The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Oct. 13, 1998
Filed:
Oct. 27, 1995
Donald R Humlicek, Wichita, KS (US);
John R Kloeppner, Hesston, KS (US);
Grover G Phillips, Andover, KS (US);
Curtis W Rink, Wichita, KS (US);
Symbios, Inc., Fort Collins, CO (US);
Abstract
Methods and associated apparatus operable in a RAID subsystem to improve the speed and flexibility of initializing the subsystem by storing configuration and identification information in a reserved area on each disk drive in the subsystem. The reserved area on each disk drive of the disk array contains a unique identifier to identify the particular disk drive from all others and further contains group configuration information regarding all groups in which the particular disk drive is a member. The configuration and identification information is generated and written to each disk drive in the disk array when the particular disk drive is configured so as to be added or deleted from groups of the subsystem. Upon subsystem reset (e.g. power on reset or other reset operations), the RAID controller in the subsystem determines the proper configuration of the RAID groups despite temporary unavailability or physical relocation of one or more disk drives in the disk array. In addition, entire groups of disk drives may be moved from one subsystem to another and automatically recognized by the new controller when the controller is reset.