I want to inquire about listing NVMe devices under the IRST Driver.

[CJ_Chen]

How can I identify different NVMe devices for RAID configuration under the IRST Driver?
Currently, I can send deviceiocontrol CMD via IOCTL_SCSI_MINIPORT and open handles through SCSIx to search for corresponding Path IDs.
However, I am facing an issue where the handles opened from different SCSIx result in repeated search results for the same Path ID device.
Is there a filtering method to match the relationship between NVMe and Disk?

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen

Thank you for posting on the Intel️® communities. We would be more than glad to help you with your questions.

We will proceed to check the issue internally and post back soon with more details.

Best regards,

Jean O. 

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen,

We appreciate your patience.

To answer your question, it is important to mention that the ports that are handled by the different controllers according to the motherboard design, the RST driver just takes the one configured for RAID and can be identified by using Intel® Optane™ Memory and Storage Management app or depending on the motherboard manufacturer, on their BIOS.

Best regards,

Jean O. 

Intel Customer Support Technician

[CJ_Chen]

Hi Jean,
Thank you very much for your willingness to provide assistance.

Based on the document "563914-Intel® Rapid Storage Technology Private API Support: NVMe* Pass-through API, Firmware Download API and AER API", I am able to perform NVMe pass-through CMD transmission and reception. However, the document does not provide any information on how to identify the PathID.
Currently, I am using PathID 0-255 to execute NVMe Identify CMD operations and verifying the response. If the NVMe Identify CMD can respond, then the PathID is considered valid.
However, it is not possible to identify which system disk belongs to different combinations of RAID modes using different NVMe devices.

For example, if I have installed 4 NVMe devices in the platform, representing A/B/C/D respectively.
I expect to partition them as follows:
 System Disk 0 => NVMe A+NVMe B => use RAID0
 System Disk 1 => NVMe C => NonRAID
 System Disk 2 => NVMe D => NonRAID
I assume that the corresponding SCSI ports for each disk are:
 System Disk 0 => SCSI 0
 System Disk 1 => SCSI 1
 System Disk 2 => SCSI 2

When using the aforementioned PathID loop search, opening the deviceiocontrol handle using SCSI 0 will identify NVMe A/NVMe B/NVMe C/NVMe D with different PathIDs in the same system disk.
The desired outcome is for SCSI 0 to only recognize the PathIDs of NVMe A and B.
For SCSI 1 to only recognize the PathID of NVMe C.
For SCSI 2 to only recognize the PathID of NVMe D.

BRs,

CJ

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen,

Thank you for the information provided.

• We would like to further investigate your query; however, we would like to first ask for some system information:
• Are you working on a project? If so, what is the project about?
• To gather more system information, create a report using the Intel System Support Utility (Intel SSU):
  • Download the Intel SSU
  • Open the application and click "Scan" to see the system and device information. By default, Intel SSU will take you to the "Summary View."
  • Click on the menu where it says: "Summary" to change it to "Detailed View."
  • To save your scan: click "Next"; then "Save."

Best regards,

Jean O. 

Intel Customer Support Technician

[CJ_Chen]

Hi Jean,

Yes, we are dealing with the requirements for the project that some specific laptop manufacturers have such needs.
As our company is a supplier of SSD Controllers, So we need to help solve this kind of requirement from  SSD Module Makers.

The attachment contains information about our experimental PC.
Please help us with this issue.

Best regards.

CJ

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen,

Thank you for the information provided. 

We will look further into this scenario and post back soon with more details.

Best regards,

Jean O.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Jean_Intel]

Dear CJ_Chen,

Thank you for waiting patiently.

Please note that the Intel® RST Tool does not provide the specific details you are requesting. It only uses the information provided by the motherboard for RAID management purposes. Based on the images you shared, the tool displays the current RAID and available drives. However, the information you are seeking can only be obtained from the motherboard manufacturer.

Best regards,

Jean O.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[CJ_Chen]

Hi Jean,
I am a bit confused.

Are you saying that the RST Driver is unable to provide information on which NVMe devices under the same SCSI port can be used to create a RAID with the system disk?

What kind of information can the motherboard manufacturer provide in this regard?

Would this be controlled by the BIOS?

BRs,
CJ

[CJ_Chen]

Hi Jean,
It appears that Intel's Optane Memory and Storage Management can display the corresponding relationship properly.
Can you show me how to achieve the same identification method as this tool?

BRs,
CJ

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen,

Thanks for the information provided.

As the Intel® RST Tool indicates, it only provides information about the drives available and which drivers are part of the RAID array. However, the tool does not share information about what ports are connected to.

To determine the ports to which the drives are connected, simply check the motherboard BIOS.

Best regards,

Jean O.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[CJ_Chen]

Hi Jean,
I initially thought that the Intel® RST Tool manages NVMe devices through PathID.

Could you please help me with how to categorize RAID and Non-RAID devices like the red arrow in the Intel® RST Tool?

Also, can you tell me which NVMe devices are combined to form the PCIe_Array_0000 with RAID?

BRs,
CJ

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen,

About your questions about how to categorize RAID and Non-RAID devices like the red arrow in the Intel® RST Tool. We have reviewed the image you provided and noticed that the first arrow indicates two drives belonging to the PCIe_Array_0000, while the other two arrows represent PCIe drives that are not part of a RAID array. However, we require further clarification on your specific requirements to better assist you. Please let us know how we can be of further assistance.

Also, regarding the which NVMe devices combined to form the PCIe_Array_0000, if you select on of the drives displayed on the Intel RST tool, you will see that there is a little description of the device on your right. In the image you shared, the SSD selected is a BC901 NVMe SK Hynix with a 256GB capacity

Best regards,

Jean O.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[CJ_Chen]

Hi Jean,
Sorry, I forgot to mention that I am a software developer.

I would like to know how to get information from the RST Driver to modify my tool that can classify PCIe_Array_0000 like the Intel® RST Tool.
My tool can send NVMe CMDs to these four NVMe devices, but I don't know how to distinguish which two NVMe devices are configured as a RAID within these four devices.
This is preventing our tool from further classifying the devices as PCIe_Array_0000 like the Intel® RST Tool does.

BRs,

CJ

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen,

Thanks for the information provided.

We will investigate this matter and promptly provide you with an update.

Best regards,

Jean O.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen,

Upon careful review, we can confirm that you have access to the files from the Intel® Rapid Storage Technology (Intel® RST) Driver 19.5.2.1049.5, to extract them follow the below instructions as per the Read Me File

Extract driver files from SetupRST.exe:

• Open the terminal in the directory with SetupRST.exe by right-clicking the directory and selecting "Open in Terminal" or "Open PowerShell here"
• Enter the following command: ./SetupRST.exe -extractdrivers SetupRST_extracted.

Best regards,

Jean O.

Intel Customer Support Technician

[Jean_Intel]

Hello CJ_Chen,

We hope you are doing fine.

We have not heard back from you. So we will close this thread. If you need any additional information, submit a new question, as this thread will no longer be monitored.

Best regards.

Jean O. 

Intel Customer Support Technician.