Dell Computer Hardware S300 User Manual
Dell PowerEdge  
RAID Controller (PERC) S100,  
PERC S300  
User’s Guide  
Contents  
1
WARNING: Safety Instructions  
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7
SAFETY: General  
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8
SAFETY: When Working Inside Your System  
Protecting Against Electrostatic Discharge  
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2
Overview  
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11  
Introduction  
11  
General Information, Intended Audience, and  
Prerequisites for Use  
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11  
12  
Related Documentation  
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PERC S100 Adapter or PERC S300 Adapter  
Descriptions  
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12  
17  
18  
About RAID  
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RAID Terminology  
3
4
Features  
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21  
21  
General Features.  
Specifications  
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29  
Hardware Installation  
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31  
Before You Begin  
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31  
Contents  
3
General Considerations  
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31  
32  
35  
35  
Installing the PERC S300 Adapter  
Connect Physical Disks to the PERC S300 Adapter  
Complete the Hardware Installation  
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5
6
Installing the Drivers  
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37  
Installing the Microsoft Windows Drivers  
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37  
RAID Configuration and  
Management  
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47  
Configuring the Controller: Using the PERC  
Virtual Disk Management Utility  
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47  
7
Troubleshooting  
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61  
System Startup Problems  
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61  
Warning Messages: Dell Inc. PERC S100  
Adapter or Dell Inc. PERC S300 Adapter  
BIOS Screen  
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64  
70  
75  
Virtual Disk-Related Errors  
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Physical Disk-Related Errors  
8
Appendix A  
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77  
77  
78  
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Controller Specifications  
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Controller Tasks  
Physical Disk Tasks  
Virtual Disk Tasks  
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4
Contents  
Supported RAID Levels  
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79  
80  
Virtual Disk Specifications  
9
Appendix B  
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81  
RAID Technology - Understanding Disk Arrays  
and Virtual Disks.  
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81  
10 Appendix C  
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89  
89  
90  
92  
92  
94  
Regulatory Notices  
FCC Notice (U.S. Only)  
Industry Canada Notice (Canada Only)  
CE Notice (European Union)  
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CE Mark Notice  
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11 Appendix D  
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95  
Contacting Dell  
95  
Index  
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97  
Glossary  
103  
Contents  
5
6
Contents  
1
WARNING: Safety Instructions  
Use the following safety guidelines to help ensure your own personal safety  
and to help protect your system and working environment from potential  
damage.  
WARNING: Do not expose the Dell PowerEdge Expandable RAID Controller  
(PERC) S300 adapter to liquids. To reduce risk of fire hazard, do not cover or  
obstruct the ventilation openings of the system in which it is installed. Do not  
install the controller in a zero-clearance compartment. This could result in  
overheating.  
WARNING: Do not operate the controller if it has been dropped or damaged in  
any way.  
WARNING: The controller, like every other electronic part of a system, can be  
damaged by static electricity. Be sure that you are properly grounded. It is  
recommended that you wear a grounded antistatic strap and that the system is  
unplugged before you install the controller.  
CAUTION: Cable connectors must be mated carefully with the connectors on the  
PERC S300 adapter. The connectors are keyed to prevent them from being inserted  
incorrectly.  
CAUTION: Ensure that the current RAID controller (if any) is not currently working  
on any pending tasks (such as a rebuild) before it is turned off to conduct a system  
upgrade.  
CAUTION: During a firmware update, do not reboot the system that contains the  
PERC S300 adaper. An update might take up to five minutes per controller.  
WARNING: Safety Instructions  
7
   
SAFETY: General  
Observe and follow service markings:  
•
Do not service any product except as explained in the user documentation.  
Opening or removing covers that are marked with a triangular symbol with  
a lightning bolt might expose you to electrical shock. Components inside  
these compartments must be serviced only by a trained service technician.  
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Use the product only with Dell-approved equipment.  
Operate the product only from the type of external power source indicated  
on the electrical ratings label. If you are not sure of the type of power  
source required, consult your service provider or local power company.  
SAFETY: When Working Inside Your System  
Before you remove the system covers, perform the following steps in the  
sequence indicated.  
WARNING: Only trained service technicians are authorized by Dell to remove  
covers from the system, and access any of the internal components, unless the  
Dell documentation expressly states otherwise.  
CAUTION: To help avoid possible damage to the system board, wait five seconds  
after turning off the system before disconnecting the controller.  
1
2
Turn off the system and any devices.  
Wear grounding straps that are properly grounded before touching  
anything inside the system.  
3
4
While you work, periodically touch an unpainted metal surface on the  
chassis to dissipate any static electricity that might harm internal  
components.  
Disconnect your system and devices from their power sources. To reduce  
the potential of personal injury or shock, disconnect any  
telecommunication lines from the system.  
8
WARNING: Safety Instructions  
       
In addition, take note of these safety guidelines when appropriate:  
•
When you disconnect any cable, pull on its connector or on its strain-relief  
loop, not on the cable itself. Some cables have a connector with locking  
tabs. If you are disconnecting this type of cable, press in on the locking  
tabs before disconnecting the cable. As you pull connectors apart, keep  
them evenly aligned to avoid bending any connector pins. Also, before you  
connect a cable, make sure that both connectors are correctly oriented and  
aligned.  
•
Handle the controller with care. Do not touch the components or contacts  
on the controller.  
Protecting Against Electrostatic Discharge  
Electrostatic discharge (ESD) events can harm electronic components inside  
your system. ESD, or electrostatic discharge, is the process by which static  
electricity can build up within a person or an object, and then discharge into  
another object. ESD events can harm your PERC S300 adaper, your system,  
and other electrical components. To prevent ESD damage, you must  
discharge static electricity from your body before you interact with any of the  
system’s internal electronic components. You can protect against ESD by  
touching a metal grounded object (such as an unpainted metal surface on  
your system’s I/O panel) before you interact with anything electronic. In  
addition, as you work inside the system, periodically touch an I/O connector  
to remove any static charge your body might have accumulated.  
You can also take the following steps to prevent damage from electrostatic  
discharge:  
•
When unpacking the controller from its shipping carton, do not remove  
the controller from the antistatic packing material until you are ready to  
install it. Just before unwrapping the antistatic package, be sure to  
discharge static electricity from your body.  
•
Handle all electrostatic sensitive components in a static-safe area. If  
possible, use anti-static floor pads and work bench pads.  
WARNING: Safety Instructions  
9
   
10  
WARNING: Safety Instructions  
2
Overview  
Introduction  
The Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC) S300 provides an integrated  
software RAID solution for Dell PowerEdge Value Servers. The PERC S300  
controllers support SAS and SATA interfaces. Containing two internal  
connectors with four ports each, the PERC S300 adapter features  
eight ports for connecting drives with a maximum burst speed of up to  
3 Gbps per port.  
The PERC S100 adaper is targeted as a low-cost RAID solution for Dell  
PowerEdge Value Servers. The PERC S100 adapter solution supports SATA  
Hard Disk Drives (HDD) and Solid State Disk (SSD) drives. The PERC S100  
adapter requires no additional hardware; it runs from the I/O Controller HUB  
(ICH) or Platform Controller Hub (PCH) chipset on the platform  
motherboard.  
The PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter offer the same RAID level  
support and functionality, including the support of up to eight physical  
drives.  
General Information, Intended Audience, and  
Prerequisites for Use  
This document provides information about:  
•
The PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter, including server,  
operating system, and software support  
•
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Controller configuration and startup procedures  
Controller operating modes  
Overview  
11  
     
This document is intended for use by system administrators and technicians  
who are familiar with the storage system installation and configuration.  
Prerequisites for configuring and using the controller include familiarity with:  
•
•
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Servers and computer networks  
RAID technology  
Storage-interface technology, such as SAS and SATA  
Related Documentation  
For more information about the PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter  
and its relationship to the Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Storage  
Management documentation, see the Storage Management documentation  
available on the Dell Support website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
PERC S100 Adapter or PERC S300 Adapter  
Descriptions  
The following list describes each type of controller:  
•
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The PERC S300 Adapter has two internal connectors with x4 SAS ports.  
The PERC S300 Modular has two internal connectors with x4 SAS ports.  
The PERC S100 adapter runs on the ICH or PCH chipset on the platform  
motherboard.  
12  
Overview  
     
Supported Platforms  
Table 2-1. Dell Systems and Support Matrix for the PERC S100 Adapter and  
PERC S300 Adapter  
PowerEdge Server  
PERC Controller, with Chipset and Adapter Support per Platform  
PowerEdge R210  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel Ibex Peak chipsets  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter  
PowerEdge R210 II  
PowerEdge R310  
PowerEdge R410  
PowerEdge R415  
PowerEdge R510  
PowerEdge R515  
PowerEdge T110  
PowerEdge T110 II  
PowerEdge T310  
PowerEdge T410  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel Cougar Point chipsets  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel Ibex Peak chipsets  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Modular  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel ICH10R chipsets  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Modular  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Modular,  
AMD SP5100 South Bridge chipsets  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel ICH10R chipsets,  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter,  
AMD SP5100 South Bridge chipsets  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel Ibex Peak chipsets  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel Cougar Point chipsets  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel Ibex Peak chipsets  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter  
PERC S100 adapter – Intel ICH10R chipsets  
PERC S300 adapter – Dell 3Gb/s SAS Adapter  
Overview  
13  
Platform Requirements for the PERC S100 Controller and PERC S300  
Controller  
Table 2-2. Platform Requirements — PERC S100 Controller or PERC S300 Controller  
Component Requirements  
Processor x86, 32-bit compatible processor greater than 500 MHz.  
Memory  
512 MB or greater.  
Physical  
disk  
At least one Hard Disk Drives (HDD) or Solid State Disk (SSD) Drives.  
NOTE: The PERC S100 controller supports cabled configurations of up to  
4 SATA HDD or 4 SATA SSD physical disks. The PERC S300 controller  
supports cabled or hot-swap configurations of up to 8 SATA or SAS HDD  
physical disks.  
• SATA-II HDD physical disks can be used with a PERC S100 adapter or  
a PERC S300 adapter.  
• SATA-II SSD physical disks can be used only with a PERC S100  
adapter.  
• SAS HDD physical disks can be used only with a PERC S300 adapter.  
Ports  
• The S300 Adapter has two 8470-type internal SAS connectors on the  
adapter card. Each mini-SAS connector supports 4 SAS/SATA ports.  
• The S300 Modular typically plugs into a backplane that has a single  
8470-type SAS connector (except for PERC S300 adapters on an R210  
or T110, whose cables plug directly into the physical disks).  
Available  
slots  
The PERC S300 Adapter and PERC S300 Modular cards plug into  
8-lane Peripheral Component Interconnect Express (PCI-E) slots.  
14  
Overview  
 
Table 2-2. Platform Requirements — PERC S100 Controller or PERC S300 Controller  
Component Requirements  
Operating • Microsoft Windows Essential Business Server (x64)  
systems  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Datacenter Edition (x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Edition (x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Edition (x86)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Foundation  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 HPC Edition  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Datacenter SP1  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise SP1  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Foundation SP1  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 HPC Edition  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard SP1  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Datacenter Edition (x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Enterprise Edition (x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Enterprise Edition (x86)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Standard Edition (x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Standard Edition (x86)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Web Edition (x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2 Web Edition (x86)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Standard Edition (x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Standard Edition (x86)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2, 64-bit, Standard and Enterprise  
Edition  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 64-bit Web Edition  
Overview  
15  
Table 2-2. Platform Requirements — PERC S100 Controller or PERC S300 Controller  
Component Requirements  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Web Edition (x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Web Edition (x86)  
• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2008  
• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2008 SP2  
• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2003 R2 SP2 (x86 or x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Small Business Server 2011  
• Microsoft Windows Web Server 2008 R2  
• Microsoft Windows Web Server 2008 R2 SP1  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2003 SP2 (x86 or x64)  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2, 32-bit or 64-bit, Standard and  
Enterprise Edition  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 SP2 32-bit Web Edition  
• Microsoft Windows Server 2008 SP2, 32-bit or 64-bit, Standard and  
Enterprise Edition  
NOTE: Microsoft Windows Server 2003 SP1 is not supported.  
NOTE: Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 is not supported.  
NOTE: PERC S100 controllers and PERC S300 controller are not supported  
with Windows Hyper-V.  
Supported • PERC S100 adapter: supports Dell-supported SATA-based tape devices  
devices  
and SATA optical disk devices.  
NOTE: The PERC S100 controller supports system boot to a tape using a  
Dell RD1000 tape device. Select Continue while in CTRL-R for RD1000 to  
remain first in the boot order. The RD1000 option goes to end of the boot  
order listing if <Ctrl><Alt><Del> is selected and you would not be able to  
boot to it.  
• PERC S300 adapter: does not support tape devices or SATA optical disk  
devices.  
16  
Overview  
About RAID  
A RAID disk array is a group of independent physical disks that provides high  
performance by increasing the number of drives used for saving and accessing  
data. A RAID disk subsystem improves I/O performance and data availability.  
The physical disks appear to the host system either as a single storage unit or  
multiple logical units. Data throughput improves because several disks are  
accessed simultaneously. RAID systems also improve data storage availability  
and fault tolerance. Data loss caused by a physical disk failure can be  
recovered by rebuilding missing data from the remaining physical disks  
containing data or parity.  
NOTE: When a physical disk in a RAID 0 virtual disk fails, data is lost because there  
is no redundancy for this RAID level. However, when a physical disk in a  
RAID 1, RAID 5, or RAID 10 fails, data is preserved because there is redundancy  
with these RAID levels.  
Summary of RAID Levels  
•
•
•
Volume uses available space on a single physical disk and forms a single  
logical volume on which data is stored.  
RAID 0 uses disk striping to provide high data throughput, especially for  
large files in an environment that requires no data redundancy.  
RAID 1 uses disk mirroring so that data written to one physical disk is  
simultaneously written to another physical disk. RAID 1 is good for small  
databases or other applications that require small capacity but also  
complete data redundancy.  
•
•
RAID 5 uses disk striping and parity data across all physical disks  
(distributed parity) to provide high data throughput and data redundancy.  
RAID 10 uses disk striping across two mirrored sets. It provides high data  
throughput and complete data redundancy.  
Overview  
17  
 
RAID Terminology  
Disk Striping  
Disk striping allows you to write data across multiple physical disks instead of  
just one physical disk. Disk striping involves partitioning each physical disk  
storage space into stripes of the various sizes. These stripes are interleaved in  
a repeated sequential manner. The part of the stripe on a single physical disk  
is called a stripe element.  
For example, in a four-disk system using only disk striping (used in RAID  
level 0), segment 1 is written to disk 1, segment 2 is written to disk 2, and so  
on. Disk striping enhances performance because multiple physical disks are  
accessed simultaneously, but disk striping does not provide data redundancy.  
Figure 2-1 shows an example of disk striping.  
Figure 2-1. Example of Disk Striping (RAID 0)  
Stripe element 1  
Stripe element 5  
Stripe element 9  
Stripe element 2  
Stripe element 6  
Stripe element 10  
Stripe element 3  
Stripe element 7  
Stripe element 11  
Stripe element 4  
Stripe element 8  
Stripe element 12  
Disk Mirroring  
With mirroring (used in RAID 1), data written to one disk is simultaneously  
written to another disk. If one disk fails, the contents of the other disk can be  
used to run the system and rebuild the failed physical disk. The primary  
advantage of disk mirroring is that it provides 100 percent data redundancy.  
Because the contents of the disk are completely written to a second disk, it  
does not matter if one of the disks fails. Both disks contain a copy of the same  
data at all times. Either of the physical disks can act as the operational  
physical disk. Disk mirroring provides 100 percent redundancy, but is  
expensive because each physical disk in the system must be duplicated.  
Figure 2-2 shows an example of disk mirroring.  
18  
Overview  
   
NOTE: Mirrored physical disks improve read performance by read load balancing.  
NOTE: The PERC S300 controller only supports physical disks (SAS and SATA). SSD  
devices cannot be migrated to a PERC S300 controller.  
Figure 2-2. Example of Disk Mirroring (RAID 1)  
Stripe element 1 Stripe element 1 Duplicated  
Stripe element 2 Stripe element 2 Duplicated  
Stripe element 3 Stripe element 3 Duplicated  
Stripe element 4 Stripe element 4 Duplicated  
Spanned RAID Levels  
Spanning is a term used to describe the way in which RAID level 10 is  
constructed from multiple sets of simpler RAID levels. For example, a RAID  
10 has multiple sets of RAID 1 disk arrays in which each RAID 1 set is  
considered a span. Data is then striped (as it is in RAID 0) across the RAID 1  
spans to create a RAID 10 virtual disk.  
Parity Data  
Parity data is redundant data that has been generated to provide fault  
tolerance within certain RAID levels. In the event of a drive failure, the parity  
data can be used by the controller to regenerate user data. Parity data is  
present only for RAID 5 disk arrays.  
The parity data is distributed across all the physical disks in the system. If a  
single physical disk fails, it can be rebuilt from the parity and the data on the  
remaining physical disks. RAID 5 combines distributed parity with disk  
striping, as shown in Figure 2-3. Parity provides redundancy for one physical  
disk failure without duplicating the contents of entire physical disks.  
Overview  
19  
 
