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SSD in RAID 1 using Perc H200 on PowerEdge T110
Hey chaps,
Running a PowerEdge T110 II, 8GB RAM, Perc H200 adaptor with 2 x 512TB SAS Drives in RAID1, Windows Server 2012. It's the solo server on the network and used as a fileserver only and is configured as a DC/AD, with 14 client computers.
Has been a bit sluggish of late and I've also seen some disk IO and memory related issues as well (an extra 8GB RAM is on order).
As I have 2 x 512GB Samsung 860 EVO SSD's which are spare figured I'd pop them in for a speed boost!
The H200 has cabling and caddies for 4 drives and from what I've read supports 2 x RAID 1's and does support SSD's.
So my plan was to add the SSD's - configure them into RAID 1 - boot up from the SAS Drives and use Macrium Server to clone data to the SSD RAID.
Then power off, disconnect the SAS drives and boot from the SSD RAID.
Does this sound like a solid plan that will actually work? or am I missing something?
I also know that the H200 isn't very good and not a real Hardware RAID (no BBU etc) - but figured I could then enable write cache as I have a decent UPS which I will hook up.
Any comments/advice much appreciated.
WilliamD
DELL-Chris H
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May 7th, 2020 12:00
William_DS,
Dell doesn't support imaging of a Virtual Disk to another. The supported method, for stability, would be to backup the data and then reinstall and restore on the new Virtual Disk.
Another issue is that the SSD's you listed are not supported on Poweredge servers.
Hope this helps.
William_DS
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May 7th, 2020 14:00
Hi Chris, @DELL-Chris H
Thanks for your reply. Please note that this server is out of warranty so Dell support is not a concern. I'd just like to eke another year or so out of it. It's for my critical care company and right now with all the massive additional PPE etc costs we don't have extra budget to get a new server. Hopefully in 2021..
When you say that virtual disk cloning is not supported - do you mean officially not supported? or that it will not work?
I know that SSD's are not officially supported but it seems that many people are successfully using SSD's with H200 on a PET110 II, or do you mean the Samsung 960's in particular won't work?
Cheers
WilliamD
DELL-Chris H
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May 8th, 2020 04:00
When I say it isn't supported, it officially isn't supported to clone, it is due to inherent instabilities that could be caused from it. As far as the SSD goes, it is that specific drive that isn't compatible, it isn't compatible in any Poweredge server, not just the T110 II. The T110 II has SSDs up to 3.8 TB showing as available for that server.
William_DS
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May 8th, 2020 06:00
Thanks @DELL-Chris H ,
For answering all my questions, much appreciated.
I've done some research on compatible/supported SSD's but can't find a working link/current list. Would you by any chance have one I can view?
I installed Dell OMA and enabled write cache / disabled window write cache buffer flushing on the existing drives and it doubled the speed of seq writes and more than tripled random writes. Which is definitely a step in the right direction. I'm just hooking up a UPS now to protect against data loss.
Thanks again
WilliamD
DELL-Chris H
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May 8th, 2020 06:00
I don't have an all encompassing list of every SSD, but if you give me the specs you're interested in (size, speed, SAS/SATA) I can give you some part numbers.
William_DS
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November 18th, 2020 23:00
Hi Chris,
Appreciate your help and apologies for the very delayed response. I'm afraid Covid has had us all slammed so had to put this on the back burner for a few months.
Regarding disk spec;
500GB
SATA if possible - rather than SAS (to keep the cost down)
Thanks again...
Dell-Martin S
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November 18th, 2020 23:00
Hi William,
thanks for your reply.
Currently, we did not sell on our webpage 500 GB SATA disks anymore.
You could only find 500 GB SATA 3.5" disks on 3rd party webpages.
The part numbers for a 3.5" Tray are U6436, H7283, YJ221.
With kind regards Martin