LSI Storage Manger for Windows PERC H700 Controller

Question

I have a PERC H700 controller from Dell which appears to be a re-badged LSI 9260-16i raid card. I looked in the download link from LSI, but it only has the MegaRaid Storage Manager for Linux. MegaCLI for Windows is provided but I prefer a GUI.

I looked up another raid card: LSI 9265-8i and it has the MegaRaid Storage Manager available for Windows. Is it okay for me to install it and monitor the PERC H700? Or was this program specifically designed for 1 raid card?

A lot of blogs mention monitoring the PERC H700 using the LSI utility, just want to find the correct version.

Solution 1

Openmanage as suggested above is a great tool that I think MUST be installed on any compatible Dell server that give information and allows configuration of more than just the RAID controller. However the Megaraid Storage Manager allows more control of the RAID controller than Openmanage or even accessing the RAID controller BIOS.

To get the utility, look at Dell's support pages for older servers fitted with the PERC5/6 such as the Poweredge 29xx or Rxx0. (obviously you need to match your operating system).

The later version of the utility installs on the server to be administered. The older version (if you can find it) seems to be split into a server and client part. When installing the package on a server with a PERC it installs both server and client. If installing on a pc without a PERC it only installs the client.

The advantage in the older version is that you can have one client on your normal desktop and connect this to any of the servers as and when required.

Solution 2

Is there a reason why you're not using Dell's OpenManage? This comes straight from the vendor (Dell), does everything you stated that you want (monitoring), and is quite useful outside of storage monitoring.

When in doubt, trust the vendor, especially if it's a huge and well-known vendor like Dell.

Comments

[David Corsalini]

+1, PERC is not exactly rebranded LSI, there are additional changes there, and it's always better to use native management utilities

[David Corsalini]

how is this different from using ITA or connecting to any OMSA enabled host using an internet browser?

[Robin Gill]

@ dyasny : You can do a lot of stuff that cannot be done from OMSA, some things can't even be done from the BIOS. Examples off the top of my head - check exact battery level vs what it should be, and manually kick of battery training cycle. I believe you can add/drop drive from a RAID volume while running but I haven't tested that. Let you change write cache mode while running (sometimes has shown volumes not being cached even when RAID BIOS claims they are cached), the s/w is able to send alert emails itself, trust me, have a look and I suspect you will be converted.

[David Corsalini]

Just had a look at a rather old (1.5 years) setup with H700 and OMSA - no battery level, but training cycles can be managed and manually started. Drive can be taken offline in an array no problem, caching policies also can be changed on the fly, email alerts also available. In short - I'm not converted yet, and will stick to the native stuff :)

[invulnarable27]

I agree that OpenManage is a great tool, gives a ton of info of the overall server. @Robin, It just so happens my controller went through a BBU relearn cycle which prevented my pfsense test server from being shutdown for a few hours. That is the sole reason I was looking for the LSI Storage Manager, in case it started the relearn cycle during peak hours. I was aiming for a manual relearn during off hours based on the battery level left. OMSA sadly doesn't show the battery level, just a "ready" status. Will be using both tools in unison for greater administration.

[Coré]

If you want to know the state of the battery you just need to export the log from the available task of the controller and check the last logs of the battery. Also you can't try with the OMSA CLI but I'm not sure if it's going to give you the information you need.

[Dan Pritts]

It doesn't always do everything you might want - for instance, it doesn't tell me the temperature of the disks.