[OpenIndiana-discuss] 2x Xeon XS8600

[Harry Putnam]

Murray <themurman01 at gmail.com> writes:

[...]

>> Img2 shows a row of only 2 ports and a row of 6 (while I hold the sata
>> connector wires up out of the way with my hand)
>> 
>> Can anyone tell me what I'm looking at here?  What the color coding
>> means? How many are actually working sata ports?  What does RED
>> indicate?
>> 
>
> Images didn't get through, but from memory, there should be 6 sata
> ports and 8 sas ports on the motherboard. Should be an Lsi 1068e on
> the mobo.
>
> I think I still have one as a spare at work, I will check tomorrow and let you know for sure.
>
> The inside of the hp lid usually has a sticker detailing sata and sas ports, PCI-x and PCI-e slots, etc.
>
> I had very good luck running OI on an 8400 with 12 gb ram.

Murman, can you coach me a bit about how the bios settings regarding
sata ports, and the LSI utility, effects the actual ports themseleves?

There are three options at bios main menu `Storage' and then the
`options', then the SATA Emulation [...] heading item:
  
  SATA Emulation—Sets the SATA emulation mode with the following options:

      RAID + AHCI–both the RAID and AHCI OPROMs execute. This
      emulation mode is the default and offers the best performance
      and most functionality.

      Separate IDE Controller–offers standard SATA supports (four
      ports only).

      Combined IDE Controller–makes the SATA controller look like an
      IDE controller and offers best IDE compatibility (two ports
      only).
-------       -------       ---=---       -------       ------- 

Here. I am running a version (Openindiana) of solaris 11.

Far as I can see, my setup will only boot with options 2 or 3.  I've
been using 2 (Separate IDE) which is recommended in some of the oracle
documentation. 

WIth that setting, the two RED ports on the upper (main) row of sata
ports are unusable for sata disks.

Further, attempting to plug a pair or wd black, 1tb drives (new) into
the two right most SAS/Sata ports on the bottom row fails.  The bios
fails to recognize them.

So far I've only been able to use the first 4 Sata ports on top row,
beginning with the left most port.

I really need to be able to use all the available Sas/Sata ports for
Sata discs.