IBM Released ServeRAID F-Series for System X

The IBM ServeRAID F-Series family of products offers MegaRAID data protection and onboard flash technology that can be used in a variety of ways to help improve performance and server storage density.

These products are optimized to deliver performance demanded by the increasing I/O requirements of enterprises. They integrate disk media such as SAS, SATA HDDs and SSDs into an organization’s storage infrastructure.

The portfolio is designed with individual flash modules on board. They can be configured in a RAID array to support latency-sensitive storage – used for the boot volume, for the ‘golden image’ in a VDI application, or for storing tempdb in SQL server or indexes/data objects from an Oracle or MySQL database, for example – and will still support a caching volume as well, dynamically identifying ‘application hot data’ to be stored and serviced from the flash for improved performance and reduced latency.

The ServeRAID F5115-200GB and F5115-800GB SAS/SATA Controllers for System x offer RAID functionality, RAID-0, RAID-1, RAID-5, RAID-10, RAID-50, RAID-6, and RAID-60, on connected devices, plus an array of additional features. Both the 200GB and 800GB flash modules leverage eMLC memory – each providing essentially two enterprise-quality SSDs on board. The onboard flash storage supports RAID-0 and RAID-1. Intelligent caching algorithms are utilized to help identify frequently accessed application data and promote it to fast onboard flash.

The F5115-200GB and F5115-800GB come as a small form factor PCIe adapter, each of which provides one (x4) internal mini-SAS (SFF8087) connector with four lanes of 6Gb SAS and eight lanes of PCIe 3.0 to facilitate high data transfer rates.

The ServeRAID F-Series portfolio is covered under IBM warranty. All adapters carry a one-year limited warranty or, when installed in a System x server, assume your system’s base warranty and any IBM ServicePac upgrade.

ServeRAID F5115-200GB SAS/SATA Controller for IBM System x (00AE882)
ServeRAID F5115-800GB SAS/SATA Controller for IBM System x (00AE886)

• Up to 6 Gbps per port
• RAID Levels 0, 1, 5, 6, 10, 50, and 60
• x8 lane PCIe 3.0
• LSI SAS2208 Dual-Core RAID on Chip
• 1GB 1333 MHz DDR3 SDRAM
• PCI low profile – MD2 form factor
• One (x4) mini-SAS internal connector
• Support for up to 128 devices
• S.M.A.R.T. support

Notes:

• 12.2PB lifetime writes on ServeRAID F5115-200GB
• 48.8PB lifetime writes on ServeRAID F5115-800GB

Key prerequisites: SAS/SATA Controllers can be used on supported System x servers with an available PCIe expansion slot.

Planned availability date: February 12, 2014