Dell PowerEdge 2950 PERC 6/i not recognising any drives

Question

I've just recieved a second hand PowerEdge 2950 with a PERC 6/i raid controller and the sata disks that used to be in the machine. However when I power up the machine the controler will not see the physical disks at all. (ie, in the configutil, no PD's are shown.)

They are definetly connected as the drive's green power lights flash briefly at startup.

These drives used to be connected to this or a simular machine, and I read somewhere that this could be because they have some configuration already written. (This of course could be massive red herring, as the drives don't seem to have power or are being accessed.)

Another consideration is that only one of the power supplies is plugged in, though I'd have thought that wouldn't make a difference.

I've tried setting the SATA options in the bios from OFF (as it was when it arrived) to AUTO, but I suspect that this setting doesn't apply to the PERC 6/i drives.

Any suggestions?

Answer 1

1.) Do you see the PERC6 BIOS loading during POST? Can you start its configuration and confirm it's fully enabled, etc?

2.) One of the slots in the back of the machine actually overlaps the PERC's slot in front. Do you have another HBA or controller installed? Even if it seems innocuous, it can cause the PERC to not be recognized.