MAC pro drive classification question

[septicdeath]

Okay, got the pass through disk in heathly mode, loaded the areca drivers for the raid card, and bang, the raid 5 was there, as was the external enclosure known as a pass through disk.

Was able to format the drive, partition the drive.

Windows Complained that the drive was not active in bios and I should reboot the computer and turn it on with however your bios is set.

I raid card boots EFI, it was flashed to work in OSX that way, its one or the other.

Ha ha, I just moved the OWC external to the esata port connected to the cable connected to the main logic board, and rebooted the windows media.
I saw the light on the enclosure flickering so I thought, cool.

I was able to see the disk, I was able to delete the disk, I was able to create a new partition, but when formating the drive, it errors that

Failed to format the selected partition. [Error 0x80070057]

I think I've given just about the best attempt at all of this, I dont think its going to be possible. I think the 2.5" drive is actually going to be the way to go. Hell, its only for booting to play games, and I think some of the 2.5" drives actually have decent performance.


Time to just uninstalling everything and getting RMA's for them...

 

[nanofrog]

That blows.

It's easier I think to keep the OS drives internal if possible. You can put them on the RAID controller, or even install the OS to an array, provided it provides boot support.

The other trick, and I know this works, is attach the OS drives to the logic board connectors. Physically install the drives in the empty optical bay. Then the sleds are all capable of being used by the RAID controller for an array(s).

The internal configuration of the MP is a problem for drives, especially if you want to go beyond 8 drives. Good external enclosures aren't exactly cheap, and they can eat away the savings seen compared to an equivalent PC in terms of hardware.

BTW, CalDigit's RAID card isn't very good. People are losing their data with them. Too many issues to be considered reliable.

 

[septicdeath]

yeah. I already have array drives 5/6 in the optical bay. But your correct, Im going to install another internal drive (drive #7) in the machine, its going to be a laptop 2.5" sata high perf drive.

I found a 2.5" 320 gig, 16mb cache (most have 4/8) 7200 RPM, and I'll take a picture when I have it installed, It actually fits against the psu wall and fits in the small space the door has in it. This will be directly connected to the logicboard via a sas to sata pigtail.

There is also the option of fitting the 2.5" on top of the two 3.5" drives in the optical bay, I just dont want the 3.5" to add heat to 2.5" drive.


ONE WILD ROUND of CRAP if you ask me. Cant believe the limitations. I've used the same raid card in a windows box, with raid 5, was able to do all the partition work, add linux, and everything smooth. Owell, the drive was on sale at Fry's for 104.00, less than the money I got back from 1 of the drive enclosures and cables, so its even cheaper.

Will update.

-nicita

 

[nanofrog]

Heat's not as much as an issue as many think. So long as the drives remain under 55C, they will be OK. 45C is better, but not necessary. (55C is the default alarm setting on drive enclosures (usually made for RAID). It happens to be the upper limit of the "touch test", which is also the default setting on a hot water heater. 120-125F to prevent getting burned (scalded).

You should be more concerned about creating an electrical short. Just use some sort of insulating material if it's in danger of shorting any of the solder joints. Especially against the aluminum covers on the 3.5" drives. Even if painted/anodized. A small scratch is really easy to do, and zap. Smoked drive. (Damn conductive aluminum covers).

 

[septicdeath]

Well, after 6 days, 500 bucks (at least) and lots of trying every thing that can be tried, I ended up going another route.

$100.00 at fry's

7200 RPM
16MB Cache
320 GB
"Desktop Performace" 2.5" sata II hard drive

I just routed one of the pigtails up to the optical bay like I did with the 2 from 5/6 on my areca raid card, and lined it up so that it was in the exact location, when the door is on, the rails actually hold the drive almost perfectly, so besides the doublesided foam tape (thats insulating the oposite side I might add) the door closed stops and movement or sag just the same.

Maybe someday, someone else will get it working, but I didnt, and I bought enclosures from WD, Vantech, MacAlley, OWC, and even Trans Intl'l Mini G, none of them would work through the logicboard through a esata back plate like we all use on our pc's and let me install windows. failure after failure after failure.

here's a pic




vista is already installed.

 

[nanofrog]

Glad to hear you got it running. Sorry it took all that aggravation, and the RMA's to boot.

I prefer to keep the drives internal. Extremely simple, and avoids issues like what you ran into. (No PM issues,...)

If I go external, it's almost always for RAID. Previous experience helps, but I can buy the wrong parts if I ignore research first. Even then, it's still possible.
Usually due to issues though.

 

[septicdeath]

Thanks for all the help. I posted parallel at a few sites, didn't find anyone willing to join in, I hope this helps the next guy attempting this. I mean, I did try 5 different external enclosures, 2 different back-plates, and various $5 to $35 esata cables, from flat to "monster" rolled, triple shielded (blah blah blah) and it didn't have any luck. The logic board controller is obviously just barley enough to do what it needs to do, and doesn't compare to what one would find on a after market raid/esata card.

One of the funniest things about it all, is how much money some of the raid card manufactures told me to spend, I guess most people with 8 core 3.2 MPro's with large raids are actually doing something professional, I'm not. I just wanted to build the best system I could, I really dont have any substained video to disk transfer minimums or any advanced HD work to do, I'm glad I can handle it if I ever wanted too, but HD video editing is not something you wake up and just start doing.

Thanks again..

John

P.S. To anyone following this thread, the final verdict is this. Windows WILL not install onto an external esata driven drive. Even if your getting the esata from the 2 onboard "extra" sata ports, windows doesn't have the drivers for these ports built into the install.