Patent Application
20080084680
The invention itself, as well as a preferred mode of use, further objects, and advantages thereof, will best be understood by reference to the following detailed description of an illustrative embodiment when read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:
The present invention provides a method and system for allowing a multi-drive tray (MDT) to be interchangeable with a battery backup unit (BBU) tray within a disk enclosure blade (DEB).
With reference now to
Controller cards 115 and 125 are each utilized to control the interfaces between multiple MDTs and a Serial Attached Small Computer System Interface (SAS) switch, which allows the MDTs to be communicatively connected to the plurality of processors in blades 110A through 110K. Similarly, in another embodiment RAID controller cards may be utilized to control the RAID functionality of the plurality of hard disk drives (HDDs) within each MDT. Since all DEB designs utilize a plurality of HDDs, it is crucial to integrate as much data storage capacity as possible. The present invention thus allows a user of blade server 100 to interchange an MDT with a BBU tray containing two BBUs in order to provide one BBU per controller without sacrificing additional volume in DEB 105. In an alternate embodiment, two MDT slots are replaced by two BBU trays, each of which contains a single BBU.
Within the descriptions of the figures, similar elements are provided, similar names and reference numerals as those of the previous figure(s). Where a later figure utilizes the element in a different context or with different functionality, the element is provided a different leading numeral representative of the figure number (e.g., 1xx for
With reference now to
MDT 120 comprises a connector having two key holes 215, a standard air hole 220, HDD 235, and HDD 240. HDD 235 and HDD 240 are utilized to store data and may be accessed by blades 110A through 110K. Although
With reference now to
Each of the plurality of MDT connectors 310 includes two key pegs 325, which are utilized to connect MDT 125 to midplane 300. Each MDT 120A through 120H utilizes an Inter-Integrated Circuit (I2C) interface to communicate with controller cards 115 and 125 within DEB 105. Similarly, BBU tray connector 315 includes a single key peg 330, which is utilized to connect BBU tray 200 to midplane 300. Single key peg 330 also prevents BBU tray 200 from being physically installed into an MDT slot equipped with MDT connector 310. Midplane 300 is coupled to DEB 105, which is in turn coupled to other devices within blade server 100 (e.g. blades 110A through 110K). Midplane 300 thus enables the devices within DEB 105 to be communicatively connected with each other and/or blades 110A through 110K.
In one embodiment, electrical output signals, including, but not limited to, battery backup power and I2C interfaces, are produced by BBU tray 200 and combined with output signals sent from one or more of MDTs 120A through 120H via a multiplex (MUX) operation. After the MUX operation, the output signals may be transmitted to controller card 115 and/or controller card 125 via midplane 300. In an alternate embodiment, BBU tray 200 generates unique output signals that are sent to controller card 115 and/or controller card 125 separately from the output signals of MDTs 120A through 120H.
Turning now to
At block 410, a determination is made whether the queried slot contains BBU tray 200. If the queried slot contains, BBU tray 200, controller card 115 manages the queried slot as a BBU during future interactions with the queried slot, as depicted at block 415. If the queried slot does not contain BBU tray 200, controller card 115 manages the queried slot as a MDT during future interactions with the queried slot, as depicted at block 420.
A determination is made at block 425 whether all MDT slots within DEB 105 have been queried. If all MDT slots within DEB 105 have not been queried, controller card 115 returns to block 405, where the next MDT slot is queried. In response to a determination by controller card 115 that all MDT slots within DEB 105 have been queried, the process terminates at block 430. The present invention thus allows BBU tray 200 to be interchangeable with MDT tray 120 within DEB 105.
It is understood that the use herein of specific names are for example only and not meant to imply any limitations on the invention. The invention may thus be implemented with different nomenclature/terminology and associated functionality utilized to describe the above devices/utility, etc., without limitation.
The present invention thus provides a method of allowing MDT 120 to be interchangeable with BBU tray 200 within DEB 105. In one embodiment, the method includes, but is not limited to, the steps of: querying each MDT slot, from among a plurality of MDT slots within DEB 105, to determine if a queried MDT slot contains BBU tray 200; managing the queried MDT slot as a BBU during future interactions with the BBU if the queried MDT slot contains BBU tray 200; and managing the queried MDT slot as MDT 120 during future interactions with MDT 120 if the queried MDT slot contains MDT 120.
While an illustrative embodiment of the present invention has been described in the context of a fully functional computer system with installed software, those skilled in the art will appreciate that the software aspects of an illustrative embodiment of the present invention are capable of being distributed as a program product in a variety of forms, and that an illustrative embodiment of the present invention applies equally regardless of the particular type of signal bearing media used to actually carry out the distribution. Examples of signal bearing media include recordable type media such as thumb drives, floppy disks, hard drives, CD ROMs, DVDs, and transmission type media such as digital and analog communication links.
While the invention has been particularly shown and described with reference to a preferred embodiment, it will be understood by those skilled in the art that various changes in form and detail may be made therein without departing from the spirit and scope of the invention.
