SUMMARY: Ultra60 support for large hard drives

Thanks to Mike (mikelist@sky.net) and Jay Lessert (jayl@accelerant.net) for
the quick replies. Original question and a concise answer from Jay are
below. Agree with Jay on the 'driver' quote which is why I decided to post
to the list.

joe


> Ultra-60, (2) 450 UltraSPARC III procs, 2GB RAM, (2) 36GB internal drives
> running Solaris 8 10/01.
>
> The user would like to replace one of the internal 36GB drives with an
80GB
> (unknown brand). Checked with Sun and they reported that they did not
> provide drivers that would allow this. Anyone out there successfully
running
> a similar configuration or can verify that it's impossible?

No such thing as an 80GB SCSI drive that *I've* ever heard of, so I
hope you don't have a clueless luser that wants to drop an 80GB IDE
drive into U60.

If it's a 73.xGB, SCA 3.5" drive (those *do* exist), then it will work
just fine, assuming the power consumption is no more than 20-30%
greater than the factory drive it replaces.  I've done that in a
previous job, a ST173404LC, I think.

Not supported, of course.  If it breaks, it's up to you and the company
who sold you the drive to fix it.  But if it's a good drive, it'll
work.

The "did not provide drivers" comment is bizarre.  Unlike IDE, the
arbitrary size limits for SCSI are way up over 1TB.  Or else an A1000
(to pick a common example) with single SCSI interface and stuffed with
12x36GB drives wouldn't work very well, would it?  Either your Sun
contact totally misunderstood what you wanted, or they're a moron, or
they thought you're a moron.  :-)

By the way, don't even think about putting that drive in your U60
unless you know *exactly* what the drive is, where it came from, you've
got the datasheet on hand, etc.

--
Jay Lessert                               jay_lessert@accelerant.net
Accelerant Networks Inc.                       (voice)1.503.439.3461
Beaverton OR, USA                                (fax)1.503.466-9472