PMC-Sierra Assigned Patent

Standby disk spin up control
in disk array system using expander device

PMC-Sierra, Inc., Santa Clara, CA, has been assigned a patent (8,296,513) developed by Jun Liu, Shanghai, China, for a "standby disk spin up control in disk array system using expander device."

The abstract of the patent published by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office states: "A method and system are provided for controlling SAS/SATA disk spin up when a disk enters an inactive mode, such as standby mode, in a near line storage system. A routing table entry is modified for a selected HDD in an expander routing table to redirect and reroute to a spinup control virtual target any access requests intended for the selected HDD, in response to the selected HDD being in standby mode. In response to the selected HDD exiting standby mode, the routing table entry is modified to direct and route requests for access to the selected HDD back to the drive itself. A SAS expander device can control spin up for standby disk drives in a disk array. Alternatively, spin up control can be performed for disks in other power modes, such as idle, in a disk array."

The patent application was filed on Aug. 21, 2009 (12/545,114).