Purchased a MD1000 from craiglist, came with two SAS 5/E cards and cables. I dug out an old 2950, put server 2003 (32bit) on it, put in one of the cards, installed / updated firmware, etc. When I boot, I see:
Dell SAS 5 Host Bus Adapter BIOS
then later, CTRL-C to run SAS Configuration Utility
then later, I can press CTRL-R to config the PERC 6/i
I found post where Dell doesn't support the MD1000 connected to a SAS 5/E.. When I go looking on ebay for a PERC 5/E card, they look very similar to what I have now…
Looking for direction on how to get the 2950 and MD1000 connected… should I get a card off ebay, even if it looks very close to what I have now? Is there a way to tell a difference
Best Answer
The MD1000 is a "JBOD" enclosure. The device that it connects to gets presented with access to all of the hard drives. If the device is a PERC 5/e controller, the card can manage the drives for you in RAID sets, and present Virtual Disks to the OS.
With a SAS 5/e card though, you would end up seeing every single hard drive separately in the OS (if it even worked - as you said, it is actually an unsupported config).
If you want a setup that is validated to function properly, go for the PERC 5/e card.
The MD1200 + SAS 6/E cards is supported now with Server 2012 and Storage Spaces to manage the drives... I would be curious whether or not you could get this to work on the hardware you have now, as the PE2950 does support Server 2012 (non-R2). Might be worth a try!