11TB WHS Part II – Drive Reconfigure

(or how to convert your 11TB Server into a 10TB Server)

As you read in my article Extreme Makeover Windows Home Server Edition, I created an 11TB Windows Home Rack Server using an old rack chassis and modernized it's motherboard with a power saving Intel D945GCLF2  motherboard with an Atom 330 processor. So far I have been very pleased with the performance of the dual core Atom processor, although I have to tell you that I have not tried video streaming (stuff for another article).

But it's been almost 2 weeks now with my system and it's time for some changes. Read on to see what I did about the drive configuration…

Replacing the SATA Card

First, I have been having intermittent problems with the Promise SATA driver crashing. A look in the even logs showed "The device \Device\Scsi\ulsata21 did not respond within the timeout period" (see event log screen capture, right). Attempts to resolve this with Promise lead nowhere. They claimed that it was an IRQ issue and kept closing my case, even as it remained unresolved (they must have performance bonuses based on the number on open cases).

I had also mentioned before that the port 5 on each of the port multiplier was not working. I assumed (as did Addonics, the distributor of the port multiplier) that it was an incompatibility between the PM and the Promise TX4 SATA card.

I had enough. I decided to replace the Promise card with one from a different manufacture. Addonics sold a 4 port PCI SATA card that I thought was worth a shot. Two things gave me hope for the new card (and it's driver working with WHS/Win2003). 1) The card was sold by Addonics, the same people that sell the PM and they claim they work together. 2) It is the same card that Tranquil PC uses in their BBS2 Barebones Home Server and is sold by Newegg as the Rosewill RC-217 SATA II card.

I replaced the card, hooked up the cables and turned on the server. Now I needed to update the driver. Before I used the CD that came with the card, I thought I would let Windows see if it could find the driver on it's own (after all this was a generic card sold under several names). Right-click, Update Driver and a few minutes later Windows found and installed the proper driver.

I clicked on the WHS Console icon and to my delight, all 11 drives were recognized and the system health was green. This was done with over a terabyte of live data with Folder Duplication enabled, mind you. It's comforting to know that you can mess with Windows Home Server's drives, even changing their positions around and still have a "healthy system". I don't recommend moving the System Drive.

Downgrading to 10TB

My next step is to downgrade my system from 11TB to 10TB. Here's why. The system drive is in the corner of the rack here there is little to no air flow. All of the other drives are in the SATA backplane which have fans and a constant air flow. So far I have noticed a 4C-7C difference in heat as reported by S.M.A.R.T. while under relatively normal conditions. Even as we speak the system drive is at 38C and the rest of the drives are 31C-34C.

With that in mind and with full confidence in my manhood in tact (even with the loss of a full terabyte), I designed a new system diagram:

I am now using both SATA ports on the motherboard (the System Drive 0 and Drive 1). Ports 1, 2, and 3 of the SATA card go directly to hard drives 2, 3 and 4. That makes a total  of five drives connected without a port multiplier. I use the port 4 of the SATA card to connect to the single port multiplier and then on to drives 5-9.

It should be noted that using a 4 port SATA card (on a motherboard that supports only 2 SATA drives) makes a great 5 or 6 drive system. As I mentioned above, this is exactly what Tranquil did on their 5 drive BBS2 Barebones Home Server.

As you can see, not only do I solve the heat issue, but this new approach even eliminates the need for the second port multiplier. And what will I do with my extra terabyte drive? You'll have to tune in later and see what I have planned. I can disclose exactly what it will be, but suffice to say that it can only be appreciated by a true aficionado.

One thing to note about removal of the 11th drive. I first had to logically remove it using the WHS Console before I could physically remove it from the system. Also reconfiguring the system like I did really messed with Drive Manager's wire frame. I basically had to clear and re-assign all of the drives.

Part III of this article will talk about cooling options for the damn loud fan on the Northbridge!