Power edge 1800

Question

I recently acquired a PowerEdge 1800 box. No hard drives so no operating system. Contains: a suci card attached to a tape
drive, a cd drive, and a floppy drive. Ihave installed four 2 terabits drives attached to the sata raid card. Disabled the suci array in the bios. Removed
the suci card & disconnected the tape drive from the power supply. Installed two 2.8 gig dual processors. Start the system and: Bios utility yields: “No Int 13 Drives to support” No logical drives found, “BIOS not installed” The Bios lists the three
drives installed. But when I cont A the config array it says no drives found.
Configuring only as a home server but with possibility some family
support. More. What operating system when I
get past these setup problems???

Daniel My · Accepted Answer

Is there a PERC card that is compatible with a PowerEdge 1800?

The only PERCs validated for the 1800 are the PERC 4/SC and DC. Both of them are SCSi controllers. PERC 5 and higher are SAS/SATA controllers. The PERC 5 and 6 controllers are x8 PCIe cards. The 1800 has one x8 PCIe slot, so in theory a PERC 5 or 6 should work in the system, but we have not validated them to work. I would suggest searching online to find out if anyone has tested the configuration.

Thanks

dpes 1800 · Accepted Answer

I purchased the cables on eBay. I read the descriptions that mentioned the 6i. The 6i has two headers with three positions each just like the 4. So if the cables are described as having seven positions or plugs on the drive end, they most likely won’t work. Beside there only six drive bays. You could put a solid state or 2 ½ drive in the floppy space but you still would not have the controller capacity. The biggest problem is the cable length. It is usually not mentioned in descriptions. I had to purchase two sets before I got one that was workable. The second pair barely worked. But the cables are cheap so I was prepared to buy a few. My son is an Oracle consultant in KC so he will be up on the various Linux applications. I use Windows like most everybody but am excited to experience Linux. Have you considered LibreOffice over Apache Office? I rebuilt a castaway for graphics only so did not load productive software because I could get by with WordPad / notepad. But considered LibreOffice. Which do you prefer Pegasus or Google Docs? I don’t know if age is the problem in your office. In my experience, people are most original and productive in their twenties, slows down in their thirties, while still producing in their forties the output is mostly a variation of their twenties creativity. Sounds like you need an organizational behavior intervention in your office.

Daniel My · Answer

Hello dpes In the system BIOS>Integrated Devices> what is  Embedded SATA Controller set to? Also, what is Boot Sequence and Hard-Disk Drive Sequence set to? Thanks

dpes 1800 · Answer

I set the boot sequence To the CD then to the floppy. Both are checked. A third choice went away after I removed the
SUCI card.
As far as I can tell the hard disks are set to
first zero then one.
The imbedded SATA controller was set to Auto
Mode. Since the RAID card was installed I
left it in Auto Mode. Other choices are RAID and off. Choosing RAID or off does
not change anything. The Array Configuration Utility / Create Array in the BIOS reads
no drive detected when any of the three options are chosen. The Disk utility reports that no drives are
present at SATA Port #0 and #1
Also. The
bios boot sequence ends with two beeps.
There is also a warning “ No microcode update loaded
for processor 1

D

Daniel My · Answer

Since the RAID card was installed Ileft it in Auto Mode What SATA RAID card are you talking about? Did you install a RAID card?

Daniel My · Answer

The Raid card is an Adaptec 2610sa

I'm not familiar with that card. I think you are on the right path for the microcode error. You might want to try pulling the SATA controller out of the system to see if the microcode error stops with it removed. If it does then perform the update with the card removed.

