PERC6/i Integrated and "Connectors"

[Patrick_Boyd at Dell.com]

So in SAS there are PHY's and connectors. For a PERC 6/I there are 2
connectors of the SFF 8484 type, for the PERC 6/E there are 2 connectors
of the SFF 8470 type. Each of these connectors is also called a "wide
port" each wide port contains 4 PHY's. Each of these PHY's allow a
connector to a single SAS expander or endpoint. In the 6 disk bay
situation you will have PHYs 0-3 or connector 0 connecting to the drives
in slots 0-3, you will also have PHYs 4 and 5 or connector 1 connecting
to the drives in slots 4 and 5. This becomes more complex in the case of
expanders which is why OMSA simplifies it into connectors.

These connectors essentially implies a physical cable running from the
controller to the backplane or drives.

I hope that helps clarify things.

Patrick Boyd

-----Original Message-----
From: linux-poweredge-bounces at dell.com
[mailto:linux-poweredge-bounces at dell.com] On Behalf Of Derek Yuen
Sent: Wednesday, November 05, 2008 10:42 AM
To: linux-poweredge-Lists
Subject: PERC6/i Integrated and "Connectors"


Hi,

I'd like clarification on what OMSA believes SAS "connectors" are.

In the OMSA interface, it describes my PowerEdge 2950 III (with PERC
6/i)
as having 2 "connectors".  Are connectors analagous to "independent" IO
channels ?

I'm confused as wikipedia describes "connectors" as being the physical
connectors--see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Serial_Attached_SCSI#Connectors

However, my PowerEdge 2950 has 6 disk bays (i.e. 6 connectors?), so I'm
not sure why OMSA says there's only 2 connectors.




Thanks,
Derek

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