HPE MSA 1050

18 Installing the enclosures
Connecting the MSA 1050 controller to the LFF or SFF drive enclosure
The MSA 2050 LFF Disk Enclosure and the MSA 2050 SFF Disk Enclosure can be attached to an MSA 1050 controller
enclosure using supported mini-SAS to mini-SAS cables of 0.5 m (1.64') to 2 m (6.56') length [see Figure 10 (page 20)].
Each drive enclosure provides two 0.5 m (1.64') mini-SAS to mini-SAS cables. Longer cables may be desired or required,
and can be purchased separately.
Cable requirements for MSA 1050 enclosures
IMPORTANT:
• When installing SAS cables to expansion modules, use only supported mini-SAS x4 cables with SFF-8088 connectors
supporting your 6 Gb application.
• See the QuickSpecs for information about which cables are provided with your MSA 1050 products.
https://www.hpe.com/support/MSA1050QuickSpecs
(If a website location has changed, an Internet search for “HPE MSA 1050 quickspecs” will provide a link.)
• The maximum expansion cable length allowed in any configuration is 2 m (6.56').
• When adding more than two drive enclosures, you may need to purchase additional 1 m or 2 m cables, depending
upon number of enclosures and cabling method used (see QuickSpecs for supported cables):
 Spanning 3 or 4 drive enclosures requires 1 m (3.28') cables.
• See the QuickSpecs (link provided above) regarding information about cables supported for host connection:
 Qualified Fibre Channel cable options
 Qualified 10GbE iSCSI cable options or qualified 10GbE Direct Attach Copper (DAC) cables
 Qualified 1 Gb RJ-45 cable options
 Qualified HD mini-SAS standard cable and fan-out cable options supporting SFF-8644 and SFF-8088 host
connection [also see “12 Gb SAS protocol” (page 25)]:
– SFF-8644 to SFF-8644 cable option is used for connecting to a 12 Gb/s enabled host.
– SFF-8644 to SFF-8088 cable option is used for connecting to a 6 Gb/s enabled host/switch.
– A bifurcated SFF-8644 to SFF-8644 fan-out cable option is used for connecting to a 12Gb/s enabled host.
– A bifurcated SFF-8644 to SFF-8088 fan-out cable option is used for connecting to a 6Gb/s enabled
host/switch.
NOTE: Using fan-out cables instead of standard cables will double the number of hosts that can be attached to
a single system. Use of fan-out cables will halve the maximum bandwidth available to each host, but overall
bandwidth available to all hosts is unchanged.
See SAS fan-out cable option for more information about bifurcated SAS cables.
For additional information concerning cabling of MSA 1050 controllers, visit:
https://www.hpe.com/support/MSA1050QuickSpecs
https://www.hpe.com/support/MSA1050BestPractices
Browse for the following reference documents:
• HPE MSA 1050 Cable Configuration Guide
• HPE MSA Remote Snap technical white paper: MSA Remote Snap Software