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Dell PowerEdge Express Flash PCIe SSD
User’s Guide

Regulatory Model: Adapter UCEA-100 and UCEM-100

Summary of Contents for PowerEdge Express Flash PCIe SSD

Page 1: ...Dell PowerEdge Express Flash PCIe SSD User s Guide Regulatory Model Adapter UCEA 100 and UCEM 100 ...

Page 2: ...henom and AMD Sempron are trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices Inc Microsoft Windows Windows Server Internet Explorer MS DOS Windows Vista and Active Directory are either trademarks or registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the United States and or other countries Red Hat and Red Hat Enterprise Linux are registered trademarks of Red Hat Inc in the United States and or other countries No...

Page 3: ...he PCIe Extender Adapter Card 15 Installing The PCIe Extender Adapter Card 16 Removing The PCIe Extender Modular Card 17 Installing The PCIe Extender Modular Card 18 4 Driver Installation 19 Downloading PCIe SSD Drivers 19 Installing Or Upgrading The PCIe SSD Driver For Microsoft Windows Server 2008 Windows Server 2012 and Windows Server 2012 R2 19 Installing Or Upgrading The PCIe SSD Driver For R...

Page 4: ...erating System 31 PCIe SSD Is Not Seen In Disk Management In The Operating System 32 Cannot Update The Firmware Using Dell Update Package DUP 32 Linux Fails To Boot And Prompts For The Root Password 32 PCIe SSD Is Inserted In The System And Is Visible To The Operating System But The Status LED Is Off 32 Delay In System Boot While The PCIe SSD Activity LED Is Blinking 32 I O Device Error On Write T...

Page 5: ...Related Documentation 39 Contacting Dell 39 Documentation Feedback 40 ...

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Page 7: ...is hereinafter referred to as PCIe SSD PCIe SSD Architecture The PCIe SSD solution consists of a PCIe extender adapter card which provides PCIe connectivity for up to four PCIe SSDs at the front of the chassis The number of supported PCIe SSDs depends on the system PCIe SSDs from Dell are available in 175 GB and 350 GB SLC or 700 GB MLC capacities and are supported on Dell PowerEdge systems In Del...

Page 8: ...ndicator 3 status indicator 4 PCIe SSD NOTE For more information on activity and status indicators see PCIe SSD Device Carrier LED Indicators PCIe Interface The SSD controller used on the PCIe SSD has a PCIe Gen2 5 Gbps interface The interface is available in a PCIe x4 lane width for a 16 channel flash memory controller The PCIe interface is used to transmit or receive storage interface commands b...

Page 9: ...he device you must notify the system that the device is about to be removed This notification defines hot removal as an orderly operation Orderly Swap You remove a device from the system in an orderly fashion and replace it with a supported device The device that is removed and the device that replaced it use the same device driver WARNING Do not remove the PCIe SSD without notifying the system fi...

Page 10: ... after it reaches the threshold of total bytes written the amount of time the Dell PowerEdge Express Flash PCIe SSD retains data while powered off decreases below device specifications For more information see PCIe SSD Technical Specifications Device Write Status NAND SSDs have a finite number of spare sectors and if the device exhausts the available spare sectors the Dell PowerEdge Express Flash ...

Page 11: ...s In Windows based systems Dell PowerEdge Express Flash PCIe SSDs have a controller entity and a device entity The controller entity is displayed under the Storage controller menu in the Device Manager NOTE In driver versions 7 x and older PCIe devices are displayed under IDE ATA ATAPI controllers Use the controller entity when installing or updating the PCIe SSD driver You can configure the PCIe ...

Page 12: ...em instability To remove your PCIe SSD from a running system use the Prepare to Remove task in OpenManage Server Administrator You can safely remove the device from the system under the following conditions after you use the Prepare to Remove task The PCIe SSD LED blinks in a pattern that indicates that the drive is preparing for removal The PCIe SSD is no longer accessible by the system NOTE See ...

Page 13: ...backplane is mounted on the front chassis assembly of the system PCIe SSDs are supplied in hot swappable device carriers that are compatible with the PCIe SSD bays CAUTION Before attempting to remove or install a PCIe device from a system which is running see Preparing To Remove A Physical Device Task For PCIe SSD NOTE For information on removing and installing the system components see the system...

