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R720xd Connect tape drive to J_SAS_PCH
I am trying to connect a tape drive which has a SFF8088 port to PowerEdge R720xd. I found a "J_SAS_PCH" port on the motherboard, and I tried to use a SFF8087 to SFF8088 cable to hook it up, but nothing is shown in the operating system. Do I need to enable it? I have an H710 mini RAID card installed, and the "Integrated RAID Controller" option in BIOS has been enabled.
whc2001
8 Posts
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May 14th, 2020 18:00
Okay after some investigation I discovered that R720xd does not even support the internal SAS and SATA connectors. They are available only for R720 without XD suffix. The only solution is to use a PCI-e HBA card.
Dell-DylanJ
2.9K Posts
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May 14th, 2020 13:00
J_SAS_PCH is the SAS connector for the software RAID controller. I don't know if your tape drive will work on that port, but you could toggle from AHCI to RAID On to see if that helps.
Is this drive one you got from us, or is it third party? It may work all the same, but if it is a Dell part, I can check for validation.
whc2001
8 Posts
0
May 14th, 2020 17:00
Thanks. According to its name this port should hook to motherboard chipset directly and have nothing to do with the H710 mini expand card right? I tried to remove the H710 mini but still not recognized. I checked the BIOS but can't find any option about ACHI or RAID, just that "Integrated RAID controller" option which has been enabled. And yes the tape drive is an PowerVault LTO4 with a service tag SN of BT7LHF1, and it can be recognized by OS when using with an LSI9212-4i4e PCI-e card.
whc2001
8 Posts
0
May 14th, 2020 18:00
According the owner manual, that J_SAS_PCH port is for connecting the front hotplug panel for R720 without XD, and has nothing to do with PCH.