Firmware on the storage controller (RAID or HBA) must be verified for compatibility with the current Cisco IMC and BIOS versions that are installed on the server. If not compatible, upgrade or downgrade the storage controller firmware using the Cisco Host Upgrade Utility (HUU) for your firmware release to bring it to a compatible level.

See the HUU guide for your Cisco IMC release for instructions on downloading and using the utility to bring server components to compatible levels: HUU Guides.

Note

For servers running in standalone mode only: After you replace controller hardware, you must run the Cisco Host Upgrade Utility (HUU) to update the controller firmware, even if the firmware Current Version is the same as the Update Version. This is necessary to program the controller's suboem-id to the correct value for the server SKU. If you do not do this, drive enumeration might not display correctly in the software. This issue does not affect servers controlled in UCSM mode.

This server supports installation of one Supercap unit (UCS-SCAP-D). The unit mounts to a bracket in-line with the fan modules and attaches through the Supercap cable (CBL-SCAP-C220-D).

The optional SCPM provides approximately three years of backup for the disk write-back cache DRAM in the case of a sudden power loss.

For Supercap unit replacement instructions, see Replacing the Supercap (RAID Backup).

For this server, the default write-cache policy for the Cisco Modular RAID controller is Write Through (irrespective of the presence of a charged SuperCap or “good BBU”). This utilizes the optimal performance characteristics of the controller.

The write policy can be set to Write Back, if preferred. You can set the write policy using the following methods:

• For standalone servers, use the Cisco IMC interface to set Virtual Drive Properties > Write Policy. See the “Managing Storage Adapters” section in your Cisco IMC Configuration Guide.

  Cisco IMC GUI and CLI Configuration Guides

• For Cisco UCS-integrated servers, use the Cisco UCS Manager interface to set the write-cache policy as part of virtual drive configuration in your storage profile.

  Cisco UCS Manager Configuration Guides

• Use the LSI Option ROM Configuration Utility.

For the best performance follow these guidelines:

• Use either all SAS, all SATA or all U.3 NVMe drives in a RAID group.

• Use the same capacity for each drive in the RAID group.

• Never mix HDDs and SSDs in the same RAID group.

This section describes cabling connections for the storage controllers and the backplane. The SAS/SATA cables are factory-installed and are used for all supported internal controllers in the UCSC-C220-M8S server.

This section also contains diagrams that show the cable-to-drive mapping.

Note	The UCSC-C220-M8E3S supports direct-attached EDSFF E3.S1T NVMe drives only, and so does not use storage controllers. This UCSC-C220-M8E3S server comes with a PCIe cable that directly connects the drives with the motherboard.