I've been running a G1610 for some years and (aside from my first one that died for no obvious reason and it was cheaper to replace than to purchase support!) it's been great, but I think my needs have outgrown it - So I've got my hands on a G8 DL360e, 1U, LFF.
I'm somewhat new to the world of servers so please bear with me while I ask what I assume are some basic questions with pretty obvious answers.
The server comes with the B120i controller, but after some conversations with people who know far more about this stuff, I've been given to believe that if I can upgrade to one of the smart array controllers (presumably a p420i) then I'll see a significant boost in performance.
I've tried to find out a bit more about all this, but there seems to be little information for the beginner, so given that I have 4 x 6TB SATA drives, and my aim is to keep this as low cost as possible, I'd like to know:
1) Will there genuinely be a noticeable increase in performance that would warrant the extra expenditure? (I accept this is relative, but some insight would be helpful)
2) Which card should I be looking for? I've read the 420i is the one, though I originally got hold of a very cheap 400i which physically won't fit in the server due to the position of the SAS ports.
3) I note that Mezzanine cards appear cheaper, but from what I can tell they won't fit in the DL360e - am I correct in this assumption?
4) Will I need to get an FBWC module separately, or can the card work without one?
5) Is it possible to build a RAID 10 array using the B120 controller, and then migrate to a p420i at a later date without losing data?
Thanks in advance for any help.