Dell POWERVAULT MD1000 - Manual (Page 7)

A REFERENCE GUIDE FOR OPTIMIZING DELL™ MD1000 SAS SOLUTIONS VER A00
PAGE 7 5/06/2005
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Enable Background Read Patrol
Background Read Patrol, a function of the RAID controller, is an automatically scheduled
background task that scans and helps resolve possible physical disk errors that may lead to
physical disk failure and result in data integrity issues. Dell recommends implementing Background
Read Patrol in all configurations.
See section 5 for details.
Schedule and run periodic consistency checks / Background Initialization (BGI)
Consistency checks / BGI are performed by many RAID controllers to verify that all stripes in a
redundant virtual disk are consistent and to automatically correct stripes where inconsistencies are
found. BGI is a consistency check that automatically runs on all redundant arrays. Depending on
workload, Dell recommends that consistency checks should be run manually on the virtual disks at
least once every month to help ensure data integrity. Consistency checks and Background Read
Patrol are complementary and both should be used.
See section 5 for details.
Enable Hot Spares
Hot spare functionality provides extra security, availability and redundancy by automatically
replacing a failed disk in a RAID group and allowing the rebuild of the degraded array to begin
immediately. Dell PERC controllers support Hot Spare functionality and it is recommended
whenever possible.
See section 5 for details.
Document your configuration and keep the documentation current
Documenting your configuration facilitates faster and easier recovery should a failure occur. Make
sure to include RAID levels, physical disks included in your virtual disks, firmware and driver
versions and usage of hot spares in your documentation.
Perform periodic physical inspection of your connections and cabling
Damaged cables and loose connections may cause functional issues with your storage solution.
Dell recommends a physical equipment audit two times a year or anytime after re-cabling or re-
deploying your storage hardware.
3. Dell’s SAS Product Offering
The PowerVault MD1000 is a feature-optimized storage expansion enclosure which utilizes the
latest industry standard storage interconnect technology, Serial Attached SCSI (SAS). This 3U
enclosure supports between 2 and 15 physical SAS drives. Along with Dell’s host-based RAID
controller, PERC 5/E, the PowerVault MD1000 storage enclosure introduces new levels of
performance, capacity, and scalability. Major features of the PowerVault MD1000 and PERC 5/E
solution include: