This file contains the following:
 WHAT IS IN Array1000UDMA v4.40
CAVEAT FOR USING UDMA DRIVES
COMPATIBILITY NOTES
HARDWARE INSTALLATION NOTES
SOFTWARE INSTALLATION NOTES
TIPS
KNOWN INCONVENIENCES IN USING THE RAID
PACKAGE CONTENTS:
BIOS & Driver Selection Utility - v4.40
ARRAYCONFIG - v4.40
NT 4.0 Driver - v4.40
Netware 4.11, 4.2, 5.0 Drivers - v4.40
Windows 2000 Driver - v4.40
CI/O Management Software 4.03 - v4.03
PRODUCT FEATURES:
Array1000UDMA is a release of Adaptec's low end RAID product family.
This product supports systems running Windows NT 4.0, NetWare 4.11, 4.2, 5.0,
and Windows 2000
The following features are included: RAID levels 0, 1, 5, and 0/1
CAVEAT FOR USING UDMA DRIVES
Drives must support UDMA 33mbps or UDMA 66mbps:
Do not connect an IDE drive, which cannot support Ultra DMA mode
of data transfer. Look for UDMA 33 mbps and UDMA 66 mbps drives.
Older drives will NOT work with AAA-UDMA.
Drive jumpers must be configured for MASTER/SINGLE mode of operation:
Do not connect such UDMA drives to the card that are configured
for SLAVE mode of operation. Keep the configuration jumpers of
the drives for MASTER or SINGLE only.
BLUE end of cable to be connected to AAA-UDMA receptacle:
Always connect the BLUE end of the UDMA cable to the connector
receptacle on the AAA-UDMA. The BLACK end goes to the drive.
Connecting the other way may cause system problems, or show a
UDMA 66 drive as UDMA 33.
Some early UDMA models are known to fail in high speed Ultra DMA mode
of transfers:
Some early UDMA models have been reported to work well only in
PIO mode or lower DMA speeds. Such drives may not work properly
on the AAA-UDMA.
If you are using Western Digital drives and face a problem:
Western Digital has a web page for a Hard Drive Quality Alert.
This web page contains the tools to determine if your WD drive is a
part of this alert. If you run into a WD issue, please check
this page first and execute the tools as necessary.
COMPATIBILITY NOTES:
NETWORK CARD CONFIGURATIONS:
Some uncommon network card configurations may cause the array
configuration to hang. If the array configuration utility hangs,
check for conflicts with the network card configuration.
MEMORY ERRORS WITH AHA-2940:
Memory errors or other problems may be experienced if both AHA-2940
and AAA-UDMA RAID Controller coexist. To solve this problem,
upgrade the AHA-2940 BIOS to the most recent version, v1.24 or later.
If both AAA-UDMA and the AHA2940 are installed in the same system,
one of the cards may not be visible by the operating system. This
problem is caused by the system BIOS. Correct this problem by
enabling the shadow RAM for all the address ranges in the system
BIOS setup.
EZ-SCSI 4.0 & 5.0 SUPPORT:
EZ-SCSI is not supported on AAA-UDMA RAID Controller.
ATI VIDEO CARDS:
ATI SVGA drivers may conflict with Array1000UDMA drivers under Windows
NT. Use only standard VGA drivers with an ATI video adapter card
under an NT environment.
SHARING PCI INTERRUPTS:
Do not configure the system to share interrupts between the
AAA-UDMA RAID Controller and any network interface cards (NICs) in
the system. Refer to the system BIOS manual for information on how
to configure PCI interrupts, or change the PCI slot in which the NIC
is installed.
REMOVABLE DEVICES AS PART OF A RAID ARRAY:
Removable storage media devices cannot be part of a RAID array.
MS BACKOFFICE ON INTEL LANCEWOOD:
There is an incompatibility between MS Backoffice SBS and Lancewood
that causes the system to hang during installation.
The problem appears to be related to the NIC chip on the motherboard.
Using a PCI NIC card solves the problem (the on-board NIC
can be ignored).
Array1000UDMA WITH 2940 ON NT:
Specifying more than one "additional" device during Windows NT
installation may cause NT to prompt the user for driver disks in the
improper order. For example, if an Array1000UDMA driver and a 2940U2
driver are specified (in that order) as additional devices, when
Windows NT later attempts to copy these drivers to the hard disk, it
prompts the user to insert the floppy containing the 2940U2 driver.
This occurs even though Windows NT is actually expecting the
Array1000UDMA driver. As a work around, simply inserting the
Array1000UDMA driver disk solves the problem. An alternative
solution is to specify only one additional device, install the OS,
then later use the Control Panel options to add other devices.
Array1000UDMA WITH 2940 ON NETWARE:
There is a conflict between the AHA2940 and the CDAUDMAH driver with
AIC 7895B on the motherboard. Netware cannot load one of these drivers
if one is already in use. This problem occurs if both drivers are
selected during installation.
HARDWARE INSTALLATION NOTES:
On some older systems, the AAA-UDMA drives will be bootable
only if this adapter is inserted in a slot number lower than
other such adapters who also support boot-up BIOS. E.g. if you
have both AHA-2940 and AAA-UDMA, you should keep the adapter
that has bootable drives, at a slot number lower than the other
adapter.
On some platforms, the AAA-UDMA has been seen to work on the
first slot only. This has been the case with a problem in the
system BIOS in allocating interrupt resources for devices
placed across a PCI-PCI bridge. Work around for this is
normally available by upgrading the system BIOS or by using
AAA-UDMA on the first slot.
On some systems with Intel chipset, which have 66MHz slots, the
ASPI8U2.SYS driver does not work properly. ASPI8U2 is used only
for flashing the AAA-UDMA BIOS. Use another slot in the system
to work around this problem.
Using AAA-UDMA on AST Bravo MS5200:
Keep the "Plug and Play OS" option in the CMOS setup as
disabled for bootable RAID on AAA-UDMA.
The AAA-UDMA Windows 2000 driver is not supported on this system.
Using AAA-UDMA on Compaq SP700, PII-450 XEON:
The flash diskette will not work properly on this platform. To
work around this problem, you will need to flash the AAA-UDMA
BIOS by taking the adapter to any other platform. You do not
need to connect any drives to the adapter while preparing the
adapter for a BIOS flash. AAA-UDMA Windows 2000 driver is not supported on this system.
Using AAA-UDMA on Tyan 440GX/AMI BIOS/XeonIII 550:
This system has a built in AIC-7896 on the mainboard.
If on-board SCSI is disabled, the AAA-UDMA BIOS may not function.
Even if you do not connect a device to on-board scsi, please
keep the embedded SCSI enabled, when you face such a problem.
If on-board SCSI is enabled and a bootable device is connected
to it, the system hangs right after loading the boot sector
from floppy. The system cannot boot if the bootable devices
are connected to the on-board SCSI as well as the AAA-UDMA.
A workaround to the problem is:
- Have the on-board scsi enabled and
- If SCSI boot is desired, disable the BIOS of AAA-UDMA, or
- Do not connect a disk to the on-board SCSI and enable
AAA-UDMA BIOS.
SOFTWARE INSTALLATION NOTES:
BIOS INSTALL:
The Array1000UDMA BIOS will run its self-test diagnostic upon
power-on. However, it will not install unless at least one
device is attached to the AAA-UDMA RAID Controller.
INSTALLING NETWARE 5.0:
There is a known limitation that if the SMP module is selected during
installation, NetWare 5.0 will hang. This is because NetWare fails
to handle interrupts after driver initialization. To overcome this
problem, do the following:
- During installation, NW 5.0 brings up a menu for selecting:
- Platform Support Module
- HotPlug Support
- Storage Adapters
- Deselect any SMP module listed under the Platform Support Module.
- Complete the installation.
- Reboot the system and install the SMP module from the NWConfig screen.
NETWARE 5.0 LIST DEVICES:
A "list devices" command will not complete if you remove a drive
from an existing configuration or bring down an array.
