[Working system no longer boots with HBA installed]

I am running a SuperMicro X8DTL-iF with a LSA 9211-8i HBA w/ Unraid 6.8.3. Unraid has been working fine for months through multiple reboots. Suddenly I'm getting cursor blinking in upper left corner on reboot. I checked Bios and boot order is fine. If I remove the HBA I get the Unraid boot menu. 

 

I tried all obvious steps including following:

 

• Load Bios defaults 
• Default boot order after defaults 
• Default boot order w/ USB moved to 1st
• Disabled all boot devices except USB
• New USB drive w/ fresh Unraid install w/ above steps

 

Old + new USB boot fine if I remove HBA. They also work in different server. 

 

Any ideas?

 

*** Resolution:

 

Following up in case anyone stumbles across this. The HBA reverted to "Bios & OS" for some reason. I disabled in HBA bios and things are back to normal. 

[***Guide*** Install virt-manager on OSX and connect to Unraid]

Most articles/videos for virt-manager on OSX connecting to Unraid seemed a bit dated so thought I'd share what I did to get things running. What's outlined below seems like a lot but once you've done it once it can be repeated in under 5 minutes. 

 

My requirements:

 

- Create, start and stop VM's on Unraid from OSX
- Create + manage snapshots on Unraid from OSX
- Clone VM's on Unraid from OSX
- Monitor basic stats like cpu/ram/network usage

 

Guide:

 

##########

## Unraid

##########

1. Setup libvirt + qemu to listen on "0.0.0.0"

 

A lot of articles referred to editing "/etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf" but this didn't exist in "/etc/libvirt/". Restarting VM service + array fixed it for me.

 

a) Restart VM service + array 

 

Settings -> VM Manager -> Set "Enable VM's" to No 
Main - Stop Array 
Main -> Start Array
Settings -> VM Manager -> Set "Enable VM's" to Yes

 

b) SSH to Unraid server and change two files:

 

/etc/libvirt/libvirtd.conf

listen_addr = "0.0.0.0" <-- default is "127.0.0.1"

 

/etc/libvirt/qemu.con

vnc_listen = "0.0.0.0" <-- default is "127.0.0.1"

 

c) Again, restart VM service and array (doing both is likely redundant)

 

Settings -> VM Manager -> Set "Enable VM's" to No 
Main - Stop Array 
Main -> Start Array
Settings -> VM Manager -> Set "Enable VM's" to Yes

 

##########

## OSX

##########

 

1. Install virt-manager on OSX

 

a) Prerequisites:

 

Install Homebrew @ https://brew.sh 

 

b) Install virt-manger + dependencies:  

 

brew cask install xquartz
brew tap jeffreywildman/homebrew-virt-manager
brew install virt-manager virt-viewer
mkdir -p /usr/local/Cellar/libosinfo/1.7.1/share/libosinfo
cd /usr/local/Cellar/libosinfo/1.7.1/share/libosinfo/
curl http://www.linux-usb.org/usb.ids -O
curl https://pci-ids.ucw.cz/v2.2/pci.ids -O

 

2. Create virt-manager app instead of launching via Terminal

 

Why? There are tools such as "appify" that will wrap a shell script and create pseudo OSX App but it will still launch a Terminal window in addition to virt-manager. I wanted virt-manager to launch like a native OSX app.

 

a) Create virt-manager app via Automator

 

Applications -> Automator -> New Document -> Workflow -> Choose 
Scroll down and double click "Run Shell Script"
Paste (w/ quotes) -> "/usr/local/bin/virt-manager"
File -> Save -> Click down arrow to expand view -> Choose "Applications" -> Save As: virt-manager -> File Format: Application -> Save

 

b) Add virt-manger icon to app:

 

Grab virt-manager icon @ https://icon-icons.com/icon/virt-manager/94317 (just click icon and drag to desktop)
Double click icon (it will open in Preview)
CTRL-C to copy
Applications -> virt-manager -> Right Click -> Get Info
Click on icon and CTRL-V to paste 

 

3. Connect to Unraid 

 

a) Launch virt-manager

 

Applications -> virt-manager

 

b) Add connection to Uraid

 

File -> Add Connection 

Hypervisor: Custom URI
Autoconnect: Checked
Custom URI: qemu+tcp://root@<unraid-server-ip>/system

 

** Note - There is no TLS or password auth setup. If you are running in environment where this is required I would suggest looking into ssh auth vs. tcp. 

[SilverStone CS380 w/ 6xHDD + 6xSSD]

I had a bunch of HDD's, SSD'ss and RAM sitting around from server project I never built. My immediate use case is a higher end Plex server as my Synology is close to capacity.

 

I did some research and settled on the following:

 

• SilverStone Technology CS380 NAS Tower
• Coraisr RM850x
• Super Micro X8DTL-iF
• 2 x Xeon E5620
• LSI 9211-8i
• 2 x Arctic Freezer 12 CO
• Icy Dock ExpressCage 6 x 2.5
• 6 x Sata III Cables
• 2 x Mini SAS to 4 SATA
• StarTech 50x10mm
• AYA 7" 8-Pin to Dual 8-Pin EPS
• Arctic Alumina Thermal Adhesive
• Alex Tech 1/2 inch Wire Loom

 

Existing:

 

• 6 x Samsung 8GB 2RX4 PC3L-10600R
• 8 x Seagate 4TB
• 6 x Samsung 850 EVO 1TB

 

Total cost for new parts was ~$650. Equivalent Synology to support drives/ssd + ram upgrade would have been $2k+ and would still have less cores and memory.

 

Overall I'm pleased with build. Plex streams 4k w/ no issue and only slightly louder than my Synology. I’m also starting to use Unraid as spill over for larger dev VM’s that don’t fit on my laptop.

 

Notes:

 

• Many posts state the Arctic Freezer 12's work on X8DTL boards with supplied adapters which was untrue in my case. The screws are about 1/8" too long so I used a few washers as spacers. Worth noting, I tried four different coolers and theses were by far the best.
• Originally I had both cpu cooler/fans facing toward rear but the front CPU ran a few degrees hotter as the fan blew directly into back of rear cpu cooler/fan. I rotated 90 degrees and they now run at same temp.
• I originally purchased the Mediasonic 6 x 2.5 but it had intermittent issues with ssd's so swapped it for the Icy Dock.
• I glued the StarTech fan directly to the chipset heatsink with thermal glue. It's more permanent than I'd like but cleanest solution I could find.

 

Planned additions:

 

• I have an old 980 Ti which I hoped to use for transcoding but it is about 20mm too long. I may add a 1060 at some point for GPU pass through to VM’s + transcoding.
• I have a 3TB FusionIO card I may try to get running for VM's if I don’t add a GPU.