Figure 2-3. Example of Distributed Parity (RAID 5)  
stripe element1  
stripe element7  
stripe element2  
stripe element8  
stripe element3  
stripe element9  
stripe element4  
stripe element10  
stripe element5  
parity (6-10)  
parity (1-5)  
stripe element6  
stripe element13 stripe element14 stripe element15 parity (11-15)  
stripe element19 stripe element20 parity (16-20) stripe element16  
stripe element25 parity (21-25) stripe element21 stripe element22  
parity (26-30) stripe element26 stripe element27 stripe element28  
stripe element11 stripe element12  
stripe element17 stripe element18  
stripe element23 stripe element24  
stripe element29 stripe element30  
20  
Overview  
 
3
Features  
General Features  
The features of the Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC) S100 and  
PERC S300 adapter are described in Table 3-1.  
NOTE: BAS, BGI, CC and OCE run only on the operating system.  
Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller  
RAID Controller Feature Description  
Automatic virtual disk Rebuilds a redundant virtual disk automatically when a  
rebuild  
failure is detected, if a hot spare is assigned for this capability.  
Background Array  
Scan (BAS)  
Verifies and corrects correctable media errors on mirror,  
volume, or parity data for virtual disks. BAS starts  
automatically after a Virtual Disk is created while in the OS.  
Background virtual  
disk initialization  
(BGI)  
The background initialization of a redundant virtual disk  
creates the parity data that allows the virtual disk to maintain  
its redundant data and survive a physical disk failure.  
Because background initialization helps the controller to  
identify and correct problems that might occur with the  
redundant data at a later time, background initialization is  
similar to a consistency check.  
Background initialization allows a redundant virtual disk to  
be used immediately. Data is lost if a physical disk fails before  
the completion of a BGI.  
NOTE: Although a BGI is software-initiated at the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility, the PERC S100 adapter/PERC S300  
adapter drivers must be loaded before the BGI runs.  
NOTE: Unless mentioned otherwise, the term PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility refers to both the PERC S100 Virtual Disk  
Management utility and the PERC S300 Virtual Disk  
Management utility.  
Features  
21  
         
Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller (continued)  
RAID Controller Feature Description  
Boot support for RAID Allows boot support for Volume, RAID 0, RAID 1, RAID 5,  
levels  
and RAID 10.  
Boot support for  
Enables the system to boot from degraded redundant virtual  
degraded virtual disks disks (RAID 1, RAID 5, or RAID 10).  
Cache support for  
virtual disks  
Supports these cache options: None, Read Only, Read/Write.  
The PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter uses part of  
system memory for cache.  
Checkpointing  
Allows different types of checkpointing (background  
initialization, consistency check, and rebuild) to resume at  
the last point following a restart.  
After the system restarts, background checkpointing resumes  
at its most-recent checkpoint.  
Command queuing  
Command queuing is a command protocol used by SATA  
and SAS physical disks that is supported by the PERC S100  
adapter and PERC S300 adapter.  
Command queuing allows the host to issue multiple  
input/output requests to a disk simultaneously. The disk can  
then decide in which order to process the commands to  
achieve maximum performance.  
The SATA and SAS versions of command queuing have  
slightly different protocols and means of handling multiple  
traffic requests at the same time, but the end-purposes are  
comparable.  
22  
Features  
           
Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller (continued)  
RAID Controller Feature Description  
Consistency check  
(CC)  
A consistency check is a background operation that verifies  
and corrects the mirror or parity data for fault-tolerant  
physical disks. It is recommended that you periodically run a  
consistency check on the physical disks.  
By default, a consistency check corrects mirror or parity  
inconsistencies. After the data is corrected, the data on the  
primary physical disk in a mirror set is assumed to be the  
correct data and is written to the secondary physical disk in  
the mirror set.  
A consistency check cannot be user-initiated in the PERC  
Virtual Disk Management utility. However, a consistency  
check can user-initiated when using Dell OpenManage Server  
Administrator Storage Management.  
Disk initialization  
Fault tolerance  
For physical disks, initialization writes metadata to the  
physical disk, so that the controller can use the physical disk.  
The following fault tolerance features are available with the  
PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter, in order to  
prevent data loss in case of a failed physical disk:  
• Physical disk failure detection (automatic).  
• Virtual disk rebuild using hot spares (automatic, if the hot  
spare is configured for this functionality).  
• Parity generation and checking (RAID 5 only).  
• Hot-swap manual replacement of a physical disk without  
rebooting the system (only for systems with a backplane that  
allows hot-swapping).  
If one side of a RAID 1 (mirror) fails, data can be rebuilt by  
using the physical disk on the other side of the mirror.  
If a physical disk in RAID 5 fails, parity data exists on the  
remaining physical disks, which can be used to restore the  
data to a new, replacement physical disk configured as a hot  
spare.  
If a physical disk fails in RAID 10, the virtual disk remains  
functional and data is read from the surviving mirrored  
physical disk(s). A single disk failure in each mirrored set can  
be sustained, depending on how the mirrored set fails.  
Features  
23  
     
Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller (continued)  
RAID Controller Feature Description  
Mirror rebuilding  
A broken mirror can be rebuilt after a new physical disk is  
inserted and the physical disk is designated as a hot spare.  
The system does not have to be rebooted.  
Online Capacity  
Expansion (OCE)  
OCE is a process that allows you to add storage capacity to an  
existing virtual disk. In most cases additional storage capacity  
can be added without taking the system offline. However, if  
an additional physical disk needs to be added and the system  
does not support hot-swapping, the system must be turned  
off.  
OCE enables you to increase the total storage capacity of a  
virtual disk by integrating unused storage with the virtual  
disk.  
Data can be accessed while the physical disks are added (if a  
system has hot-swap capability) and while data on the virtual  
disk is being redistributed.  
For Volume and RAID 1, OCE expands the virtual disk by  
using the available space of the physical disks that are already  
members of the virtual disk. For RAID 0, RAID 5 and RAID  
10, additional capacity can be attained by adding physical  
disks to the virtual disk.  
Physical disks  
(general)  
The PERC S100 adapter supports up to four SATA HDD or  
SSD physical disks. The PERC S300 adapter supports up to  
eight SAS or SATA HDD physical disks.  
NOTE: The physical disks in a virtual disk must be the same  
interface and drive type (HDD or SSD). For example, you cannot  
mix a SATA and SAS interface (HDD or SSD), or HDD and SSD  
physical disks, in the same virtual disk.  
A maximum of eight physical disks can be used for RAID 0  
and RAID 5. A maximum of two physical disks can be used  
for RAID 1. A maximum of four physical disks can be used for  
RAID 10.  
If a physical disk fails during system startup, the controller  
identifies the failed physical disk as follows:  
• At the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility by  
highlighting the failed physical disk in a virtual disk in red.  
24  
Features  
     
Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller (continued)  
RAID Controller Feature Description  
• In a brief warning at the Dell Inc. PERC S100 Controller  
BIOS or Dell Inc. PERC S300 Controller BIOS screen,  
that a virtual disk(s) were found that are Degraded and/or  
Failed. This alerts the user to the failed physical disk(s).  
• At Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Storage  
Management.  
• With a bi-color Status LED on each physical disk. The green  
element of the Status LED is off, while the amber element  
flashes on and off.  
NOTE: The Status LED applies only to systems with a PERC S300  
adapter and a backplane that has removable physical disks.  
NOTE: PERC S100 adapters support HDD physical disks of  
capacity 2 TB and greater. Current and upcoming releases of  
PERC S300 adapters will only support upto 2 TB HDD physical  
disks .  
Physical disk  
hot-swapping  
Hot-swap (hot-plug) capability is the manual substitution of  
a physical disk for another one while the host system is  
(hot-swap capability) powered on.  
If a system supports hot-swapping, physical disks can be  
plugged into a system’s backplane while the controller is  
operating, without causing the controller to reset.  
CAUTION: A physical disk can be hot-swapped from a system  
only if the system has a PERC S300 adapter and a backplane  
that supports hot-swapping.  
NOTE: If a system’s physical disks are accessible only when the  
system’s cover is removed, the physical disks cannot be hot-  
swapped. The physical disks must be located on the backplane  
(behind the removable front panel) and accessible externally.  
NOTE: When replacing physical disks in a virtual disk that has  
already been created, make sure that SAS HDD physical disks  
are replaced with SAS HDD physical disks, that SATA HDD  
physical disks are replaced with SATA HDD physical disks, and  
that SATA SSD physical disks are replaced with SATA SSD  
physical disks.  
NOTE: When hot-swapping a physical disk, make sure that the  
new disk is of equal or greater capacity to the physical disk that  
is being replaced.  
Features  
25  
 
Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller (continued)  
RAID Controller Feature Description  
Physical disk roaming The controller supports moving a physical disk from one  
backplane slot or cable connection to another (on the same  
controller). The controller automatically recognizes the  
repositioned physical disk and logically places it in the proper  
order.  
WARNING: A virtual disk is lost if you perform disk  
roaming while an OCE is running at Storage Management.  
NOTE: For more information on how to open the system and  
add parts, see the Hardware Owner’s Manual, available on the  
Dell Support website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
Perform the following steps for physical disk roaming:  
NOTE: These steps do not apply to systems that have a  
backplane with hot-swap capability.  
1
Turn off the power to the system, physical disks, and system  
components.  
2
3
Disconnect the power cables from the system.  
Move the physical disks to different slots on the backplane  
or to different cable connections.  
4
Perform a safety check. Make sure the physical disks are  
inserted properly.  
5
Connect the power cables and power up the system.  
NOTE: The controller detects the RAID configuration from the  
configuration data on the physical disks.  
Storage port (Storport) For use with Microsoft Windows Server 2003 and later, the  
driver support  
Storport driver improves throughput and miniport driver  
interfaces.  
Stripe size  
Stripe size is determined by a PERC S100 adapter/PERC  
S300 adapter algorithm. Stripe size cannot be configured by  
the user.  
26  
Features  
     
Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller (continued)  
RAID Controller Feature Description  
Virtual disks (general) Up to eight virtual disks are supported.  
The PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter allows:  
• Creating virtual disks of different RAID levels on a single  
controller.  
• Creating different RAID level virtual disks on the same  
physical disk, to adapt each virtual disk to the I/O that it  
processes.  
• Building different virtual disks with different characteristics  
for different applications.  
The PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter does not  
allow:  
• Creating a virtual disk from a mix of different type physical  
disks. For example, a RAID 10 virtual disk cannot be created  
from two SATA-II HDD physical disks, a SAS HDD physical  
disk, and a SSD physical disk. All of the physical disks must  
be the same interface (SAS or SATA) and drive type (HDD  
or SSD).  
• Selecting a physical disk as a dedicated hot spare if the  
physical disk is a different type from the physical disk or  
disks.  
A virtual disk refers to data storage created by the controller  
from one or more physical disks. Although a virtual disk can  
be created from several physical disks, it is seen by the  
operating system as a single disk.  
The capacity of a virtual disk can be expanded online for any  
RAID level, without the operating system being rebooted.  
Features  
27  
 
Table 3-1. Features of the PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller (continued)  
RAID Controller Feature Description  
Virtual disk migration The controller supports automatic virtual disk migration  
from a PERC S100 adapter to a PERC S300 adapter (or vice  
versa). Manual intervention for migration is not required or  
used by the PERC S100 adapter or  
PERC S300 adapter.  
CAUTION: Before starting a virtual disk migration, power-  
down both systems before removing or inserting the physical  
disks. After the migration occurs, make sure that all of the  
physical disks have been migrated and are present in the  
virtual disk.  
CAUTION: The virtual disk is lost if you perform a virtual disk  
migration during an OCE.  
NOTE: The PERC S100 adapter only supports SATA HDD and  
SATA SSD disks. SAS disks cannot be migrated with a  
PERC S100 adapter.  
NOTE: A bootable virtual disk cannot be migrated between  
dissimilar controllers or dissimilar system models when the  
system uses Microsoft Windows Server 2003 as its operating  
system.  
Virtual disk RAID  
levels  
Virtual disks at different RAID levels can be created.  
Virtual disk  
Virtual disk transformation can consist of:  
transformation  
• Capacity expansion, using OCE (to allocate additional  
virtual disk space on the original physical disks or after  
additional physical disks are added).  
• Rebuilding (rebuilding data on a virtual disk consists of  
using an available hot spare or backup physical disk).  
28  
Features  
   
Specifications  
Table 3-2 compares the specifications of the PERC S100 adapter and PERC  
S300 adapter.  
Table 3-2. Specifications for the PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter  
Specification  
PERC S100 adapter  
PERC S300 adapter  
SAS technology  
SATA technology  
eSATA technology  
SSD technology  
No  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
No  
No  
Support for x8 PCI-E Host Interface No  
Yes  
I/O Controller  
Intel ICH10R or  
Intel Ibex Peak chipsets Adapter  
Dell 3Gb/s SAS  
or Intel Cougar Point  
chipsets  
Communication to the system  
Communication to end devices  
SAS connectors  
Integrated  
SATA links  
No  
PCI-E lanes  
SAS/SATA links  
Two 4-port connectors  
on all systems  
SATA connectors  
Discrete on the  
motherboard  
Two 4-port connectors  
on all systems  
Lead-free  
Yes  
Yes  
Supported operating systems  
Microsoft Windows Server 2003 Family,  
Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Family,  
Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2  
Dell-compliant SATA compatibility Yes  
Dell-compliant SAS compatibility No  
Yes  
Yes  
Dell-supported direct-connected  
end devices  
Dell-compliant  
physical disks  
Dell-compliant  
physical disks  
*SMART error support through  
management applications  
Yes  
Yes  
Backplane supported systems  
No  
Yes  
Features  
29  
   
Table 3-2. Specifications for the PERC S100 adapter and PERC S300 adapter  
Specification  
PERC S100 adapter  
PERC S300 adapter  
Software-based RAID  
Volume, RAID 1,  
RAID 0, RAID 5,  
RAID 10  
Volume, RAID 1,  
RAID 0, RAID 5,  
RAID 10  
Maximum number of virtual disks  
Support for internal tape drive  
Support for global hot spare  
8
8
Yes  
Yes  
No  
Yes  
Maximum number of hot spares  
Varies (by the number Varies (by the number  
of free disks in the  
system)  
of free disks in the  
system)  
*SMART is supported under the Windows Driver but is not supported with  
Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) and CTRL-R. The SWRAID  
SMART drive status shows as "Degraded" in OpenManage Storage Services  
(OMSS).  
30  
Features  
4
Hardware Installation  
Before You Begin  
This chapter describes how to install the Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller  
(PERC) S300 adapter.  
NOTE: The PERC S100 controller is an integral component of the motherboard.  
Hardware installation instructions are not required for a system with a PERC S100  
controller.  
General Considerations  
WARNING: Before you begin any of the procedures in this chapter, follow the  
safety instructions that were shipped with your system. For additional safety  
information, see the Regulatory Compliance Homepage on dell.com at the  
following location: dell.com/regulatory_compliance.  
WARNING: Electrostatic discharge can damage sensitive components. Always  
use proper antistatic protection when handling components. Touching  
components without using a proper ground can damage the equipment.  
WARNING: Plug the PERC S300 controller only into a PCI-E slot. Plugging the  
controller into an incorrect type of slot can potentially destroy the controller, as  
well as the motherboard.  
CAUTION: Before installing a controller in an existing system, back up all critical  
data. Failure to follow this accepted system management practice could result in a  
loss of data.  
Hardware Installation  
31  
         
Installing the PERC S300 Adapter  
NOTE: The procedure to open a system and add parts might vary from system to  
system. For more information, see the Hardware Owner's Manual of the system on  
the Dell Support website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
1
2
Unpack the PERC S300 Adapter and check it for damage.  
NOTE: If the PERC S300 Adapter is damaged, contact Dell Support at  
support.dell.com.  
Turn off the system and attached peripherals. Disconnect the system  
power cable from the electrical outlet. See the system’s Hardware Owner’s  
Manual or User’s Guide on support.dell.com/manuals for more information  
about power supplies.  
3
4
Disconnect the system from the network and remove the cover of the  
system. See your system’s Hardware Owner’s Manual or User’s Guide for  
more information on opening the system.  
Select an appropriate PCI-E slot. Remove the blank filler bracket on the  
back of the system aligned with the PCI-E slot you have selected.  
NOTE: Insert the controller into a slot that has at least eight PCI-E lanes for  
optimum performance.  
NOTE: Insert the controller into a slot with a PCI-E x8 or larger physical  
connector.  
NOTE: For more information about your system’s PCI-E slots, see your  
system’s Hardware Owner’s Manual or User’s Guide on the Dell Support  
website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
5
6
Align the PERC S300 Adapter to the PCI-E slot you have selected.  
Insert the controller gently, but firmly, until the controller is firmly seated  
in the PCI-E slot. See Figure 4-1.  
7
Tighten the bracket screw, if any, or use the system’s retention clips to  
secure the controller to the system’s chassis.  
NOTE: If you are attempting to install a Modular PERC S300 refer to the  
platform documentation for help with the installation.  
32  
Hardware Installation  
   
