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January 11th, 2016 13:00

R320 w/ perc H710p mini - Will Dell support this configuration or should I return it?

We purchased a server from Dell site on 12/28, an R320 with a perc H710p mini.

After using the Lifecycle controller (LCC) to install firmware and bios updates, installed Redhat 6.7 , installed Dell tools (OMSA and dsu), server seems to be running fine.

OMSA status showed an updated was need to the Raid controller

  Firmware installed: 21.2.0-0007

  Suggested Firmware: 21.3.2-0005

I thought it was odd that the LCC hadn't picked it up/installed the latest, so rebooted back to the LCC to try again.  The LCC didn't even show/register that a H710p mini was installed much less give an option to update firmware.

Booted back into the OS, ran "dsu -inventory" ... that doesn't seem to show that a Perc H710p mini is installed either.

Going to Dell support page for R320 , they have a DRIVER (kernel model for the operating system) listed, but no firmware.  Just for giggles tried the H710 mini firmware download that was listed.

Wouldn't work, hw check says firmware not valid for my hardware.

Support tried to initially say that the h710p mini was not supported hardware for the R320, but after showing him my order number he checked and the system does allow R320 to be configured with this raid card.

However, there are no firmware updates released for the R320. He told me that R320 is identical to the R420 except single cpu instead of double.  That because of the difference in cpu, no guarantee that the firmware that could be found on the R420 page would work with the R320 ... differences in bios might make unusable ... but I could try if I wanted. That seemed unbelievable to me that the onus is on the customer to do the QA work that Dell should be doing and providing. 

I did download the firmware from the R420 page and it did indeed work; however there seems to be a large disconnect on what they are selling vs what they are supporting.  What is the point of the LCC which is supposed to be completely independent of the OS install and solve the manual headache of trying to find the right version of fw for your hardware ... the LCC in the R320 does not seem to be able to recognize the raid card ... will it successfully log errors?

Is the Perc H710p mini supported in an R320 ?  

If not, we need to RMA the configuration that Dell sold us.

tl;dr: If you have a Perc H710p mini and can't find a download/update for your model, look under the R420.

8 Posts

January 11th, 2016 14:00

Dell updated my ticket with

"  The H710P mini card is a card that is supported on the R420 and higher. The R320 is not listed for supporting the H710P card. When I tried searching for the build of material for the card I did not see R320 as a listed server that's compatible. "

So ... I guess we will return the machine.

8 Posts

January 11th, 2016 14:00

" supported card " usually infers the ability to receive QA certified/tested firmware updates though.

January 11th, 2016 14:00

The H710P MINI is a supported card in the storage slot on the R320. The PERC will log errors as expected via the IDRAC and OMSA ( the LCC is not involved in such PERC error reporting ).

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