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Dell DR Series System Administrator Guide

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DR Series Hardware System — Expansion Shelf Cabling

The DR Series hardware system appliance is capable of supporting additional storage capacity by connecting Dell PowerVault MD1200 (DR4000, DR4100, DR6000) or Dell PowerVault MD1400 (DR4300e, DR4300, DR6300) data storage expansion shelf enclosures. The expansion shelf enclosure contains 12 physical disks that provide additional data storage capacity for a basic DR Series system. For the expansion unit limits and supported capacities, see the Dell DR Series System Interoperability Guide .

As an example, this section and the following figures, Figure 1 and Figure 2 display the recommended method for cabling between the DR Series system’s PERC controller card to the appropriate connectors on the rear of a Dell PowerVault MD1200 expansion shelf enclosure. This example applies to the DR4000, DR4100, and DR6000 systems. Note that for the DR4300e, DR4300, and DR6300, the MD1400 expansion shelf enclosure is used.

Make sure that the Dell PowerVault MD1200 front panel selector switch is set to its Unified mode (with the switch set to its “up” position, indicated by a single Volume icon). Figure 1 shows the SAS In ports on the Enclosure Management Module (EMM) on the rear of the Dell MD1200. Figure 2 shows the recommended redundant path cabling configuration, which includes cable connections from both PERC H800 connectors on the DR4000 system (or the PERC H810 on a DR4100/DR6000 system) to the two SAS In ports on the EMM rear chassis of the Dell PowerVault MD1200.

  • NOTE:

    For the DR4300e, DR4300, and DR6300, the MD1400 expansion shelf enclosure is used for data storage expansion. The MD1400 has 4 ports in each controller or EMM; and, Dell recommends using ports 1 and 2 on the MD1400.

If you plan on installing multiple expansion shelf enclosures, then the two SAS In ports on the rear chassis of the EMM on the additional enclosure are daisy-chained to the two SAS Out ports on the EMM rear chassis on the first enclosure. This is considered a redundant mode connection via the SAS In/Out connectors on the enclosures with the DR Series system appliance.

If you install multiple enclosures and cable them as described here, make sure to set the enclosure mode switch on the MD1200 front chassis to the top (unified mode) position. For more information, see Dell PowerVault MD1200 and MD1220 Storage Enclosures Hardware Owner's Manual at dell.com/support/home.
Figure 1. Dell PowerVault MD1200 Rear Chassis This figure shows the rear chassis of the EMM on the MD1200 enclosure, with the two SAS In and two SAS Out ports.
Figure 2. Unified Mode Daisy-Chained Redundant Path Dell PowerVault MD1200 Enclosures This figure shows the PERC H810 connector cable connections between a DR4100 system rear chassis to the first expansion enclosure, and the cable connections from the first expansion enclosure to the second one using the SAS In/Out ports.
Figure 3. SAS Port and Cable Connections (Dell PowerVault MD1200 EMM) This figure shows how an SAS cable connection is made to an SAS In/Out port: 1) SAS cable, and 2) cable pull-tab.
  1. SAS cable
  2. pull-tab

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