compaq hard drive substitute

I would have no reservations about using a non-Compaq packaged drive in that situation unless it were a company system (not mine) or one under a Compaq support contract. Nothing is going to blow up unless you do something very wrong.

-SCSI is mature and good with regard to inter-vendor compatibility.

-Compaq sources their drives & controllers from other companies who make their money selling standards compliant products. In general, a company will specify house-brand drives to reduce the variables for support commitments (warranty and contract), and of course to improve profitability. While the  policy seems ethically shakey, knowing you have house-brand drives does shrink their testing matrices.

If it's your sytem have at it. If the company's, I'd be sure a larger IT authority doesn't have an existing solution/policy. If there's a warranty or contract it would come down to whether saving a X dollars is worth the remaining coverage.

Dave

cyrnel-

Thanks for the response.  That is what I believe as well.  However I am really looking for a response from someone who has actual experience using third party drives with compaq array controllers.  I have a response from someone in a forum other than EE who claims that "All compaq SA controllers require HDDs with HP/Compaq firmware".  I think he is full of it however I wanted to ask someone here with experience.