Page 14: ...and Installing a PCIe SSD From Into the System 1 release button 2 PCIe SSD slot 3 PCIe SSD 4 PCIe SSD carrier handle Installing A PCIe SSD In The System WARNING Inserting a PCIe SSD carrier and attempting to lock its lever next to a partially installed carrier can damage the partially installed carrier s shield spring making it unusable When installing a PCIe SSD ensure that the adjacent devices a...

Page 15: ...use damage due to improper cooling 3 Disconnect the data cables from the PCIe extender adapter card 4 Remove any retention mechanism such as a bracket screw that might be holding the PCIe extender adapter card in the system 5 Lift the adapter card from the system s PCIe slot See figure Removing and Installing a PCIe Extender Adapter Card Figure 5 Removing and Installing a PCIe Extender Adapter Car...

Page 16: ...re to the extender adapter card while inserting it in the PCIe slot Applying pressure may break the adapter module 7 Insert the PCIe extender adapter card until the card is firmly seated in the PCIe slot 8 Tighten the bracket screw if any or use the retention clips to secure the PCIe extender adapter card to the system chassis 9 Connect the cables from the PCIe backplane to the PCIe extender adapt...

Page 17: ...r 3 Remove the system board and place it on a stable and flat surface 4 Gently pull to disconnect the extender modular card connector from the system board connector For more information see figure Removing and Installing a PCIe Extender Modular Card 5 Lift the PCIe extender modular card from the system board For more information see figure Removing and Installing a PCIe Extender Modular Card 6 Re...

Page 18: ...Remove the modular system from the modular system chassis 2 Remove the system cover 3 Remove the system board and place it on a stable and flat surface 4 Unpack the PCIe modular extender card 5 Identify the PCIe extender connector 6 Insert the PCIe modular extender card into the slot until it clicks into place 7 Reinstall the system board 8 Replace the system cover 9 Reinstall the modular system i...

Page 19: ...ocedures in this section to install or upgrade the driver for Windows The driver is updated frequently To ensure that you have the current version of the driver download the updated Windows driver from dell com support For more information see Downloading PCIe SSD Drivers NOTE Close all applications on your system before you update the driver NOTE Driver version 7 x is ATA port based and driver ve...

Page 20: ...4 14 for all remaining devices in the system 16 Restart the system for the changes to take effect Installing Or Upgrading The PCIe SSD Driver For Red Hat Enterprise Linux Or SUSE Linux Enterprise Server NOTE For a complete list of supported operating systems see Supported Operating Systems For PCIe SSD NOTE Use the procedures in this section to install or upgrade the driver for Linux The driver is...

Page 21: ...he driver using the vSphere Client a Navigate to the Configuration tab b Select Storage from the hardware section c Right click Datastore and select Browse d Upload the PCIe SSD driver to the datastore To transfer the driver to the ESXi host using SFTP FTP client launch the SFTP FTP program and copy the PCIe SSD Driver zip file to a local folder on the host 3 Power off all virtual machines running...

Page 22: ...NOTE To remove the PCIe SSD VIB from host run the following command esxcli software vib remove vibname mtip32xx scsi 22 ...

Page 23: ... Viewing physical device properties Running physical device operations Retrieving debug information CAUTION Hot swapping PCIe SSDs is not supported in the HII Configuration utility Hot swapping a PCIe SSD while in the HII Configuration utility may not be detected and handled properly Entering The HII Configuration Utility Follow the steps to enter the HII Configuration utility 1 Turn on the system...

Page 24: ...p NOTE Full initialization operation takes several minutes to complete While this operation is in progress you cannot navigate out of this page Setting LED Blinking The LED blink option allows you to identify a physical device in the system Perform the following steps to start or stop the option 1 Navigate to the Select Physical Device Operations menu in the PCIe SSD HII Configuration utility 2 Se...

Page 25: ...om a single graphical or command line interface NOTE The graphical user interface GUI is wizard driven with features for novice and advanced users and a detailed online help The command line interface available on selected operating systems enables you to perform PCIe SSD management tasks that are fully featured and scriptable For more information see the OpenManage Server Administrator online hel...

Page 26: ...ing Media Displays the media type of the physical device Device Life Remaining Displays the warranted wear out level of the PCIe SSD in percentage Failure Predicted Displays a status of the device on whether it has received a Self Monitoring Analysis and Reporting Technology SMART alert and is therefore predicted to fail Revision Displays the current running firmware version on the PCIe SSD Driver...

