Dell PowerEdge 1950 - Maximum SATA HDD size?

[xera]

Hi all,

I have a PowerEdge 1950 from work, and need to set it up as a testing server.
http://www.dell.com/us/dfb/p/poweredge-1950/pd#TechSpec

Basically, I would like to get 1x 2TB 3.5" WD Black 7200RPM SATA HDD and install it in there. Will this work?

Long story.. :erm:
It currently doesn't have enough space - the current SAS drive is 73GB, so I want to get 1-2TB for it.
Accorrding to the Dell specs, it can only support 1.5TB (2x 750GB SATAu)
Is this "support" list due to big HDD's not being available at the time, and will it work with larger drives?
What is SATAu, will normal SATA drives be compatible with this?

I am wanting to put some WD Black's in there, but they don't come in the 750GB size.
I currently only have one HDD 3.5" mount in there, so would prefer to get 1x 2TB drive, other wise I need to get a mount - does anybody know where I could source one of these?

Has anybody got any idea if this will work? Or what else would you recommend?

Here's what I found so far:
http://en.community.dell.com/support-forums/servers/f/906/p/19490717/20295985.aspx

 

[sajunky]

Accorrding to the Dell specs, it can only support 1.5TB (2x 750GB SATAu)
Is this "support" list due to big HDD's not being available at the time, and will it work with larger drives?
What is SATAu, will normal SATA drives be compatible with this?

They usually give specs for currently manufactured drive sizes, it is normal. Expect BIOS boot limitation 2GB, it will not boot from larger drives, but you can try bigger drives as non-bootable drives. For drives with non-512KB sector size normal procedure applies (partition aligment&jumpers) - for performance reason.

I can't comment on SATAu, it is something to do with using SATA drives on SAS controllers, probably cabling or special caddy.

 

[xera]

They usually give specs for currently manufactured drive sizes, it is normal. Expect BIOS boot limitation 2GB, it will not boot from larger drives, but you can try bigger drives as non-bootable drives. For drives with non-512KB sector size normal procedure applies (partition aligment&jumpers) - for performance reason.

I can't comment on SATAu, it is something to do with using SATA drives on SAS controllers, probably cabling or special caddy.

Thanks for reply.

Do you mean boot limit of 2TB?

 

[TheGuy]

I could be wrong but just check if other drives will be recognised by the server. I have a feeling you will have to buy Dell specific drives.

 

[TheGuy]

Thanks for reply.

Do you mean boot limit of 2TB?

The server needs to support booting through GPT disks to have a partition bigger than 2TB. What I have done in the past is to just create 2 Virtual disks 1 100GB disk for Boot partition and the rest for data drive.

 

[xera]

I could be wrong but just check if other drives will be recognised by the server. I have a feeling you will have to buy Dell specific drives.

I hope not.