About This Manual
PixelStor 5000 User Manual
Rev. 1, May 2013
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market. The 2U/12 bay controller unit can be expanded with up to eight 2U/12 bay PixelStor
100e/312e/324e expansion enclosures for a total capacity of 108 SATAII drives. The PixelStor
100e/312e provide 2U and 12 bays single or dual controller expansion enclosures and PixelStor
324e 4U/24 bay single controller expansion enclosure. These enclosures can be hot added to
the system via the PixelStor 5000 24Gbps SAS connectors. The capacity expansion feature
simplifies the task of adding additional storage capacity. You can expand Disk Groups across
enclosures. The user can expand the LUN capacity on-line within the Disk Group, or expand the
Disk Group by adding disks from the pool of global spare disks.
Software RAID
- The PixelStor 5000 architecture focuses on the critical performance elements
of protocol processing and data movement. The powerful multi-core processor and server
chipset (high-speed front-side bus and DDR3) present a data mover architecture that is
superior over embedded processor solutions found in traditional storage arrays. Traditional
embedded solutions tend to be a generation behind in memory technology and require special
chips to enhance performance. With a dedicated IA processor with multiple cores in our array,
there is little benefit of using expensive “hardware” RAID. “Hardware” RAID is important in
general-purpose servers to off-load the CPU. In an external array with dedicated controllers
and memory, “hardware” RAID only adds cost.
Global Spares
- In PixelStor 5000, any drives not assigned to a Disk Group are automatically
available as global hot spares. If a drive fails, the RAID controller can automatically rebuild its
data on the spare drive without requiring intervention by the administrator. The rebuild
operation occurs in the background while the controller processes normal operations.
LUN Masking
- Authentication and Access Control List (ACL) - Enterprise data must be
secured and closely guarded. In PixelStor 5000, LUNs are only exposed to the hosts that
have authority to access them. This is generally referred to as LUN masking. In addition,
CHAP authentication is used for each iSCSI session login. All management access is also
protected with the access control list, which filters out the machines that are not on the list.
Active Mid-plane
- PixelStor 5000 is built around an active mid-plane. This permits the
PixelStor 5000 to achieve a shorter chassis length and a smaller foot-print. Additionally, a single
component failure only affects one drive of a Disk Group.
Robust Enclosure
- Both the enclosure and the drive carriers are designed for operation
without IO errors in various temperature and vibration conditions. The whole enclosure is built
in one piece. Extensive thermal and vibration testing has been conducted on the enclosure by
itself and in a densely populated rack. Special attention has been taken to recover the data path
failure due to signals stuck at zero or one. In addition, each active component such as the
drives and controllers monitor the incoming current and shut down power in case of a
