HPE ProLiant DL380 Gen10 hard drives: chassis rules, HPE's LFF list and UK prices

DL380 Gen10 chassis: how many LFF and SFF drives each one takes

Version 77 of HPE's DL380 Gen10 QuickSpecs, dated 16 June 2025, sets out the drive cages. HPE has marked the document retired: the base products in it are obsolete and no longer available for sale. Buying drives for a DL380 Gen10 therefore means filling, expanding or repairing a machine already in service, and the chassis it shipped as decides how far it can grow.

The 8 LFF row is the one people misread. HPE states that the 8 LFF chassis cannot be upgraded to 12 LFF at the front in the field, but the same note says the 4-LFF mid plane is supported, as long as the performance fan kit goes in with it, and HPE says both LFF chassis support the 2 SFF rear drive box. So an 8 LFF machine stays at eight front bays and can still add four LFF drives in the mid plane and two small ones at the rear. A 12 LFF machine goes further, to nineteen LFF with the mid-plane and the 3 LFF plus 2 SFF rear bay.

HPE's maximum-storage example for LFF SAS hard drives is written as 12+4+3 x 16 TB + 2 x 3.84 TB: nineteen 16TB hard drives and two 3.84TB rear SSDs. The example uses 16TB drives even though the list below reaches 20TB, so read it as a layout, not a ceiling.

Hard drives HPE lists for the DL380 Gen10

The LFF names on HPE's list read "Business Critical" and "Multi Vendor HDD", and carry SC in the same place. SC is the Smart Carrier, and on this server it is tied to the controller.

Smart Carrier or Basic Carrier: the controller decides

HPE's DL380 Gen10 QuickSpecs sets out one rule that matters more than capacity. Smart Array controllers only support Smart Carrier drives, and Smart Carrier (SC) drives will not function with Broadcom controllers. Only Basic Carrier (BC) drives listed in the QuickSpecs will function with Broadcom MegaRAID controllers, and configurations must not mix BC and SC drives.

HPE also limits where BC belongs: Broadcom MegaRAID controllers and Basic Carrier drives are only supported with two models, the HPE DL380 Gen10 NC 8SFF BC CTO Server (P56969-B21) and the HPE DL380 Gen10 8SFF BC CTO Server (P56970-B21). Neither is an LFF machine, and every LFF drive on HPE's list for this server carries SC.

The warranty wording in HPE's names belongs to HPE's own drives. A maker-branded drive in the tables below comes without an HPE carrier and carries whatever its maker and the seller on that listing offer, so read the terms on the listing itself.

HPE ProLiant DL380 Gen10 hard drives: 3.5-inch SAS prices

These are 3.5-inch enterprise SAS drives under the maker's own name, the same form factor and interface as HPE's LFF SAS 12G entries but not HPE parts. The table shows 8 listings right now. Lowest £/TB at the last check: £30.00/TB. Prices are pounds sterling inc VAT on Amazon.co.uk.

The table shows every capacity listed on Amazon.co.uk, so a row can sit above the 20TB on HPE's list. We have not found a document that states how a DL380 Gen10 treats a drive larger than that. Condition is on each row; new and used are mixed.

3.5-inch SATA for DL380 Gen10 LFF bays

HPE lists a SATA 6G twin for its 20TB SAS drive, and its SATA list starts lower, at 1TB. If your controller and backplane run SATA, this is the table that matches. The table shows 8 listings right now. Lowest £/TB at the last check: £20.49/TB.

2.5-inch SAS for the SFF chassis and the rear bays

An 8 SFF or 24 SFF machine, or the two SFF slots in an LFF machine's rear box, takes 2.5-inch drives. On the SFF chassis the carrier rule bites hardest, because the two BC models HPE names are both 8SFF servers. The table shows 6 listings right now.

HPE option drives

What HPE's option QuickSpecs say about -B21 option drives, and how little of it names a server, is set out on HPE ProLiant hard drives and, for the three option SSDs and their generation statement, HPE 3.84TB SSDs.

Planning the array

Eight, twelve or nineteen LFF drives make very different arrays. The calculator below shows the usable space for a RAID level, drive count and drive size, so you can weigh an 8 LFF machine at eight front drives against the same machine with its mid plane and fan kit fitted, or a 12 LFF machine built out to nineteen.

The Gen11 changes chassis and drive labels; it has its own page at HPE DL380 Gen11 hard drives.