Figure 4-1. Installing a PERC S300 Adapter  
1
5
2
3
4
1
3
5
bracket screw  
PCI-E slot  
2
4
PERC S300 Adapter  
filler bracket  
PCI bracket  
Hardware Installation  
33  
 
Figure 4-2. Connecting the Cables  
1
2
3
1
3
cables to the physical disks (applies to  
systems with a PERC S300 adapter) or to  
backplanes (applies only to systems with a  
PERC S300 modular)  
2
SAS/SATA x4 internal  
connectors (2)  
PERC S300 Adapter  
34  
Hardware Installation  
Connect Physical Disks to the PERC S300 Adapter  
WARNING: Critical system components might be damaged if the installer is not  
properly grounded to prevent electrostatic discharge (ESD).  
NOTE: Use either the standard power connector or, if available on the power  
supply, a SATA/SATA II power connector. Do not use both.  
NOTE: You can view the physical disk LEDs on a system that uses a PERC S300  
controller by removing the front panel from the system.  
NOTE: The controller supports a feature that staggers the spinup of each physical  
disk sequentially. This allows enough time between physical disk starts to prevent  
the power supply from overloading.  
1
2
Install the physical disks into the system.  
Connect a multiple-connector cable from the physical disks (or from the  
backplane) to the controller.  
NOTE: If the system contains a PERC S300 controller and has a backplane with hot-  
swap capability, the cables cannot be inserted directly into the physical disks. The  
physical disks (within their carriers) are inserted and seated in the backplane.  
A cable from the backplane is then connected to the PERC S300 controller.  
Complete the Hardware Installation  
After the controller and cables are installed, perform the following steps:  
1
Make sure that the wire bundles and cables inside the system are not  
twisted. Make sure they do not interfere with fans, power supplies, heat  
sinks, or electrical devices.  
2
3
Replace the cover of the system. See your system’s Hardware Owner’s  
Manual or User’s Guide for more information on closing the system.  
Reconnect the power cable(s) and network cables, and then turn on the  
system.  
Hardware Installation  
35  
       
36  
Hardware Installation  
5
Installing the Drivers  
The Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC) S100 or PERC S100 adapter  
require controller drivers to operate with the supported operating systems.  
This chapter contains the procedures for installing the controller drivers for  
the following operating systems:  
•
•
•
Microsoft Windows Server 2008  
Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2  
Microsoft Windows Server 2003 SP2  
NOTE: Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 is not supported.  
Installing the Microsoft Windows Drivers  
Downloading the Controller Driver Media  
1
2
3
Go to support.dell.com/support/downloads  
Select Choose by Service TagEnter a Tag  
Enter the Service Tag of the system on which you want to install the  
PERC S100 adapter/PERC S300 adapter drivers and select Go  
.
.
.
NOTE: Alternatively, you can select Choose a ModelSelect  
Model.Navigate to Servers, Storage, Networking  
PowerEdge Server. Select the model of your system and select  
Confirm.  
4
5
6
Choose the applicable operating system.  
Expand the SAS RAID Controllercategory.  
Select Download Nowfor the appropriate controller driver.  
NOTE: Load a blank optical medium (CD-ROM or DVD) in your system.  
Installing the Drivers  
37  
         
7
8
Use the blank optical medium to burn the ISO image.  
Download the files for the PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter to  
the driver media, as indicated in Figure 5-1.  
Table 5-1. Operating System And Device Driver Media  
Operating System  
Driver Media (CD-ROM, DVD, USB flash drive, or floppy disk)  
to Use  
Windows Server 2008,  
32-bit or 64-bit: Copy all of the files to a CD-ROM, DVD,  
Windows Server 2008 R2 USB flash drive, or floppy disk.  
Windows Server 2003 32-bit or 64-bit: Copy all of the files to a floppy disk.  
NOTE: Windows Server 2003 versions SP1 and older  
support driver load for operating system installation using a  
USB key  
Pre-Installation Requirements for the Controller Drivers  
•
•
•
Make sure that your system has the latest BIOS and firmware updates from  
the Dell Support website at support.dell.com/manuals  
.
Perform the pre-installation procedures in Table 5-2 before you install the  
controller drivers and the operating system.  
When you are ready to install the controller drivers and operating system  
see "Installing the Controller Drivers During the Operating System  
Installation: For Systems with a PERC S100 Adapter" on page 42 or  
"Installing the Controller Drivers During the Operating System  
Installation: For Systems with a PERC S300 Adapter" on page 44.  
38  
Installing the Drivers  
   
Table 5-2. Pre-Installation Procedures For The Controller Drivers  
Procedure Steps  
1
Confirm or change  
a
Boot the system. When the Dell Power-On Self-Test  
configuration settings  
at the Dell PowerEdge  
System window  
(POST) screen appears, press <F2>.  
b
Wait until the Dell PowerEdge System window  
appears. Perform the following, depending on the  
controller:  
•
For a PERC S100 adapter: Scroll to SATA  
Settings. Press <Enter>. At the sub-screen,  
confirm that the SATA Controlleris set to a RAID  
mode.  
NOTE: If necessary, use the space bar to change the  
setting.  
•
For a PERC S300 adapter: Scroll to SATA  
Settings. Press <Enter>. At the sub-screen, set  
SATA Controllerto either ATAMode or AHCI  
.
NOTE: If necessary, use the space bar to change the  
setting.  
c
d
Press <Esc> to exit.  
Press <Esc> again The following occurs:  
.
• If no change was made at step b, the boot sequence  
continues.  
• If a change was made at step b, a dialog box appears.  
Select Save Changes and Exit. Press <Enter>.  
The boot sequence continues.  
NOTE: If you decide to change from a PERC S100 adapter to  
a PERC S300 adapter, make sure that you also change the  
setting at SATA SettingsSATA Controller  
from a RAID mode to ATA Mode. See step b.  
2
3
Install the PERC S300 See "Install the PERC S300" in the Hardware Installation  
adapter (as required)  
Guide, located on the Dell Support website at  
support.dell.com/manuals.  
Initialize physical disks See "Initializing Physical Disks" on page 50.  
(as required)  
Installing the Drivers  
39  
     
Table 5-2. Pre-Installation Procedures For The Controller Drivers (continued)  
Procedure  
Steps  
4
Create a bootable  
See "Creating Virtual Disks" on page 51.  
virtual disk  
5
Check controller  
options and the boot  
list priority  
a
At the PERC S100 Virtual Disk Management utility or  
PERC S300 Virtual Disk Management utility, use the  
arrow keys to select Controller Options. Press  
<Enter>. Make sure that Toggle INT13 Boot  
Supportis ON. Press <Esc> to exit.  
b
At the Virtual Disksfield, make sure the bootable  
virtual disk created in Procedure 4, is the first virtual  
disk listed.  
If the bootable virtual disk is not the first virtual disk  
listed, see "Swapping Two Virtual Disks" on page 55.  
NOTE: If Non-Raid virtual disks are used (and appear in the  
Virtual Diskslist), the Swap Two Virtual Disks option  
is enabled only if the system contains an initialized physical  
disk.  
c
Select Continue to Boot and press <Enter>.  
NOTE: If the next Procedure (6) is not applicable, continue  
with one of the following procedures:  
• "Installing the Controller Drivers During the Operating  
System Installation: For Systems with a PERC S100  
Adapter" on page 42  
• "Installing the Controller Drivers During the Operating  
System Installation: For Systems with a PERC S300  
Adapter" on page 44  
40  
Installing the Drivers  
   
Table 5-2. Pre-Installation Procedures For The Controller Drivers (continued)  
Procedure  
Change the Boot  
Steps  
6
To change the order of the devices (CD-ROM, optical  
DVD, and so on), perform the following:  
Priority List  
for Devices(if  
applicable)  
NOTE: Unless mentioned otherwise, the term PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility refers to both the PERC S100 Virtual  
Disk Management utility and the PERC S300 Virtual Disk  
Management utility.  
NOTE: If the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility is open,  
select Continue to Boot, then press <Enter>. Press  
<Ctrl><Alt><Delete> to reboot the system.  
a
b
c
d
Boot the system. When the POST screen appears,  
press <F2>.  
At the Dell PowerEdge System screen, use the arrow  
keys to scroll to Boot Sequence. Press <Enter>.  
Make sure that Hard drive C:is the first device  
listed.  
To change the sequence of other devices:  
•Use the <+> key to move devices up, or the <-> key  
to move devices down.  
•Use the space bar to enable or disable a device.  
Press <Esc> to exit.  
Press <Esc> again. Select Save Changes and  
e
f
Exit and press <Enter>.  
NOTE: Continue with one of the following procedures:  
• "Installing the Controller Drivers During the Operating  
System Installation: For Systems with a PERC S100  
Adapter" on page 42  
• "Installing the Controller Drivers During the Operating  
System Installation: For Systems with a PERC S300  
Adapter" on page 44  
Installing the Drivers  
41  
 
Installing the Controller Drivers During the Operating System  
Installation: For Systems with a PERC S100 Adapter  
CAUTION: The latest firmware, drivers and applications must be installed  
whenever the controller software is upgraded. A previous version of the driver  
might not work with the latest controller software and vice versa.  
NOTE: When using an external USB floppy disk drive, make sure to connect it to  
the system when the system is turned-off and before starting step 1. Failure to do so  
might result in the external USB floppy disk drive not being recognized by the  
system.  
1
2
Reboot the system. When the POST screen appears press <F11>.  
Insert the Windows operating system media into the optical drive of the  
system.  
3
4
5
When the BIOS boot manager or boot device menu appears, select the  
text that begins with Embedded SATA... and press <Enter>.  
Install the applicable Microsoft Windows operating system, using the  
on-screen instructions.  
At the Select the driver to be installed window a Load Driver sub-screen  
appears. Perform the following:  
For Microsoft Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2:  
a
Insert the CD-ROM, DVD, USB flash drive, or floppy disk that  
contains the files copied at "Downloading the Controller Driver  
Media" on page 37. Click Browse  
.
b
At the Browse to folder window, access the directory that contains the  
controller driver files. Locate and select the files. Click OK  
.
42  
Installing the Drivers  
     
For Microsoft Windows Server 2003:  
a
Insert the floppy disk that contains the files copied at "Downloading  
the Controller Driver Media" on page 37. (An external USB floppy  
disk drive can be used, if your system does not have a built-in floppy  
disk drive).  
b
c
d
Press <F6> on the keyboard, when prompted at the beginning of the  
Windows setup.  
Wait until the Windows Setup window with S = Specify  
Additional Deviceappears. Press <S> on the keyboard.  
Insert the requested media disk (as applicable) and press <Enter>.  
6
At the next Select the driver to be installed window, select Dell PERC  
S100 S300 Controller...Click Nextto load the driver files.  
For Microsoft Windows Server 2003:  
When you are asked to load additional drivers, press <Enter> to start the  
Microsoft Windows installation process.  
7
8
From the list at the Select the operating system you want to install  
window, select the applicable operating system. Click Next  
.
Perform the remaining operating system installation instructions. Some of  
the windows require user-specific password and system information. As  
required, contact your IT administrator for assistance.  
For Microsoft Windows Server 2003 only: Two warning dialog boxes  
appear during the Installing Windows segment of the installation:  
•
•
At the Software Installation dialog box, click Yes  
.
At the Hardware Installation dialog box, click Yes  
.
NOTE: When the operating system installation process is finished, remove the  
installation media inserted in step 5.  
Installing the Drivers  
43  
Installing the Controller Drivers During the Operating System  
Installation: For Systems with a PERC S300 Adapter  
CAUTION: The latest firmware, drivers and applications must be installed  
whenever the controller software is upgraded. A previous version of the driver  
might not work with the latest controller software and vice versa.  
NOTE: When using an external USB floppy disk drive, make sure to connect it to  
the system when the system is powered-off and before starting step 1.  
1
2
Reboot the system. When the POST screen appears press <F11>.  
Insert the Windows operating system media into the optical drive of the  
system.  
3
4
5
When the BIOS Boot Manager window appears, select the text that  
begins with SATA Optical Drive... and press <Enter>.  
Install the applicable Microsoft Windows operating system, using the  
on-screen instructions.  
From the list at the Select the operating system you want to install  
window, select the applicable operating system. Click Next  
.
6
7
Perform the on-screen instructions at the next several windows.  
At Install Windows - Where do you want to install Windows?, perform  
the following:  
For Microsoft Windows Server 2008 and Windows Server 2008 R2:  
a
Insert the CD-ROM, DVD, USB flash drive, or floppy disk that  
contains the files copied at "Downloading the Controller Driver  
Media" on page 37. Click Load Driver  
At the Load Driver sub-screen, click Browse  
Select the directory that has the controller driver files. Click OK  
.
b
c
.
.
For Microsoft Windows Server 2003:  
a
Insert the floppy disk that contains the files copied at "Downloading  
the Controller Driver Media" on page 37. (An external USB floppy  
disk drive can be used, if your system does not have a built-in floppy  
disk drive).  
b
Press <F6> on the keyboard, when prompted at the beginning of the  
Windows setup.  
44  
Installing the Drivers  
     
c
d
Wait until the Windows Setup screen appears with S = Specify  
Additional Device. Press <S> on the keyboard.  
Insert the requested media disk (as applicable) and press <Enter>.  
8
9
At the Select the driver to be installed window, select Dell PERC  
S100, S300 Controller...Click Nextto load the driver files.  
For Microsoft Windows Server 2003: When you are asked to load  
additional drivers, press <Enter> to start the Microsoft Windows  
installation process.  
Perform the remaining operating system installation instructions. Some of  
the windows require user-specific password and system information. As  
required, contact your IT administrator for assistance  
For Microsoft Windows Server 2003 only: Two warning dialog boxes  
appear during the Installing Windows segment of the installation:  
–
–
At the Software Installation dialog box, click Yes  
.
At the Hardware Installation dialog box, click Yes  
.
NOTE: When the operating system installation process is finished, remove the  
installation media inserted in step 7.  
Performing the PERC S100 Controller or PERC S300 Controller  
Management Setup Procedure  
The PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter management setup  
procedure is described in Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Storage  
Management. To set up a PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter on your  
system, see the Storage Management procedures located at the Dell Support  
website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
Installing the Drivers  
45  
 
46  
Installing the Drivers  
6
RAID Configuration and  
Management  
The Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC) S100 and PERC S100 adapter  
are configured by using the PERC S100 Virtual Disk Management utility or  
PERC S300 Virtual Disk Management utility. The utility is accessed at system  
startup, when you are prompted to press <Ctrl><R>.  
NOTE: Unless mentioned otherwise, the term PERC Virtual Disk Management utility  
refers to both the PERC S100 Virtual Disk Management utility and the PERC S300  
Virtual Disk Management utility.  
NOTE: To configure the PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter with Dell  
OpenManage Server Administrator Storage Management, see the Dell Support  
Website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
NOTE: The PERC Virtual Disk Management utility can be accessed and configured  
without the operating system and controller drivers being installed.  
Configuring the Controller: Using the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management Utility  
Table 6-1. PERC Virtual Disk Management Utility Operations  
Operation  
Description  
Accessing the PERC  
Describes how to log onto the PERC Virtual Disk  
Virtual Disk Management Management utility.  
Utility  
Understanding the Text  
Colors in the PERC  
Virtual Disk Management  
Utility  
Describes the status of the physical disks and virtual  
disks, based on the color-highlighted text.  
Initializing Physical Disks Describes how to initialize a physical disk for data storage.  
Creating Virtual Disks  
Describes how to create a virtual disk from the connected  
physical disks.  
RAID Configuration and Management  
47  
         
Table 6-1. PERC Virtual Disk Management Utility Operations (continued)  
Operation  
Description  
Deleting Virtual Disks  
Deletes one or more virtual disks that are configured for  
the controller.  
Swapping Two Virtual  
Disks  
Swaps virtual disks to enable them to load in any order.  
Managing Global Hot  
Spares  
Enables you to create or delete a global hot spare(s).  
Viewing Physical Disk  
Details  
Enables you to view detailed information about any  
connected physical disk.  
Viewing Virtual Disk  
Details  
Enables you to view detailed information about any  
virtual disk.  
Rescanning Disks  
Controller Options  
Continuing to Boot  
Rescans the disks to detect new or removed physical disks  
or virtual disks.  
Changes the selected controller options, such as booting  
and virtual disk warnings.  
Enables the system to continue booting after you use the  
PERC Virtual Disk Management utility.  
Accessing the PERC Virtual Disk Management Utility  
1
Boot the system and wait until the message Press <Ctrl><R> to  
Configureappears.  
2
Press <Ctrl><R>.  
You have a maximum of three seconds to press <Ctrl><R>, or the  
system’s boot process continues.  
CAUTION: If SATA Controller is not set to RAID Mode, data might be destroyed.  
Make sure to backup all data before changing modes.  
NOTE: If the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility does not appear and your  
system uses a PERC S100, press F2 to access the Dell system BIOS. At the SATA  
Settings field, make sure that SATA Controlleris set to RAID Mode. If  
the settings are correct and the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility still does not  
appear contact Dell support at support.dell.com.  
48  
RAID Configuration and Management  
   
