Patent ID: 8190818
Filing Date: 2012-05-29
Classification: G06F

Abstract:
1. A storage system comprising: a plurality of host ports adaptive to receive commands from a host computer; a plurality of first ports each adaptive to attach either a Serial Attached Small Computer System Interface (SAS) drive or a Serial Advanced Technology Attachment (SATA) drive, and adaptive to communicate using a Serial SCSI Protocol, a Serial Management Protocol, and a Serial ATA Tunneled Protocol; a processor and a memory; and a second port to communicate with a user interface program; wherein the storage system is configured to execute a discover process to determine whether an attached drive for each of said plurality of first ports is either a SAS drive or a SATA drive, and to select an appropriate protocol from the Serial SCSI Protocol and the Serial ATA Tunneled Protocol depending on a kind of the attached drive and to send a request to the attached drive using the selected protocol in response to a request received from the second port, where the request sent to the attached drive is to retrieve information of the attached drive, the information including capacity, serial number, and status of the attached drive; wherein the storage system sends, to the user interface program, information retrieved of the attached drive; wherein the storage system is enclosed in a chassis; wherein the user interface program displays the status of the attached drive for each of said plurality of first ports in a layout corresponding to a position of the attached drive in the chassis of the storage system; and wherein when a user clicks a corresponding position to specify one of the attached drives in a window on a monitor, the user interface program displays the information of the corresponding attached drive in another window.