Patent ID: 8880817

Claim:
A storage subsystem backplane management system, comprising: a storage controller; a service processor; a first backplane including a first management controller that is coupled to the storage controller and the service processor, wherein the first backplane is configured to couple a plurality of first mass storage drives to the first management controller; and a second backplane including a second management controller that is coupled to the first management controller, wherein the second backplane is configured to couple a plurality of second mass storage drives to the second management controller; wherein the first management controller is configured to: create a virtual management controller and at least one virtual management engine; use the virtual management controller to present the storage controller and the service processor a virtual backplane that appears to the storage controller and the service processor as a single, physical backplane including each of the plurality of first mass storage drives and each of the plurality of second mass storage drives when the plurality of first mass storage drives are coupled to the first management controller and the plurality of second mass storage drives are coupled to the second management controller; communicate with the second management controller using the at least one virtual management engine such that drive management communications from at least one of the storage controller and the service processor to one of the plurality of second mass storage drives appear to the second management controller to be coming from the at least one of the storage controller and the service processor and are used by the second management controller to manage the one of the plurality of second mass storage drives to provide at least one of drive presence monitoring, drive Light Emitting Device (LED) control, and drive Field Replaceable Unit (FRU) information retrieval; and communicate with at least one of the storage controller and the service processor using the virtual management controller such that communications from the second management controller that are related to the management of the one of the plurality of second mass storage drives appear to the at least one of the storage controller and the service processor to be coming from the one of the plurality of second mass storage drives.