The utility contains these fields:  
•
An information field (yellow or red text): Located below the window name  
and the current build number.  
•
Virtual Disks: Displays the virtual disks that have been created and  
information about them: virtual disk number, RAID level, virtual disk size,  
virtual disk status, and caching mode status.  
•
•
•
Main Menu: Indicates the main PERC Virtual Disk Management utility  
operations  
.
Physical Disks: Displays information about the physical disks or  
ATAPI devices.  
Available Keys: Indicates the keyboard keys to use to select a line of  
text or perform an operation.  
NOTE: For a description of virtual disk and physical disk states, see Table B-2 and  
Table B-3, located on the Dell Support website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
NOTE: The first virtual disk listed in Virtual Disksmust be the bootable  
virtual disk. The system can boot only when the bootable virtual disk is at the first  
position in the list.  
Understanding the Text Colors in the PERC Virtual Disk Management  
Utility  
Text within the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility is color-coded, as  
follows:  
Table 6-2. PERC Virtual Disk Management Text Colors  
Text Color  
Description  
White text  
Indicates an available option or informational text.  
Black text, yellow Indicates an option or device for which you might take action.  
highlighting  
Yellow text  
Green text  
Light blue text  
Magenta text  
Red text  
Indicates information about the yellow-highlighted option.  
Indicates an item that has been selected.  
Indicates that the item cannot be selected.  
Indicates items that are related to hot spares or boot options.  
Indicates a failed virtual or physical disk or a warning. For example,  
informational text might be red if an option is not available.  
RAID Configuration and Management  
49  
   
Initializing Physical Disks  
New physical disks must be initialized before they can be used. Initialization  
writes controller configuration information to the physical disk.  
Physical disks with the following statuses can be initialized:  
•
Non-RAID  
adapter or PERC S300 adapter.  
—
A physical disk that was configured by a non-PERC S100  
•
Ready— Contains no stored data but has PERC S100 adapter or  
PERC S300 adapter configuration information.  
Physical disks that are Onlinecannot be initialized.  
1
2
Power-up the system to start booting.  
When prompted, press the <Ctrl><R> keys to access the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
3
At the Main Menufield use the arrow keys to select the Initialize  
Physical Disk(s) option.  
4
5
Press <Enter>.  
Use the arrow keys to select Initialize for PERC S100 (PERC S300) or  
Initialize to Non-Raid  
.
6
7
Press <Enter>.  
Use the arrow keys to select a physical disk. Press <Insert> to select the  
physical disk, or press the <A> key to choose all selectable physical disks.  
NOTE: You can select and initialize multiple physical disks. There is no need  
to initialize one physical disk at a time.  
8
9
Press <Enter> to initialize the selected physical disk or disks.  
NOTE: After a physical disk is initialized as Non-Raid, it appears as Non-  
Raidin the Physical Disks field of the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility.  
A Non-Raidvirtual disk is also created and appears in the Virtual Disks  
field.  
A dialog box appears, warning that any data on the physical disk will be  
permanently lost if it is initialized. Press the <C> key to continue with  
initialization or press <Esc> to cancel.  
Initialization takes 10–15 seconds per physical disk. A status indicator shows  
which physical disk is being initialized. When initialization is complete, the  
status indicator turns off, and all channels are re-scanned automatically.  
50  
RAID Configuration and Management  
   
CAUTION: If a physical disk has a virtual disk on it, the physical disk cannot be  
selected for initialization. To initialize the physical disk anyway, make sure to  
delete the virtual disk. Be sure you want to initialize the physical disk, because all  
data on it (including PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter configuration  
information) is deleted.  
NOTE: When Non-Raid physical disks are installed in the system, their associated  
Non-Raid virtual disks must be deleted in order to use the physical disks with the  
PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter. Deleting the Non-Raid virtual disks  
initializes the Non-Raid physical disks and changes their state to Ready.  
NOTE: Typically, continue with the next procedure, Creating Virtual Disks.  
Creating Virtual Disks  
You can create virtual disks after the physical disks are initialized, especially if  
the virtual disk is a bootable virtual disk for your system. If you have not  
decided what RAID level to use, see the Raid Technology Guide, located on  
the Dell Support website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
Before You Begin  
•
•
At any point in this procedure, return to a prior state by pressing <Esc>.  
A maximum of eight virtual disks can be created with the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
•
Avoid mixing of redundant and non-redundant raid levels on the same set  
of physical disks.  
NOTE: The Create Virtual Disk operation is not selectable when there is no  
available capacity on the physical disks.  
1
Power-up the system to start booting.  
2
When prompted, press the <Ctrl><R> keys to access the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
3
At the Main Menu field, use the arrow keys to select Create  
Virtual Disk. Press <Enter>.  
RAID Configuration and Management  
51  
   
4
At the Physical Disks field, select the physical disk(s) on which to  
create a virtual disk:  
a
b
For each physical disk, press the <Insert> key to select the physical  
disk. (The physical disks can be inserted in any order.)  
After selecting the physical disk(s) to be included in the virtual disk,  
press <Enter>.  
5
6
At the User Input field, use the arrow keys to select a virtual disk type  
(RAID level). Press <Enter>. (Only the virtual disk types that can be  
created with the selected physical disk(s) are indicated; they are  
highlighted in white text).  
If hot spares are applicable:  
a
At the User Inputfield, use the arrow keys to select a dedicated hot  
spare. Press <Enter>.  
NOTE: A global hot spare can be assigned after a virtual disk is created, by  
selecting the Manage Global Hot Spare(s) option.  
b
At the Physical Disksfield, select the physical disk to use as a  
hot spare (if applicable). Press <Insert> to select it.  
c
Press <Enter> to add the hot spare. Press the <C> key to confirm  
the change.  
7
Select a size for the virtual disk, depending on the available free space of  
the physical disks. Review the choices indicated in Table 6-3. (Virtual disk  
size changes are displayed at the Create Virtual Diskand User  
Inputfields.)  
NOTE: The maximum size of the virtual disk is affected by the available free  
space of the physical disks and by the RAID level that you select.  
8
9
After you choose the virtual disk size, press <Enter>.  
At the User Input field, select a Caching Mode. Press <Enter>.  
10 Press the <C> key to confirm that you want to create the virtual disk.  
11 At the Main Menufield, perform other operations or select Continue  
to Bootand press <Enter>.  
NOTE: The boot virtual disk must be the first virtual disk listed in the Virtual  
Disksfield. If necessary, use the Swap Two Virtual Disks option to place the  
bootable virtual disk in the first position.  
52  
RAID Configuration and Management  
Table 6-3. Selection of Virtual Disk Sizes  
To Create This  
Perform This Task  
Virtual Disk Size  
< 2.199 TB  
Use the <Page Up> or <Page Down> keys to select a size in large  
increments  
or  
Use the up arrow or down arrow keys to select a size in small  
increments.  
Continue with "Creating Virtual Disks" on page 51.  
> 2.199 TB  
1
Press the <Page Up> or the up arrow key to increase the virtual  
disk size.  
2
At the maximum size, a dialog box appears in the User Input  
field. It inquires if you want to limit the size of the virtual disk or  
exceed the normal maximum size.  
3
4
Press <Esc> to create a larger virtual disk.  
Press the <Page Up> or the up arrow key, until the desired or  
maximum available size has been attained.  
5
Continue with "Creating Virtual Disks" on page 51.  
NOTE: When physical disks of different capacities are used, the  
maximum size of the virtual disk is limited by the size of the physical  
disk with the smallest capacity.  
NOTE: If you want to have a bootable virtual disk, make sure that INT 13 support is  
enabled on the controller, as described in "Controller Options" on page 58.  
Deleting Virtual Disks  
CAUTION: Although any virtual disk in the Virtual Disksfield can be  
deleted, including the first-listed virtual disk in the field, do not delete the first-  
listed virtual disk. It may be the system’s bootable virtual disk. Deleting the  
bootable virtual disk erases the operating system and the controller drivers.  
CAUTION: When a physical disk is removed from a system, the current PERC S100  
adapter or PERC S300 adapter configuration information (metadata) remains on the  
disk. If the removed physical disk causes a virtual disk to fail, and the virtual disk  
is then deleted and a Rescan is performed, re-inserting the physical disk causes  
the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility to merge the re-inserted physical disk's  
RAID Configuration and Management  
53  
   
configuration information with the existing configuration information. The  
previously deleted virtual disk re-appears in the PERC Virtual Disk Management  
utility.  
CAUTION: Make sure that all physical disks that are part of a virtual disk are in  
the system before you delete the virtual disk.  
1
2
Power-up the system to start booting.  
When prompted, press the <Ctrl><R> keys to access the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
3
4
At the Main Menu field, select Delete Virtual Disk(s). Press  
<Enter>.  
Perform one of the following:  
•
Select each virtual disk in the Virtual Disks field that you want  
to delete. Press <Insert> to confirm each selection.  
OR  
•
Press <A> to select all virtual disks for deletion.  
NOTE: The text color of the selected virtual disk(s) changes to green.  
5
6
Press <Enter>.  
CAUTION: A dialog box appears, describing the consequences of deleting the  
selected virtual disk(s). Deleting a virtual disk permanently destroys all data that  
is on the virtual disk, as well as the virtual disk itself. This action cannot be  
undone.  
Press the <C> key to confirm the deletion.  
54  
RAID Configuration and Management  
Swapping Two Virtual Disks  
Use the Swap Two Virtual Disks option of the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility to arrange virtual disks in a different order.  
CAUTION: Do not swap the first-listed virtual disk at Virtual Disks if it is the  
system’s bootable virtual disk. The bootable virtual disk must always be the first-  
listed virtual disk at Virtual Disks.  
Before You Begin  
•
The Swap Two Virtual Disks option is enabled only if there is at least one  
initialized physical disk in the system. For example, if all the physical disks  
in the system are Non-Raid, the Swap Two Virtual Disks option is  
disabled.  
•
It is recommended that the bootable virtual disk be a redundant virtual  
disk-type, such as RAID 1, RAID 5, or RAID 10, to preserve data in case a  
physical disk in the virtual disk fails. As required, swap that virtual disk  
into the first position at Virtual Disks, if it is not already virtual  
disk 1. See the Swap Two Virtual Disks option below.  
•
•
The boot device and the boot order are user-selectable.  
The swap feature is available only with the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility  
.
NOTE: Only two virtual disks can be swapped at a time.  
1
Power-up the system to start booting.  
2
3
4
When prompted, press the <Ctrl><R> keys to access the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
At the Main Menufield, select Swap Two Virtual Disks Press  
.
<Enter>.  
Use the arrow keys to highlight a virtual disk at the Virtual Diskfield.  
Press <Insert>.  
5
6
Use the arrow keys to highlight another virtual disk. Press <Insert>.  
Press <Enter> to swap the virtual disks.  
RAID Configuration and Management  
55  
     
Managing Global Hot Spares  
This option enables you to create a global hot spare from a selected physical  
disk, or to delete a global hot spare.  
NOTE: A global hot spare can be created only if a physical disk is in Ready or  
Normal status at the Physical Disks field. If the physical disk is in Online status, it is  
being used by a virtual disk and cannot be selected as a hot spare.  
Create a Global Hot Spare  
1
2
Power-up the system to start booting.  
When prompted, press the <Ctrl><R> keys to access the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
3
At the Main Menu field, select Manage Global Spare(s). Press  
<Enter>.  
4
5
Select Assign Global Hot Spare(s). Press <Enter>.  
Use the up or down arrow key to select a physical disk(s) for use as a global  
hot spare(s). Press <Insert>.  
6
7
Press <Enter> to add the global hot spare.  
Press the <C> key to confirm the action.  
Delete a Global Hot Spare  
1
2
Power-up the system to start booting.  
When prompted, press the <Ctrl><R> keys to access the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
3
At the Main Menufield, select Manage Global Spare(s). Press  
<Enter>.  
4
5
Select Unassign Global Hot Spare(s). Press <Enter>.  
Use the up or down arrow key to select the physical disk(s) to delete as a  
global hot spare(s). Press <Insert>.  
6
7
Press <Enter> to delete the global hot spare.  
Press the <C> key to confirm the action.  
56  
RAID Configuration and Management  
     
Viewing Physical Disk Details  
1
2
Power-up the system to start booting.  
When prompted, press the <Ctrl><R> keys to access the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
3
At the Main Menufield, select View Physical Disk Details.  
Press <Enter>.  
4
5
Use the arrow keys to choose a physical disk.  
Physical disk information is displayed at the top of the window:  
•
•
•
•
•
•
Physical disk number  
Channel number  
Physical disk size  
Physical disk status: New  
Amount of free space  
/Non-Raid/Ready/Online  
Manufacturer and model number  
6
When finished, press <Esc> to return to the main window.  
Viewing Virtual Disk Details  
1
Power-up the system to start booting.  
2
When prompted, press the <Ctrl><R> keys to access the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility.  
3
At the Main Menufield, select View Virtual Disk Details. Press  
<Enter>.  
4
5
Use the arrow keys to choose a virtual disk.  
Virtual disk information is displayed at the top of the window and in the  
Virtual Disksfield:  
•
•
•
•
Virtual disk number  
RAID level  
Size  
Status (R/W  
,
R
,
NA)  
6
When finished, press <Esc> to return to the main window.  
NOTE: The PhysicalDisksfield indicates the physical disks that are in  
the virtual disk, highlighted by green text.  
RAID Configuration and Management  
57  
       
Rescanning Disks  
This option enables you to rescan all channels and detect new or removed  
physical disks or virtual disks.  
•
To perform a rescan, select Rescan Disksfrom the Main Menu field  
and press <Enter>. (The activity indicator, in the information field at the  
top of the window, spins while the physical disks are being polled).  
•
The Rescan Disks option rescans all the channels, searches for new or  
removed physical disks, and re-reads the configuration information from  
each physical disk.  
NOTE: Sometimes when a physical disk has failed, it can be brought online  
through a rescan.  
Controller Options  
The Controller Options feature enables you to select INT 13 boot support  
and select whether the boot process pauses when an error occurs. The boot  
process pauses when Pause if...is enabled and a virtual disk becomes  
Degraded or has Failed. Press <Enter> to continue booting.  
View the error message on the window. If Pause...is OFF, the error  
message is displayed briefly, but the system continues to boot.  
1
2
3
At the Main Menufield, use the arrow key to select Controller  
Options. Press <Enter>.  
At the Controller Optionsfield, use the up or down arrow keys to  
scroll to the desired controller option. See Table 6-4.  
When finished, press <Esc> to return to the main window.  
Table 6-4. Controller Options  
Controller Option  
Description  
Determines whether the BIOS Press <Enter> to  
installs INT 13 support toggle between ON  
How to Operate  
INT13 Boot Support  
(physical disk seek, read, and and OFF.  
write operations for a PERC  
S100 adapter or PERC S300  
adapter).  
58  
RAID Configuration and Management  
         
Table 6-4. Controller Options  
Controller Option  
Description  
How to Operate  
Pause if Degraded  
When ON, the BIOS stops  
booting when a degraded  
virtual disk is found.  
Press <Enter> to  
toggle between ON  
and OFF.  
Pause if Failed  
When ON, the BIOS stops  
Press <Enter> to  
booting when a failed virtual toggle between ON  
disk is found. and OFF.  
Continuing to Boot  
After using the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility, return the system to its  
normal booting process by selecting Continue to Bootin the Main  
Menufield and pressing <Enter>.  
RAID Configuration and Management  
59  
   
60  
RAID Configuration and Management  
7
Troubleshooting  
To get help with your Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC) PERC S100  
adapter and PERC S300 adapter, contact your Dell Technical Service  
representative or access the Dell Support Web site at support.dell.com.  
The chapter discusses four major categories of troubleshooting:  
•
•
Normal tasks that cannot be performed during system startup.  
Warning messages that might appear at the Dell Inc. PERC S100  
Controller BIOS or Dell Inc. PERC S300 Controller BIOS screen.  
•
•
Functions that cannot be performed with virtual disks.  
Functions that cannot be performed with physical disks.  
NOTE: Unless mentioned otherwise, the term PERC Virtual Disk Management utility  
refers to both the PERC S100 Virtual Disk Management utility and the PERC S300  
Virtual Disk Management utility.  
System Startup Problems  
The following table indicates potential PERC S100 adapter or PERC S300  
adapter-related causes for system startup problems.  
Table 7-1. System Does Not Boot  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
Controller mode is set  
incorrectly at System Setup  
1
2
At system startup, when the Dell Power-On Self-  
Test (POST) screen appears, press <F2> to enter  
the Dell Inc. PowerEdge BIOS screen.  
Scroll to SATA Settings. Press <Enter> and  
make sure that the following is true:  
• For a PERC S100 adapter: SATA Controller  
is set to a RAID mode.  
• For a PERC S300 adapter: SATA Controller  
is set to ATA Mode or AHCI  
.
NOTE: Data might be lost when switching from  
RAID Mode to ATA Mode.  
Troubleshooting  
61  
       
