QNAP Expansion Units – SAS Interface EJ1600 v2

Simple & flexible storage expansion for Enterprise ZFS NAS

The EJ1600 v2 expansion enclosure is designed for expanding the storage space on a QNAP Enterprise ZFS NAS by connecting multiple expansion enclosures via high-speed mini SAS cables. Featuring a 12 Gbps SAS interface on the chassis, the EJ1600 v2 ensures fast data passthrough from 12 Gbps SAS-enabled Enterprise ZFS NAS. This is especially useful for virtualization applications and large data applications that require high-performance interconnection, such as video surveillance, archiving large data, and TV broadcast storage, to provide businesses with optimized efficiency and maximized ROI. The EJ1600 v2 connects to the Enterprise ZFS NAS via the dual path mini-SAS design to sustain continuous operations even if an external JBOD cable is disconnected.

Dual path design to ensure continuous operations

The EJ1600 v2 and Enterprise ZFS NAS all provide dual-channel (Dual Path) to tolerate single node failure. Even if an external JBOD cable is disconnected due to external damage to the mini-SAS cable, it can still run normally. This is essential for intermachine data protection and capacity scalability for uninterrupted mission-critical enterprise tasks. Simply connect a EJ1600 v2 to an Enterprise ZFS NAS and power it on, the NAS will detect hard drives in the EJ1600 v2 as newly-installed local drives. You can seamlessly expand and manage the NAS capacity by using the powerful QES Storage Manager.

As shown in the above figure, the cabling method used to connect expansion units creates a redundant cross loop configuration. This provides the expansion units with redundant paths to the base Enterprise ZFS NAS. Moreover, system failover protection includes protection of JBOD connection failure to provide an extra layer of protection. With these two protection methods, when one or multiple paths to the EJ1600 v2 disconnect, other expansion units are still able to communicate with the base Enterprise ZFS NAS.

Missing Mode protection

When the disconnection of a RAID expansion enclosure is detected, the Enterprise ZFS NAS blocks IO access to protect data. The system can recover from missing mode to its normal state with the data staying intact.

High density, high efficiency and highly scalable

The EJ1600 v2 supports a high storage capacity by accommodating up to 16 hard drives in 3U rack space. The EJ1600 v2 has two SAS wide ports (IN and OUT ports) for each controller (with 4 SAS wide ports in total with dual controllers) for host connectivity and daisy-chaining respectively. Each SAS wide port combines four SAS channels, with each supporting 12 Gbps full duplex speed. The solution delivers unprecedented performance of up to 48 Gbps per host connection.

Powerful QES Storage Manager

The QES Storage Manager neatly presents tools and options for managing system storage with an intuitive graphical user interface, which simplifies the process of NAS capacity expansion and EJ1600 v2 management. IT administrators can easily monitor the health of the EJ1600 v2 and the disks within it. When cascading multiple expansion enclosures in a rack, the Locate Disk and Locate Enclosure functions assist IT administrators in quick maintenance.

An excellent backup solution for Enterprise ZFS NAS

In addition to expanding an existing volume, IT administrators can use the EJ1600 v2 as a cost-effective external storage to perform speedy and secure backup tasks for an Enterprise ZFS NAS. The QNAP RTRR (Real-Time Remote Replication) or rsync service lets IT administrators back up NAS data to the EJ1600 v2 on a real time or scheduled basis.

Flexible drive type and capacity

The EJ1600 v2 offers high flexibility in hard drive selection. IT administrators can choose enterprise-level SAS HDDs with high performance and high reliability for mission-critical applications, or high-speed SSDs for I/O-intensive operations.