Lenovo ServeRAID M5110 Product Manual page 4

Fast initialization for quick array setup
Fast initialization quickly writes zeros to the first and last sectors of the virtual drive. This feature
allows you to immediately start writing data to the virtual drive while the initialization is running in
the background.
Consistency check for background data integrity
Consistency check verifies that all stripes in a virtual disk with a redundant RAID level are
consistent. The consistency check will mirror data when an inconsistent stripe is detected for a
RAID 1 and recreate the parity from the peer disks in the case of a RAID 5 or RAID 6. Consistency
checks can be scheduled to take place periodically.
Extensive online configuration options and advanced monitoring and event notification
Management tools provide convenience for the configuration of logical volumes and alerting when
errors have occurred or are about to occur.
Patrol read for media scanning and repairing
Patrol read is a background sentry service designed to pro-actively discover and correct media
defects (bad sectors) that arise normally as a disk drive ages. The service issues a series of verify
commands, and if a bad block is discovered, the card's firmware uses RAID algorithms to recreate
the missing data and remap the sector to a good sector. The task is interruptible based on
controller activity and host operations. The firmware also provides an interface where the patrol
read task can be initiated, set up for continuous operation, and terminated from a management
application. Patrol read can be activated by a manual command or automatically.
Global and dedicated hot spare with revertible hot spare support
A hot spare rebuilds data from all virtual disks within the disk group in which it is configured.
ServeRAID provides the ability to define a physical disk as a hot spare to replace a failed drive. Hot
spares can be configured as either global or dedicated. A global hot spare allows any physical drive
to be designated as a hot spare. A dedicated hot spare allows the user to assign a hot spare drive
to a particular array of the same drive type.
Single controller multipathing (failover) I/O load balancing
The ServeRAID's firmware detects and uses multiple paths from the controllers to the SAS drives
that are in enclosures. With redundant paths to the same port of a device, if one path fails, another
path can be used to communicate between the controller and the drive. Using multiple paths with
load balancing, instead of a single path, can increase reliability through redundancy.
WebBIOS configuration utility for pre-boot array configuration and management
WebBIOS is a utility that is built into the ServeRAID controller that allows you to configure drive
groups and logical drives before installing or booting the operating system.
MegaRAID Storage Manager management software
MegaRAID Storage Manager is an easy-to-use advanced RAID management application that is
used across the entire family of ServeRAID M controllers. It allows you to configure, monitor, and
maintain drive groups, virtual drives, and advanced features with an intuitive GUI, reducing
administrative efforts and simplifying troubleshooting.
Note: RAID 10, 50 and 60 drive groups do not support Online Capacity Expansion and Online RAID Level
Migration. RAID 0, 1, 5, and 6 drive groups do not support Online Capacity Expansion and Online RAID
Level Migration if two or more virtual drives are defined on a single drive group.
The following features are optional and require the respective upgrade to be purchased:
Support for RAID levels 6 and 60 with M5100 Series RAID 6 Upgrade (81Y4546).
This is a Features on Demand upgrade and only one upgrade is needed per server; all M5200 and
M5100 series adapters installed in the server will have this upgrade enabled automatically.
ServeRAID M5110 and M5110e SAS/SATA Controllers (withdrawn product) 4