Table 7-1. System Does Not Boot  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
Boot Mode  
and/or Boot Sequence Retry are  
set incorrectly  
,
Boot Sequence  
,
1
At system startup, when the Dell POST screen  
appears, press <F2> to enter the Dell Inc.  
PowerEdge BIOS screen.  
2
3
Scroll to Boot Settings. Press <Enter> and  
make sure that Boot Modeis set to BIOS  
Scroll to Boot Sequence. Press <Enter> and  
make sure that Hard drive C: * PERC  
.
(
S100 adapter or PERC S300 adapter  
)
is  
the first device listed.  
* The variable text displayed here might be:  
Embedded SATA 1  
SAS  
Scroll to Boot Sequence Retry. Make sure  
that the setting is Enabled  
Press <Esc> to exit and continue booting.  
,
Slot 1, or Integrated  
.
4
5
.
NOTE: If changes are made at the Dell Inc.  
PowerEdge BIOS screen, a dialog box appears and  
asks you to save your changes and then exit.  
Bootable virtual disk is in a  
failed state  
1
2
Press <Ctrl><Alt><Del> to restart.  
After the system restarts, press <Ctrl><R>.  
Check the status of the bootable virtual disk at the  
Virtual Disk field, or by highlighting View  
Virtual Disks Detailsand pressing  
<Enter>.  
3
1
Check for missing or offline physical disks.  
The boot order is incorrect for a  
bootable virtual disk  
When prompted at system startup, press  
<Ctrl><R> to access the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility  
.
2
3
Check Virtual Disksand make sure that the  
bootable virtual disk is the first virtual disk listed.  
As required, use the Swap Two Virtual  
Disksoption to reposition the virtual disks.  
62  
Troubleshooting  
Table 7-1. System Does Not Boot  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
A Non-Raid virtual disk is no  
longer in the first position in the  
PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility list after the  
system is rebooted  
1
2
3
When prompted at system startup, press  
<Ctrl><R> to access the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility.  
Check Virtual Disksand determine if the  
bootable Non-Raid virtual disk is no longer in the  
first position.  
Use the Swap Two Virtual Disksoption to  
swap the virtual disks and place the bootable Non-  
Raid virtual disk in the first position of the  
Virtual Disksfield.  
NOTE: When booting from a  
Non-Raid virtual disk, creating a  
virtual disk in Dell OpenManage  
Server Administrator Storage  
Management changes the virtual  
disk order and displaces the  
bootable Non-Raid virtual disk  
from the first position. PERC S100  
adapter or PERC S300 adapter  
then attempts to boot from the  
first virtual disk.  
NOTE: A Non-Raid virtual disk  
can be created from Non-Raid  
physical disks (which are physical  
disks initialized at a  
non-PERC S100 adapter or a non-  
PERC S300 adapter).  
Table 7-2. The PERC Virtual Disk Management Option Does Not Display  
Likely Causes to Check Corrective Actions  
The PERC S100 adapter mode See Table 7-1 for the correct SATA Setting.  
is set incorrectly in the system  
BIOS  
The PERC S300 adapter is not Make sure that the PERC S300 adapter is installed  
seated correctly  
in the correct slot and is properly seated.  
Troubleshooting  
63  
Warning Messages: Dell Inc. PERC S100 Adapter  
or Dell Inc. PERC S300 Adapter  
BIOS Screen  
The Dell Inc. PERC S100 Controller BIOS screen or Dell Inc. PERC S300  
Controller BIOS screen is one of the first screens to appear during your  
system’s boot sequence. If the system’s virtual disks were in Normal or Ready  
status before a system boot, the boot sequence continues normally to the  
Microsoft Windows Server 2008 or Microsoft Windows Server 2003 operating  
system.  
But, if a virtual disk is in Degraded or Failed status, or if specific options in  
the Controller Options field were changed previously at the PERC Virtual  
Disk Management utility, the warning messages described in Table 7-3  
through Table 7-6 appear during the boot sequence. For other issues, see  
Table 7-7.  
64  
Troubleshooting  
   
Table 7-3. Warning Messages: Dell Inc. PERC S100 or PERC S300 Adapter BIOS  
Warning Message Corrective Action  
WARNING: Found This warning message appears when at least one virtual disk is  
virtual disks in a Degraded state and Pause if Degradedis set to ONat  
that are  
the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility.  
Degraded  
The following message appears after the warning is displayed:  
--- Press <Enter> to continue, or <CTRL><R>  
to enter setup ---  
Press <Enter> to allow the operating system to continue with  
the boot sequence, or press <Ctrl><R> to enter into the  
PERC Virtual Disk Management utility to investigate the cause  
of the Degraded virtual disk.  
To investigate the cause, check for the following:  
• Whether a physical disk in the virtual disk has failed or has  
gone offline. Check the status at the Physical Disks  
field. A Degraded status depends on the RAID level of the  
virtual disk and the number of physical disks that have failed:  
– For a virtual disk at RAID 1 or RAID 5, a single physical disk  
failure causes a Degraded status.  
– For a virtual disk at RAID 10, the failure of a physical disk in  
each of the mirror sets creates a Degraded status for the  
RAID 10. The failure of two physical disks in the same  
mirror set creates a Failed status for the RAID 10.  
• Whether the controller has failed, due to a firmware failure or  
a component failure. A failed controller causes a virtual disk  
not to boot.  
For the virtual disk to recover from Degraded status, the failed  
physical disk must be replaced and the virtual disk must be  
rebuilt, using Dell OpenManage Server Administrator Storage  
Management. When the rebuild operation is completed, the  
virtual disk status changes from Degraded to Ready. For a  
description of the rebuild function, see Storage Management,  
located on the Dell Support website at  
support.dell.com/manuals.  
Troubleshooting  
65  
   
Table 7-4. Warning Messages: Dell Inc. PERC S100 or S300 Adapter BIOS (continued)  
Warning Message Corrective Action  
WARNING: Found This warning message appears when at least one virtual disk is  
virtual disks in a Failed state and Pause if Failedis set to ONat the  
that are  
PERC Virtual Disk Management utility.  
Failed  
The following message appears after the warning is displayed:  
--- Press <Enter> to continue, or <Ctrl><R>  
to enter setup ---  
Press <Enter> to allow the operating system to continue its  
boot, or press <Ctrl><R> to enter into the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility to investigate the cause of the Failed virtual  
disk.  
NOTE: A boot virtual disk that is in a Failed state prevents the  
operating system from booting.  
To investigate the cause, check for the following:  
• Determine if a single or multiple physical disks in a non-  
redundant virtual disk have failed. If "yes," data is lost. Recover  
the lost data from a backup storage source.  
• Determine if two or more physical disks in a redundant virtual  
disk have failed. If "yes," data is lost. Recover the lost data  
from a backup storage source.  
NOTE: For a RAID 10, if a single physical disk fails in each  
mirrored set, the redundant virtual disk goes to a Degraded status  
but data is not lost. If two physical disks fail in one of the mirrored  
sets, the redundant virtual disk goes to a Failed status and data is  
lost.  
66  
Troubleshooting  
 
Table 7-5. Warning Messages: Dell Inc. PERC S100 or S300 Adapter BIOS (continued)  
Warning Message Corrective Action  
WARNING: Found This warning message appears when multiple virtual disks are  
virtual disks in Degraded and Failed state and Pause if Degradedor  
that are  
Degraded and  
Failed  
Pause if Failedare set to ONat the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility.  
The following message appears after the warning is displayed:  
--- Press <Enter> to continue, or <Ctrl><R>  
to enter setup ---  
Press <Enter> to allow the operating system to continue its  
boot, or press <Ctrl><R> to enter into the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility to investigate the cause of the Degraded  
and Failed virtual disks.  
NOTE: A boot virtual disk that is in a Failed state prevents the  
operating system from booting.  
To investigate the cause, check for the following:  
• Whether the virtual disk is in Degraded status because one of  
the physical disks of a RAID 1 or RAID 5 virtual disk has  
failed, or one of the physical disks of a RAID 10 virtual disk  
has failed.  
Press <Ctrl><R> and verify if the physical disks are offline  
or missing. Remove and replace a failed physical disk. A  
second physical disk failure could cause a Degraded virtual  
disk to change to Failed status.  
• Whether the virtual disk is in a Failed status because one or  
more of the physical disks have failed.  
Press <Ctrl><R> and verify if the physical disks are offline  
or missing. Remove and replace the failed physical disk or  
disks.  
Troubleshooting  
67  
Table 7-6. Warning Messages: Dell Inc. PERC S100 or S300 Adapter BIOS (continued)  
Warning Message  
Corrective Action  
BIOS NOT  
This warning message appears when:  
INSTALLED -  
User Disabled  
INT13 BIOS  
Load  
•
The INT13 Boot Support option has been set to OFFat  
the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility.  
Bootable devices do not function with the controller when INT  
13 Boot Support is set to OFF. (ONis the default setting,  
which allows bootable devices to function with the controller).  
NOTE: You can set INT 13 Boot Support to OFFwhen you want to  
boot the system from another boot device (for example, another  
hard-drive). It is recommended that you use only your system’s  
current boot device.  
If INT 13 Boot Supportis set to OFFand another boot  
device is not selected, the following occurs:  
• The boot sequence stops after BIOS Not Installed -  
User Disabled INT 13 BIOS Loadappears.  
• A second warning message appears: No boot device  
available - strike F1 to retry boot, F2 for  
setup utility, F11 for BIOS boot manager  
.
When the system’s boot sequence stops, perform the following:  
1
2
3
Press <Ctrl><Alt><Del> to exit from the boot sequence.  
Turn off your system, then restart it.  
When instructed during the start-up sequence, press  
<Ctrl><R> to access the PERC Virtual Disk Management  
utility.  
4
5
At the Main Menu field, use the arrow key to scroll to  
Controller Options. Press <Enter>.  
At INT13 Boot Supportpress <Enter> and change OFF  
to ON  
.
6
7
Press <Esc>.  
At the Main Menufield, use the arrow key to scroll to  
Continue to Boot. Press <Enter>.  
NOTE: The system boot sequence continues to the operating  
system.  
68  
Troubleshooting  
     
Table 7-7. Other Errors Appearing on the BIOS  
Issue  
Likely Causes to Check Corrective Actions  
The RAID 0 goes  
Faulty physical disk  
1
Boot system into CTLR-R and  
replace faulty drive.  
Delete the failed RAID 0 and then  
create a new RAID 0. Now RAID 0  
is optimal and RAID 1 is still  
degraded.  
offline and the RAID 1  
becomes degraded in a  
PowerEdge R210  
2
system with two drives.  
3
4
Install OS on the RAID 0 and  
backup RAID 1.  
Delete and Recreate RAID 1 and  
restore backup data.  
When attempting to  
update system  
DUPs are not  
supported.  
Use the DOS utilities  
backplane firmware  
and or Hard drive  
firmware using DUPs  
the updates fail.  
eSata devices appear in Issue with the physical Remove the devices from eSata port  
Ready state in CTLR-R connection  
and plug them into the chassis.  
NOTE: eSATA devices are blocked  
from virtual disk creation.  
During CTRL-R,  
S100/S300 do not  
display greater than  
eight Virtual Disks.  
The function is not  
supported.  
Remove all physical disks except for  
the last one(s) added. Then proceed  
with deleting the virtual disks that  
are not needed. Remember to take  
account of the virtual disks that are  
currently being used.  
Unable to delete  
The function is not  
supported.  
Remove all physical disks except for  
the last one(s) added. Then proceed  
with deleting the virtual disks that  
are not needed. Remember to take  
account of the virtual disks that are  
currently being used.  
Virtual Disks when  
there are more than  
eight Virtual Disks  
present in the system.  
Virtual disk rebuild  
status while during  
CTLR-R  
Rebuild is not  
Boot to a supported OS. Rebuild  
supported in Ctrl-R. starts. To view rebuild status, install  
a supported storage application.  
Troubleshooting  
69  
 
Table 7-7. Other Errors Appearing on the BIOS  
Issue  
Likely Causes to Check Corrective Actions  
S100 and S300 co- Remove S300 adapter and reboot  
existence in the same system to select F1 and select RAID  
S100 rom option not  
visible during S300  
controller use in the  
system.  
system is not  
for boot BIOS.  
supported. S100  
The S100 rom option appears during  
POST boot.  
option rom becomes  
disabled when S100  
and S300 are available.  
NOTE: If both controllers are used in  
the system, the windows driver  
manager displays the additional driver.  
Virtual Disk-Related Errors  
Use the information on the following tables as guidelines for troubleshooting  
the controller.  
Table 7-8. Cannot Create a Virtual Disk  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
The physical disk is not  
displayed  
This error might be because:  
– The controller cannot communicate with the  
physical disks.  
– A cable might be loose or defective.  
Re-seat the physical disks in the backplane and  
check their cables.  
Insufficient free space available There must be sufficient available free space on the  
on the selected physical disks  
physical disk(s) used by the virtual disk.  
Incorrect number of physical  
disks selected for the desired  
RAID level  
See "Understanding RAID Levels" in the RAID  
Technology Guide, located on the Dell Support  
website at support.dell.com/manuals, for a  
description of RAID levels and the allowable  
number of physical disks used with each RAID  
level.  
70  
Troubleshooting  
   
Table 7-8. Cannot Create a Virtual Disk (continued)  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
The desired physical disk is  
unavailable  
Determine whether the physical disk:  
• Is a dedicated hot spare and unavailable for use in  
another virtual disk.  
• Is full or has insufficient available capacity.  
Delete unused virtual disks.  
The system already has a  
maximum of eight virtual disks  
CAUTION: Deleting a virtual disk destroys all data  
on the virtual disk.  
Table 7-9. A Virtual Disk is in a Failed State  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
The virtual disk has lost one or Replace the failed physical disk(s) and restore the  
more physical disks  
data from a backup storage source.  
A
physical disk in the virtual disk • Re-install the original physical disk if it was  
has failed or has been removed  
inadvertently removed. Perform a rescan.  
• Check the status of the physical disks in the  
virtual disk. Replace any failed disk(s), if  
necessary. Restore the data from a backup storage  
source.  
After any change, perform a rescan to verify if the  
disk is still in a Failed state.  
The virtual disk has lost the  
maximum allowable physical  
disks per RAID level  
One or more physical disks have failed.  
– If the virtual disk is non-redundant, the failure  
of a single physical disk can cause the virtual  
disk to fail.  
– If the virtual disk is redundant, two or more  
physical disks have failed and the virtual disk  
cannot be rebuilt.  
Create a new virtual disk. Restore the data from a  
backup storage source.  
Troubleshooting  
71  
 
Table 7-10. A Virtual Disk is in a Degraded State  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
A physical disk was removed  
• Install the original physical disk, if it was  
inadvertently removed, or replace it with a new or  
used physical disk.  
• Initialize a new physical disk. Perform a Rescan  
for all physical disks that are replaced.  
• If the physical disk was not removed, check that  
its cables are correctly installed.  
Physical or mechanical problems • Check if the physical disk in the virtual disk has  
with the physical disk  
failed.  
• If a physical disk was recently removed and  
replaced, check that it is correctly positioned in  
the backplane. Check the cable connections at the  
physical disk and at the motherboard. Perform a  
rescan.  
The virtual disk has lost  
redundancy  
• One or more physical disks in the virtual disk have  
failed. Due to the failed physical disk or disks, the  
virtual disk is no longer maintaining redundant  
(mirrored or parity) data. The failure of an  
additional physical disk results in lost data.  
• Replace the physical disk or disks. Rebuild the  
physical disk using Storage Management. See the  
applicable Storage Management screen, located  
on the Dell Support website at  
support.dell.com/manuals.  
Corrupted metadata in the  
virtual disk  
1
2
3
Delete the virtual disk that has the failed  
metadata.  
Assign the physical disk as a hot spare to rebuild a  
redundant virtual disk.  
To create a non-redundant virtual disk, delete and  
rebuilt the data on a virtual disk, and restore the  
data from a backup storage source.  
72  
Troubleshooting  
Table 7-11. Cannot Assign a Dedicated Hot Spare to a Virtual Disk  
Likely Causes to Check Corrective Actions  
The RAID level does not allow a Hot spares cannot be created for Volume or RAID 0  
dedicated hot spare to be created virtual disks.  
The designated physical disk  
The capacity of the physical disk selected to be a  
does not have sufficient capacity dedicated hot spare must be equal to or larger than  
to be a dedicated hot spare  
the capacity of the smallest physical disk in the  
virtual disk.  
For example, if the physical disk selected for a  
dedicated hot spare is 160 GB, and the physical  
disks in the virtual disk are 80 GB, 160 GB, and  
500 GB, a dedicated hot spare can be assigned.  
That is because the physical disk selected for the  
dedicated hot spare is larger than the smallest  
(80 GB) physical disk in the virtual disk.  
The physical disk is already part A dedicated hot spare cannot be assigned to  
of a virtual disk  
another virtual disk.  
The physical disks are of  
different types  
The physical disk used as a dedicated spare must be  
the same type as the physical disks that are already  
part of the virtual disk. For example, if a virtual disk  
consists of SATA-II physical disks, the dedicated  
hot spare must be a SATA-II physical disk.  
Table 7-12. Cannot Create a Global Hot Spare  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
There are no empty physical  
disks available or the physical  
disks have not been initialized  
Install additional physical disks and initialize them.  
If existing physical disks have a status of New they  
need to be initialized.  
WARNING: When a physical disk is initialized, all  
data on the physical disk is lost.  
NOTE: A physical disk with a Non-Raid status can be  
initialized, if desired, but it is no longer Non-Raid  
(initialization adds PERC S100 adapter/PERC S300  
adapter configuration information to the physical  
disk).  
Troubleshooting  
73  
 
