So I recently upgraded my server to use a backplane (specifically a supermicro BPN-SAS2-846EL1). I am running an IBM 1015 card flashed to IT mode. I previously had been using a SAS to sata cable for my drives, but now have the backplane connected with two of the SAS-SAS cables.
The issue I am having is that since switching to use the backplane I am having some start up issues. Essentially, it seems to be a dice role as to whether the HBA card/backplane get recognized by unraid on boot up. If it is not recognized, then essentially unraid will show all drives as missing, however, if it is recognized, then it works perfectly, including hotswap features, and read/write speeds are excellent.
I'm not really sure exactly what to make of it. Since the backplane is working well when recognized, I would assume that the issue is more likely to be related to the HBA, and I'm not sure if I need to get a new HBA, or whether it could be something simpler, like the cable configuration is wrong (I have both cable slots for the card connected to J0 and J1 on the backplane).
Either way, it's kind of frustrating because it means anytime I do a reboot right now, I have to deal with the possibility of troubleshooting the server for a while, just rebooting it until the backplane is properly recognized, after which it will be extremely stable.
Thanks for any insight on this in advance.