IBM ServeRAID M5210, User Manual

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ServeRAID M5210 SAS/SATA Controller for IBM System x User’s Guide
July 2014 Chapter 1: Overview
Benefits of the ServeRAID M5210 SAS/SATA Controller
The controller supports 64-bit logical block addressing (LBA), which makes it possible to connect a large number of
drives to the RAID controller, directly and through expanders. However, the actual number of drives that you can
attach depends on the limits listed in
Table 1 rather than by the actual RAID volume capacity.
The maximum drive numbers in Table 2 depend on how many physical devices you have connected to the controller.
For example, the maximum number of arrays per controller is equal to the number of physical disks supported by the
controller up to the limit of 128 arrays per controller. In addition, though you can have up to 16 virtual disks per array,
and up to 128 arrays per controller, there is a limit of 64 virtual disks per controller.
1.5.3 SATA III Features
The following list describes the SATA III features of the ServeRAID M5210 controller:

Supports SATA III data transfers of 6.0 Gb/s

Supports STP data transfers of 3.0 Gb/s

Provides a serial, point-to-point storage interface

Simplifies cabling between devices

Eliminates the master-slave construction used in parallel ATA

Allows addressing of multiple SATA III targets through an expander

Allows multiple initiators to address a single target (in a fail-over configuration) through an expander

Displays activity and fault indicators for each PHY

Supports Port Selector (for dual-port drives)

Each port on the controller supports SAS devices, SATA devices, or both using SSP, SMP, STP, and SATA. SSP enables
communication with other SAS devices.

Enables the controller to communicate with other SATA devices.

Supports staggered spin-up

Supports hot plug
1.5.4 PCI Express Performance
The following list describes the PCI Express performance features of the ServeRAID M5210 Controller:

Provides a PCI Express 3.0 interface that:
—
Supports a dedicated PCI Express bus
—
Supports x8 lane configuration
—
Supports transfer rates of up to 8 GT/s (1 GB/s) per lane
—
Complies with the PCI Express Specification, Revision 3.0

Provides unequaled performance through the Fusion-MPT architecture

Provides high throughput and low CPU utilization to off load the host processor
Maximum hot spares per controller 128
Maximum spans per virtual disk 8
Maximum Ports 2
NOTE The maximum number of hot spares per array is equal to the maximum number of device drivers per
array.
Table 2 ServeRAID M5210 SAS/SATA Controller Array
Specification
ServeRAID M5210
SAS/SATA Controller