Table 7-12. Cannot Create a Global Hot Spare (continued)  
The physical disk is already part A global hot spare cannot be selected if it is already  
of a virtual disk  
part of an existing virtual disk.  
The physical disk assigned as the When prompted at system startup, press  
global hot spare has failed  
<Ctrl><R>to access the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility.  
At the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility,  
select View Virtual Disk Details and  
press <Enter>. Determine whether the physical  
disk that is designated as the global hot spare has a  
status of Failed.  
• Check to see if the physical disk is malfunctioning  
or is physically disconnected.  
• Select another physical disk as the global hot  
spare.  
The physical disk assigned as the • Check to see if the physical disk was removed  
global hot spare is missing  
from the backplane or cable connection, or  
whether the cables from the controller to the  
physical disk are disconnected or faulty.  
• Perform a rescan to verify that the physical disk is  
still missing.  
74  
Troubleshooting  
Physical Disk-Related Errors  
Table 7-13. The Physical Disk Fails  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
A physical disk is not visible • Check that the cables are properly connected.  
in the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility or is  
offline  
• For PERC S300 adapters only: check that the physical  
disk is installed properly in the system’s backplane.  
• For PERC S300 adapters only: check the system’s  
backplane for damage.  
• For PERC S300 adapters only: reinstall the physical  
disk and make sure that it is seated correctly in the  
system’s backplane.  
• Perform a Rescan, to (a) update the status of storage  
devices attached to the controller, or (b) fix an error  
caused by deleting or initializing a virtual disk.  
A physical disk is highlighted • Replace the physical disk. Depending on the  
red at the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility  
RAID level of the virtual disk, data might be lost.  
• Perform a rescan to confirm that the new disk was  
discovered.  
Table 7-14. A Dedicated Hot Spare Fails  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
The controller cannot  
communicate with the hot  
spare  
• Check that the cable from the controller to the  
physical disk is connected properly.  
• Make sure that the physical disk is still assigned as a  
global or dedicated hot spare.  
• Check if the physical disk assigned as the hot spare  
has failed.  
The dedicated spare is not  
The controller cannot communicate with the hot  
visible in the PERC Virtual spare.  
Disk Management utility or  
• Check if the physical disk has been removed or has  
failed.  
is offline  
• Check for a loose or bad cable.  
Troubleshooting  
75  
       
Table 7-15. The Wrong Physical Disk was Removed  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
A physical disk has been  
The removal of one physical disk from a virtual disk  
removed from a virtual disk causes:  
• A Volume or RAID 0 virtual disk to change to Failed  
status.  
• A RAID 1 and RAID 5 virtual disk to change to  
Degraded status.  
• A RAID 10 virtual disk to change to Degraded status  
(when a physical disk is removed from one of the  
mirrored sets).  
Re-insert the removed physical disk and perform a  
Rescan of the virtual disk.  
Table 7-16. Cannot Initialize a Physical Disk  
Likely Causes to Check  
Corrective Actions  
The physical disk cannot be  
initialized  
Check whether or not the physical disk is:  
• Already a member of a virtual disk.  
• Currently a global or dedicated spare.  
• Reporting an Offline state.  
Only physical disks that are Ready can be  
initialized.  
76  
Troubleshooting  
A
Appendix A  
Controller Specifications  
This section contains information about the Dell PowerEdge RAID  
Controller (PERC) S100 and S300 adapter specifications:  
•
•
•
•
Read, write, and cache policy  
Physical and virtual disk tasks  
Virtual disk specifications  
Supported RAID levels  
Read, Write, and Cache Policy  
Table A-1 indicates the read, write, and cache policies that are supported/not  
supported by the PERC S100 Adapter and PERC S300 adapter.  
Table A-1. Read, Write, and Cache Policy for the PERC S100 adapter and  
PERC S300 adapter  
Category  
Supported by PERC S100 Adapter, PERC  
S300 adapter  
Cache Settings  
Read/Write  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Read Only  
None (Read/Write)  
CAUTION: The current default for Write-Cache mode enablement is  
Write Through, Non Read Ahead (WT, NRA). To enable Write Back (WB), a UPS is  
recommended.  
Appendix A  
77  
         
Controller Tasks  
Table A-2 indicates the tasks that are supported or not supported by the  
PERC S100 Adapter and PERC S300 adapter.  
Table A-2. PERC S100 Adapter and PERC S300 Adapter Tasks  
PERC S100 adapter or  
PERC S300 adapterTask Name  
Supported by PERC S100 adapter,  
PERC S300 adapter  
Enable alarm  
No  
No  
No  
No  
No  
No  
Yes  
Disable alarm  
Quiet alarm  
Test alarm  
Set check consistency rate  
Rescan controller  
Create virtual disk  
Physical Disk Tasks  
Table A-3 indicates the physical disk tasks that are supported/not supported  
by the controllers at the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility.  
NOTE: Unless mentioned otherwise, the term PERC Virtual Disk Management utility  
refers to both the PERC S100 Virtual Disk Management utility and the PERC S300  
Virtual Disk Management utility.  
Table A-3. Physical Disk Tasks  
Physical Disk Task Name  
Blink/Unblink  
Supported by PERC S100 adapter,  
PERC S300 adapter  
Only with a system that has a  
PERC S300 adapter and a backplane  
Assign and unassign global hot spare  
Yes  
78  
Appendix A  
           
Virtual Disk Tasks  
Table A-4 indicates the virtual disk tasks that are supported/not supported by  
the controllers.  
Table A-4. Virtual Disk Tasks  
Virtual Disk Task Name  
Supported by PERC S100 adapter, PERC S300  
adapter  
Assign and unassign dedicated hot  
spare  
Yes  
Create virtual disk  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Reconfigure  
Delete (any) virtual disk  
Start a check consistency  
Cancel check consistency  
Initialize virtual disk  
No (if using the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility)  
Yes (if doing a BGI in Storage Management)  
Supported RAID Levels  
Table A-5 indicates the RAID levels that are supported by the PERC S100  
Adapter and PERC S300 adapter.  
Table A-5. Supported RAID Levels for the PERC S100 adapter and  
PERC S300 adapter  
RAID Level  
Supported by PERC S100 adapter,  
PERC S300 adapter  
Volume  
Yes (only when using the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility)  
RAID 0  
RAID 1  
RAID 5  
RAID 10  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Yes  
Appendix A  
79  
           
Virtual Disk Specifications  
Table A-6 indicates the virtual disk specifications that apply to the  
PERC S100 Adapter and PERC S300 adapter.  
Table A-6. Virtual Disk Specifications for the PERC S100 adapter and  
PERC S300 adapter  
Virtual Disk Specification  
Value  
8
Maximum number of virtual disks per controller  
Minimum virtual disk size  
102 MB  
Maximum virtual disk size  
No maximum size;  
there may operating  
system size limitations  
Maximum number of physical disks per virtual disk  
Maximum number of virtual disks per physical disk  
8
8
Maximum number of physical disks that can be  
concatenated  
N/A  
Maximum number of physical disks in a Volume  
Maximum number of physical disks in a RAID 0  
Maximum number of physical disks in a RAID 1  
Maximum number of physical disks in a RAID 5  
Maximum number of physical disks in a RAID 10  
1
8
2
8
8
Minimum number of physical disks that can be  
concatenated  
N/A  
Minimum number of physical disks in a Volume  
Minimum number of physical disks in a RAID 0  
Minimum number of physical disks in a RAID 1  
Minimum number of physical disks in a RAID 5  
Minimum number of physical disks in a RAID 10  
1
2
2
3
4
80  
Appendix A  
     
B
Appendix B  
RAID Technology - Understanding Disk Arrays  
and Virtual Disks  
A disk array consists of the physical disks that are connected to a controller.  
A virtual disk is data storage created by a controller from one or more physical  
disks. The virtual disk is viewed by the operating system as a single disk.  
The Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC) S100 controller and PERC  
S300 controller allows:  
•
SAS HDD (PERC S300 controller only), SATA HDD, and/or SATA SSD  
(PERC S100 controller only) physical disks to co-exist on a single  
controller.  
•
•
Physical disks of the same type (SAS HDD, SATA HDD, SATA SSD) but  
of different capacities.  
Virtual disks to be at different RAID levels on the same controller, but not  
supported on the same group of physical disks.  
Because some RAID levels enhance performance while others improve  
reliability, it is important to consider your needs when planning a virtual disk  
configuration.  
The ability of the controller to provide online expansion to virtual disks across  
multiple physical disks and controllers becomes extremely valuable when  
storage expansion is a requirement.  
Appendix B  
81  
     
Understanding RAID Levels  
A PERC S100 controller or PERC S300 controller supports the following  
RAID levels:  
Table B-1. RAID Levels and Characteristics  
RAID Level  
Main Characteristics  
Advantages  
Volume (can be  
created only using the available space on a single  
PERC S100 Virtual  
Disk Management  
utility or PERC S300 which data is stored.  
Virtual Disk  
A virtual disk type that links • Concatenation allows  
access to a single physical  
disk.  
physical disk and forms a  
single logical volume on  
• Concatenation does not  
provide performance  
benefits or data redundancy.  
Management utility.  
• When a physical disk in a  
concatenated virtual disk  
fails, data is lost from that  
virtual disk. Because there is  
no redundancy, data can be  
restored only from a  
Dell OpenManage  
Server Administrator  
Storage Management  
can manage a Volume  
but cannot create it.)  
NOTE: Unless  
backup.  
mentioned otherwise,  
the term PERC Virtual  
Disk Management  
utility refers to both the  
PERC S100 Virtual Disk  
Management utility and  
the PERC S300 Virtual  
Disk Management  
utility  
RAID 0 (striping)  
Provides the highest  
RAID 0 virtual disks are useful  
for holding information, such  
as the operating system  
paging file, where  
performance is extremely  
important but redundancy is  
not.  
performance, but no data  
redundancy. Data in the  
virtual disk is striped  
(distributed) across two or  
more physical disks.  
82  
Appendix B  
Table B-1. RAID Levels and Characteristics (continued)  
RAID Level  
Main Characteristics  
Advantages  
RAID 1 (mirroring)  
Mirrors data on one physical Useful when only two physical  
disk to another, to provide  
basic redundancy.  
disks are available, and when  
data integrity is more  
important than storage  
capacity.  
In the event of a single  
physical disk failure a second  
copy of the data exists, which  
can be used to restore the  
data to a new, replacement  
physical disk.  
RAID 10 (striped  
mirror sets)  
Combines mirrored and  
striped sets; data are striped  
across mirrored sets of  
physical disks.  
• Offers better performance  
than a simple mirror  
because of the additional  
physical disks.  
RAID 10 allows multiple  
physical disk failures, up to  
one failed physical disk in  
each mirror that has been  
striped.  
• Requires twice the disk  
space of RAID 0 to offer  
redundancy.  
• When a physical disk in a  
RAID 10 virtual disk fails,  
the virtual disk is still  
functional. Data is read  
from the surviving mirrored  
disk.  
In the event of a single  
physical disk failure (per  
mirror set) a second copy of  
the data exists, which can be  
used to restore the data to a  
new, replacement physical  
disk.  
Appendix B  
83  
Table B-1. RAID Levels and Characteristics (continued)  
RAID Level Main Characteristics  
RAID 5 (striping with Stripes data, as well as parity, • Offers exceptional read  
Advantages  
parity)  
across all physical disks in the  
virtual disk. Parity  
performance, as well as  
redundancy.  
information is interspersed  
across the virtual disk.  
• Requires only one extra  
physical disk to offer  
redundancy.  
In the event of a single  
physical disk failure, parity  
data exists on the remaining  
physical disks, which can be  
used to restore the data to a  
new, replacement physical  
disk.  
• For most systems with three  
or more physical disks this is  
the best choice as a RAID  
level.  
Disk States - Virtual and Physical Disks  
The following tables indicate the statuses that can appear at the PERC  
Virtual Disk Management utility.  
Table B-2. Physical Disk States  
State  
Definition  
ATAPI  
Indicates a peripheral device (CD-ROM, DVD, or tape drive) instead  
of a physical disk. An ATAPI device cannot be initialized or added to  
a virtual disk.  
Non-Raid  
A physical disk has been moved from another, non-PERC S100  
controller or non-PERC S300 controller.  
Online  
Ready  
The physical disk has been initialized and is part of a virtual disk.  
The physical disk has been initialized but is not currently used in a  
virtual disk.  
Failed  
A failed physical disk appears as Failed only when (a) View Virtual  
Disk Details is selected, and (b) the virtual disk to which the physical  
disk belongs is selected. The Failed status is reported only when the  
physical disk is part of a virtual disk.  
Spare  
A physical disk that is assigned as a dedicated or global hot spare.  
84  
Appendix B  
 
Table B-3. Virtual Disk States  
State Definition  
Degraded A physical disk in a redundant virtual disk has failed. Additional failures  
might result in lost data.  
Failed  
One or more physical disks have failed. The virtual disk has gone offline.  
The virtual disk cannot restore the data.  
Non-Raid A Non-Raid physical disk is automatically linked to a Non-Raid virtual  
disk for use with a PERC S100 controller or PERC S300 controller.  
Normal  
Ready  
A virtual disk has been created and its preparation process has been  
completed.  
A redundant virtual disk has been created, and is ready for additional  
preparation.  
Failure States  
Whether a virtual disk is marked as Failed or Degraded depends upon what  
RAID level virtual disk it is, and how many physical disks of the virtual disk  
have failed. In Table B-4 note the changes in state.  
If a rescan of all channels is performed after disconnecting a physical disk, the  
state of every virtual disk using the disconnected physical disk changes from  
the Ready state to either the Failed or Degraded state, depending on the  
virtual disk’s RAID level.  
For additional information about rescanning to update storage configuration  
changes, see the OpenManage documentation available on the Dell Support  
website at support.dell.com/manuals.  
Table B-4. Failure Status by Virtual Disk RAID Level  
Virtual Disk RAID Level  
RAID 1, RAID 5  
RAID 10  
Failure Status Description  
Degraded  
Degraded  
A single physical disk fails.  
A single physical disk fails in one or  
more of the mirrored sets.  
Volume, RAID 0  
RAID 1 or RAID 5  
RAID 10  
Failed  
Failed  
Failed  
A single physical disk fails.  
Two or more physical disks fail.  
Two physical disks in a mirrored set  
fail.  
Appendix B  
85  
   
Creating Virtual Disks: Future Expansion  
When creating virtual disks, consider whether or not the virtual disk capacity  
needs to be expanded in the future.  
For a Microsoft Windows operating system, format the virtual disks with New  
Technology File System (NTFS). Microsoft Corporation provides a utility  
(diskpart.exe) that can dynamically extend an NTFS file system onto any  
unused adjacent space.  
Note also that using a single partition per virtual disk makes expansion much  
easier.  
NOTE: The diskpart.exe utility version depends on which version of the Windows  
operating system is running.  
NOTE: The diskpart.exe utility can be found on the CD for some versions of  
Windows operating systems, or on the Microsoft Corporation website  
(microsoft.com) for other versions. Use the correct version for your operating  
system.  
Understanding Physical Disks  
Physical Disk States  
Within the management applications, physical disks can be part of one or  
more virtual disks and can exist in the states indicated:  
Table B-5. Minimum and Maximum Physical Disk Configurations  
RAID Level Minimum Number of Physical Disks Maximum Number of Physical Disks  
RAID 0  
RAID 1  
RAID 10  
RAID 5  
2
2
8
3
8
2
8
8
86  
Appendix B  
 
