Chapter 4. IBM System x3690 X5 1454.9 StorageThe x3690 X5 has internal capacity of up to sixteen 2.5-inch drives, as shown in Figure 4-20.The server supports 2.5-inch disk drives or solid-state drives (SSDs), or 1.8-inch SSDs.Figure 4-20 Front of the x3690 X5 with sixteen 2.5-inch drive baysThis section covers the following topics: 4.9.1, “2.5-inch SAS drive support” on page 145 4.9.2, “IBM eXFlash and SSD disk support” on page 149 4.9.3, “SAS and SSD controller summary” on page 152 4.9.4, “Battery backup placement” on page 155 4.9.5, “ServeRAID Expansion Adapter” on page 157 4.9.6, “Drive combinations” on page 158 4.9.7, “External SAS storage” on page 162 4.9.8, “Optical drives” on page 163See the IBM ServerProven website for the latest supported options:http://www.ibm.com/systems/info/x86servers/serverproven/compat/us/4.9.1 2.5-inch SAS drive supportThe server supports up to sixteen 2.5-inch disk drives. These drives are connected to theserver using hot-swap backplanes, either four-drive backplanes or eight-drive backplanes or acombination of the two.BackplanesMost standard models of the x3690 X5 include one SAS backplane supporting four 2.5-inchSAS disks, as listed in 4.3, “Models” on page 124. Additional backplanes can be added toincrease the supported number of SAS disks to 16 (using part number 60Y0338 for a 8xbackplane and part number 60Y0369 for a 4x backplane). The database model 7148-3Dx hastwo IBM eXFlash 8x 1.8-inch HS SAS SSD backplanes as standard. See 4.3, “Models” onpage 124 for details. The standard backplanes are installed in the leftmost sections.Table 4-17 on page 146 lists the backplane options. These backplanes support both SAS andSSD 2.5-inch drives. The specific combinations of the backplanes that are supported arelisted in 4.9.6, “Drive combinations” on page 158.
