Help Identifying Hard Disk Type / SCSI Plug Type

[Shaunk]

Hi all,

Hope fully someone can help e with this I have a couple of 1TB HP NB1000D4450 Hard Disks, I believe they are originally used in something like a Proliant ML350 server or Storage works, anyway I can;t figure out what type of plug is on the hard disk and what I actually need so that I can get both disks running in another Server. I've attached a picture and any help would really be appriciated.

Thanks Shaun

Attachments

[Doomer]

That's Fiber Channel I beleive
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fibre_Chan ... _interface

[CK]

Yep, they're Fiber-ATA (FATA). Damn expensive drives!!

[Shaunk]

OK, identified as Fibre Channel which is a start.

I'm trying to identify a card and cable etc... that I need to run two of these in a server if anyone can point me in the right direction.

I note that it was mentioned that these drive are expensive, they are both 1TB each and I guess the other alternative would be to sell them and go get myself some standard SCSI drives or even SATA drives but I would really like to get these up and running, I want to use them as a back up solution to my ever growing Media Centre Film collection and general data backup from 3 PC's so the server that they would sit in is on a GB network link.

I'm actually very comupter literate it's just that I've never installed a FC hardrive or seen one hence why I need assistance and I appriciate the help.

Thanks Shaun

[CK]

I don't know a huge amount about fiber drives, but it would seem that the cost of a suitable interface card might be prohibative. From what I can see, a fiber card will set you back hundreds of $$$ and the card would probably not be compatible with a regular pc/workstation.

If I were you, I'd stick them up on eBay, get some cash for them and invest in some regular SATA's.

[pcrecovery]

ANY card that can actually come close to keeping pace with modern drives' speeds in real world performance (I'd say that over 90% of peoples' hard drives are actually performing around 25 to 75 Mb/s only no matter what kind of drive they have due to controller or lack thereof) will cost a small fortune. The controller card for one of my servers is over $1,000 USD. The card basically needs a very fast interface (like PCI-X or PCI-e) and its own cpu as well as tons of RAM. Thus, the card is essentially a computer in its own right. Without it, these exotic/expensive drives are a waste of money. All of the good cards that deliver real performance (not just short-term bursts of speed) are pricey. What I'm saying is that you can get cheap controller cards for U320 scsi, sas, fibre, etc, but don't expect real performance...they work and that's about it. To benefit with actual throughput, you'll need a good card. Try EBay. There are a lot of good pulls from servers available. You can often pickup a 800 card for 200, etc. If speed is not important then there are plenty of cheap alternatives in every form factor.

[Doomer]

I note that it was mentioned that these drive are expensive, they are both 1TB each and I guess the other alternative would be to sell them and go get myself some standard SCSI drives or even SATA drives

Sell them
You can buy Seagate 7200.11 that's THE SAME drive but with SATA interface
These 1TB drives with FC interface will not bring you fast speed, they still 7200rpm and nothing to do with high speed (they have special server firmware but it is not enough for speed)

[Odiferous]

I note that it was mentioned that these drive are expensive, they are both 1TB each and I guess the other alternative would be to sell them and go get myself some standard SCSI drives or even SATA drives

Sell them
You can buy Seagate 7200.11 that's THE SAME drive but with SATA interface
These 1TB drives with FC interface will not bring you fast speed, they still 7200rpm and nothing to do with high speed (they have special server firmware but it is not enough for speed)

Using Seagate 7200.11 drives would also leave you with a very unreliable system. I would advise Samsung or Hitachi instead.

That said, Seagate drives are extremely useful if you're in the data recovery business - they guarantee plenty of DR work.


Duncan

[Doomer]

Well you can buy any drive WD, Hitachi, Samsung or Seagate
My point was - the FC drive on a picture is a Seagate drive and Seagate 7200.11 SATA is the same drive (internally) as the drive on a picture