Netware 5.0 doesn't handle failure of singles or Arrays properly.
A fix for this problem has been identified that involves the
SCSIHD.CDM, NWPA.NLM and MM.NLM modules. A temporary fix is
available from the net at http://developer.novell.com
WINDOWS 2000 INSTALLATION BLUESCREENS ON SEAGATE ST9140 DRIVE:
Windows 2000 bluescreens just before rebooting to configure the
system when you use Seagate Medalist Pro 9140 UDMA33 drives. The
problem is very specific to this drive model and it shows up
only during the installation process.
If you ignore the blue screen and complete the installation, the
normal operation of the OS will never see this problem.
WINDOWS 2000 WARNING MESSAGE WHEN CREATING DISK PARTIONS:
We recommend you create disk partitions one at a time. If you need
additional partitions, please create them after the previous one has
completed. If you try to create all the partitions simultaneously, Windows 2000
sometimes displays this message:
Device Configuration Change. Please reboot the machine.
However, the system functions normally after the reboot.
WINDOWS 2000 CRASHDUMP NEEDS FREE DISK SPACE:
Crashdump requires sufficient free disk space to capture the memory
state. If there is not enough free disk space, Crashdump will be
unable to write the memory state to the hard disk. In such a case,
the crashdump file is 0 bytes in size.
WINDOWS 2000 ASKS FOR DRIVER FOR ADAPTEC XOR MEMORY DEVICE:
AAA-UDMA RAID Controller has an extra PCI device which performs the
XOR operation for RAID. This device is discovered by Windows 2000
Plug & Play logic. When we add AAA-UDMA RAID Controller to an
existing Win2000 system, the OS will ask for the drivers for
AAA-UDMA and XOR device. However, a fresh installation of the
operating system attaches the drivers for both automatically.
TIPS
INITIALIZING THE ARRAY:
If the user has created the array without initializing it and reboots
the system, the state of the array will be reported as:
"New array needs init, needs system reboot"
A reboot at this point is not required. One can initialize the array,
and the array will become fault tolerant
NT SYSTEM PARTITION LIMITATIONS:
The following information was obtained from Microsoft's Support WEB
site. For further information see:
http://support.microsoft.com/support/kb/articles/q137/4/74.asp
The information in this article applies to:
Microsoft Windows NT Workstation versions 3.5 and 3.51
Microsoft Windows NT Server versions 3.5 and 3.51
Microsoft Windows NT Workstation versions 4.0
Microsoft Windows NT Server versions 4.0
When you attempt to install Windows NT on a computer using two or
more drives containing free space, Windows NT does not allow creation
of partition sizes larger than 1 gigabyte (GB). The text mode setup
restricts Partition 0 on the first disk to 1024 cylinders - if there
are no partitions, partition 0 is the free space on the drive, so the
drive appears in the listing limited to 1024 cylinders non-translated.
If you create a partition during setup, reboot and delete it. The
same check is not performed again, so the size of the
partition (Partition 0) is added onto the free disk space and you can
make a partition that spans the whole drive up to 4 GB or 1024
cylinders worth of data, whichever is less.
-OR-
Using MS-DOS, create a partition using FDISK. During NT Setup,
delete the partition created with MS-DOS. This will allow Windows
NT Setup to create a system partition larger than 1 GB, but limited
to 4 GB or 1024 cylinders worth of data, whichever is less.
RISKS & BENEFITS OF DRIVE WRITE-BACK CACHING:
Most disk drives allow write-back caching which greatly speeds up
writes to disks. This feature enables an application program to
continue executing once write data is successfully sent to a
drive. In very rare cases a deferred write error can occur
(for example, because of a parity error within the drive cache
memory). A deferred write error means data has been incorrectly
written and is no longer available to the I/O system. The error
is unrecoverable. The consequence of turning off the write cache
on the drive is slower write performance, but deferred write errors
are prevented.
