Subject: Re: [vserver] Sponsoring VServer getting up to date with mainline
From: Tom Laermans <tom.laermans@powersource.cx>
Date: Sat, 23 Aug 2008 22:05:06 +0200

Herbert Poetzl wrote:
> well, most BIOS interfaces nowadays are kind of
> graphical ones, and that is not the best idea for
> a headless server, the intel card was extremely
> annoying in this regard, as it even 'required
No, this is a text-based setup, requiring a mouse would be insane imo.
> webinterface doesn't sound like a good idea either,
> but I could live with that, but the question is,
> who provides the web interface? is that something
> you only get with the network enabled cards?
>   
Yes, otherwise all you have to go on is the CLI tool (afaik), on Windows 
there is some "larger" management software included which has its own 
interface. I don't know of a way to access SMART data of individual 
disks, I'm sure areca support will happily answer that for you (it may 
already be in their faq system).

I will try to see if I can try out some of the things at work later this 
week..
> > Size will not matter, I'm not sure which low level commands would 
>   
>
> that was another problem I ran into with the intel
> card, it insisted to cut away a few hundred megabytes
> (which isn't such a big deal with 500GB/1TB disks),
> but I couldn't access existing disks that way and
> had to attach a separate controller for that purpose
>   
I'm not sure if it will "eat" JBOD disks without putting its own 
formatting on it, unfortunately don't have an easy way to test that. You 
don't have any onboard SATA ports?
>   
> [jbod]
>> no, this is not the intended setup, but it comes
>> really handy when you want to migrate stuff or
>> integrate existing setups slowly

> looks nice, does it provide command completion
> and/or command history? is the help sufficient
> to find your way around?
>   
Unfortunately it lacks a decent readline interface, no tabcompletion nor 
history :( The help is pretty concise but was for me enough to find my 
way around - the BIOS itself isn't much more eloquent.
e.g.:

CLI> rsf -h

Sub-Command & Parameters Of [ rsf ]
Sub-Command Description
======================================================================
create      Parameter: <drv=xx> [name=xxx]
            Fn: Create A RaidSet.
            Ex: Create A RaidSet With Drive1,2,3,5,7 name=RaidSet1.
            Command: rsf create drv=1~3,5,7 name=RaidSet1 [Enter]

delete      Parameter: <raid=xx>.
            Fn: Delete A RaidSet.
            Ex: Delete RaidSet#1.
            Command: rsf delete raid=1 [Enter]

expand      Parameter: <raid=xx> <drv=xx> [vol=xx] [newlevel=<0|1|3|5|6>]
                       [newstripe=<4|8|16|32|64|128>]
            Fn1: Expand RaidSet Without VolumeSet Modification.
            Ex1: Expand Drive 3 To RaidSet#1.
            Command1: rsf expand raid=1 drv=3 [Enter]
            Fn2: Expand RaidSet With VolumeSet Modification.
            Ex2: Expand Drive 3 To RaidSet#1 And Modify VolumeSet#1
                 From Raid1 To Raid5.
                 (Assuming VolumeSet#1 Is Currently Raid1).
            Command2: rsf expand raid=1 drv=3 vol=1 newlevel=5 [Enter]
(...)
CLI>

All-in-all I'm very happy with these cards, way nicer than 3ware, same 
for md raid, way better performance as well. Had no problems at all with 
these cards in years.

Tom

Tom