Page 27: ...ware ESXi 5 1 Hot swapping a PCIe SSD while in ESXi 5 1 may cause system instability WARNING The identify LED pattern is the same LED pattern as prepare for removal When you initiate a prepare to remove operation ensure that your PCIe SSD is no longer accessible by the system before you physically remove the PCIe SSD CAUTION To prevent data loss it is mandatory that you use the Prepare to Remove t...

Page 28: ...SSD SubSystem object 3 Expand the PCIe SSD Extender object 4 Expand the Enclosure Backplane object 5 Select the Physical Devices object 6 Select Full Initialization task 7 Click Execute The following caution message is displayed Caution When you perform the Full Initialization operation any data on the disk will be lost permanently Are you sure you want to continue 8 Select Full Initialization to ...

Page 29: ...tate of each physical device Each PCIe SSD carrier in your enclosure has an activity LED green and a status LED bicolor green amber as shown in the figure The activity LED flashes whenever the device is accessed Figure 8 PCIe SSD Device Carrier LED Indicators 1 activity indicator 2 status indicator While the operating system is running the status indicator provides the current status of the device...

Page 30: ...g there is very limited access from the host operating system After the recovery procedure is complete the steady blinking stops and the device is fully accessible CAUTION Removing a PCIe SSD from the system without preparing the device for removal first causes the PCIe SSD to enter recovery mode the next time it is inserted in the system NOTE The operating system event log displays events during ...

Page 31: ... connectors mate with the backplane and the extender card cable connectors mate with the extender card See Replacing And Configuring Hardware Extender card Ensure that the PCIe extender card is plugged into the correct supported slot See the system specific Owner s Manual at dell com support manuals An Error Message Is Displayed When Running Full Initialization In HII Description When you run a fu...

Page 32: ...mount 3 Manually edit etc fstab to remove the non existent device entry PCIe SSD Is Inserted In The System And Is Visible To The Operating System But The Status LED Is Off Cause OpenManage Server Administrator is not installed or its services are not running Solution Install a supported version of OpenManage Server Administrator and ensure its services are running See Configuring and Managing Your...

Page 33: ...or you may check the PCIe SSD state to confirm if the PCIe SSD is in Read Only Mode Alternatively you can boot into the HII and do the same For further instructions contact a Dell Technical Service representative PCIe SSD Performance Measurement Not Optimal Cause PCIe SSD has not been pre conditioned and or BIOS settings are not optimal Description There are a number of factors that may alter the ...

Page 34: ...responsive and shut down Solution Reboot the ESXi host and restart the virtual machine VMware Reports A Missing Virtual Disk After A PCIe SSD Is Removed Cause The PCIe SSD is either ungracefully removed from the system or it is properly removed but the virtual machine is not properly configured Description VMware reports a missing virtual disk in the path vmfs volumes VD name vmdk after a PCIe SSD...

Page 35: ...Description VMware ESX 5 5 with native driver version 3 3 4 is unable to see or manage the PCIe SSD Solution Download and install the latest available driver from dell com support 35 ...

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Page 37: ...ice No Self monitoring enabled Yes Offline data retention Up to one year after total bytes written reaches 100 General Model PCIe SSD System interface PCIe Standard PCIe 2 0 Backplane interface Combo connector SFF 8639 NOTE For more information on the combo connector see SFF 8639 PCIe SAS Combo Connector Mechanical Dimensions Height 66 80 mm Width 14 9 mm Minor Length 97 25 mm Device Capacity Unfo...

Page 38: ...also known as a 6x unshielded connector is a high speed plug and receptacle connector pair It is a common connector that supports both SAS and PCIe based devices Systems utilizing the combo connector can simultaneously support dual port SAS or quad lane PCIe device configurations in an isolated manner Quad port SAS devices may be supported by sharing two lanes between SAS and PCIe NOTE The combo c...

Page 39: ...ions This document is also shipped with your system Owner s Manual Provides information about system features and describes how to troubleshoot the system and install or replace system components Rack Installation Instructions Describes how to install your system into a rack This document is shipped with your rack solution Administrator s Guide Provides information about configuring and managing t...

Page 40: ...or the selected business segment is displayed 4 Select the appropriate option depending on your requirement NOTE If you have purchased a Dell system you may be asked for the Service Tag Documentation Feedback If you have feedback for this document write to documentation_feedback dell com Alternatively you can click on the Feedback link in any of the Dell documentation pages fill up the form and cl...

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