Patent ID: 7353321

Claim:
A storage shelf that contains a number of data-storage devices interconnected to a communications medium, the storage shelf including: a first storage-shelf-router integrated circuit and a last storage-shelf-router integrated circuit, each storage-shelf router integrated circuit including a first communications-medium port, a second communications-medium port, one or more processors, a number of disk-drive-link-port components that transmit data and commands to the number of data-storage devices through disk-drive links, and routing logic for routing commands received through the first and second communications-medium ports to the one or more processors and for routing data received through the two or more communications-medium ports to the number of data-storage-device-link-port components; and a number of path controller cards, each path controller card receiving data and commands transmitted through disk-drive links from the number of data-storage-device-link-port components of one of the two storage-shelf-router integrated circuits, and, following a failure of a disk-drive link or data-storage-device-link port, receiving data and commands transmitted from one or more of the number of data-storage-device-link-port components of the other of the storage-shelf-router integrated circuits, and transmitting the received data and commands to a data-storage device.