The ARC-4036 8-Bay 6 Gbps SAS Tower JBOD Enclosure from Areca provides a compact external storage chassis capable of accommodating up to eight 6 Gbps Serial-Attached SCSI (SAS) or Serial ATA (SATA) drives. The SAS expander module is based on the LSI 28-port LSISAS2x28 expander IC, SAS-2 chip which features 28 x 6 Gbps ports and 6G/3G multiplexing, SAS 2.0 zoning, self-configuration, table-to-table routing and an integrated PPC processor for SES-2 and enclosure management support.
The compact tower enclosure connects to the host system through two 4-lane SAS connectors (host in) and two 4-lane SAS connectors (exp. out) to the next SAS-to-SAS JBOD enclosure. It is used to enhance the ARC-8040 RAID Subsystem by allowing support for more than 8 internal hard disk drives. Configuration and environmental information are accessible either via in-band (SES-2 over SMP) or out-of-band serial port.SAS for Maximum Scalability
SAS 2.0 is designed for backwards compatibility with SAS 1.0 and delivers a data transfer rate of 6 Gbps per physical link. The SAS 2.0 interface supports both 6 Gbps SAS 2.0 disk drives for data-intensive applications and 6 Gbps SATA drives for low-cost bulk storage of reference data. Applications can be optimized for cost/performance through the use of both SAS and SATA drive types. The enclosure includes 8 internal and 16 external 6 Gbps SAS ports connection for host and easy expansion. High-performance architecture sets new boundaries of industry performance expectations - 6 Gbps SAS (600 MBps bandwidth per physical link) 3 Gbps SATA (300 MBps bandwidth per physical link).
Easy Management
The expander box contains an embedded expander manager that can access via in-band SES-2 over SMP protocol and out-of band RS-232 port. An out-of-band serial port is available for managing the configuration and monitoring the expander. The expander firmware and EPLD have implemented the SES-2 protocol and disk activity map to the individual fault/activity status indicator on the backplanes. Furthermore, it has implemented autonomous chassis management of power supply status connectors and two fan monitor/speed control connectors through the SES-2 protocol. In data center environments, identifying issues with drives and environments are crucial. The hardware monitor can check system voltage and temperature. The warning message will be shown in alarm buzzer and the respective LED.
Maximum Interoperability
Areca presents its high performance and high reliability 6 Gbps SAS expander module for a cost-effective and enterprise-class JBOD storage enclosure. A 6 Gbps SAS expander module literally expands the number of end devices that you can connect together. Expander devices, typically embedded into an expander module to connect system backplane, support large configurations of SAS end devices, including SAS host/RAID adapters and SAS and SATA disk drives. The SAS protocol defines a mechanism that has been implemented in the SAS expanders to guarantee fair access between drives in a domain. The enclosure is ideal for 6 Gbps SAS storage systems with external interfaces and provides the benefits of increased storage capacity. The type and total amount of drives you use are based on the host interface in the server that the JBOD is connected to. Host-based RAID configuration is supported via an external SAS/Fibre/iSCSI/PCIe 2.0 to 6 Gbps SAS RAID controllers, external series 6 Gbps SAS RAID and SAS host adapters.