well, after rewording my search, I found my own answer here: [URL]  sorry for the noise!  Robert  
Hi, I bought a c2100 without doing all my research, thinking I'd be able to set the h700 to JBOD mode and use Linux software raid. If I buy a h200 off ebay, will that work the with expander card in the c2100 and present all 12 drives to the OS directly?  If not, is there another HBA that will work with the expander?  Thanks, Robert
c2100 swap h700 for h200