dpes 1800 · Answer

• Figured out that the 'no microcode update loaded for processor one'... means that there is a problem with the processor which means that I first have to update the BIOS then if that does not work replace the processors with ones with matching in stepping.  I have BIOS A05 and think I have located A07 on one of your Dell pages. • The RAID card was all ready installed.  The Raid card is an Adaptec 2610sa.  My reading indicated that there is a problem with this card supporting arrays larger than 2T.  I have three 2T drives installed  and one more on the bench hopping to use four of the six drive bays available for a total of 8T installed ( 4x2T).  Want to then configure a RAID 5 array.  There may be a firmware update for the 2610 that may fix this.  Absent that there may be some fancy RAID configuration tricks as a work around that I don’t understand.  Or it may not even be a problem.   • On post the drives are listed but the array configuration indicates 'not found' • Incidentally: Great name I am a Daniel also.  Thanks for the help Dan.  This legacy equipment can be challenging.  More about myself.  I am a novice at this server stuff.  I am retired so have time.  I have a back ground in managing factory maintance, so have basic troubling skills.   • This last indication 'BIOS not installed'

dpes 1800 · Answer

The 2610 is Dell 0XD084

dpes 1800 · Answer

Is there a PERC card that is compatible with a PowerEdge 1800?

Daniel My · Answer

The 2610 is Dell 0XD084

XD084 is a CERC SATA 6 channel controller. It does not support drives of 1TB or larger, so you will likely need to install drives that are smaller than 1TB. It also does not support arrays larger than 2TB.

Thanks

dpes 1800 · Answer

I can’t find anyone who has tried the 5i or 6i with an 1800 but agree that it should work and am willing to try so I have purchased a 5i card –coming. Problem is what cabling? I need to go from the card to four SATA drives. I get numbers like M135R which sounds good but the pictures don’t look like SATA connectors – maybe they are intended to go into a backplane? So what cable to go from the 5i or 6i (I presume SAS) directly to a SATA drive? Power is not needed as it is provided directly by the power supply with individual SATA power connectors. The DPES 1800 does not have a hard drive backplane – only a six capacity HD case! Also is the battery needed for the 5i or 6i to operate?

I have pulled the SUCI drive card, the insufficient RAID card, & disconnected the tape drive as these are not necessary in my estimation.

theflash1932 · Answer

They are SAS connectors.  SAS is 'backwards' compatible with SATA.  The SFF-8484 SAS connector will connect to the controller (and is also the connector used for connecting to a backplane).  The other end(s) of M135R is four SFF-8482 SAS connectors that will connect to EITHER a SAS drive OR a SATA drive. Yes, the PERC 5/i should have a battery and memory DIMM.

dpes 1800 · Answer

I downloaded this file PE1800_BIOS_WIN_A07 from Dell onto a DVD & CD disk.  My BIOS is AO5 and are attempting to upgrade to AO7 to solve my 'no microcode update' problem. Set the boot sequence to the cd drive.  Load the cd & start the machine. BIOS start the load process. Seek the CD.  But in the end nothing changes.  Same script & AO5 still there. Any suggestions?  PERC equipment coming so would like to solve this before the next step.  Thanks DPES d.

Daniel My · Answer

I downloaded this file PE1800_BIOS_WIN_A07 from Dell onto a DVD & CD disk

That file version is designed to be run from within a Windows operating system. You will need the floppy version to run outside an OS.

http://www.dell.com/support/drivers/us/en/555/DriverDetails/Product/poweredge-1800?driverId=37MFC&osCode=WNET&fileId=2731094597&languageCode=en

It sounds like you are not getting to the point to run the file. When you create the CD/DVD make sure it is bootable. The software you are using to create it should have an option to make bootable. An alternative would be to use a thumb/USB drive. Put a blank thumb drive in the computer and format it as FAT32. Then run the floppy executable file. Direct it to the USB drive and it should make it bootable and copy the necessary files.

Once you boot to the USB drive it should put you at a command prompt. You can then run the executable update file by typing in the file name. Type in dir and hit enter to bring up a list of files and directories. One of the files should end with .exe. Type in that file name and hit enter. That should start the update.

SertomaBen · Answer

Did you ever end up testing the PERC card with your Poweredge 1800? I am wanting to try the same setup and am curious if you had success or not. Thanks!

PowerEdge HDD/SCSI/RAID

Power edge 1800

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