Supermicro SC846 Backplane Options

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TXAG26

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I'm looking into a Supermicro SC846 series 24-bay case for a project involving SSD's and had a question about the backplane options. I see two different SFF-8087 Mini SAS connector backplanes:

SAS846EL1 and SAS846EL2.

From what I can tell, The EL1 has a single built-in LSI expander that is fed by a single SFF-8087 port (x4 6gb/s ports). On then EL2, there appears to be two separate expanders, each with their own SFF-8087 input.

My question is, can I feed both of the SFF-8087 connectors on the EL2 version from one 8-port HBA, like the LSI 2308, in order to essentially throw 48gb/s of bandwidth at the backplane (vs being limited to 24gb/s with the EL1 version).

I known the EL2 can provide multi-path support for enterprise SAS drives using two separate HBA's for fail-over purposes. Just trying to figure out if more bandwidth can be thrown at the backplane by using one HBA card that is hooked up to both expander chips.
 

jamiejunk

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From what I recall the 2nd port is only for expansion or failover. The way you want it to work would mean each port would only control X number on the backplane essentially splitting the backplane...

With that said I have seen backplanes with like 4 connectors and each one of those controlled X number of drives.
Maybe don't listen to me haha.. Supermicro usually has a PDF just for the backplane with good information in them.
 

jamiejunk

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You might try emailing support@supermicro.com. I had this same question come up today and looked at the manual. Of course the manual didn't specify. So I emailed. Turns out the backplane I'm using on one of my servers it is indeed X ports control X number of drives. Check out the png they sent me. Granted, this isn't the same backplane you have.
tA7Gtou.png
 
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