Hi all, this may be a basic SCSI/RAID question or an adapter specific one -
- I'm not sure which. The general question is, is it possible to have a
hot spare (failover) drive that functions across SCSI channels? For
example, could a drive located on channel X serve as the failover drive for
arrays on both channel X and channel Y?

The specific example I'm thinking of involves the Adaptec 2200S (two-
channel SCSI RAID card) and seven drives. For logistical reasons (I'm
physically limited to 4 drives per channel), my setup would be as follows:
On one channel, 4 drives in a RAID-5; on the other channel, 2 drives in a
RAID-1 and the final drive that I would like to use as the failover.
There's of course no problem getting the failover to work with the RAID-1,
but what about the RAID-5 on the other channel?

If anyone knows if this is possible either in general with SCSI RAID, or in
particular with the Adaptec 2200S, that would be very helpful.
Unfortunately there seems to be no way to ask Adaptec a question unless you
already own the product, which I don't yet.

Thanks very much,

Mike

"Cisephys" <(E-Mail Removed)> wrote in message news:Xns9423C3DCE9BA3BE46839E7DAD4B7DB263@66.75.162.201...
> Hi all, this may be a basic SCSI/RAID question or an adapter specific
> one - I'm not sure which. The general question is, is it possible to have
> a hot spare (failover) drive that functions across SCSI channels? For
> example, could a drive located on channel X serve as the failover drive
> for arrays on both channel X and channel Y?
>
> The specific example I'm thinking of involves the Adaptec 2200S (two-
> channel SCSI RAID card) and seven drives. For logistical reasons (I'm
> physically limited to 4 drives per channel),

Which is also a logical limit, bandwidth wise.

> my setup would be as follows:
> On one channel, 4 drives in a RAID-5; on the other channel, 2 drives in
> a RAID-1 and the final drive that I would like to use as the failover.
> There's of course no problem getting the failover to work with the
> RAID-1, but what about the RAID-5 on the other channel?
>
> If anyone knows if this is possible either in general with SCSI RAID,
> or in particular with the Adaptec 2200S, that would be very helpful.
> Unfortunately there seems to be no way to ask Adaptec a question
> unless you already own the product, which I don't yet.

Why not download the manual?

>
> Thanks very much,
>
> Mike