[rescue] Clariion raid questions (Fiberchannel)

[Ethan O'Toole]

Hello everyone,

 It seems as if these Clariion Fibrechannel arrays are getting cheap. I'm
speaking of the DAE units. From what I gather:

 Some have SP (Storage Processors), and some are JBODS.

 A unit with a SP can connect to two JBOD boxes.

 They can do redundant SP's

 They use Fibre channel disks that are formatted (low level) to 520 bytes
per block instead of 512 bytes.

 The disk IDs are probably changed so I can't buy scrap drives from eBay
and load up an array?

 Anyone have any experience? Is it a nice cheap way to add some hardware
raid 5 disks to a host? I have Qlogic 2100's that are copper, and a Vixel
FC hub.. all 1gb gear..

 I can't help but think about using a SP loaded DAE and a JBOD to add
storage to our mail server (a Compaq 1850R w/ FreeBSD).

 Thoughts? Opinions? Is there a scene of people getting off the shelf
disks working on these units?

 I remember the old arrays that had 20 drives and there was a secret
command you could type in the console window to change vendor and such.

 It all started when I was trying to figure out the real name of the SGI
TP9400 branded LSI made storage processor... (Also seen in STK arrays).

-- 
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