PROMISE Pegasus disk size support

[bergert]

The Pegasus1-R6 I bought in 2013 had a problem today (one disk dead); but I checked it using an SATA->TB adapter on my MacPro and the disk seems fine. Rebuild of RAID completed ok. One occasion to look at the PROMISE web-site.

As PROMISE does not sell spare parts; I was looking for a new enclosure - when I found the new firmware for my P1 (FW 5.04.0000.61) and then I started updating my P2 as well. Then I realized that the P1 and P2 have v5 firmware, but P3 has a totally different firmware (v6) - will not update on a Pegasus2 unit (tried it by mistake).

FW 6.00.0000.18 - disks size 8TB, 10TB, 12TB are now supported (Pegasus3 only)
FW 5.04.0000.61 - disks 1TB up to 6TB (Pegasus1 and 2)
Even though the firmware for the large size disks is only certified in the R8 units (P1,P2,P3) - technically there is no difference in the controller. As long as the firmware does support the disk size it will work .

BEWARE: today I saw several P1 and P2 units on eBay with 12TB disks. This will not work, the hardware only supports disks up to 6TB, and taking the example of an R6 with RAID5 6TB (max size) x5 (6 slots minus one disk for checksum) = 30TB the unit will crash (i.e roll over from 30.000.000 byte to 00.000.000) where the partition table is and all data is lost after writing past 30TB. Repeat: it will power up, it will mount as 60TB unit (12x5), it will start writing data, but it CANNOT work on a P1 or P2.

NOTE: PROMISE is quite religious on modifications. If you replace the disks, with non-PROMISE models (they sell disks with trays as well) they will not give any support or warranty. They totally insist that only supported configurations are used. So if you use your own disks, you are on your own! But then, the units last a lot longer than the warranty: I have a 2011 P1-R6 used 7 days a week on my MacPro, now more than 6 years old; still with the original disks.

COMMENTS: There are some other differences as well:
* P3 units have USB-C (TB3) connectors; I will only buy P3 because USB-C is the future; dongles are temporary for legacy (TB1, TB2) computers like my MacPro.
* P3 supports larger disks (above); again future proof
* P3 units now have 3 years of warranty (instead of 1) when using supported configurations
* starting with P2 the controller powers down the disks, this is one argument to replace a P1: when the disks are spun down, the controller only draws about 10W - very little heat (I live in a hot climate zone)

just my summary - there is too much fake information

my post from 2013:
https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...th-seagate-nas-hdd-4tb.1618818/#post-20637862

 

[chfilm]

Hey,

I recently had some off behavior (random disconnects) and a drive failure in my years old Pegasus1 R6 and was on the phone and team viewer with a super friendly promise tech guy from Germany. He was extremely open and helpful, even though I was wayyyy out of warranty.
He told me that the Pegasus 1 and 2 are basically the same hardware wise and share the same firmware - they support up to 10TB disks, BOTH models that is.
You could theoretically put 60 TB in an old R6! Wow!

I got an empty R6 2 on eBay and put 6x4 WD Red in it - officially not supported but he told me that many of their customers use these and they work perfectly.

So I dont know, if you verified what you just wrote about larger than 6TB drives yourself, or if it‘s just something they told you, but they definitely told me otherwise and this guy seemed very trustworthy and on top of his stuff.

I would personally disagree with advising only to buy the P3. I think the P2 offers GREAT bang for buck right now- especially if you consider that it really supports 10TB drives now.
(I can only assume the technician told the truth.)
Who cares if there‘s a dongle at the end of the cable from a raid that‘s stored away in a locker, when the new new Mac Pro next year hits our desks..