next to proceed with the action or select
Cancel to return to the configuration utility main page.
Adding a Configuration
If you selected Add Configuration, the following screen displays.
Add Configuration
• Manual Configuration: Check this item to manually create drive groups and
virtual drives and manually set their parameters. All drives including configured
drives will display.
• Automatic Configuration: Check this item to allow the LSI SAS RAID Controller
to configure the MegaRAID settings automatically.
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Chapter 2: Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
Add Drives
2. Select the drives you want to add to the array and click Add to Array. To
undo any drive addition, select the drive and click Reclaim.
3. After all desired drives are added to the drive group, select Accept DG to
create a drive group. Multiple drive groups can be created by adding addi-
tional available drives. When finished creating drive groups, select Next.
4. In the pull-down menu of the Span Definition screen, select the drive group
you want to add to SPAN and click Add to SPAN, then click Next.
Span Definition
Note: For RAID 10, 50, and 60, two or more drive groups must be added
to SPAN.
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
In the Virtual Drive Definition screen, configure the following options as needed:
RAID Level: Select the desired RAID level. The available options are:
• RAID 0 (data striping)
• RAID 1 (data mirroring)
• RAID 5 (data striping with parity)
• RAID 6 (distributed parity and disk striping)
• RAID 10 (striped mirroring)
• RAID 50 (striped mirroring)
• RAID 60 (distributed parity with two independent parity blocks per stripe)
Stripe Size: Select the desired stripe size.
Read Policy: Select either Always Read Ahead or No Read Ahead. Selecting Al-
ways Read Ahead will improve performance during sequential reads.
• Write-Back With BBU: Use this option to write data only to the controller
cache, provided that a battery backup is installed and functional.
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Chapter 2: Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
• Always Write-Back: Use this option to write data only to the cache, even if a
battery backup is bad or missing. (This option is not recommended because
cached data will be lost in the event of a power outage.)
IO Policy: The IO Policy applies only to reads on a specific virtual drive and does
not affect the Read Policy or the Write Policy. Select between the following options:
• Cached: Use this option to buffer all IO reads in cache memory.
• Direct: Use this option to simultaneously transfer data to the cache and host.
Drive Cache: This applies to the cache on physical drives in the array. Select
between Enable, Disable, and Unchanged.
Select Size: Enter a value to set the desired size of the virtual drive. The maximum
capacity that can be set is displayed in the Virtual Drives window (right side of
Virtual Drive Definition screen)
6. When finished configuring the virtual drive options, select Accept then select
Next to proceed to the configuration preview screen (shown below).
Configuration Preview
7. Select Accept to save the configuration. Continue to select Accept in the fol-
lowing screens until you are prompted to initialize the virtual drive.
8. Select Yes when prompted to initialize the drive. Initialization options are
identical to Virtual Drives section (see page 2-6).
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
Logical View
Physical View
To view physical drives (instead of logical drives) in the main window, select Physical
View in the left pane of the main page to display the status of all physical drives
detected in the system.
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Chapter 2: Configuring the LSI MegaRAID Settings
2-11 Events
This feature displays system event information. From the configuration utility main
page, use the <Tab> key or the mouse to select Events. The following screen
displays.
Event Information
Use the left pane of the screen to set the parameters, then select Go to display the
associated events. The parameters are:
First Sequence# / Last Sequence#: The first and last sequence are for display
only. They indicate the range of events that have been captured.
Event Locale: Select the location for the event search. Available locations include:
• Virtual Drive
• Physical Device
• Enclosure
• BBU (Battery Backup)
• SAS (SAS devices)
• Controller
• Configuration
• Cluster
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LSI 2108/2208 SAS MegaRAID Configuration Utility User's Manual
Event Class: Select the class level for the event search. Available classes include:
• Informational: This type of event is informative only and does not require
user action.
• Warning: This type of event indicates a component that may cause a failure.
• Critical: This type of event affects system stability. User intervention is re-
quired to solve the problem before the system becomes unstable.
• Fatal: This type of event indicates that some component has failed and that
data loss will occur or has occurred.
• Dead: This type of event indicates that a devastating error occurred, result-
ing in controller failure. This error will only be seen if the controller has
been restarted.
Start Sequence#: Based on the range of sequences (events) that are logged, enter
a sequence starting point for the event search.
2-12 Exit
After you have configured RAID settings, return to the main page and use the <Tab>
key or the mouse to select Exit. A screen displays prompting you to confirm exiting.
Select No to return to the LSI RAID Utility. Select Yes to exit, at which point you are
prompted to reboot your system. Press <Ctrl> + <Alt> + <Del> to reboot the system.
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(Disclaimer continued)
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