Drive message router

• US 10,061,736 B2
• Filed: 04/10/2015
• Issued: 08/28/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 04/11/2014
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Spectra Logic Corporation
• Original Assignee: Spectra Logic Corporation
• Inventors: Fatzer, David John, Ninesling, Matthew John, Starr, Matthew Thomas
• Primary Examiner(s): Tsai, Henry
• Assistant Examiner(s): Phan, Dean
• Application Number:
  US14/684,105
• Publication Number:
  US 20150293878A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,236 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 13/4068 Electrical coupling
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 13/4234 being a memory bus
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 13/4286 using a handshaking protocol, e.g. RS232C link
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0658 Controller construction arrangements
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 3/0689 Disk arrays, e.g. RAID, JBOD

Abstract

Embodiments described are generally directed to a mass storage unit possessing a plurality of non-volatile data storage devices each possessing non-transitory mass storage memory hardware, a drive message router possessing with a plurality of different light sequence instructions retained therein, a motherboard that is connected to each of the non-volatile data storage devices and the drive message router via a bus that is adapted to transfer data via a data storage protocol arranged for mass data storage, a bezel electrically connected to the drive message router via an electrical cable that is adapted to transfer signals in a non-data storage protocol, a plurality of lights visibly disposed on the bezel. The drive message router is adapted to receive a data packet in the data storage protocol from the motherboard via the bus. Once received, an execution instruction is extracted from the message to carry out a subset of the light sequence instructions in a particular order. A sequence of electrical signals is transmitted from the drive message router to the plurality of lights based on the subset of the light instructions via the electrical cable. The plurality of lights are illuminated as dictated in the sequence of electrical signals.

Claims

1. A multi-drive non-transient storage unit (mass storage unit) comprising:

a plurality of disk drives each possessing at least one magnetic disk and a disk drive connector;

a drive message router possessing the disk drive connector, a controller, and solid state storage, the drive message router does not possess a magnetic disk;

a motherboard that is connected to each of the disk drives and the drive message router via the disk drive connectors, wherein the motherboard is adapted to communicate to each of the disk drives and the drive message router via either a SATA or SAS protocol, the drive message router is seen as a disk drive by the motherboard;

a bezel electrically connected to the drive message router via a bus that is adapted to transfer data in a SATA or SAS protocol;

a plurality of lights visibly disposed on the bezel;

a plurality of different light sequence instructions retained in the solid state memory, wherein each of the light sequence instructions instructs the plurality of lights to illuminate in a different pattern; and

a data packet retained in the solid state storage wherein the data packet includes a message to execute a subset of the plurality of different light sequence instructions, the data packet originating from the motherboard, based on the message to execute the controller adapted to control illumination of the plurality of lights in the subset of the plurality of different light sequence instructions via the SATA or SAS protocol.

2. The multi-drive non-transient storage of claim 1 wherein the plurality of different light sequence instructions include a first light sequence instruction and a second light sequence instruction, the first and the second light sequence instructions are each no larger in capacity than a single drive sector, the drive message router adapted to receive only one of the first light sequence instruction or the second light sequence instruction at a time.

3. The multi-drive non-transient storage of claim 2 wherein the single sector is 512 bytes.

4. The multi-drive non-transient storage of claim 1 wherein the data packet is triggered to be sent based on a communication status of one of the plurality of disk drives.

5. The multi-drive non-transient storage of claim 1 wherein the drive message router possesses at least length and width dimensions that are the same for factor as the disk drives.

6. The multi-drive non-transient storage of claim 1 wherein the data packet is configured to be stored on one of the disks in one of the disk drives.

7. A method comprising:

providing a mass storage unit possessing a plurality of disk drives each possessing at least one magnetic disk and either a disk drive SATA or SAS connector, a drive message router equipped with the SATA or SAS connector possessing a plurality of different light sequence instructions retained in non-transitory solid state memory, the drive message router does not possess a magnetic disk, a motherboard that is connected to each of the disk drives and the drive message router via a bus that is only adapted to transfer data via a SATA or SAS storage protocol, a bezel electrically connected to the drive message router via an electrical cable that is adapted to transfer data in a SATA or SAS protocol, a plurality of lights visibly disposed on the bezel;

transferring a data packet from the motherboard to the drive message router via the disk drive storage protocol over the bus;

extracting an execution instruction from the data packet to execute a subset of the light sequence instructions in a particular order;

retrieving the subset of the light instructions from the non-transitory solid state memory;

transmitting a sequence of electrical signals from the drive message router to the plurality of lights based on the subset of the light instructions via the electrical cable; and

illuminating the plurality of lights as dictated in the sequence of electrical signals.

8. The method of claim 7 wherein the drive message router possesses a controller that is adapted to execute the extracting step, the retrieving step, and the transmitting step.

9. The method of claim 7 further comprising prompting the motherboard to transfer the data packet after the motherboard receives a status update from one of the disk drives.

10. The method of claim 9 wherein the status update includes a problem.

11. The method of claim 7 wherein the drive message router is only capable of receiving the data packet if it is 512 bytes or less.

12. The method of claim 11 wherein the 512 bytes is the size of one disk drive sector.

13. The method of claim 7 further comprising initializing the drive message router by sending the drive message router the plurality of different light sequence instructions one at a time.

14. The method of claim 13 wherein each of the plurality of different light sequence instructions are no larger than that which can be stored on a single sector of a disk drive.

15. The method of claim 7 further comprising repeating the transmitting step of the sequence of electrical signals in a continuous loop from the drive message router to the plurality of lights until a different data packet from the motherboard is received by the drive message router via the bus.

16. The method of claim 7 wherein the drive message router is essentially the same form factor as one of the disk drives.

17. The method of claim 7 wherein the drive message router is seen as a disk drive by the motherboard and the data packet is sent to the drive message router for storage in at least one disk drive sector.

18. A method comprising:

providing a mass storage unit possessing a plurality of non-volatile data storage devices each possessing non-transitory mass storage memory hardware and SATA connector, a drive message router with the SATA connector possessing a plurality of different light sequence instructions retained therein, a motherboard that is connected to each of the non-volatile data storage devices and the drive message router via a bus that is adapted to transfer data via SATA protocol, a bezel electrically connected to the drive message router via an electrical cable that is adapted to transfer signals in a non-SATA protocol, a plurality of lights visibly disposed on the bezel;

a) the drive message router receiving a data packet in the SATA protocol from the motherboard via the bus;

b) extracting an execution instruction from the message to carry out a subset of the light sequence instructions in a particular order;

c) transmitting a sequence of electrical signals from the drive message router to the plurality of lights based on the subset of the light instructions via the electrical cable; and

d) illuminating the plurality of lights as dictated in the sequence of electrical signals.

19. The method of claim 18 where the drive message router possesses a non-transitory solid state memory wherein the plurality of different light sequence instructions are retained and retrieving the subset of the light sequence instructions from the non-transitory solid state memory.

20. The method of claim 18 wherein the non-volatile data storage devices are either solid state drives possessing mass storage solid state memory or disk drives possessing mass storage magnetic disk memory, the drive message router possesses neither the mass storage solid state memory nor the mass storage magnetic disk memory.