Rescanning Physical Disks for Changes in State  
The physical disk information displayed at the PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility is the state of the physical disks when they were last  
scanned. If a rescan has not been performed, the information displayed is the  
state of the physical disks at boot time.  
Every time a physical disk is connected or disconnected while online, a rescan  
is performed. A rescan is automatically performed when Dell OpenManage  
Server Administrator Storage Management detects that a physical disk has  
been added or removed.  
Dedicated Hot Spares  
A dedicated hot spare is a backup physical disk for the redundant virtual disk  
to which it is assigned. The physical disk that is used as a dedicated hot spare  
cannot be a member of an existing virtual disk. When the hot spare is  
activated, it becomes the receptacle for the data from the failed physical disk  
member of the volume, without interrupting the system or requiring your  
intervention.  
A dedicated hot spare can be assigned to any redundant virtual disk, and up to  
four hot spares can be assigned to a virtual disk. However, a dedicated hot  
spare cannot be assigned while a task is running on the virtual disk.  
A global hot spare can be assigned when a virtual disk is created in the PERC  
Virtual Disk Management utility. A global hot spare can be added at any time  
when Storage Management is used.  
If there is enough space available on the dedicated hot spare, and a disk  
failure occurs, the rebuild process for the virtual disk starts automatically.  
Dedicated hot spare assignments do not apply to a non-redundant virtual  
disk.  
NOTE: A virtual disk is marked Failed or Degraded if a physical disk reports a Failed  
state, or if the SAS/SATA cable to the physical disk or power cable is disconnected.  
A dedicated hot spare is often preferred to a global hot spare, especially for  
critical data. This is because a dedicated hot spare guarantees that the virtual  
disk has a backup physical disk assigned exclusively to it in case of a failure.  
For additional information, see "Managing Global Hot Spares" on page 56.  
Appendix B  
87  
   
Global Hot Spares  
A global hot spare is a backup physical disk that can be used by any redundant  
virtual disk. It is not assigned (dedicated) to any specific virtual disk.  
Virtual disks can typically be rebuilt by using a global spare disk, as long as the  
global hot spare is not already part of the virtual disk and has enough available  
capacity. Unlike a dedicated hot spare, a global hot spare can be assigned at  
anytime, even while tasks are running on virtual disks.  
If there is enough space available on the global hot spare, and a disk failure  
occurs, the rebuild process for the virtual disk starts automatically.  
88  
Appendix B  
 
C
Appendix C  
Regulatory Notices  
Electromagnetic Interference (EMI) is any signal or emission, radiated in free  
space or conducted along power or signal leads, that endangers the  
functioning of a radio navigation or other safety service or seriously degrades,  
obstructs, or repeatedly interrupts a licensed radio communications service.  
Radio communications services include, but are not limited to, AM/FM  
commercial broadcast, television, cellular services, radar, air-traffic control,  
pager, and Personal Communication Services (PCS). These licensed services,  
along with unintentional radiators such as digital devices, including  
computers, contribute to the electromagnetic environment.  
Electromagnetic Compatibility is the ability of items of electronic equipment  
to function properly together in the electronic environment. While this  
system has been designed and determined to be compliant with regulatory  
agency limits for EMI, there is no guarantee that interference may not occur  
in a particular installation. If this equipment does cause interference with  
radio communications services, which can be determined by turning the  
equipment off and on, you are encouraged to try to correct the interference by  
one or more of the following measures:  
•
•
•
•
Reorient the receiving antenna.  
Relocate the system with respect to the receiver.  
Move the system away from the receiver.  
Plug the system into a different outlet so that the system and the receiver  
are on different branch circuits.  
If necessary, consult a Dell Technical Support representative or an  
experienced radio/television technician for additional suggestions.  
For additional regulatory information, see the owner’s manual or user’s guide  
for your system.  
Appendix C  
89  
     
Dell computers are designed, tested, and classified for their intended  
electromagnetic environment. These electromagnetic environment  
classifications generally refer to the following harmonized definitions:  
•
•
Class A is typically for business or industrial environments.  
Class B is typically for residential environments.  
Information Technology Equipment (ITE), including devices, expansion  
cards, printers, input/output (I/O) devices, monitors, and so on, that are  
integrated into or connected to the system must match the electromagnetic  
environment classification of the system.  
A Notice About Shielded Signal Cables: Use only shielded cables for  
connecting devices to any Dell device to reduce the possibility of interference  
with radio communications services. Using shielded cables ensures that you  
maintain the appropriate Electromagnetic Compatibility classification for the  
intended environment. Cables are available from Dell at dell.com.  
Most Dell computers are classified for Class B environments. However, the  
inclusion of certain options can change the rating of some configurations to  
Class A. To determine the electromagnetic classification for your system or  
device, see the following sections specific for each regulatory agency. Each  
section provides country-specific Electromagnetic Compatibility/EMI or  
product safety information.  
FCC Notice (U.S. Only)  
FCC, Class A  
This product has been tested and found to comply with the limits for a Class  
A digital device pursuant to Part 15 of the FCC Rules. These limits are  
designed to provide reasonable protection against harmful interference when  
the equipment is operated in a commercial environment. This product  
generates, uses, and can radiate radio frequency energy and, if not installed  
and used in accordance with the manufacturer’s instruction manual, may  
cause harmful interference with radio communications. Operation of this  
product in a residential area is likely to cause harmful interference, in which  
case you will be required to correct the interference at your own expense.  
90  
Appendix C  
   
FCC, Class B  
This product generates, uses, and can radiate radio frequency energy and, if  
not installed and used in accordance with the manufacturer’s instruction  
manual, may cause interference with radio and television reception. This  
product has been tested and found to comply with the limits for a Class B  
digital device pursuant to Part 15 of the FCC Rules.  
This device complies with Part 15 of the FCC Rules. Operation is subject to  
the following two conditions:  
•
•
This device may not cause harmful interference.  
This device must accept any interference received, including interference  
that may cause undesired operation.  
CAUTION: The FCC regulations provide that changes or modifications not  
expressly approved by Dell Inc. could void your authority to operate this  
equipment.  
These limits are designed to provide reasonable protection against harmful  
interference in a residential installation. However, there is no guarantee that  
interference may not occur in a particular installation.  
If this equipment does cause harmful interference with radio or television  
reception, which can be determined by turning the equipment off and on,  
you are encouraged to try to correct the interference by one or more of the  
following measures:  
•
•
•
•
Reorient the receiving antenna.  
Relocate the system with respect to the receiver.  
Move the system away from the receiver.  
Plug the system into a different outlet so that the system and the receiver  
are on different branch circuits.  
If necessary, consult a representative of Dell Inc. or an experienced  
radio/television technician for additional suggestions.  
Appendix C  
91  
The following information is provided on the device or devices covered in this  
document in compliance with FCC regulations:  
Product Name  
PERC S100, PERC S300  
Company Name:  
Dell Inc.  
Worldwide Regulatory Compliance & Environmental Affairs  
One Dell Way  
Round Rock, Texas 78682 USA  
512-338-4400  
Industry Canada Notice (Canada Only)  
Industry Canada, Class A  
This Class A digital apparatus complies with Canadian ICES-003.  
Cet appareil numérique de la classe A est conforme à la norme NMB-003 du  
Canada.  
Industry Canada, Class B  
This Class B digital apparatus complies with Canadian ICES-003  
Cet appareil numérique de la classe B est conforme à la norme NMB-003 du  
Canada.  
CAUTION: The Industry Canada regulations provide that changes or  
modifications not expressly approved by Dell Inc. could void your authority to  
operate this equipment.  
CE Notice (European Union)  
Marking by the symbol indicates compliance of this Dell system to the  
Electromagnetic Compatibility Directive 89/336/EEC and the Low Voltage  
Directive 73/23/EEC of the European Union. Such marking is indicative that  
this Dell system meets the following technical standards:  
•
EN 55022 — "Information Technology Equipment — Radio Disturbance  
Characteristics — Limits and Methods of Measurement."  
•
EN 55024 — "Information Technology Equipment - Immunity  
Characteristics - Limits and Methods of Measurement."  
92  
Appendix C  
       
•
•
•
EN 61000-3-2 — "Electromagnetic Compatibility - Part 3: Limits - Section  
2: Limits for Harmonic Current Emissions (Equipment Input Current Up  
to and Including 16 A Per Phase)."  
EN 61000-3-3 — "Electromagnetic Compatibility - Part 3: Limits - Section  
3: Limitation of Voltage Fluctuations and Flicker in Low-Voltage Supply  
Systems for Equipment With Rated Current Up to and Including 16 A."  
EN 60950 — "Safety of Information Technology Equipment."  
EN 55022 emissions requirements provide for two classifications:  
•
•
Class A is for typical commercial areas.  
Class B is for typical domestic areas.  
To determine which classification applies to your system, examine the FCC  
or ICES information on the regulatory label located on the back, side, or  
bottom panel of the system.  
If the FCC or ICES information on the label indicates a Class B rating, the  
following Class B statement applies to your system:  
This Dell device is classified for use in a typical Class B domestic  
environment.  
A "Declaration of Conformity" in accordance with the preceding directives  
and standards has been made and is on file at Dell Inc. Products Europe BV,  
Limerick, Ireland.  
Appendix C  
93  
CE Mark Notice  
This equipment complies with the essential requirements of the European  
Union Directive 1999/5/EC.  
94  
Appendix C  
   
D
Appendix D  
Contacting Dell  
For customers in the United States, call 800-WWW-DELL (800-999-3355).  
NOTE: If you do not have an active Internet connection, you can find contact  
information on your purchase invoice, packing slip, bill, or Dell product catalog.  
Dell provides several online and telephone-based support and service options.  
Availability varies by country and product, and some services may not be  
available in your area. To contact Dell for sales, technical support, or  
customer service issues:  
1
2
Visit support.dell.com  
Click your country/region at the bottom of the page. For a full listing of  
country/region click All  
.
.
3
4
5
Click All Support from the Support menu.  
Select the appropriate service or support link based on your need.  
Choose the method of contacting Dell that is convenient for you.  
Appendix D  
95  
   
96  
Appendix D  
Index  
controller drivers,  
pre-installation  
requirements, 38  
B
background initialization, 21  
BIOS, major functions, 47  
controller options, changing, 58  
boot device, warning  
message, 68  
controller options, changing  
them, 58  
boot priority list  
changing it, 41  
checking controller options, 40  
controller tasks, supported by  
PERC S100 adapter, PERC  
S300 adapter, 78  
boot support, RAID levels, 22  
booting the system after using  
the BIOS configuration  
utility, 59  
D
dedicated hot spares, 87  
degraded virtual disks, warning  
message, 65  
C
Dell system BIOS  
configuring the chipset, 39  
cache policy, 77  
CE Mark Notice, 94  
CE Notice (European Union), 92  
checkpointing, 22  
device driver installation  
procedure, 37  
disk arrays, understanding  
them, 81  
chipsets, configuration at the  
Dell system BIOS, 39  
disk roaming, 26  
drivers  
installation, 42, 44  
Command Queuing, 22  
consistency check, 23  
continuing to boot the  
system, 59  
controller driver, download  
procedure, 37  
Index  
97  
 
hot spares  
dedicated, 87  
global, 88  
E
electrostatic discharge,  
protecting against, 9  
hot spares, global, managing  
them, 56  
errors, physical disks  
dedicated hot spare has failed or is  
in error, 75  
hot swapping, 25  
Failed status is displayed, 75  
errors, virtual disks  
Failed status, 71  
I
virtual disk has been deleted, 73  
Industry Canada Notice (Canada  
only), 92  
ESD protection, 9  
initialization, physical disks, 23  
installation  
PERC S300 Adapter, 32  
PERC S300 adapter, 32  
F
fault tolerance, 23  
installing the controller drivers,  
PERC S100 adapter, 42  
FCC Notice (U.S. only), 90  
features of the PERC S100  
adapter, PERC S300  
adapter, 21  
installing the controller drivers,  
PERC S300 adapter, 44  
installing the operating system  
and drivers, PERC S100  
adapter, 42  
G
installing the operating system  
and drivers, PERC S300  
adapter, 44  
global hot spares, 88  
global hot spares, manage, 56  
INT13 disabled, warning  
message, 68  
H
hardware installation  
completion, 35  
general considerations, 31  
PERC S100 adapter, PERC S300  
adapter, 31  
M
Management Setup, 45  
mirror rebuilding, 24  
98  
Index  
physical disk tasks, supported by  
PERC S100 adapter, PERC  
S300 adapter, 78  
O
OCE, 24  
offline virtual disks, warning  
message, 66  
physical disks  
automatic rebuild, 21  
connecting them to the PERC  
S300 controller, 35  
errors, 75  
troubleshooting, 75  
view disk details, 57  
Online Capacity Expansion, 24  
options  
changing controller options, 58  
options, controller, 58  
physical disks, general  
description, 24  
P
platform requirements for the  
PERC S100 controller, PERC  
S300 controller, 14  
PERC S100 controller,  
Management Setup, 45  
PERC S100 Virtual Disk  
Management utility, PERC  
S300 Virtual Disk  
R
Management utility  
RAID configuration and  
management, 47  
access to it, 48  
PERC S300 Adapter  
installation, 32  
RAID levels, supported by PERC  
S100 adapter, PERC S300  
adapter, 79  
PERC S300 adapter  
installation, 32  
RAID technology, 81  
read policy, 77  
PERC S300 controller,  
Management Setup, 45  
regulatory notices, 89  
CE Mark Notice, 94  
PERC Virtual Disk Management  
utility  
CE Notice (European Union, 92  
FCC Notice (U.S. only), 90  
Industry Canada (Canada  
only), 92  
major functions, 47  
physical disk details, viewing, 57  
physical disk hot swapping, 25  
physical disk initialization, 23  
physical disk roaming, 26  
related documentation, 12  
rescan disks, 58  
Index  
99  
rescanning  
for changes in state, 87  
V
Virtual Disk Management  
utility, 47  
virtual disk specifications, for  
PERC S100 adapter, PERC  
S300 adapter, 80  
S
configuring the controller  
using the PERC S100, 47  
virtual disk tasks, supported by  
PERC S100 adapter, PERC  
S300 adapter, 79  
safety  
general, 8  
safety instructions, 7  
working inside your system, 8  
virtual disks  
background initialization, 21  
boot support for degraded virtual  
disks, 22  
specifications, PERC S100  
adapter, PERC S300  
adapter, 77  
cache support, 22  
creating, future expansion, 86  
errors, 70  
general description, 27  
migration, 28  
specificationsÖ virtual disks, 80  
Storport, driver support, 26  
stripe size, 26  
PERC S100 Virtual Disk  
Management utility, PERC  
S300 Virtual Disk  
support for RAID level, 22  
Management utility, 48  
swapping the order of two  
disks, 55  
transformation, 28  
troubleshooting, 70  
view details, 57  
T
text colors, PERC S100 Virtual  
Disk Management utility,  
PERC S300 Virtual Disk  
Management utility, 49  
transformation, virtual disks, 28  
virtual disks, understanding  
them, 81  
troubleshooting, PERC S100  
adapter, PERC S300  
adapter, 61  
W
warning message  
100  
Index  
BIOS not installed, user disabled  
INT13 BIOS load, 68  
found virtual disks that are  
Degraded, 65  
found virtual disks that are  
Offline, 66  
no boot device available, 68  
warning messages  
PERC S100 Controller BIOS  
screen, PERCS300Controller  
BIOS screen  
warning messages, 64  
write policy, 77  
Index  
101  
102  
Index  
Glossary  
ADAPTER — An adapter enables the system to access peripheral devices by  
converting the protocol of one bus or interface to another. An adapter may also  
provide specialized function. For example, a RAID controller is a type of adapter that  
provides RAID functions. Adapters may reside on the system board or be an add-in  
card. Other examples of adapters include network and SCSI adapters.  
AHCI — A programming specification which defines the operation of Serial ATA  
host controllers (also known as host bus adapters) in a non-implementation-specific  
manner. The specification describes a system memory structure for computer  
hardware vendors to exchange data between host system memory and attached  
storage-devices.  
ATA (ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY ATTACHMENT) — A standard interface for  
connecting a system’s storage devices, such as CD-ROMs and hard-drives.  
ATAPI (ATA PACKET INTERFACE) — An interface standard that defines the packet  
protocol between a system and its internal storage peripherals, such as CD-ROM,  
DVD, or tape drives. ATAPI provides the command set for controlling the devices via  
an IDE interface.  
BACKGROUND INITIALIZATION — Background initialization is the automatic check  
for media errors on physical disks. It ensures that striped data segments are the same  
on all physical disks in a virtual disk. The difference between a background  
initialization and a consistency check is that a background initialization is automatic  
for new virtual disks. The operation starts automatically after you create the disk.  
BAS (BACKGROUND ARRAY SCAN) — Background Array Scan is a background  
operation which gets executed every 100msec. that verifies and corrects the mirror,  
volume or parity data for virtual disks. BAS starts automatically after a Virtual Disk is  
created.  
BIOS (BASIC INPUT/OUTPUT SYSTEM) CONFIGURATION UTILITY — An alternate  
name for the PERC Virtual Disk Management utility. The utility appears during  
system startup when <Ctrl><R> are pressed.  
CACHE — Fast memory that holds recently accessed data. Using cache speeds  
subsequent access to the same data. It is most often applied to processor-memory  
access but also can be used to store a copy of data accessible over a network. When  
data is read from or written to main memory, a copy is also saved in cache memory  
with the associated main memory address. The cache memory software monitors the  
addresses of subsequent reads to see if the required data is already stored in cache  
memory. If it is already in cache memory (a cache hit), it is read from cache memory  
Glossary  
103  
 
