DRIVE SERIES SPECIFICATIONS
Description
Micropolis Raidion LS Modular Desktop Storage Enclosure for 5.25-Inch full-height
Winchester Hard-Disk Drives.
The Micropolis
Raidion™ series of storage enclosures consists of modular bricks of high transfer
rate digital storage systems, intercoupled multiple digital storage units. The systems can be scaled from smaller stackable desktop or
deskside units, which is a common configuration for the "Raidion LS", or 7-units tall towers more suitable for datacenter use. The Raidion
SCSI array lineup was introduced in mid 1991.
Each storage module houses a single SCSI drive, its own power supply and a fan. Over multiple "towers" up to 28 modules can be put into an
array. As each modules has its own PSU, the array has higher redundancy but failing drives are not per-se hot-pluggable, as early JBOD LS
systems were often daisy-chained and the bus has to be shut down to fix a drive from the array.
To customers the system was sometimes marketed as "Speedstack" due to the ease of how modules could be added. Early Systems that were shipped
before the "Raidion" product name was established carry the name "MicroDisk LS" on the top lid. The larger 5.25" system was Micropolis' first
step into the modular storage array space. The Raidion LS system, being only a JBOD enclosure, was usually configured as a software RAID via
Micropolis' own RAIDWARE™, a custom Novell NetWare 3.1x disk driver that implements RAID levels (only 0 and 5) with the disks connected
to a computer system via a SCSI host adapter, like an Adaptec 1502/1505 or 1540 card. Due to how the RAIDWARE software was designed, early versions
could only accomodate for Micropolis-built hard-drives - a later software patch removed this limitation. If the software patch can't be applied,
it is possible to make drives like the Micropolis 4221, 1991 and similar drives compatible via patching the drives' EEPROM.
Common compatible SCSI controllers:
Adaptec AHA-1540 (ISA)
Adaptec AHA-1640 (PS/2 Microchannel)
Adaptec AHA-1740 (EISA)
Adaptec AHA-2740 (EISA)
Modules and Components
- RM 2100 - 2100MB capacity, 5.25-inch form-factor
Array module, part-no AR1926-01-9, (RM 2100 for "Raidion Module of 2100MB") for full-height 5.25" Micropolis 1926 and third-party SCSI2 drives
- RM 3020 - 3020MB capacity, 5.25-inch form-factor
Array module, part-no AR1936-01-8, (RM 2100 for "Raidion Module of 3020MB") for full-height 5.25" Micropolis 1936 and third-party SCSI2 drives
- LS 0010 - LS Base Plate
- LS 0020 - LS Top Cover
- LS 0030 - LS Drive Module Bezel
- 200013-01-9 - 50-pin SCSI cable with one 90deg angled special conector
A common product bundle from the lineup of 5.25" Raidion towers were a set of three RM2100 modules, labeled the
Raidion LS 4200 for 4.20GB of RAID capacity, and the
Raidion LS 6040 consisting of three RM3020 modules for a total of 6.04GB of redundant storage capacity.
Downloads