OFF LINE ARRAY CACHE SETTINGS:
If an array with enabled cache goes off-line, that cache is not
returned to the "available" memory pool. This causes a bad value
to be displayed for "Internally used" cache. To correct this
situation, simply delete or reactivate the off-line array.
FLUSHING THE CACHE:
The driver can flush the cache and clear the "dirty" bit on the
reserved sectors only when it receives a shutdown notification
from the OS. It has been observed that certain versions of Windows NT,
such as the Enterprise Edition Server, do not issue a shutdown to an
array when it has no partitions. (Partitions are created through the
Disk Administrator). The driver needs only one shutdown event
however, to shutdown ALL the arrays in the system. If even one
array on the AAA/ARO has a partition, it will be sufficient to clear
the dirty flag. In the absence of a shutdown, or in the event of an
abnormal reboot, the system verifies all the redundant arrays after
first displaying the message, "Unsafe shutdown detected on array xxx".
REINSERTION OF DEDICATED SPARES:
If a dedicated spare is removed by mistake, upon reinsertion and bus
rescan, it may become a single. If this occurs, simply recreate
a dedicated spare upon that same device.
DEVICES INACCESSIBLE AFTER POWER OFF / POWER ON:
By design, newly detected arrays, single drives, or devices will
remain offline until the next reboot. The device information
structures are deleted when a device disappears, and are built
from scratch when a new one is detected. It might appear as if
the user is switching off and on the same drive, but to the driver
it is a new device.
SLOW REBOOT DURING BACKGROUND RAID MANAGEMENT OPERATIONS:
During the boot up process, RAID management operations may sometimes
execute. These background RAID operations are initiated following
certain system events. For example, a Verify operation will
automatically run after an unsafe shutdown. These operations, may
causes the operating system to take a long time to boot.
Connecting the array and the boot device(s) on separate channels, may
resolve this problem. An alternative is to boot from a higher-priority
device ID(s).
After resolving channel priority conflicts, boot performance can be
effected by the number of boot devices and their respective priorities
with respect to the array being Verified.
Once the operating system is up, remember to:
- Click on the Services icon in the Control Panel.
- Manually start the "CIOArray Manager RPC Command" service.
- Manually start the "CIOArray Manager RPC Event" service.
- Now launch the CI/O Management Software user interface from the Programs group.
KNOWN INCONVENIENCES IN USING THE RAID:
RESCANNING "SPARE" DRIVES WHEN THEY ARE OFFLINE:
Under CI/O management utility, pressing a rescan button will
result in no warning message for drives which are not part of
the array and have been turned off-line or have failed. The
warning messages are issued only for the drives, which are
members of the array.
On RAID1, if more than one spare has been failed, a
"Test Spare" command may report the failed spares incorrectly.
HEAVILY LOADED I/O PERFORMANCE DEGRADES ON SPECIFIC IBM MODELS:
On two specific IBM disk drive models IBM DJNA-351520 and
IBM DJNA -371800 U66 (17201MB), we have noticed degraded performance
when the I/Os are intensive. e.g. running RAID VERIFY while system
has over 24 I/O bound tasks would show a considerably reduced system
performance. However, running verify with fewer processes doing I/O on the RAID,
does not slow down. A workaround to this problem is to run the RAID Verify command from
CI/O during less load hours such as midnight.
RECONSTRUCT MUST BE PERFORMED AT "HIGH" PRIORITY:
If the system is running several I/O bound processes while a
"Reconstruct" operation is underway, we strongly advise you to
increase the priority of the "Reconstruct" operation to "HIGH".
To do this you need to go to the "Activity Window" of CI/O and
select the "Reconstruct" operation with right mouse button and
increase the priority.
REBOOT REQUIRED AFTER ARRAY NAME CHANGE:
If an array name is changed using CI/O Management Software, the
change will not be properly reflected on the Win2000 systems or
NetWare servers until the next system reboot. In Windows 2000
systems, you may receive a warning message about "unsafe change of
a device" when you use "Disk Management" from Control panel->Computer
Management->Administrative Tools. Please reboot the system after changing
the name of the array so that the OS recognizes new name correctly under all applications. |