immediately and the main memory read is aborted (or not started). If the data is not  
cached (a cache miss), it is fetched from main memory and saved in cache memory.  
CACHING — The process of utilizing a high speed memory buffer, referred to as a  
“cache,” in order to speed up the overall read or write performance. This cache can be  
accessed at a higher speed than a disk subsystem. To improve read performance, the  
cache usually contains the most recently accessed data, as well as data from adjacent  
disk sectors. To improve write performance, the cache may temporarily store data in  
accordance with its Write-Cache Enable policies. See the definition of Write-Cache  
Enable for more information.  
CHANNEL — A link that transports data point-to-point.  
CONSISTENCY CHECK — An operation to verify that all stripes in a virtual disk with a  
redundant RAID level are consistent and to automatically fix any errors. For RAID 5  
arrays, a consistency check verifies correct parity data for each stripe. For RAID 1 and  
RAID 10 arrays, this operation verifies correct mirror data for each stripe.  
CONTROLLER — A chip that controls the transfer of data between the microprocessor  
and memory or between the microprocessor and a peripheral device such as a physical  
disk or the keyboard. In Storage Management, the hardware or logic that interacts with  
storage devices to write and retrieve data and perform storage management. RAID  
controllers perform RAID functions such as striping and mirroring to provide data  
protection.  
DISK — A non-volatile, randomly addressable, rewriteable mass storage device,  
including both rotating magnetic and optical storage devices and solid-state storage  
devices, or non-volatile electronic storage elements.  
DISK ARRAY — A grouping of physical disks that are connected to the RAID  
controller. The RAID controller can group physical disks on one or more channels into  
an array.  
DISK MIGRATION — Disk migration refers to moving a virtual disk or a hot spare  
from one controller to another by detaching the physical disks and re-attaching them  
to the new controller.  
DISK ROAMING — Moving disks from one slot to another on a controller.  
DISTRIBUTED PARITY — Parity involves an extra bit added to a byte or word to reveal  
errors in storage (in RAM or disk) or transmission. Parity is used to generate a set of  
redundancy data from two or more parent data sets. The redundancy data can be used  
to rebuild one of the parent data sets. In distributed parity, the parity data are  
distributed among all the physical disks in the system. If a single physical disk fails, it  
can be rebuilt from the parity of the applicable data on the remaining physical disks.  
FAILED PHYSICAL DISK — A physical disk that has ceased to function, that  
consistently functions improperly, or that is inaccessible.  
104  
Glossary  
FAULT TOLERANCE — Fault tolerance is the capability of the disk subsystem to  
undergo a single drive failure for the physical disks in a virtual disk without  
compromising data integrity and processing capability. The PERC S100 controller and  
PERC S300 controller provide this support through redundant virtual disks in RAID  
levels 1, 5 and 10. Fault tolerance is often associated with system availability because it  
allows the system to be available during drive failures. In case a disk fails, the PERC  
S100 controller and  
PERC S300 controller support hot spare disks and the auto-rebuild feature.  
FIRMWARE — Software stored in read-only memory (ROM) or Programmable ROM  
(PROM). Firmware is often responsible for the behavior of a system when it is first  
turned on. A typical example would be a monitor program in a system that loads the  
full operating system from disk or from a network and then passes control to the  
operating system.  
FORMAT — The process of writing a specific value to all data fields on a physical disk,  
to map out unreadable or bad sectors. Because most physical disks are formatted when  
manufactured, formatting is usually done only if a physical disk generates many media  
errors.  
GB — Acronym for gigabyte(s). A gigabyte equals 1,024 megabytes or 1,073,741,824  
bytes (2^30 bytes).  
GPT (GUID PARTITION TABLE) — A standard for the layout of the partition table  
on a physical hard disk.  
GLOBALLY UNIQUE IDENTIFIER (GUID) — A unique reference-number identifier  
used in software applications.  
HBA (HOST BUS ADAPTOR) — An adaptor card that includes the I/O logic, software  
and processing to manage the transfer of information between the host system and  
devices connected to it.  
HOST SYSTEM — Any system on which the RAID controller is installed. Mainframes,  
workstations, and personal systems can all be considered host systems.  
HOT SPARE — An idle, powered on, stand-by physical disk ready for immediate use  
in case of disk failure. It does not contain any user data. A hot spare can be dedicated  
to a single redundant virtual disk or it can be part of the global hot-spare pool for all  
virtual disks controlled by the controller. When a disk fails, the PERC S100 controller  
or PERC S300 controller automatically replaces and rebuilds the data from the failed  
physical disk to the hot spare. Data can be rebuilt only from virtual disks with  
redundancy (RAID levels 1, 5, or 10; not RAID 0), and the hot spare must have  
sufficient capacity. If the hot spare is designated as having enclosure affinity, it  
attempts to rebuild any failed disks on the backplane within which it resides before  
rebuilding any other on other backplanes.  
Glossary  
105  
HOT SWAP — Replacement of a failed component while the system is running and  
operating normally.  
INITIALIZATION — The process of writing zeros to the data fields of a virtual disk  
and, in fault tolerant RAID levels, generating the corresponding parity to put the  
virtual disk in a Ready state. Initialization generates parity information, so that the  
virtual disk is redundant. Virtual disks can work without initialization, but they are not  
truly redundant until initialization is performed.  
INT 13H — A DOS interrupt used to activate seek, read, write and format disk  
functions. The Int 13h interface supports physical disks that contain up to an  
approximate maximum disk space of 8.45 GB.  
JBOD (JUST A BUNCH OF DISKS [DRIVES]) — A storage subsystem that uses a  
single or multiple, independent disk drives.  
LED (LIGHT EMITTING DIODE) — An electronic device that illuminates when  
powered.  
LOAD BALANCING — Load balancing is a method of spreading work between two or  
more computers, network links, CPUs, physical disk drives, or other resources. Load  
balancing is used to maximize resource use, throughput, or response time. In the  
controllers, the balancing service is performed by the firmware. You can choose  
between a single path for load balancing, and a “round-robin” load balancing scheme.  
In single path, the firmware can detect multiple paths to a device, and use only a single  
path for I/O activity to that device. The secondary path is used if a failure is detected  
on the primary path. If load balancing is enabled for the controller, the firmware  
implements a round-robin scheme to issue I/Os to the redundant path device. The  
round-robin scheme issues one I/O down one path, and the other I/O down the second  
path, and so on. There is no restriction on firmware regarding which path to choose  
first. If load balancing is disabled, the firmware can use any one of the available paths  
to issue I/Os, and it should continue to use the same path for all further I/O activity.  
On reboot or path failure, the firmware again chooses any available path.  
MB — Acronym for megabyte(s). The term megabyte means 1,048,576 bytes (2^20  
bytes); however, when referring to hard drive storage, the term is often rounded to  
mean 1,000,000 bytes.  
MIRRORING — The process of providing complete redundancy using two physical  
disks, by maintaining an exact copy of one physical disk’s data on the second physical  
disk. If one physical disk fails, the contents of the other physical disk can be used to  
maintain the integrity of the system and to rebuild the failed physical disk.  
NAS (NETWORK ATTACHED STORAGE) — A server that runs an operating system for  
handling files, and which is accessible directly on a LAN by using protocols like  
TCP/IP.  
106  
Glossary  
NCQ (NATIVE COMMAND QUEUING) — A command protocol for Serial ATA, that  
allows multiple, outstanding commands to be active on a drive at the same time.  
NON-RAID CONFIGURATION — Non-Raid data is data that already exists on a  
replacement physical disk. The Non-Raid physical disk must be initialized before it  
can be used with the PERC S100 controller or PERC S300 controller.  
NON-REDUNDANT VIRTUAL DISK — A non-redundant virtual disk is one which does  
not have redundant data on physical disks that can be used to rebuild a failed physical  
disk. A RAID 0 virtual disk consists of data striped across the physical disks, without  
disk mirroring or parity to provide redundancy. This provides for high data throughput  
but offers no protection in case of a physical disk failure.  
N
S
— Acronym for nanosecond(s), one billionth of a second.  
NTFS (NEW TECHNOLOGY FILE SYSTEM) — The file system used by Microsoft  
Windows operating systems.  
OCE (ONLINE CAPACITY EXPANSION) — Operation to add capacity to an existing  
virtual disk by adding an additional physical disk while the host system is active, and  
without affecting data availability.  
OFFLINE — A physical disk is offline when it is part of a virtual disk but its data is not  
accessible to the virtual disk.  
ONLINE — An online device is a device that is accessible.  
PARITY — An extra bit added to a byte or word to reveal errors in storage (in RAM or  
disk) or transmission. Parity is used to generate a set of redundancy data from two or  
more parent data sets. The redundancy data can be used to rebuild one of the parent  
data sets. However, parity data does not fully duplicate the parent data sets. In RAID,  
this method is applied to entire physical disks or stripe elements across all physical  
disks in a virtual disk. Parity consists of dedicated parity, in which the parity of the data  
on two or more physical disks is stored on an additional physical disk, and distributed  
parity, in which the parity data are distributed among all the physical disks in the  
system. If a single physical disk fails, it can be rebuilt from the parity of the applicable  
data on the remaining physical disks.  
PARTITION — A logical structure on a contiguous segment of storage on a physical  
disk or virtual disk that is recognizable by an operating system.  
PCIE (PERIPHERAL COMPONENT INTERCONNECT EXPRESS) — A high-speed  
peripheral interconnect that can accommodate gigabit and chip-to-chip transfers.  
PERC S100 VIRTUAL DISK MANAGEMENT, PERC S300 VIRTUAL DISK  
MANAGEMENT UTILITY — The PERC S100 Virtual Disk Management or PERC  
S300 Virtual Disk Management utility (aka PERC Virtual Disk Management utility)  
configures and maintains RAID virtual disks, and manages the RAID system. Because  
the utility resides in the controller BIOS, its operation is independent of the operating  
Glossary  
107  
system. The PERC Virtual Disk Management utility, accessed by pressing  
<Ctrl><R> at system startup, is built on elements called controls. Each control  
performs a function. The functions include procedures you can use to configure  
physical disks and virtual disks. The PERC Virtual Disk Management utility differs  
from the Dell Inc. system BIOS, which contains the BIOS settings for each Dell  
platform and is accessed by pressing <F2> during system startup.  
PHYSICAL DISK — A non-volatile, randomly-addressable device for storing data.  
Physical disks are rewriteable and commonly referred to as disk drives.  
P
NP (PLUG AND PLAY) — A technology that allows automatic recognition of  
interface cards and devices when plugged into a PC.  
PORT — A connection point to a RAID controller, disk drive, enclosure, or another  
device.  
RAID (REDUNDANT ARRAY OF INDEPENDENT DISKS) — An array of multiple  
independent physical disks managed together to yield higher reliability and/or  
performance exceeding that of a single physical disk. The virtual disk appears to the  
operating system as a single storage unit. I/O is expedited because several disks can be  
accessed simultaneously. Redundant RAID levels (RAID levels 1, 5, and 10) provide  
data protection.  
RAID LEVELS — A set of techniques applied to the physical disks in a virtual disk to  
deliver higher data availability, and/or performance characteristics to host  
environments. Each virtual disk must have a RAID level assigned to it.  
RAID MANAGEMENT UTILITY — A RAID management utility (PERC Virtual Disk  
Management utility) is used to configure physical disks and virtual disks. Use the  
PERC Virtual Disk Management utility if the operating system has not yet been  
installed on the controller.  
REBUILD — The regeneration of all data to a replacement disk in a redundant virtual  
disk (RAID levels 1, 5, and 10) after a physical disk failure. A disk rebuild normally  
occurs without interrupting normal operations on the affected virtual disk, though  
some degradation of performance of the disk subsystem can occur.  
REDUNDANCY — The provision of multiple interchangeable components to perform  
a single function to cope with failures and errors. Common forms of hardware  
redundancy are disk mirroring, implementations of parity disks, or distributed parity.  
REDUNDANT VIRTUAL DISK — A redundant virtual disk is one which has redundant  
data on physical disks that can be used to rebuild a failed physical disk. A virtual disk  
can use disk striping across the physical disks, disk mirroring or parity to provide  
redundancy. This offers protection in case of a physical disk failure.  
REPLACEMENT DISK — A physical disk that replaces a failed physical disk in a virtual  
disk.  
108  
Glossary  
SAN (STORAGE AREA NETWORK) — A high-performance, typically enterprise-level  
network that attaches disk storage subsystems to servers. The storage devices are  
accessible to multiple hosts at the same time.  
SAS (SERIAL ATTACHED SCSI) — SAS is a serial, point-to-point, enterprise-level  
device interface that leverages the proven Small Computer System Interface (SCSI)  
protocol set. The SAS interface provides improved performance, simplified cabling,  
smaller connectors, lower pin count, and lower power requirements when compared to  
parallel SCSI. SAS physical disks are supported only by the PERC S300 controller.  
SATA (SERIAL ADVANCED TECHNOLOGY ATTACHMENT) — A physical storage  
interface standard, is a serial link that provides point-to-point connections between  
devices. The thinner serial cables allow for better airflow within the system and permit  
smaller chassis designs. The PERC S100 controller and PERC S300 controller leverage  
a common electrical and physical connection interface that is compatible with Serial  
ATA technology.  
SCSI (SMALL COMPUTER SYSTEM INTERFACE) — A standard that allows multiple  
devices to be connected in a daisy-chain format. The fastest hard-drives are SCSI-  
based, rather than IDE-based.  
SPANNING — The method by which nested RAID levels (such as RAID 10) are  
constructed from multiple sets of basic, or single RAID types. For example, a RAID 10  
is made up of multiple sets of RAID 1 arrays where each RAID 1 set is considered a  
span. Data is then striped (RAID 0) across the RAID 1 spans to create a RAID 10  
virtual disk. Spanning is generally used when referencing these nested RAID levels.  
SPARE — A physical disk available to replace another physical disk in case that  
physical disk fails.  
SSD (SOLID STATE DISK) — A high-performance storage media that contains no  
moving parts. It contains a memory board, a memory board bus, a CPU, and a battery  
card.  
STORPORT — The Storport driver has been designed to replace SCSIport and work  
with Windows 2003 and beyond. In addition, it offers better performance for newer  
RAID controller protocols (like SAS), provides higher I/O throughput rates, improves  
manageability, and has an upgraded miniport interface. For example, while SCSIport  
allows a maximum of 254 commands per controller, Storport allows 254 commands  
per logical unit number (LUN).  
STORAGE ARRAYS — A storage entity that is managed entirely by storage  
management software. A storage array consists of a collection of physical components  
(drives, controllers, fans, and power supplies) and logical components (such as virtual  
disks). A storage array can span multiple physical enclosures.  
Glossary  
109  
STRIPING — Disk striping writes data across all physical disks in a virtual disk. Each  
stripe consists of consecutive virtual disk data addresses that are mapped in fixed-size  
units to each physical disk in the virtual disk using a sequential pattern. For example,  
if the virtual disk includes five physical disks, the stripe writes data to physical disks  
one through five without repeating any of the physical disks. The amount of space  
consumed by a stripe is the same on each physical disk. The portion of a stripe that  
resides on a physical disk is a stripe element. Striping by itself does not provide data  
redundancy. Striping in combination with parity does provide data redundancy.  
TB (TERABYTE) — One thousand gigabytes (approximately one trillion bytes).  
TRANSFORMATION — A transformation can mean: (1) Capacity expansion, using  
OCE (adding more physical disks to a virtual disk and increasing the storage capacity  
of the virtual disk or virtual disks), or (2) Rebuilding (rebuilding data on the virtual  
disk from a redundant virtual disk or from a hot spare or backup physical disk).  
VIRTUAL DISK — A virtual disk refers to storage created by a RAID controller from  
one or more physical disks. Although a virtual disk may be created from several  
physical disks, it is seen by the operating system as a single disk. Depending on the  
RAID level used, the virtual disk may retain redundant data in case of a disk failure.  
WRITE-CACHE ENABLE — In Write-cache enable mode, the controller sends a data  
transfer completion signal to the host when the controller cache has received all the  
data in a disk write transaction. The VD cache is disabled by default, but can be  
enabled by the user through the user interface. The risk of using Write-cache enable is  
that the cached data can be lost if there is a power failure before it is written to the  
storage device. This risk can be mitigated by using a Uninterrupted Power Supply  
(UPS) on PERC S100 or S300 system. A UPS is recommended for use if the cache is  
enabled.  
WRITE-CACHE DISABLE — In Write-Through caching mode, the controller sends a  
data transfer completion signal to the host when the disk subsystem has received all  
the data and has completed the write transaction to the disk.  
WHQL (WINDOWS HARDWARE QUALITY LABS) — A Microsoft Corporation facility  
that provides testing services for non-Microsoft hardware and device drivers, to ensure  
compliance and compatibility with Microsoft operating systems.  
110  
Glossary  

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