Anyone ever tried moving an S3260-M4 array ctrlr to M5 server module

[derek.small]

We have an older S3260-M4 server.  I would like to upgrade it with an M5 server module, but does anyone know if you can remove the array controller from the old M4 server and install it directly onto the M5 server module.  We have about 128TB of storage in this 3260 and I would hate to lose it all if we just installed an M5 without the current array controller/config.

I found the following doc, Upgrading to Cisco UCS S3260 System With S3260 M5 Server Nodes - Cisco

This does seem to address this specific upgrade, and although I don't understand why we have to replace/wipe the SSDs, I'm not really concerned with having to wipe the boot disks and reinstall the OS.  But we have a years worth of backups on the internal drives that I would hate to lose if we can avoid it.

This document does not talk about moving the array controller to the new M5 server, but it also doesn't say you can't.

[Kirk J]

Was trying to review the older M4 vs M5 service guides to see if the M5's controller slot was going to house the older M4s controller (definitely have different PIDs and RAID chipsets).

I am highly doubtful you can forklift the M4 controller onto the M5 server (which had a dual Raid controller config).

You are more likely going to need to have a M5 server (and it's matching raid controller Ucs-s3260-draid).  Then confirm your chassis's disk zoning policy for the M5 controller are matched back to the same disk slots that your M4 controller were.  Most of the time similar raid controller's will import raid sets by reading in the metadata off the drives and detecting the logical virtual drive config (i.e. raid 5,6,10, etc).  See https://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/td/docs/unified_computing/ucs/s/hw/C3X60M4/install/C3X60M4.html#99780

Do you have the M5 compatible raid controller available?

Kirk...